Shaetlan Project
Ootpit
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2025+. Shaetlan. An endangered Mixed Language in the North Sea. Tae appear athin: Jeffrey P. Williams & Nils Langer (eds.), Endangered languages of Europe. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton. Pre-print version (PDF, 976KB)
2025. Shaetlan - A young language wi aald røts. Uradale: Kalafine-Skrits.
2025. Language preservation in strangely familiar places: How traditional skills have helped preserve Shaetlan. In: Alexandra Y. Aikhenvald, Anne Storch & Viveka Velupillai (eds.), Linguistics in strange and familiar places [Anthropological Linguistics]. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton. Pre-print version (PDF, 996KB)
2022. Da Spaektionary - Fir Shetlanders, by Shetlanders. Avaelable online here.
2022. Shaetlan - A primer.
2022. A spelling and keyboard for Shaetlan. The New Shetlander (No 297), pps 22-25. Pre-print version (PDF, 352KB)
2022. Shaetlan. A contact language in the North Sea. Lingoblog blog post. English version / Danish version.
2020. Loops on wires. Knitting in Shetland dialect. The Knitter Magazine (No. 155). 46-48.
2020. Musings around Eddie's Noost. Moder Dy blog post.
2019. Gendered inanimates in Shetland dialect. English World-Wide 40(3): 269-298.
2019. Loops on wires. Shetland dialect words for knitting. The New Shetlander Yule (No. 290): 10-16. Doonlodd (PDF, 742KB).
2016. The Shetland Archives oral history recordings as a linguistic window into the past. The New Shetlander Hairst (No. 277): 10-16.
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Loops on wires: How traditional skills have helped preserve Shaetlan.
Presentation held at the North Atlantic Native Sheep and Wool Conference, Tórshavn, 15 September 2024.Shaetlan: Ett hotat blandspråk i Nordsjön.
Guest lecture, Tjóðsavnið (Faroe Islands National Museum), 10 September 2024.Shaetlan: A Contact Language in the North Sea.
Guest lecture, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, 1 Feberwirry 2024.Shaetlan and its status as a mixed language. [PDF slides, 1.71MB]
Panelist talk, Islands Matter Faroes and Shetland Research Symposia, Institute for Northern Studies, UHI Shetland, 22 September 2023.Shaetlan: A Contact Language in the North Sea.
Guest lecture, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, 2 Feberwirry 2023.Shaetlan: A contact language in the North Sea.
Guest lecture, University of Bremen, 30 Janiwirry 2023.Shaetlan: the Language of Shetland (with Dr. Viveka Velupillai and Roy Mullay)
Guests on Jackson Crawford Patreon Q&A October 22 2022, published YouTube 7 December 2022.Shaetlan: A contact language in the North Sea.
Guest lecture, University of Colombo, 17 October 2022.Shaetlan. Language revival and maintenance in the digital era.
Guest lecture, University of Colombo, 28 Mairch 2022.Shaetlan: A contact language in the North Sea.
Guest lecture, Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich, 26 Janiwirry 2022.Beyond linguistic repression at 60°N: Growing acceptance of diversity in Shetland.
Guest lecture, MIT Linguistics, 23 November 2021.Shaetlan: A contact language in the North Sea.
Guest lecture, ACLC, University of Amsterdam, 12 November 2021.The power of digitalk: How social media registers can give a written voice to stigmatized varieties
Guest lecture, University of Michigan, LSA, 4 Jün 2021.The power of digitalk: How social media registers can give a written voice to stigmatized varieties
Stylistics, Critical Discourse Analysis, and Language Use in the Caribbean, University of Trinidad & Tobago, 2-3 April 2021.He or she? Gendered nouns in Shetland dialect. Some preliminary results.
Guest lecture, The Shetland Museum and Archives, Lerwick 7 Feberwirry 2018.On the potential for a Mixed Language in Shetland. A thought experiment.
Eleventh Creolistics Workshop in Giessen, Germany, 23-25 Mairch 2017.False friends and other bothers. Why Shetland dialect is much more than just unkan words
Guest lecture, Shetland ForWirds, Lerwick, Shetland 22 Feberwirry 2017Pre-oil Shetland dialect. A typological description.
Nesting Local History Group, Shetland, 13 Feberwirry 2017Lönabracks and affrugs of contact and change: A typological study of pre-oil Shetland dialect. Ninth memorial lecture. In honour of James Stout Angus.
Memorial Lecture, The Shetland Museum and Archives, 18 November 2016 -
Shaetlan has been recognised as a language
The Shetland Times. 22 October 2025.Good Evening Shetland (starts 7:47)
BBC Radio Shetland. 16 October 2025.Shaetlan receives full recognition as a language
Shetland News. 15 October 2025.Good Evening Shetland (Starts 7:26)
BBC Radio Shetland. 27 Aagist 2025.Good Morning Scotland (Starts 1:25:57)
BBC Radio Scotland. 27 Aagist 2025.Could Shetlandic be on cusp of breaking the language barrier?
The Times. 26 Aagist 2025.Shetland's mother tongue set to break language barrier.
The Times (print edeetion): 9. 26 Aagist 2025.Swinney ‘dumbfounded’ that NorthLink passengers cannot book for 2026
Shetland News. 21 Aagist 2025.New books explore language and place-names
Shetland.org. 11 Jün 2025.Good Evening Shetland (Starts 16:08)
BBC Radio Shetland. 16 Mey 2025.Giving the mother tongue the respect it deserves
Shetland News. 15 Mey 2025.New dialect [sic] book described as the best one ever written
The Shetland Times (Print edeetion): 4. 11 April 2025.New book to catalogue [sic] and celebrate Shaetlan language
The Shetland Times. 6 April 2025.PM (Starts 21:02)
BBC Radio 4. 9 Mairch 2024.New York Times kills off ‘Shetland Wordle’
The Times (Print edeetion): 17. 9 Mairch 2024.'Shetland Wordle' forced offline after New York Times legal threat
The Daily Telegraph (Print edeetion): 3. 9 Mairch 2024.Wordle wars as NY Times threatens to sue islanders
The Daily Mail (Print edeetion): 13. 9 Mairch 2024.Wordle wars! New York Times threatens to sue people living on Shetland for creating a dialect version of the online game
The Daily Mail. 9 Mairch 2024.New York Times is sending legal notices to these games
The Times of India. 9 Mairch 2024.New York Times takes legal action against Wordle clones, sparks concerns among game creators
Hindustan Times. 9 Mairch 2024.The NY Times War On All Wordle ‘Clones’ Continues
TechDirt. 8 Mairch 2024.New York Times kills off ‘Shetland Wordle’ game
The Times. 8 Mairch 2024.New York Times Issues DMCA Notice Targeting Wordle Clones, Threatening Thousands of Similar Games
Tech Times. 8 Mairch 2024.New York Times issues legal threat against Scottish dialect version of Wordle
Prolific North. 8 Mairch 2024.Lunchtime Live(Starts 01:23:43)
BBC Radio Scotland. 8 Mairch 2024.New York Times legal threat to Shetland Wordle
BBC News. 8 Mairch 2024.The New York Times is targeting Wordle clones with legal takedowns
The Verge. 8 Mairch 2024.‘Shetland Wordle’ shut down after legal threat from New York Times
The Telegraph. 8 Mairch 2024.New York Times threatens legal action over Scots language Wordle game
The National. 7 Mairch 2024.Dialect game removed by The New York Times
The Shetland Times. 7 Mairch 2024.Shaetlan version of Wordle to be taken down after legal threat
Shetland News. 7 Mairch 2024.Jarlshof story translated into Shaetlan for the first time
Historic Environment Scotland. 19 December 2022.Good Evening Shetland (Starts 18:08)
BBC Radio Shetland. 7 October 2022.Plans to officially define Shetland Language Plan
The Press and Journal (Print edeetion): 16. 6 October 2022.Should Shaetlan be recognised as a language? UHI working on groundbreaking Shetland language plan
The Press and Journal. 6 October 2022.'Ground-breaking' language plan paves way for Scots to flourish in Shetland
The National. 5 October 2022.Fishing protest march, port performance, language project, swimming club anniversary
Shetland News. 27 September 2022.Scots variant at 'global forefront' of push to preserve endangered languages
The National. 7 Aagist 2022.Interactive dictionary launched
The Shetland Times (Print edeetion): 14. 5 Aagist 2022.I Hear Dee launches Shaetlan dictionary
The Shetland Times. 4 Aagist 2022.Team behind new online dictionary of Shaetlan hopes for lively community participation
Shetland News. 30 Joolie 2022.International acclaim for bilingual Shetland language primer
The National. 29 Mey 2022.Don’t let language die out
The Shetland Times (Print edeetion): 9. 27 Mey 2022.Major first for I Hear Dee as first grammatical document released
The Shetland Times (Print edeetion): 5. 27 Mey 2022.Local grammar book is a world first
Shetland News. 25 Mey 2022.Shaetlan Scots word game's success leads to international partnerships
The National. 18 Mairch 2022.Partnership recognises that language, culture and environment are inter-linked
The Shetland Times (Print edeetion): 22. 18 Mairch 2022.Thousands of players take up challenge of isles’ answer to word game Wordle
The Shetland Times (Print edeetion):27. 18 Feberwirry 2022.A tongue twister… Shetland’s ‘Wirdle’ goes global
Daily Mail: 12. 18 Feberwirry 2022.Shetlanders’ Wirdle hobby is global hit.
Daily Record: 18. 18 Feberwirry 2022.'HUGE INTEREST' Scots version of Wordle created to promote rare dialect spoken in Shetland becomes ‘worldwide hit’
The Scottish Sun. 17 Feberwirry 2022.Wordle, or Wirdle? The Scots game bringing Shaetlan to the world
The National. 16 Feberwirry 2022.Good Evening Shetland(Starts 24:28)
BBC Radio Shetland. 15 Feberwirry 2022.‘Have you done today’s Wirdle?’ – popular word game given Shaetlan slant
Shetland News. 15 Feberwirry 2022.‘Wirdle’ is the word of the week
The Shetland Times. 15 Feberwirry 2022.Lunchtime News (Starts 04:12)
BBC Radio Shetland. 15 Feberwirry 2022.The Seven.
BBC Scotland. 14 Feberwirry 2022.Good Evening Shetland (Starts 17:46)
BBC Radio Shetland. 21 Janiwirry 2022.‘I hear dee’ project launches website to help safeguard the local language
Shetland News. 20 Janiwirry 2022.I Hear Dee taps out a link with Amazon [sic] and is braaly chuffed wi' Shaetlan' texting
The Shetland Times (Print edeetion). 14 Janiwirry 2022.Whit laek? Now mobiles ‘speak’ Shaetlan!
Daily Mail (Print edeetion). 26 November 2021.Local dialect predictive text comes to mobile keyboard
Shetland News. 24 November 2021.Good Evening Shetland(Starts 22:56)
BBC Radio Shetland. 23 November 2021.