SCOTTISH HUMOR

The Scotch-Irish Hillbillies made stills and brewed “moonshine.” They used words like “afeared,” “damnedest,” “chaw u’ tabacker,” “hex,” “plum right” or “plum crazy.” And they’re great story tellers. They ate “bonny-clabber” (curdled sour milk) and “flannel-cake (a thin wheat cake). They provided English with the expression “you-all.” And when they called the cows home at night they used the Old-English “sūcan” meaning “suck.” The Hillbillies said “tharr,” “barr,” and Herr” for “there,” “bear,” and “here.” They dropped their final –g, and used the Old-English “on” in front of –ing words, like “a-huntin, and a-fishin.” They also used the Old-English form of “it,” which was “hit.” These features are throughout the Southwest, but are most prominent in West Virginia, Kentucky, Tennessee and the Ozarks. Today about twenty million people (10 % of Americans) claim Scots-Irish ancestry. The Scots-Irish ballads are currently imitated and reproduced throughout the United States. Dolly Parton, Pat Boone, Kenny Rogers and Willie Nelson are four of these ballad singers.

Blue-Collar TV (Bill Engvall and Jeff Foxworthy, etc.) also are great “Hillbilly” story tellers. It is possible to see reruns of a sitcom called “The Beverly Hillbillies.” It is about some hillbillies who struck oil and moved to Beverly Hills in California. In 1954, Sylvia Wright coined the term “mondegreen” for a particular kind of mishearing. When she was a child, er mother used to read to her from Percy’s Reliques, and one of her favorites was:

Ye Highlands and ye Lowlands,

Oh, where hae ye been?

They hae slain the Earl o’ Moray,

And they laid him on the green.

She misheard this as, “They hae slain the Earl o’ Moray, and the Lady Mondegreen.”

Don and Alleen Nilsen “Humor Across the Academic Disciplines” PowerPoints:

https://www.public.asu.edu/~dnilsen/