Dialect goes online

AROUND 50 islanders gathered at the conference room of the Shetland Amenity Trust on Saturday to celebrate the launch of the Shetland ForWirds website.

Local historian and storyteller George P S Peterson cut the blue ribbon to reveal www.shetlanddialect.org.uk to the public.

Shetland ForWirds was formed back in 2004 as the result of a conference about the Shetland dialect.

The group aims to foster and promote the use of written and spoken Shetland dialect as an essential element of Shetland’s distinctive heritage and culture.

As part of their work, the Shetland dictionary, compiled by the late John Graham, has now been made available online as part of the new website.

Both the written and spoken dialect are available at the click of a mouse at www.shetlanddialect.org.uk, from storytelling and song to learning about the dialect for all ages from peerie moots and up.

Shetland ForWirds convener Laureen Johnson sees the website as an important development for the group. “We are very much lookin forward ta makkin best use o da site, an we really hoop fok will enjoy usin it.”

The website was created in two phases. Initial site building was done at Arcadia University in Philadelphia before Shetland ForWirds won an Awards for All grant which enabled them to get local firm nb communications to bring it to the final stage.