Irish Language - should it be a compulsary school subject?

turgon

I did Irish for 14 years in school, and I cant speak much now. While me not being able to speak it is a separate issue the fact remains that this lack of Irish has never had a negative impact on my like. I have never been in a situation where Ive had to speak Irish. I could live out the rest of my life never uttering a word of it again and it would make no real difference. The 14 years of compulsory Irish have apparently made no positive contribution to my life.

Contrast that to Europe, where I was traveling for a month of late. There were plenty of times where I had to use French, Italian and German (and Eastern European languages but they're far too hard to pronounce). So given that Ive never had to use Irish, and Ive certainly have had to use German, the natural corollary would be that it would be more useful to have compulsory German than Irish.

So from a totally pragmatic and realistic perspective, the compulsory learning of Irish is flawed and lacks use.

The main argument for the preservation current scenario is to do with culture, heritage and nationalism, and is tied to the whole idea of being "proud of where you came from." While I can appreciate that some people are attracted by this I most certainly am not. Yet I will still be "forced" to have my children learn Irish just for this cultural ideal held by, presumably, the majority of people.

Thoughts, opinions etc?

LadyJ

I think it should be optional. That way, if you feel so strongly about heritage etc. then you can go and learn it and if not then you can just pick something different and more useful, like French, German, Spanish etc.

Either way, I think primary school is the time to start teaching children a second language if they are to have any hope of becoming fluent. Teaching people in secondary school is just too late, imo.

If it was compulsory up to 6th class and then optional on entry into secondary school, that'd be a better system.

Joey the lips

Yes irish language should be compulsary. In fact i am going to go further and say it should be encouraged in state institutions. We do not use it enough. There has been a lot of work done on the irish language to get it an official language of the EU. To get certain jobs in the EU you need to speak 3 languages. English Irish and french or "A" another. If irish was not an official language you would have to learn 2 more. say french and german.

The biggest failure of society is not to embrace its own culture heritage tradition and practice it. To say because you have not seen it in europe highlights the greater failure of Irish society as a whole. Even the American Indians who are virtually wiped out still practice there own language.

I am as guilty of this as the next person!

ChocolateSauce

In primary school, it should be up to the parents, in secondary school, it should be up to the students soley. It shouldn't be a requirement to get into University.

It should also be taken off of life support. I think that if people realised that it wasn't going to be kept alive by the state, they'd get their asses in gear and speak it.

As it stands, it is a spoken by only an extremely tiny minority of people on a regular basis, and it is practically criminal the amount of money which is wasted on it; at a time when we have so little money, it is obscene that we're spending hundreds of millions a year on flogging a dead horse, especially on the translation of state documents into Irish.

Joey the lips wrote:

If irish was not an official language you would have to learn 2 more. say french and german.

You mean you'd need to know three useful languages instead of two? Oh my...

Turgon wrote:

The main argument for the preservation current scenario is to do with culture, heritage and nationalism, and is tied to the whole idea of being "proud of where you came from." While I can appreciate that some people are attracted by this I most certainly am not. Yet I will still be "forced" to have my children learn Irish just for this cultural ideal held by, presumably, the majority of people.

Thoughts, opinions etc?

I don't see how altering the mechanics of how we make noise to communicate would affect our culture, so in total agreement there. The Irish will be just as Irish either way.

metrovelvet

I have met far far too many Irish people who have had 12 years of Irish and cant speak it. So no, it shouldnt be compulsory since it is obviously isnt being taught effectively.

turgon

Joey the lips wrote: »

Yes irish language should be compulsary. In fact i am going to go further and say it should be encouraged in state institutions. We do not use it enough.

But the question is why should we use it instead of English? Instead of focusing our money and energies on a language that isnt necessary whatsoever, we could be equipping future generations with the ability to work abroad.

Culture is fine and all, but what you are saying is that it should be force fed to us at humongous costs, even though we may not want it.

Joycey

ChocolateSauce wrote: »

I don't see how altering the mechanics of how we make noise to communicate would affect our culture, so in total agreement there. The Irish will be just as Irish either way.

What about that amazonian tribe whos language doesnt permit recursion in sentences? For example, they cant say "i was going to the shop when he said 'you cant walk down there'". This has profound implications for the way they perceive the world. They are unable to refer to anything unless they, or someone they have directly spoken to, has experienced it. They have no conception of ancestry or any of the other multitude of things which you may feel simply relies on the "mechanics of how we make noise to communicate". Given this extreme example, it should be apparent that the language which we speak has a significant influence on the way we experience the world. To lose a mode of experiencing the world is a loss of richness in our lives.

I speak practically no Irish, but I wish I did. Theres definitely something seriously wrong with the way that its taught in the country, I would say largely down to the fact that most Irish teachers (that ive come across) cant teach to save their lives, but thats a fact which pertains to most subjects. I dont know how we could better go about protecting the language, but I dont think the state abandoning the effort is the right way to approach it.

Micilin Muc

turgon wrote: »

But the question is why should we use it instead of English? Instead of focusing our money and energies on a language that isnt necessary whatsoever, we could be equipping future generations with the ability to work abroad.

Culture is fine and all, but what you are saying is that it should be force fed to us at humongous costs, even though we may not want it.

Who ever said we should use it instead of English? The state policy is bilingualism, not monolingualism. (see page 6).

It has been proven that bilinguals have better cognitive skills than monolinguals. Given that bilingualism is favourable, what language do you suggest we start speaking? French instead of Irish?

And who says "we may not want it"? The answer is 7% of the population (see page 21).

_michelle_

it is maddness that our government is WASTING :mad::mad: so much €€€€€€ on a language that i have never heard being spoken outside of school,,,, i spent 13 years trying to lean it & to this day i still could tell you my dob in irish,, what a waste of money & time!!:mad::mad:

ardmacha

we could be equipping future generations with the ability to work abroad.

Why shouldn't abroad speak English too? Why should we support their languages at the expense of our own. What an inferiority complex!

The state policy is bilingualism, not monolingualism.

Exactly the State policy is bilingualism, which requires State services to be available in Irish. If people did not learn Irish at school then they could not work for or progress in the State service. There would then be shouts of "discrimination" and any form of bilingualism would become impossible.

turgon

Micilin Muc wrote: »

Who ever said we should use it instead of English?

The poster whose comments I was commenting on, it seems. Joey the lips, that is.

And btw, just because 7% dont want it, does that justify forcing them to have it?

ardmacha wrote: »

Why shouldn't abroad speak English too? Why should we support their languages at the expense of our own. What an inferiority complex!

Because it isnt the mainstream language there!!! What you are doing there is idealizing. Anyone pragmatic can see that Irish isnt spoken, and English is the main primary language of Ireland. We should be reasonable and not spend all our taxpayers money forcing people to keep it alive for no reason at all.

ardmacha wrote: »

Exactly the State policy is bilingualism, which requires State services to be available in Irish.

What is the point when anyone who can speak Irish can speak English?

cici81

I absolutely believe Irish should be a compulsory subject. The key is to change the way it is taught. This has happened at primary level, there's far more focus now on speaking than grammar and writing. I believe that a lot of the snobbery has gone out of Irish, which is also great. I used to be afraid to speak Irish in front of fluent speakers before, for fear I'd say it wrong, now I believe there's much more of a "try it anyway" attitude.

Also, there are loads of situations when I've found Irish useful. For example, when volunteering in Africa, with lots of other nationalities who all spoke English, it was great to be able to speak privately to my boyfriend without being understood by everybody (we all shared one large army tent). It also was a great way to let off steam without being understood, thus avoiding lots of potential tensions in camp. Also, when on conferences with other nationalities also, it's been great to be able to have private chats. And before anyone calls me rude, people around me were chatting privately to each other in Lithuanian/ German/ etc. so we were just adding to the general melange of languages. Another example would be bartering in Turkey, where the locals kept chatting to each other in Turkish (obviously) while we were haggling. Although most of my friends had only very basic Irish, we all had enough to decide amongst ourselves whether or not we were getting value for money, without letting the trader know what we were thinking.

I think people should ignore the snobbier Irish speakers, forget the rubbish way it was taught in the past (and sometimes still is unfortunately), just give it a go. I am a teacher, and I hated Irish when I was a child. If I'd been given the option to give it up I would have, with great joy! But now I'm so delighted I did learn it and am grateful that it was compulsory for me in those early years...

chocgirl

I think Irish should be compulsory too. Disagree with how it's taught though. I think it should be taken on in secondary school, I know children pick up languages better at a younger age but not the way they're taught in Ireland. Most people I've discussed this with seem to have a much better grasp of their second language that they started in secondary school while they struggle to string basic irish sentences together.

ardmacha

What is the point when anyone who can speak Irish can speak English?

Firstly why pander to ignorance.
But everyone who can cycle can walk, why bother with cyclepaths, cycle racks and so forth.

Micilin Muc

turgon wrote: »

And btw, just because 7% dont want it, does that justify forcing them to have it?

I think it does.

turgon wrote: »

Anyone pragmatic can see that Irish isnt spoken

Get your facts straight before you insult Irish speakers with your own made up figures.

Here are some real facts (from page 64):

26,171 people speak Irish on daily basis outside of the education system. Another 14,393 people speak Irish on a daily basis within and outside of the education system. Another 44,669 speak Irish on a weekly basis outside of the education system.

Over 35,500 children attend Gaelscoileanna outside of the Gaeltacht. Go and tell them "no-one speaks Irish".

turgon wrote: »

and English is the main primary language of Ireland.

Of course English is the language most spoken in Ireland, I don't think anybody has claimed otherwise.

turgon wrote: »

We should be reasonable and not spend all our taxpayers money forcing people to keep it alive for no reason at all.

Again, you should get your facts straight. We don't spend all our money on the language.

turgon wrote: »

What is the point when anyone who can speak Irish can speak English?

So that more people will speak Irish. Why do you think??

Joycey

_michelle_ wrote: »

it is maddness that our government is WASTING :mad::mad: so much €€€€€€ on a language that i have never heard being spoken outside of school,,,, i spent 13 years trying to lean it & to this day i still could tell you my dob in irish,, what a waste of money & time!!:mad::mad:

Yeah id recommend learning to speak English properly before you go taking on any other challenges...

Sleepy

What's the advantage of forcing people to learn a completely bastardised version of a language that was to all intents and purposes dead a hundred years ago?

TBH, I'd like to be able to speak Irish but no more than I'd like to be knowlegeable about Latin, the classics, history, other computer languages, philosophy, science etc. The purpose of an education system is to provide our children with a broad knowledge of the world we live in and to prepare them to be capable of contributing positively to our society.

To this end, we need to ensure that students leave school at least literate and numerate. Irish won't die if we stop forcing it on people - those who are interested in it will continue to learn it just as those of us with an interest in economics chose to study it to Leaving Cert level, or those with an interest in chemistry / physics / technical drawing / accounting / French / German / Spanish etc. chose to pursue those areas of study.

If a population has a uniform set of skills, it seems likely to stagnate rather than to be creative and adaptable. Ensuring that our students graduate to the highest standard of the broadest range of skills they can is a good thing imho. Forcing students to pursue anything but the most essential of life skills (i.e. arithmetic and literacy) seems a waste of time when those students will by and large choose to pursue those skills they're best suited to / have the most talent for.

Curriculum reform is certainly required whether the subject is compulsory or not. Pointing that out doesn't make a convincing argument for keeping the subject on a pedastal with the most vital skills our students leave secondary education with, it merely distracts from the question at hand.

Grudaire

Why are English and Maths compulsary?

I personnally have no problem with Irish being made compulsary for the LC - but staying compulsary until 3rd year. AS LONG AS ENGLISH IS TREATED THE SAME.

since we're in the humanities section should the question be 'should anything be compulsary?'?

ballsymchugh

Irish as a subject in secondary should be split into two separate subjects, one focusing like the way french and german are taught, and another focusing on literature.
i love irish, and i love speaking it, but the literature bored the tits off me at school. it's a pretty straight forward language given that there are about 10 irregular verbs (may be 9 or 11!!) which is a lot less than most other languages. so maybe if it was taught like a foreign language up to junior cert to get the grammar and basic reading right, and then the option of taking another literature subject for the leaving?? most of my class dropped down to pass irish for the leaving just to ease the workload.
plus, it increases your chances of scoring the weather girl on tg4. i'd say.

metrovelvet

In general the way foreign languages are taught stinks. I have no idea how Irish is taught, but I know it cant be taught well with the results I have seen.

I know that after a few years of french, my french is decent, and of latin, was ok, but no real chance or use of it so it's pretty much gone. Why the hell do people have to study a language for 10 years or more and barely know any of it.

pog it

A lot of the time when this is being argued the same people who don't think that Irish should be compulsory argue that French or German or Spanish or another foreign language would be much more 'useful' or beneficial to them when in reality there are so few jobs in Ireland where you would use these languages, and in reality there are just as many jobs where you can speak/use Irish as there are with using French (e.g. call centre IT work with a second language) or you can use Irish in the many Gaeltachts who need fluent speakers,.. there are a lot of examples!

The reason you might get the impression that a second language like French etc. would be more beneficial is because any job on irishjobs.ie, recruitireland, etc. advertise in English, whereas the Irish jobs are generally posted in Irish newspapers, radio, etc, and so you don't get the same exposure to them.

I for one didn't have the wherewithal to appreciate Irish in secondary school, I was all about French, loved French, hated Irish.
Now that I still live in my home country Ireland I don't see how French is any advantage, but having Irish is. I have got to the stage where my Irish is ahead of my French now thank God. So I for one am really really glad that the people who are in charge of the education system are doing a good job of keeping it compulsory. And even though I don't use it for a job right now - I may well do in the future -right now it's enough for me to be able to listen to the radio in Irish, watch and understand TG4, speak to friends in Irish, though most speak English of course, and yeah it has become a really enjoyable hobby!

I know that a lot of people like me found they loved Irish after they left school and I'm grateful I did learn it then or I'd have had it a lot harder learning since then.

Irish is never going to be for everyone though and it's a personal decision, but when you're 13 you shouldn't have the responsibility of deciding whether you want to keep on with Irish or not!!!

turgon

ardmacha wrote: »

But everyone who can cycle can walk, why bother with cyclepaths, cycle racks and so forth.

Walking and cycling are two different things with two different advantages. Using Irish and English, at a pragmatic level, achieve exactly the same thing: they facilitate communication.

Micilin Muc wrote: »

Get your facts straight before you insult Irish speakers with your own made up figures.

Apologies for being so reckless in equating voluntary private usage with necessary public usage. I dont doubt that many people speak Irish, I also dont doubt that this is mostly done in either the Gaeltacht and/or in the privacy of the home. Two places where, if Irish is made voluntary, it will continue to be spoken. In the former case it is their primary language, and in the latter case if a family is so interested in Irish they converse in it they will no doubt voluntarily learn it.

Which is what my argument is about; not about stopping teaching people Irish but about allowing parents and young adults who feel it is not in their/their childs benefit to learn it to concentrate on other fields of study they feel may be more beneficial. Like learning a language that is spoken by 50 million; rather than 26 thousand.

Micilin Muc wrote: »

Over 35,500 children attend Gaelscoileanna outside of the Gaeltacht. Go and tell them "no-one speaks Irish".

And if Irish is made non-compulsory this figure will at least stay the same, if not rise.

Micilin Muc wrote: »

Again, you should get your facts straight. We don't spend all our money on the language.

I didnt mean it like that

Micilin Muc wrote: »

So that more people will speak Irish.

Why do you think that that is so necessary?

turgon

Cliste wrote: »

Why are English and Maths compulsary?

I would guess they are more useful. Considering that most people will go on to use English exclusively in terms of careers etc.

pog it wrote: »

there are so few jobs in Ireland where you would use these languages

The key words being "in Ireland." If everyone knew French instead of Irish it would open more career prospects, in the same way learning English opens you up to jobs worldwide.

pog it wrote: »

Irish is never going to be for everyone though and it's a personal decision, but when you're 13 you shouldn't have the responsibility of deciding whether you want to keep on with Irish or not!!!

So basically, make everyone do it for the few that may end up liking it? We could apply that logic to almost any subject.

ChocolateSauce

Joycey wrote: »

What about that amazonian tribe whos language doesnt permit recursion in sentences? For example, they cant say "i was going to the shop when he said 'you cant walk down there'". This has profound implications for the way they perceive the world. They are unable to refer to anything unless they, or someone they have directly spoken to, has experienced it. They have no conception of ancestry or any of the other multitude of things which you may feel simply relies on the "mechanics of how we make noise to communicate". Given this extreme example, it should be apparent that the language which we speak has a significant influence on the way we experience the world. To lose a mode of experiencing the world is a loss of richness in our lives.

This is a very extreme example, although yes a very interesting one. However, even assuming (a pretty big assumption) that Irish is a different enough language from English to alter the way we perceive the world, would this be a desirable perception?

It seems to me that being unable to understand the notion of the past would be a crippling disability for someone from any other culture but this one unique example you've used.

Who ever said we should use it instead of English? The state policy is bilingualism, not monolingualism. (see page 6).

It has been proven that bilinguals have better cognitive skills than monolinguals. Given that bilingualism is favourable, what language do you suggest we start speaking? French instead of Irish?

And who says "we may not want it"? The answer is 7% of the population (see page 21).

I wish we were like the Dutch; if we spoke Irish first and English second, we'd speak English better than the English. However, I think is too late, and I certainly don't think we should force people which second language they should learn; we should merely offer them the chance to learn whichever one(s) they want.

joycey wrote:

Yeah id recommend learning to speak English properly before you go taking on any other challenges...

Says the person who doesn't capitalise his/her "I"'s, or use apostrophes.

whitefox

I'm currently in 6th year and in Honors Irish, I think it should definetly stay compulsary, but be taught as ballsymchugh said, taught as foreign languages are. At least up to Junior Cert, and then to learn useful verses and rhymes, ones that reflect Irishness

Personally, I hated Irish in 1st, 2nd and 3rd year, but I went to a Gaeltacht after my Junior Cert and now I'm considering studying the language in college, I just needed to see that it wasn't all about poems, stories, and learning phrases.

Tiocfadh an t-am The time will come
Is beidh bóthar ar gach logán That there will be a road over every level bit of ground
Teach mór ar gach cnocán A big house on every hill
Droichead thar gach shruthán A bridge over every stream
Béarla ar gach blocán English spoken by every "blockhead"
Cóiste faoi gach breallán A car under every fool
Is an saol uile ina bhrachán Then life will be in a mess

Ceapaim go bhfuil an t-am anseo anois

Greyfox

pog it wrote: »

Irish is never going to be for everyone though and it's a personal decision, but when you're 13 you shouldn't have the responsibility of deciding whether you want to keep on with Irish or not!!!

This is exactly when you should have the choice as this is when you know wheter or not your suited to learing the language and wheter or not your likely to want to use it again after the LC. I think it's very unhealtly to have so many Irish people like myself who genuinely hate their national language (for me it's definitely hate rather then just dislike) but for as long as it's compulsory their will always be adults that hate Irish.

I only know 20 words of Irish and I spent 13 years learning it, for me it was a riddiculous waste of time!

ballsymchugh

Greyfox wrote: »

This is exactly when you should have the choice as this is when you know wheter or not your suited to learing the language and wheter or not your likely to want to use it again after the LC. I think it's very unhealtly to have so many Irish people like myself who genuinely hate their national language (for me it's definitely hate rather then just dislike) but for as long as it's compulsory their will always be adults that hate Irish.

I only know 20 words of Irish and I spent 13 years learning it, for me it was a riddiculous waste of time!

you should hate english too, by the looks of that!!

pog it

turgon wrote: »

I would guess they are more useful. Considering that most people will go on to use English exclusively in terms of careers etc.



The key words being "in Ireland." If everyone knew French instead of Irish it would open more career prospects, in the same way learning English opens you up to jobs worldwide.



So basically, make everyone do it for the few that may end up liking it? We could apply that logic to almost any subject.

Yes Turgon- so many people will move to France or Spain for work.. eh no. Spain has as big if not bigger unemployment problem as we have. And anyway how many want to emigrate to these countries when they leave secondary school eh??

Negative dude/dudette you are. Oh well it won't be down to you if the country ends up bilingual some day we are all dead, or before

A lot of people are pro- the language so the future lies with us.

pog it

Greyfox wrote: »

This is exactly when you should have the choice as this is when you know wheter or not your suited to learing the language and wheter or not your likely to want to use it again after the LC. I think it's very unhealtly to have so many Irish people like myself who genuinely hate their national language (for me it's definitely hate rather then just dislike) but for as long as it's compulsory their will always be adults that hate Irish.

I only know 20 words of Irish and I spent 13 years learning it, for me it was a riddiculous waste of time!

If you hate the Irish language that's your problem mate. There will always be people like you who hate it. And there is no use trying to argue otherwise with people on both sides of this.

Look it, there are people too who hate French, Maths, etc. and who won't need to use the level of maths they've achieved by first year even, so let them decide at 13 whether they want to keep on Maths shall we?

13 year olds should absolutely not have the choice to drop any subject- that is way too young. Would you want to shelve these responsiblities on your own kids, right out of national school? ! Maybe you would, but I definitely wouldn't. But we are on completely different sides of this argument.

whatdoicare

I think I'd prefer Irish if I had a choice in learning it myself instead of under pressure to pass exams. I remember in my final year going straight from speaking Spanish with my dad (he's not Spanish but learned it himself in his 40's as a hobby) to French, to Irish! I was dizzy by the time I got to Irish haha!
I have never spoken French, even though I've been to France many times, never spoken Irish, as I've forgotten it all and the only language I still use is Spanish! What does that say about our education system? (That and my awful grammar!)
I would probably have loved Irish if I hadn't gained a deep hatred of it in school! I'm ashamed to say I managed to work out a system where I was able to answer written questions and the tape test questions purely on matching the question to what was in the paragraph and I learned off a few essays and poems by heart- never really learning the language- I got a B1 in pass Irish btw and using the same system a B3 in honors French!
Haha!:pac:

Micilin Muc

turgon wrote: »

Like learning a language that is spoken by 50 million; rather than 26 thousand.

26,000 is not the correct figure for people who speak Irish. The statistics I linked to show that 26,000 speak Irish on a daily basis outside of the education system. Another 14,000 who are in the education system speak Irish on a daily basis outside of the education system. Together, that's 40,000 who speak Irish on a daily basis.

The number of people who speak Irish, whether it be daily, weekly or less often is 350,000. (page 64 on the CSO Volume 9 of Census 2006). And that's just Ireland. The Irish diaspora in the US, Australia, England and all over the world are learning Irish. I don't have the statistics to hand but I believe there are more adults learning Irish abroad than there are in Ireland.

The reason I'm putting emphasis on these statistics is because the discourse on the Irish language in the English-language media insists on using figures that have no basis.

The argument that no-one speaks Irish is an old argument that no longer holds true. It belongs primarily to the older generation who suffered abuse at the hands of educators and who use the Irish language as a grievance.

Times have changed and Irish is now more fashionable. Conradh na Gaeilge, Gael-Linn, Gaelchultúr, the VECs, GAA clubs and Sinn Féin cumainn in Dublin have had a huge surge in the numbers of students attending their adult classes. There are thousands of people learning Irish in Dublin every week.
As I said earlier, 93.2% of the population are favourable to the Irish language. The question is not "should we make Irish optional", but rather "how can we change the teaching of Irish".

The Language Centre in NUI Maynooth have recently made big changes to the teaching of Irish to adults. The quality of teaching has gone up considerably and will continue to do so.

The Department of Education has changed the Irish syllabus for the Leaving Cert and these changes will be seen in the next few years when the syllabus will be implemented.

turgon wrote: »

Why do you think that that is so necessary?

I'm a big advocate of bilingualism as it's benefits are numerous. Do you have an argument against bilingualism?