Derrick McClure is the recipient o the Janet Paisley Services tae Scots Award for 2021. The Janet Paisley Award is for lifelang commitment tae and promotion o Scots.
Derrick McClure wis born in Ayr and has lang bided in the Doric-spikkin North East. As a senior lecturer at the University o Aiberdeen and renowned expert in the field o Scots for mair nor fifty year, Derrick’s contribution tae the Scots leid is baith maikless and undeemous.
Derrick’s darg in academia covered aw aspects o Scots and Scots literature and a guid swatch o the warld and aw. Spikkin passionately aboot Scots and Scots scrievers in aw the airts on the national and international lecture circuit, Derrick has been instrumental in upheezin the status and prestige o Scots leid and literary heritage at hame and furth o Scotland.
At Aiberdeen University he supervised coontless theses forby ane scrievit in Scots by Alasdair Allan, currently the MSP for Na h-Eileanan an Iar and a former Minister for Scots. Derrick himsel chaired the Ministerial Working Group on the Scots Language in 2009-10 and this group’s Report led tae significant improvements tae provision for the Scots leid and Scots speakers.
Derrick has scrievit hunners o airticles aboot the Scots leid and its makars: fae Sir David Lyndsay tae Sir Walter Scott, Allan Ramsay tae Robert Louis Stevenson, Violet Jacob tae Tom Leonard. Derrick’s recent publication o “A Kist o Skinklan Things” is a clyack feast o scrievin fae the twintieth century’s Scottish Renaissance and reveals an aye-gaun virr for sharin and makkin us look again at the best o Scots poetry.
Derrick is an accomplished and prolific translator o Scots, owersettin poetry fae a haill clanjamfrie o leids, amang them Sorley MacLean’s Gaelic “Sangs tae Eimhir” and Antoine de Saint-Exupéry’s “The Prince Bairnie”.
Add tae aw that, his influential buik “Why Scots Matters” which wis and aye is a clarion caw for the Scots language, and it’s weel seen why Derrick McClure is tae receive the Janet Paisley Services tae Scots Award for 2021.