When I worked in Hull we had a large poster put up in the middle of the office to help us translate between the people of West Hull and the the people of East Hull. This has a long list of every day items and when the American's bought us they couldn't believe why we needed until they had been on site a day.

>>And is Scots a variety or dialect of English or a separate language?

(Lights fuse and runs.)<<

A dialect isn't a (by implication, substandard) variety of the suthoritative "parent" language. It's merely the dialect that didn't win out as the shared language and remained within a smaller community (remember, "A language is a dialect with an army").

Lallans Scots and English both developed from essentially Anglo-Saxon roots, with various inclusions and borrowings from the Danes, Vikings and Norman French.

Scots Gaelic, of course, is something entirely different.

I remember staying at a hotel in Glasgow. There were several staff of Eastern European origin, and we had no problem understanding them. It was the local speaker whose accent made his speech unintelligble to us soft southern English folks.

Lights fuse and runs - love it.

I'm no linguist, but I do remember being fresh off the plane from Australia, in a pub somewhere in the very north of England. I couldn't understand a word the locals said. Well, maybe except "another beer ?"

I remember when it dawned upon me that many of the English writers on this forum probably talked really funny in person.

Scots - as spoken and written by Burns et al, is a separate language and completely different from Gaelic, which is also completely separate but is similar to welsh, Cornish, Breton etc.

<<I remember when it dawned upon me that many of the English writers on this forum probably talked really funny in person.>>

lol x n, stoke.

you met CW, did he speak funny?

>>you met CW, did he speak funny?<<

He did, though by then I was braced for it. He told me on the phone to meet at a pub on what I heard as "Putnam Street, behind the Goodge St. Tube stop." So I consulted a map and wandered around the day before to be sure I'd located it. Eventually I realized he'd said "Tottenham."

He gave my daughter and me a hilarious rendition of how his Scottish mother's accent gradually became more pronounced when talking to girlhood friends on the telephone.

Hi ldt,

> I learned another word from you GAUSSIAN - ...

Happy to be of help.

You might wish to look up "Binomial Distribution".

He did, though by then I was braced for it.>>

sadly stoke, we will never know if CW thought that you talk funny too.

BTW, my BFF is american and sounds american even though she's lived in the UK for nearly 40 years, so I'm used to it.

Ann, I read your comment about Burns writing in Scots and I got curious, as I had thought Burns wrote in English. Turns out he wrote in both Scots and in English. This directed me to a very interesting Wikipedia article about the Scots language:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scots_language

Meanwhile, are you under the impression that you don't speak funny?

I'd love to speak with Ann in person. I'm sure we could make ourselves understood.

Everyone speaks funny to other people not from their area. When I joined my husband who was stationed in Hawaii following the Korean War, all the friends we made except for one couple from Alabama were from "up north" plus one set from Portland, OR. They teased me unmercifully about my "southern" accent. Me! From Kentucky, not the deep South, who had never known I had an accent.

I did meet CW once at a get together and don't remember his speech as being unusual.

I'd love to speak with Ann in person. I'm sure we could make ourselves understood.>>

perhaps we could use semaphore, Stoke - i don't think that accents apply then.

<<I did meet CW once at a get together and don't remember his speech as being unusual.>>

Carolyn, sadly I never got to meet him but I assume that he spoke a mixture of RP [received pronunciation, think BBC announcer] and estuary, as he lived and worked in London. that raises the question of course, where you are from?

Nikki - you KNOW that I don't speak funny. Can't say the same about you though! [only kidding!]

I know I speak funny. I grew up in New York.

Nikki - we are used to hearing american accents from all over the US [and indeed Canada] on our TVs and in films on a daily basis.

therefore, unless someone has a very strong accent, eg like Miss Adelaide in Guys and Dolls, we really don't notice.

honestly, you did not strike me as having a strong accent.

Back to the OP's post. Newborns here in Australia start out in a bassinet before progressing to a cot. I would have thought English babies do the same.

Newborns here in Australia start out in a bassinet before progressing to a cot. I would have thought English babies do the same.>>

50% right, cathies. UK babies start out in a crib or a moses basket, and then progress to a cot. Formerly they often started off in a drawer but we have progressed a little since then.

>>Newborns here in Australia start out in a bassinet before progressing to a cot. I would have thought English babies do the same.>>

50% right, cathies. UK babies start out in a crib or a moses basket, and then progress to a cot. Formerly they often started off in a drawer but we have progressed a little since then.<<

In the 1930s, Gracie Fields used to sing:

"One bassinet, one cruet set,
And a couple of rolls of lino for the floor;
There's a book by Dr Fyfe
On the joys of married life-
All packed up in me little bottom drawer".

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kVt6N3qzp2c

British English?
Most European countries exported their languages to their colonies. Do we hear French French, Netherlands Dutch, Portuguese Portuguese?