I would say that it is just a bunch of notes - in my view what determines the scale is what chord you are playing the notes over!!

For example if you are playing those notes over an E minor chord - you would be playing an E Phrygian.

If you were to play that scale over a C Major chord then it would be a C Major scale or Ionian mode.

If you were to play it over nothing, then its just a bunch of notes - that happen to be in the key of C.

Thats my 2 cents.