: Re: How can I make my character sound Scottish? Yes, you read the title correctly. It sounds sorta ridiculous, but I'm wondering how I can make my Scottish character in a story of mine sound more

@Hamm6328258

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I have lived in Scotland and have been married to a Scot from Lanarkshire for the past 34 years, but I'm originally from the USA.

The one thing I would say is be aware that regional accent and vernacular varies a lot in Scotland, and it doesn't take a huge distance for this to happen. Fortunately there are lots of examples of current Scottish comedians that you can watch on YouTube. Kevin Bridges is popular right now. (He's from Clydebank, which is part of Greater Glasgow.) Frankie Boyle is another one. There are many others ...just google Scottish comedy, and go from there. If you watch these people performing, you'll not only get an idea of what they sound like, but also what their humour is like. Not every Scots comic is Billy Connolly. He was a one-off, but so are the others.

Please beware of using archaic stuff or doing too much phonetic 'translation' which is not only hard to read, but rarely comes off well. The ye's and the kens, etc. (Although 'ken' is used a lot in Aberdeenshire, and other areas in the eastern part of Scotland ...through Angus, Dundee and into Fife—and to some extent in the Borders as well.) It's a good idea to read modern Scottish writers to see how they portray their own language in writing. It's pretty obvious that they don't stray too far from normal English. Beware of portraying modern Scots as speaking like Robert Burns!

And also be aware that real west highland speech is different from lowland speech in that it is more soft-spoken, quite politely worded most of the time, and more 'correct English.' Why? Because it wasn't all that long ago that their first language was Gaelic, and their parents and grandparents often learned English as a second language. So they learned a slang-free form of it. Sometimes the word order gives them away, though, and they sometimes will express themselves using a Gaelic viewpoint ...but English words. Hard to explain, till you see it happening.

Just be careful, educate yourself, try to avoid clichés and stereotypes, and you'll be okay. As in so many things, less is more.

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