An apostrophe to Scots: the invention and diffusion of the Scots apostrophe in eighteenth-century Scottish verse

Selfe, David William (2021) An apostrophe to Scots: the invention and diffusion of the Scots apostrophe in eighteenth-century Scottish verse. PhD thesis, University of Glasgow.

Abstract

The intention of this thesis is to challenge three fundamental assumptions about the function of the ‘apologetic apostrophe’ – described henceforth as the ‘Scots apostrophe’ – which have, until now, exclusively characterised the scholarly understanding of this linguistic form in Scots literary history:

1. The function of apostrophised spelling forms in Scots is to indicate elision.
2. The use of apostrophised forms undermines perceptions of Scots as a language independent from English and is solely for the benefit of accessibility for an English readership.
3. Scots is intrinsically linked with Scottishness: as an agent of anglicisation, the use of apostrophised forms therefore contributes to the erosion of Scottish cultural identity.

Situated within historical pragmatics – and combining corpus and philological analysis – this study investigates the origin and diffusion of the Scots apostrophe in eighteenth-century Scottish literary verse, with particular attention paid to the influential poetic miscellanies of James Watson, Allan Ramsay, Robert Burns, and Walter Scott.

First and foremost, this thesis establishes a theoretical framework with which to understand the function of the Scots apostrophe in literary Scots that simultaneously contests unscholarly myth-making with regards to linguistic practices. In broader terms, the research therein demonstrates the value of non-lexical markers, like the apostrophe, as a capacious avenue for future historical pragmatic research.

• Item Type: Thesis (PhD)
• Qualification Level: Doctoral
• Additional Information: Supported by funding from the Arts and Humanities Research Council and the Scottish Graduate School of Arts and Humanities.
• Colleges/Schools: College of Arts & Humanities > School of Critical Studies > English Language and Linguistics
• Supervisor's Name: Smith, Professor Jeremy and Kopaczyk, Dr. Joanna
• Date of Award: 2021
• Depositing User: Theses Team
• Unique ID: glathesis:2021-82448
• Copyright: Copyright of this thesis is held by the author.
• Date Deposited: 22 Sep 2021 15:29
• Last Modified: 22 Sep 2021 15:32
• Thesis DOI: 10.5525/gla.thesis.82448
• URI: https://theses.gla.ac.uk/id/eprint/82448