Gaeilge, dead language?

John

Ronny Mitchell wrote:

Not just at the door, you should speak Irish the entire time. But I'm not going to kick up a fuss about it.

Is that legal? If a place turned you away for not speaking English there'd be uproar.

As you probably noticed, I wasn't at the beers. Term hasn't ended for everyone. I'm in til Thursday.

shay_562

Is that legal? If a place turned you away for not speaking English there'd be uproar.

Don't the Gaeltacht laws mean that there are places in the country where you can't even live if you don't have a high enough level of Irish? Compared to that, a bar refusing to admit you (which could well be covered by the fact that most places have a policy of "Management reserves the right to refuse admission, and does not have to state a reason") is pretty small fry.

John

shay_562 wrote:

Don't the Gaeltacht laws mean that there are places in the country where you can't even live if you don't have a high enough level of Irish? Compared to that, a bar refusing to admit you (which could well be covered by the fact that most places have a policy of "Management reserves the right to refuse admission, and does not have to state a reason") is pretty small fry.

I don't think it's covered by that law at all. Yes the management has the right to refuse admission but it's a discriminatory policy. I don't agree with the Gaeltacht thing either. Why should I have restricted access to my own country because I don't speak a language that is effectively dead.

cuckoo

John2 wrote:

I don't think it's covered by that law at all. Yes the management has the right to refuse admission but it's a discriminatory policy. I don't agree with the Gaeltacht thing either. Why should I have restricted access to my own country because I don't speak a language that is effectively dead.

*builds air raid shelter*

*realises that the shelter doesn't have a window, so i won't have a view of the ensuing war*

*carefully cuts hole in ceiling of shelter, build ingenious skylight/vertical tunnel contraption with mirrors*

*puts on microwave popcorn*

*sits back and waits for the entertaining hostilities to commence*

Ron DMC

John2 wrote:

Why should I have restricted access to my own country because I don't speak a language that is effectively dead.

Firstly, no one is restricting you access anywhere, The conradh has english speakers in almost every night, in fact the place is regularly host to people bringing along american toursits to show them a real Irish pub. All I'm saying is that a birthday party where most of the group are likely to speak English in what is known to be the one of the most Irish language oriented watering holes in the country would probably be frowned upon.

And to refer to Irish as "effectively dead", John, I invite to spend a couple of hours with me wandering around college. I'd imagine around a quarter or more of my day on average, is spent through Irish. And that's not confined to Scoil na Gaeilge either. Many, many people speak Irish on a daily basis, and just because you don't come into contact with them doesn't mean they're not there.

ilovemybrick

Ronny Mitchell wrote:

. Many, many people speak Irish on a daily basis, nad just because you don't come into contact with them doesn't mean they're not there.

historic moment so drumroll please.......
...........i agree with what he just said.
(although notice the guy with the spell czech symbol who studies linguistics also typed nad.....)

Pet

Why should I have restricted access to my own country because I don't speak a language that is effectively dead.

The reason it's "effectively dead" is because of that attitude. I didn't like learning it in school either, but that's because of the course - ie the Dept Education and their complete disconnection from the youth of Ireland. It's alive and well in many parts of Ireland, and a lot of people, even outside the Gaeltacht speak it on a daily basis.

If you go to half the clubs on Leeson St you won't get in, and it'll be because you're not wearing the right clothes or because you don't look like a rich-but-sex-starved businessman who wants to ogle some tits for a night. At least Conradh na Gaeilge are trying to do some good.

Irish isn't the most technically advanced of languages (and it's certainly no good for a scientist), and I don't want to go on a big patriotic rant about our forefathers and 1916 and whatever, but Irish is important. There's a wealth of information that would be lost in translation, so to let it die, now, after all these years, would be stupid.

Agent Smith

even the big man ( myself is lerning a cupla focal!







(thats Right? isnt it?)

Ron DMC

agent smith wrote:

even the big man ( myself is lerning a cupla focal!







(thats Right? isnt it?)

He is trying

John

Ronny Mitchell wrote:

And to refer to Irish as "effectively dead", John, I invite to spend a couple of hours with me wandering around college. I'd imagine around a quarter or more of my day on average, is spent through Irish. And that's not confined to Scoil na Gaeilge either. Many, many people speak Irish on a daily basis, and just because you don't come into contact with them doesn't mean they're not there.

I never said Irish speakers didn't exist but if you ever sit and listen to Irish speakers on campus or around Dublin, it isn't Irish they are speaking. About 50% of most conversations that I hear are Irish with the remaining 50% being English or pigeon English like "teacs" and "tacsaí". I don't see that as an sign of a thriving language.

Ronny Mitchell wrote:

Firstly, no one is restricting you access anywhere

So when can I move into a house in a Gaeltacht area? Why is a native speaker more important than myself that they have a right to buy there and I don't?

And Pet, my problem with Irish isn't the fact that I had to learn it at school. It's the fact that so much money and resources is wasted on what I see as a black hole. All government documents are translated into Irish. How much money is spent on this a year? How many people read them? Here's an example. Why waste money on translating things like that into Irish for no reason? Why not just make a abstract and translate that into Irish for whoever's interested?

I don't think trying to keep Irish alive is a bad idea. I don't want to get rid of it but I think the pro-Irish people overestimate the importance of the language. By trying to force it down people's necks you're going to put people off.

Ron DMC

John2 wrote:

I never said Irish speakers didn't exist but if you ever sit and listen to Irish speakers on campus or around Dublin, it isn't Irish they are speaking. About 50% of most conversations that I hear are Irish with the remaining 50% being English or pigeon English like "teacs" and "tacsaí". I don't see that as an sign of a thriving language.

I will agree with you that sometimes people speaking Irish do throw in a lot of Béarlachas, but if you look at any other language on the planet, English is finding its' way into more conversations and phrases and words. German, Chinese, Spanish etc. I don't see this as a failure on the part of the language, but as a failure on the part of the world.

So when can I move into a house in a Gaeltacht area? Why is a native speaker more important than myself that they have a right to buy there and I don't?

The Government reserve a certain amount of places in certain parts of the country for people who speak Irish. This is done mainly to prevent a dilution of the language in those areas and stop it from losing out to the more dominant language of English in things like business and media.

It's the fact that so much money and resources is wasted on what I see as a black hole. All government documents are translated into Irish. How much money is spent on this a year? How many people read them? Here's an example. Why waste money on translating things like that into Irish for no reason? Why not just make a abstract and translate that into Irish for whoever's interested?

I couldn't agree with you more, there are many worthwhile efforts underway at the moment to help the Irish language, but some of the items in the Acht Teanga take it too far.

I don't think trying to keep Irish alive is a bad idea. I don't want to get rid of it but I think the pro-Irish people overestimate the importance of the language. By trying to force it down people's necks you're going to put people off.

I understand how people can come up with that opinion after having it drilled into them in school, but can you honestly say that now that you're finished school and out in the big bad world, that you still feel that's its' forced upon you. Even roadsigns aren't exactly domineering.
A lot of people I know who hated Irish in school, now wish that they'd paid more attention at the time, so as they could use more than just their cúpla focal. The proolem is that children have a lack of foresight, and a bad teacher, and the peer pressure of other kids telling them how uselesss it is and how their parents haven't spoken since they left school etc. don't help emphasise the importance of learning the language at the time.

John

Ronny Mitchell wrote:

I will agree with you that sometimes people speaking Irish do throw in a lot of Béarlachas, but if you look at any other language on the planet, English is finding its' way into more conversations and phrases and words. German, Chinese, Spanish etc. I don't see this as a failure on the part of the language, but as a failure on the part of the world.

I've spent a lot of time abroad and I've never heard so much English used as in Irish conversations (apart, obviously, from English ones). Yes the words pop up but not with the frequency as with Irish speakers.

The Government reserve a certain amount of places in certain parts of the country for people who speak Irish. This is done mainly to prevent a dilution of the language in those areas and stop it from losing out to the more dominant language of English in things like business and media.

That still strikes me as being draconian, making some sort of reverse ghetto where only those who can reach certain standards are allowed in. We're all citizens of this country and should be able to buy a house where we like but this seems like some are more equal than others.

I understand how people can come up with that opinion after having it drilled into them in school, but can you honestly say that now that you're finished school and out in the big bad world, that you still feel that's its' forced upon you. Even roadsigns aren't exactly domineering.

Well it's not drilled in the same way as a daily Irish class but have you ever gone into a shop, had the shopkeeper speak to you in Irish and then look at you in a mixture of pity/disgust because you can't speak a word of it? That happened to me a few weeks ago in a bookshop. It's little things like that where some people who speak Irish just assume that you have Irish and when they find out that you are Irish and don't they get this self-righteous glow about themselves like you're some sort of philistine. I've gotten this sort of treatment several times, the most notable being the ones who continue to talk in Irish to you despite the fact I keep telling them that no, indeed I don't speak a word.

Nietzschean

Ronny Mitchell wrote:

I understand how people can come up with that opinion after having it drilled into them in school, but can you honestly say that now that you're finished school and out in the big bad world, that you still feel that's its' forced upon you. Even roadsigns aren't exactly domineering.

I'd agree with john... while they arn't domineering i'd say there is possibly more chinese speakers in the country than irish so putting road signs in chinese and english would be more usefull.... Heck what irish speakers don't understand english so for any tourism reasons some other language would make more sense...

A lot of people I know who hated Irish in school, now wish that they'd paid more attention at the time, so as they could use more than just their cúpla focal. The proolem is that children have a lack of foresight, and a bad teacher, and the peer pressure of other kids telling them how uselesss it is and how their parents haven't spoken since they left school etc. don't help emphasise the importance of learning the language at the time.

while i'd like to probally know more of it, i'd much rather know some usefull language like chinese or japanese.......

ilovemybrick

John2 wrote:

I've spent a lot of time abroad and I've never heard so much English used as in Irish conversations (apart, obviously, from English ones). Yes the words pop up but not with the frequency as with Irish speakers.

true of gaeilgóirí in some parts of the country but not all.go to an ceathrú rua and see. go to the aran islands and listen. your point doesnt take into account that in this country we spend the majority of our time communicating in english and then also speak irish. in germany for example they all speak german so obviously they arent going to have english words popping into there heads the way it happens to gaelgóirí here. if anything i think it adds to the idea of irish in the modern ireland that we do have words evolving like you mentioned with teacs. if it doesnt evolve it will die.

ZWEI_VIER_ZWEI

John2 wrote:

Is that legal? If a place turned you away for not speaking English there'd be uproar.

As you probably noticed, I wasn't at the beers. Term hasn't ended for everyone. I'm in til Thursday.

Wow.....I was going to start a thread based on the exact same quote, was too scared of the inevitable flamewar...fair play...

Hitchhiker's Guide to...

Interesting the way when Michael McDowell presented some bill to the Dail in Irish a few weeks ago, the Sunday Tribune (and, i think, Pat Rabitte), essentially accused him of trying to hide the content of the Bill by presenting it as gaeilge. Now, thats the type of top-down attitude we need towards the language from our elected representatives!

Nietzschean

you mean from Pat Rabbite or Micheal Mc Dowell? personally i'd be agreeing with Pat, only reason he'd present it in irish is so that most people wouldn't have a clue what he's on about......

ilovemybrick

Nietzschean wrote:

you mean from Pat Rabbite or Micheal Mc Dowell? personally i'd be agreeing with Pat, only reason he'd present it in irish is so that most people wouldn't have a clue what he's on about......

its a right and privilege to address the dáil in the first language of this country. its also the duty of any elected official to ensure they either do understand whats going on in the dáil or that they request a translator to ensure they do understand. pat rabbitte was caught out and though im far from a fianna fáil supporter it is just one more thing that rabbitte wants to have a go about. it always looks good for the opposition to be up in arms about something. lazy political tactics. that aside it was imo great to see gaeilge being used as a working language in the dáil by a cabinet member and not just as a gimmick.

John

They should either do it all through Irish or all through English. Whilst I recognise that Irish is the nation's first language, it is far from everyone's first language. Even people who can have a normal conversation in Irish may not be able to decipher a bill written in Irish as it's obiously not going to be written in conversational Irish but in a formal way (I don't recall legal Irish being taught at any level in the leaving cert). The vibe I got from that thing was that McDowell was trying to bamboozle people.

Hitchhiker's Guide to...

the thing i didn't understand about that debate - is surely there are automatic translations from english-to-irish and irish-to-english in the Dail? maybe not? but similar translation services are available in the Welsh Assembly and the EU parliament.

Nietzschean

meh as far as i'm concern'd irish is a historical artifact, its nice and all...should be in a museum not in government.

Which is more beneficial to kids today :
A) Spend 14 odd years learning irish, at the end of which only a few can speak it properly.
Spend 14 years learning chinese/japense/spanish and being conversational in it.

Hrmmm thats a toughie.

John

I agree with you there Ian. I'd prefer to do two foreign languages of one foreign language and a useful one like Latin.

europerson

Nietzschean wrote:

Which is more beneficial to kids today :
A) Spend 14 odd years learning irish, at the end of which only a few can speak it properly.
Spend 14 years learning chinese/japense/spanish and being conversational in it.

Well, most students study both Irish and a foreign language, so I don't see the problem. English is the language I grew up with, and I learned Irish and German to a high standard at school, so why should it matter? Most students study a language other than English and Irish, don't they? Admittedly, the Continental languages are more useful for the jobs market, but even the most utilitarian economist within me can't tell me that studying a language for its cultural/historical/social value isn't worth it either.

Nietzschean

europerson wrote:

Well, most students study both Irish and a foreign language, so I don't see the problem. English is the language I grew up with, and I learned Irish and German to a high standard at school, so why should it matter? Most students study a language other than English and Irish, don't they? Admittedly, the Continental languages are more useful for the jobs market, but even the most utilitarian economist within me can't tell me that studying a language for its cultural/historical/social value isn't worth it either.

We start irish much earlier, and its also compulsary.... in primary school we should be studying a usefull language.
If someone wants to choose irish in second level let them off, but if we've to do 3 languages i personally would like to know 3 usefull ones. Irish being the language i know best other than english and tbh i think its a waste of space in my brain, how much better for me would it be if i could speak chinese that well?

Certainly would keep students more interested also....

Thirdfox

anyone seen Yu Ming is Ainm Dom? All about how the Irish can't speak Irish anymore (and that a Chinese guy speaks Irish but no-one understands him)... funny film - but may become fact soon...

Hitchhiker's Guide to...

Thirdfox wrote:

anyone seen Yu Ming is Ainm Dom? All about how the Irish can't speak Irish anymore (and that a Chinese guy speaks Irish but no-one understands him)... funny film - but may become fact soon...

heard about that film - meant to be hilarious. Is it on rental?

shay_562

anyone seen Yu Ming is Ainm Dom? All about how the Irish can't speak Irish anymore (and that a Chinese guy speaks Irish but no-one understands him)... funny film - but may become fact soon...

heard about that film - meant to be hilarious. Is it on rental?

I don't think it's on rental - it's only a 10-minute short - but it's repeated on TV from time to time. Pretty funny, and a nice illustration of just how misguided it is to continue referring to Irish as our 'first language' (which, TBH, had more to do with de Valera's own feelings about the language than the general opinion of the country). Thirdfox, didn't you say somewhere a while back that you're in that film? Or did I imagine that...?

Topic: I don't have a problem with Irish in general - despite a personal antipathy towards the language, I'm not going to complain about Dail debates or garda stuff or whatever else being done through Irish, or about it being taught in schools. What I have a problem with is a) the fact that it's compulsory in schools (which is only going to engender hatred of the language) and b) that so much of our public resources are wasted on an essentially dead language. And John makes a good point about the fact that Irish is essentially there only for the select few, who live in their own select areas and drink in their own bars where only people they deem worthy are allowed in. Imagine the outcry if someone was turned away from a bar for chatting with their friends in Irish. English is a national language too, and shouldn't be treated with such disdain - it's how the vast majority of us choose to conduct our everyday lives, so having it treated as the "lesser" language while fluent Irish speakers are given special job opportunities and scholarships to help them get ahead seems pretty discriminatory.

Thirdfox

Roundtower2 wrote:

heard about that film - meant to be hilarious. Is it on rental?

Lol... as Shay said it's only a 13 minute short film... you can find it here though:

http://www.atomfilms.com/af/content/yu_ming

I did find out that I need to be able to "communicate" in Irish if I want to become a barrister or solicitor... :eek: I can imagine the court room now... "Dia duit" "Conas ata tu?" ...*silence*

*ps Shay... I'm not not in the film...

Crash

John2 wrote:

Is that legal? If a place turned you away for not speaking English there'd be uproar.

As you probably noticed, I wasn't at the beers. Term hasn't ended for everyone. I'm in til Thursday.

Just as an aside - its perfectly legal as the conradh is in fact a members club, not a public house, iirc.

ardmacha

About 50% of most conversations that I hear are Irish with the remaining 50% being English or pigeon English like "teacs" and "tacsaí".

This kind of argument is hardly convincing. Taxi is a Greek word which is the same in all European languages. People have no problem in English saying that the stopped off after going to the Gym for a Cappucino, before collecting the child from the creche. Use a similar sequence of words in Irish and it apparently shows that it is not a real language.

Which is more beneficial to kids today :
A) Spend 14 odd years learning irish, at the end of which only a few can speak it properly.
Spend 14 years learning chinese/japense/spanish and being conversational in it.

Japanese would be useful in Japan but most Irish people might never go there, while almost all Irish people spend time in Ireland nowadays.

There is no reason why you should learn Irish for 14 years and fail to speak it while having enormous success with Spanish, or whatever. Nobody is arguing for bad teaching in schools, if there is a problem with teaching it should be improved. Similarily if maths teaching isn't good in schools the solution is to improve the teaching. We are always told that compulsion is the problem, if sex education is compulsory in schools will this put people off sex?

THis is a bit like people in "deprived" areas who put their children off education, on the basis that it is no use. Not having any education, the children indeed find that they have no use for it. Similarly people with no culture.

europerson

ardmacha wrote:

if sex education is compulsory in schools will this put people off sex?

Great question!

Crash

Irish being compulsory in schools is not the problem, the course is the problem. it is taught in most cases substandardly, it is not based on being orally proficient (which in a language where the intention would be day to day use, its a bit of a ****ing joke) and it has so much ****e thrown into the course that its a disgrace.

For instance, studying Peig for my leaving just made me want to kill someone. seriously.

Thirdfox

europerson wrote:

Great question!

Sex is a biological factor that's wired into our brains... teaching (or the lack of it) will not put people off sex as it is inherent to human nature to reproduce... the learning of a particular language most certainly isn't inherent to our nature.

Chinese will be more and more important as time goes by... vast untapped economy there with people who are beginning to have more spending power.

I think choice should be given to people... take Latin for example, it was re-introduced to my old school 2 years ago and now it has become really popular. Maybe the compulsoriness of the teaching just fostered hatred towards it?

Kwekubo

Nietzschean wrote:

Which is more beneficial to kids today :
A) Spend 14 odd years learning irish, at the end of which only a few can speak it properly.
Spend 14 years learning chinese/japense/spanish and being conversational in it.

As was said above, do you seriously believe that any of those languages is inherently easier to learn than Irish?

The problem is definitely in language teaching - an EU report last week said that Ireland is the most monolinguistic country in Europe, withe 66% of people knowing only English.

This, in a country where children learn Irish and other languages for years during their school career. There's something wrong.

I personally think all school children should be taught Esperanto for one or two years in primary school. Learning any language makes learning subsequent ones easier, and since that much would be more or less sufficient to gain fluency, you could go on to French, Japanese etc much more easily. Everyone would know what tenses, verbs, past participles etc are before they get to first year!

John

ardmacha wrote:

This kind of argument is hardly convincing. Taxi is a Greek word which is the same in all European languages. People have no problem in English saying that the stopped off after going to the Gym for a Cappucino, before collecting the child from the creche. Use a similar sequence of words in Irish and it apparently shows that it is not a real language.

Touché (see what I did there).

We are always told that compulsion is the problem, if sex education is compulsory in schools will this put people off sex?

It's nothing to do with it being compulsory. People learn Irish for 40-50 minutes a day in school. Outside of that time they don't use Irish, there is no need for it and therefore they don't bother. English is compulsory and I don't think you can argue that few people can communicate in English. Maths is used all the time. Granted no one is doing double differentiation all day, everyday but it gets used.

Taking a foreign language is compulsory and I'd find more use for French and German (which I didn't learn at school and wish I could have) in my daily life than I do with Irish in all my life. Therefore I will use and want to use these languages more. In fact I'd say I have a better vocabulary in French, German, Latin and probably even Polish compared to Irish. These languages are of use to me, Irish is not.

And sex is always interesting, compulsory or not.

THis is a bit like people in "deprived" areas who put their children off education, on the basis that it is no use. Not having any education, the children indeed find that they have no use for it. Similarly people with no culture.

It's of no use to me. I've made a personal decision that I don't need to have Irish much like I haven't learned Cant (which people in Ireland speak too). And if those without Irish are your definition of those with no culture then I feel sorry for you. There's a huge world out there outside of the Irish language and not having Irish does not occlude you from enjoying other aspects of Irish culture or indeed be proud of being Irish.

Awayindahils

cuckoo wrote:

*builds air raid shelter*

*realises that the shelter doesn't have a window, so i won't have a view of the ensuing war*

*carefully cuts hole in ceiling of shelter, build ingenious skylight/vertical tunnel contraption with mirrors*

*puts on microwave popcorn*

*sits back and waits for the entertaining hostilities to commence*

i was going to wade my way through this topic to see what had been said. Saw this, started laughing and promtly gave up.

rsynnott

John2 wrote:

I don't think it's covered by that law at all. Yes the management has the right to refuse admission but it's a discriminatory policy.

As of a year or so ago, there are loopholes in the equality laws for pubs.

Roundtower2 wrote:

the thing i didn't understand about that debate - is surely there are automatic translations from english-to-irish and irish-to-english in the Dail? maybe not? but similar translation services are available in the Welsh Assembly and the EU parliament.

Possibly not; the issue, after all, hardly ever comes up.

I seem to remember there was a motion presented in Irish at some USI thing a year or so back; caused a lot of fuss.

europerson

Kwekubo wrote:

I personally think all school children should be taught Esperanto for one or two years in primary school.

Esperanto, despite what anyone says, is not a real language, and I don't see how learning it would, therefore, help anybody.

I abhor the attitudes of those who act like because someone hasn't learned Irish, they are a lesser being (mentioned upthread). This has happened to me on several occasions and p*ssed me off no end. A lot of people don't realise that Irish isn't compulsory in most schools in the North, where I went to school, in fact my school didn't even offer it at all. I genuinely didn't have the opportunity to learn it, despite considering myself Irish. I took a short course in college but as everyone well knows, Irish is a difficult language which requires years of study, or at least an intensive course, not an hour a week for 2 months.

The reason the Irish are so monolingual is that the teaching of languages at school, including English, is terrible. I believe Latin should be compulsory in secondary school as a base for the Latin languages, and that English grammar should be taught properly in primary school. I remember going into first year French and the teacher using words like 'preposition', 'past participle', 'subjunctive clause' and no-one had a clue what she was on about because they had never been taught these terms! How can you expect people to learn another language if they don't even know how their own works? The UK and Ireland are the only countries I know of in Europe where the first language grammar is basically not studied at all.

europerson

Elliott Juicy Thinner wrote:

I believe Latin should be compulsory in secondary school as a base for the Latin languages, and that English grammar should be taught properly in primary school. I remember going into first year French and the teacher using words like 'preposition', 'past participle', 'subjunctive clause' and no-one had a clue what she was on about because they had never been taught these terms! How can you expect people to learn another language if they don't even know how their own works? The UK and Ireland are the only countries I know of in Europe where the first language grammar is basically not studied at all.

I agree about Latin. English grammar is taught in primary schools, but unfortunately much of its technicalities are left up to pupils themselves. I knew what these things were when I did German and French in first year, but only because I taught myself (I found it genuinely interesting: I still do, in fact).

My brother went on work experience to a primary school the week before last, and he said that the standard of spelling, grammar and puctuation was atrocious. This is something that, in my opinion, needs to be tackled urgently. He did a spelling test with fifth and sixth class pupils, and he said that they were, for the most part, appallingly bad, with scores of five and six out of twenty. From correcting their English work, he said there were commas for full stops, no quotation marks, and definitely no apostrophes. This is a national emergency, and desperately needs to be sorted out.

Time Magazine

Latin is not a useful language. It is completely dead, thirty-two (infinitely) times moreso than Irish.

Irish is far more pertinent in Irish people's lives, is irrevocably linked to our cultural identity and is a valuable tool when you're in Leeds with your girlfriend bemoaning your racist neighbours.

In fact, the proposition that Latin should become compulsory is proof that Irish needs to become uncompulsory. There would be far less grá [see what I did there?] for Latin if it was compulsory. Irish would hold much more gravitas [wahey!] if it was optional at Leaving Cert.

But mandatory up to and including JC for me; or otherwise it'd die.

John

Angry Banana wrote:

Latin is not a useful language. It is completely dead, thirty-two (infinitely) times moreso than Irish.

Not a useful language? It's the base root of a large proportion of modern languages. If you know Latin, picking up French, Spanish and Italian is very, very easy.

Then there's the fact that an awful lot of science, history and theology is written either completely in Latin or with a large amount of Latin terms. You'd be surprised how much easier remembering scientific names are once you understand a bit of Latin.

RDM_83

Don't see how it can be claimed that Irish is a vital living language that is so important to our culture and then say that it will become extinct if it is not kept cumpulsory surely if it is so important people would keep learning it(the fact that there was protests organised when Enda Kenny whose not even close to power raised the idea of it not being cumpulsory till leaving cert raises some questions-possibly there is a fear that there would be less teaching jobs for Irish grads if this was the case might have been a strong motivator).
p.s its only the grants and stuff that actually annoy me- I'm a fluent english speaker, how come I can't have subsidised accommodation on campus with other english speakers.

Andrew 83

I'm strongly in favour of the Irish language and strongly opposed to removing its compulsory status. I wrote something about it on a thread in some other board on boards.ie. I'll try and find it later and repost it rather than writing up my views again.

Andrew 83

Here's what I posted on the Politics board about a year ago. I'd elaborate my point that French is taught very badly too with little to no influence on the spoken word. My Irish is miles better than my French and I think that's because there was much more emphasis on the spoken word in my Irish teaching than my French.



I think the Leaving Cert Irish course that currently stands is excellent (I was in the first year to complete it in 2001, I can't speak for the pre-2001 LC course which many of you may have done) but the problem is, as many of you ahve eluded to, that some people don't have a good enough mastery of the language before they go into 5th year.

What I would do to fix it is this:

a) reinstate the old system whereby Infants was taught through Irish, I don't know why they ever got rid of this. Teaching can then be either through English or Irish from 1st class onwards.

b) place a lot more influence on oral speaking. When I was in primary school we spent a couple of hours each day in class discussions as Gaeilge all the way through school. It meant I had a better grasp of the language at 12 than many of my friends at 18. That needs to be done in all primary schools and then in secondary school classes it needs to be the same as well. The same goes for French, German etc as well. The reason English is learnt so well by people in toher countries is that they watch American films, Tv etc. This means they interact with the spoken word a lot more, this needs to be replicated with a higher emphasis on the oral side of things. If you can speak the language well grammar can become second nature before you try to teach it.

RDM_83

I can understand those ideas if you consider Irish to be that important to the Irish society (though as far as I have seen the older generations don't speak any more Irish and there was extremely strict incentives to at least pass your Irish exams-not sure about this but I think when my mother was in school your leaving cert was considered void if you didn't pass Irish).
But it doesn't answer the question as too why there is financial incentives for Irish speakers.

Ron DMC

ilovemybrick wrote:

true of gaeilgóirí in some parts of the country but not all.go to an ceathrú rua and see. go to the aran islands and listen. your point doesnt take into account that in this country we spend the majority of our time communicating in english and then also speak irish.

Having been down here in An Ceathrú Rua for the last two days, I can confirm that the Irish used here is immaculate. My Irish is far from perfect myself, so hopefully some time spent here will let some of the magic rub off on me.

Pet

You should try understanding kerry irish.

Irish + so-thick-it-could-cut-butter Kerry accent + extremely fast, stammery style of speaking = near gibberish.

Even when my Irish was good I still had problems.

Crash

My finest day was when my kerry uncle called me a stingy bastard. I personally consider being called a stingy bastard by a kerryman a complement

and you're right, kerry irish is near impossible, especially from certain areas.

Pet

My finest day was when my kerry uncle called me a stingy bastard. I personally consider being called a stingy bastard by a kerryman a complement

You must have hung the teabags out to dry a few too many times so.


Still, at least they don't eat their dinner out of drawers like Cavan people..

james80000

Firstly I think that all of the arguments on this thread have been excellent and it is very possible to see both sides of the argument if you do not feel very strongly either way.
There are two things to be considered here, first, if Irish is useful as a language. Apart from using it abroad as aforementioned in situations where you have something to say about people around you (extremely fun), it is 99% useless. There is absolutely no point in it being our first language, everybody here speaks English, very few speak Irish of a similar standard. Before everybody attacks me over this one, just think about it with only logic in mind for a minute, it is most definitely useless and learning a foreign language is much more beneficial in terms of business, science, almost every industry except 'the preservation of dead languages'.
However, (a very important one), the people on this thread that have shot down the Irish language have forgotten that Irish is part of something mysterious and very abstract (certainly not logical) and that is, to use a cliché, Irish identity. It shows that we are different, that 'being Irish' is not simply being born in this country (which I incidentally wasn't!). When I came to this country at the age of 9, i was pretty annoyed at having to learn this language and couldn't see the point of it. That is how most people feel after 18 years!!! However my view has since changed. I believe it important to keep the language alive, and unfortunately, the only way to do this is to make it compulsory at least for a while, otherwise people will simply give up as there is no real USE as such for it. However, going out to An Cheathru Rua and having a conversation through Irish can show a part of our culture and a part of Irishness that cannot be let die. Real rural Ireland.
Irish should be kept alive. Perhaps not in such ridiculous forms as grants, needless translations or special housing. I think the age of 18 is a good place for people to make up their own minds about it, I would have chosen to give it up after the Junior Cert, but glad I didn't now. The oral part of the course is absolutely key and, there isn't much doubt about it, the course needs a radical overhall.
We shall see if this EVER happens.