A SCOTSMAN Explains The SCOTTISH Accent(s) to a LONDONER

How are you so late? Today on LetThemTalkTv  you're going to learn how to speak Scottish  

English and you'll also learn a little bit of the  fascinating history of the languages in Scotland.  

Now I'm from London and this subject I am  totally unqualified and ill-prepared to  

discuss and so I've elicited the help of a real  Scottish person yes indeed and here he is it's  

Jack hello Jack - Hello Gideon great to see  you. So Jack first of all, where are you from  

and how would you describe your accent? Yes  so I was born in Aberdeen the third city of  

Scotland but I grew up on the North Sea coast  in a wee town, a little town, called Dornoch  

the nearest well-known town to Dornoch is  Inverness which is just a north of Loch Ness  

famous for the monster which I still haven't  seen but I live in hope. I would describe my  

accent as pretty standard Scottish with  a slight Highland touch. Thank you Jack  

actually Gideon I have a wee gift for you oh  yeah what's this is Irn bru Scotland's other  

national drink - oh yeah -Scotland's most famous  for whisky but there is a soft drink a fizzy drink  

called Irn Bru and the taste is is quite unique  I would say. - Can I try it? - of course. Let's  

see I should I should tell the viewers we're not  sponsored no we're not sponsored by this drink  

but I have heard about it but I've actually never  tried it a fizzy drinks should you call them - yes  

fizzy drink or just juice some people some Scots  would just say juice like a juice whether it's  

orange or coke or Irn Bru. We should make another  video called “Englishman tastes Irn Bru for the  

first time” slainte-mhath OK so that's Scot  Gaelic for cheers first thing first expression

and well it's it's kind of fruity but  not in a bad way. I don't think It’s  

ever seen a single piece of fruit. I  was wondering if I had my Geiger counter

radioactive levels it's sort of a bright  orange yeah and maybe that says something  

about the Scottish character. and about perhaps  - that we're radioactive we're - yeah I don't  

know but it's yeah yeah it's interesting I'll  finish it later OK yeah thank you thank you

Jack am I right in saying that there are three  languages, three native languages spoken in  

Scotland? You are right Gideon, most Scots today  speak standard Scottish English which is by and  

large comprehensible to most speakers of English  it's often just English spoken with a Scottish  

accent but interestingly there is a language  or some would say dialect called Scots which  

differs from English hugely in terms of  vocabulary and it would be quite hard  

for many non-Scots to understand. So you speak  standard Scottish English more or less yes and yes  

I have heard Scots being spoken and even for me  it was pretty difficult to understand so I think  

that's why people call it a different language.  Yes exactly although that's a political debate.  

Basically it's about what is a language what is  the dialect and even for me if I were to visit  

maybe a small village in Aberdeenshire I might  struggle to understand one or two people but OK  

and the third language is of course Scot’s Gaelic  so not Gaelic in Ireland it's pronounced Gaelic  

but in Scotland it's Gaelic and it is a  Celtic language OK so it's unrelated to