> As I see it, Scots and Standard English are two dialects of the same language. It doesn't matter how you personally see it. Linguists and other scholars are

> As I see it, Scots and Standard English are two dialects of the same language. It doesn't matter how you personally see it. Linguists and other scholars are divided on the issue. It's recognized as a regional language by UNESCO and the Council of Europe as well as the UK and Scottish governments. There's also a spectrum from "Standard English spoken with a Scottish accent with some odd words thrown in" and broad Scots. Danish and Norwegian (or at least Bokmål) are perhaps as close as Scots and English (I only have a passing familiarity with these so native speakers can confirm), but are considered distinct languages on as much political as linguistic grounds, which is my point - the distinction is as much political and historic as linguistic (i.e. there used to be a language only a few decades ago called "Serbo-Croatian").