[19] Since the 1980s Ullans, a neologism popularized by the physician, amateur historian and politician Ian Adamson,[20] merging Ulster and Lallans, the Scots for Lowlands,[21] but also an acronym for "Ulster-Scots language in literature and native speech"[22] and Ulstèr-Scotch,[6][7] the preferred revivalist parlance, have also been used.

[24] During the middle of the 20th century, the linguist Robert John Gregg established the geographical boundaries of Ulster's Scots-speaking areas based on information gathered from native speakers.

[25] By his definition, Ulster Scots is spoken in mid and east Antrim, north Down, north-east County Londonderry, and in the fishing villages of the Mourne coast.

[30] Speaking at a seminar on 9 September 2004, Ian Sloan of the Northern Ireland Department of Culture, Arts and Leisure (DCAL) accepted that the 1999 Northern Ireland Life and Times Survey "did not significantly indicate that unionists or nationalists were relatively any more or less likely to speak Ulster Scots, although in absolute terms there were more unionists who spoke Ulster Scots than nationalists".

The definition of Ullans from the North/South Co-operation (Implementation Bodies) Northern Ireland Order 1999 above was used on 1 July 2005 Second Periodical Report by the United Kingdom to the Secretary General of the Council of Europe outlining how the UK met its obligations under the Charter.

which inter alia laid on the Executive Committee a duty to "adopt a strategy setting out how it proposes to enhance and develop the Ulster Scots language, heritage and culture."

This reflects the wording used in the St Andrews Agreement to refer to the enhancement and development of "the Ulster Scots language, heritage and culture".

[citation needed] The earliest identified writing in Scots in Ulster dates from 1571: a letter from Agnes Campbell of County Tyrone to Queen Elizabeth on behalf of Turlough O'Neil, her husband.

[49] Scots also frequently appeared in Ulster newspaper columns, especially in Antrim and Down, in the form of pseudonymous social commentary employing a folksy first-person style.

[53] The poet Michael Longley (born 1939) has experimented with Ulster Scots for the translation of Classical verse, as in his 1995 collection The Ghost Orchid.

[51] He has produced a trilogy of novels Wake the Tribe o Dan (1998), The Back Streets o the Claw (2000) and The Man frae the Ministry (2005), as well as story books for children Esther, Quaen o tha Ulidian Pechts and Fergus an tha Stane o Destinie, and two volumes of poetry Alang the Shore (2005) and Oul Licht, New Licht (2009).

Within the terms of the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages the British Government is obliged, among other things, to: The Ulster-Scots Agency, funded by DCAL in conjunction with the Department of Culture, Heritage and the Gaeltacht, is responsible for promotion of greater awareness and use of Ullans and of Ulster-Scots cultural issues, both within Northern Ireland and throughout the island.

[57] An Ulster Scots Academy has been planned with the aim of conserving, developing, and teaching the language of Ulster-Scots in association with native speakers to the highest academic standards.

[36] The 2010 documentary The Hamely Tongue by filmmaker Deaglán O Mocháin traces back the origins of this culture and language, and relates its manifestations in today's Ireland.

[61] In 2000, John Kirk described the "net effect" of that "amalgam of traditional, surviving, revived, changed, and invented features" as an "artificial dialect".

He added,It is certainly not a written version of the vestigial spoken dialect of rural County Antrim, as its activists frequently urge, perpetrating the fallacy that it's wor ain leid.

(Barney Maglone[68] 1820?–1875) From The Lammas Fair (Robert Huddleston 1814–1889) The examples below illustrate how 21st century Ulster Scots texts seldom adhere to the previous literary tradition, Yer guide tae the cheenge-ower, perhaps being a rare exception.

From Yer guide tae the cheenge-ower (digitaluk 2012)[69] From Alice's Carrànts in Wunnerlan (Anne Morrison-Smyth, 2013)[70] From Hannlin Rede [annual report] 2012–2013 (Männystèr o Fairms an Kintra Fordèrin, 2012)[71]