American-Born Scot, Update

So if you'll look below, you'll see a post that says "My Life as an American-Born Scot". This is because I'm trying to master an Edinburgh Scottish accent. I'd gotten pretty good at it up until about a week ago.

I came across an Irish folk choir song that my friend sang and I was a huge fan of. However they sang the song in an Irish accent. Now what's the problem, you may ask? I'll tell you: as I began to hum and whistle the song to myself, I also began to sing it to myself... IN AN IRISH ACCENT. Of course you're probably wondering why this is a problem.


Well if you're geographically advanced as I am, you know that Scotland and Ireland are both on the British Isles so they have somewhat similar accents. HOWEVER, they have some IMMENSE differences about other things.

For example: a Scotsman would pronounce the word "about" as 'aboot', or 'aboat'. An Irishman would say it 'abaht' or 'abut'.

Another example: Scotsmen say the world the letter "I" as 'ay'. So if you came across Gerard Butler or Ewan McGregor, he would say "Ay 'ave never meht yew bafore ehn may layfe." (I have never met you before in my life.) The Irishman next to him would say "Oi hahv nehver maht you bafore in me loife."

The letter "R" is also key in both accents. Scots roll their R's heavily. If they don't roll it, they flip it. On the other hand, Irish people don't roll the R, but they overuse the r sound. It's quite hard to remember .

Scottish people also tend to say the "i" in words like "lift" as "lehft". Irish say it more like "laft". Scottish also say "word" as 'werd', which Irish say "wahrd".


But anyway, the problem is that Oi'm star'en tae fahrgeht whech is whech (I'm starting to forget which is which) and I'm getting them mixed up. But I've decided from now until I master it, I'm going to stay away from all Irish influences and focus only on the Scottish culture. I even checked a book out from the library about Scotland. I'm very excited to read it. I've also become very fond of the Scottish national anthem, "Flower of Scotland". It's not the official national anthem, as Scotland is part of the UK (whose national anthem is technically "God Save the Queen" and oddly enough goes to the same tune as "My Country 'Tis of Thee").

As you can tell, my life is a wreck right now...