Digitised Doric to appeal to younger audience

An interactive Doric portal will allow access to a treasure trove of works in the language.

The project, built on a series of recent efforts to enhance Doric’s popularity, is a partnership between Robert Gordon University, the Elphinstone Institute at Aberdeen University, and the library services in Aberdeen, Aberdeenshire and Moray.

Professor Peter Reid, of RGU, is the driving force behind the project, and hopes the portal will be unveiled in April or May.

He is confident that by digitising “lost” texts from library collections and presenting the

“We have some incredibly important writing in Doric”

material in new ways, he can raise Doric’s profile among young people.

Prof Reid said: “We are excited about this plan, because there is a rich collection of Doric literature, letters, poetry and songs which have never been collated in the one place before.

“The portal will present some of the best examples of Doric writing from people such as Charles Murray, Flora Garry, John Milne, John Caie and Lewis Grassic Gibbon and it will sit alongside some other materials which have otherwise become difficult to access.

“We have some incredibly important writing in Doric but there are a lot of other lesser known works out there too.

“We are digitising some of the ‘lost’ texts from the library collections and will also be presenting the background to the works, information about their authors and the places and events mentioned.”

Images and audio will also be included, which the team hope will appeal to a younger audience.