North East dialect

The Doric of North-East Scotland is one of the liveliest and most distinctive of of all the many dialects of the mother tongue. From the Don to the Deveron, the old people and many young ones too still speak it every day, and the "Doric Nichts" in pubs, an annual "Doric Festival" of music and literature, and Doric writing in the newspapers, all help to keep it flourishing.

In both pronunciation and vocabulary, The Doric is distinct from the Lowland and Border dialects. Where other forms of Scots have wh-, Doric has f-: -: faar, fan, fit, and with some people fite, funn, fusky. A before n sometimes becomes ee: ane (or yin) is een, nane is neen, lane is leen. And the ui of muin, suin, guid is also pronounced as ee in the Doric: meen, seen, gweed. An Aberdonian does not say he's no comin, he says he's nae comin. There are also a substantial number of words that are not to be heard elsewhere in Scotland: cappie (ice-cream cone), dubby (muddy), ficher (play with your fingers) fooge (play truant), hallach, halliket or hallyrackit (obstreperous), stewie-bap (floury roll) and many others.

Any language must change as the times change, and the Doric is no longer purely a language for farm workers and fishermen. But changing is not the same thing as dying; and the Doric is likely to stay alive for a long time to come.

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