monolingual placenames

Fuinseog

Having placenames in irish and English is a waste of time when few understand them and it is ill advised to use an irish placenmae in the Galltacht.

buses have the placenames in irish and english, but what use, apart looking decorative, are they?
when you live in irleand you realsie its a pretence that the language is widely spoken, yet foreigenrs don't realsie this and some of tehm try to use Gaelic.
i was a bus going from Dublin to kildare. the bus driver was a Dub, an average Joe soap. A foreigner got on borad and asked to go to Cill Dara. pronunciation was perfect, yet the driver was at a loss.

The avergage Dubliner can neither spell nor pronounce his native city in his 'native' tongue .

gaeilge for the Gaeltacht and english for the Galltacht?

pog it

Ireland is becoming more and more bilingual and a lot of people and organisations and communities have worked very hard in front and behind the scenes to achieve that.

Placenames are part and parcel of it, and you ain't the only person who lives in this country so your needs are not the only needs that will be met.

An gal gréine

Fuinseog, if correct spelling in English was a pre-requisite for living in the Galltacht, where would you go then ?
Up the Dubs !

Ulsteryank

For the culture's sake, I'm glad there's bilingual signs. I see it from a different angle, however. Here in Northern Ireland, people actually pay to get signs as Gaeilge. Belfast has the highest concentration of Urban speakers outside of the Gaeltacht, the level of commitment and sacrifice people go to learn the language here is amazing. I think the whole of Ireland can learn something from Pobal na Gaeilge. Is Meiricéanach mé ach ag foghlaim.
I'm not saying that I can't understand the original viewpoint, as many other's agree, but in my opinion it's a pity a bus driver from Dublin wouldn't even know that. I've only been here a little over a year, and know the Irish for al of the counties. Even here, where the only billingual signs you see are street names in Nationalist areas, you still see the Irish on people's liscence plates on the roads.

dlofnep

I was also impressed by the Irish language movement in Belfast. Culturlann is a great centre for the language, and I wish we had something like it in Waterford.

It's well documented that the further from Dublin you go, the more Irish it gets. A lad did a trip around Ireland, using only Irish along the way.. He said that he had most problems in Dublin using it, getting odd looks from people - but the further away from Dublin he got - the more people engaged with him in Irish, even if they only had a small bit.

Ulsteryank

Oh yea, An Chúlturlann is where I take my classes on Wednesday nights. It's great, because you get a chance to use the language. We get a coffee break half way, and go down and order stuff as Gaeilge in the caife.....
I've only ever been south of Dublin for work, not really getting a much time to get about. I hope I get to explore better in the future, and hear more of the Munster dialect.

dlofnep

Do Pop by An Rinn if you get a chance. Also, they opened up another Culturlann in Derry a few weeks back. Make sure to check it out when you get a chance.

Fuinseog

Ulsteryank wrote: »

For the culture's sake, I'm glad there's bilingual signs. I see it from a different angle, however. Here in Northern Ireland, people actually pay to get signs as Gaeilge. Belfast has the highest concentration of Urban speakers outside of the Gaeltacht, the level of commitment and sacrifice people go to learn the language here is amazing. I think the whole of Ireland can learn something from Pobal na Gaeilge. Is Meiricéanach mé ach ag foghlaim.
I'm not saying that I can't understand the original viewpoint, as many other's agree, but in my opinion it's a pity a bus driver from Dublin wouldn't even know that. I've only been here a little over a year, and know the Irish for al of the counties. Even here, where the only billingual signs you see are street names in Nationalist areas, you still see the Irish on people's liscence plates on the roads.

before anyone brands me as a seoinin or a west brit I should really mention that I speak Irish.

its a reality that the vast majority of irish people speak little or no Irish and most can lead happy and conented lives thus.
if a tourist wants to hear them speak irish then they can say 'pog mo thoin' or 'an bhfuil cead agam dul amach go dti an leithreas'.
if people don't understand the placenames in irish then they serve useful purpose.
i was in Mayo over the summer and i encountered the Gaeltacht. the signs were just in gaelic, yet my map just had english. that was difficult. I stopped the car I asked two middleaged people as Gaeilge for directions and they said they couldn't speak Irish. it seems there is a lot of wishful thinking here.
while i like the fact that its widely spoken in the north I dislike its strong connection with the IRA.

Fuinseog

dlofnep wrote: »

I was also impressed by the Irish language movement in Belfast. Culturlann is a great centre for the language, and I wish we had something like it in Waterford.

It's well documented that the further from Dublin you go, the more Irish it gets. A lad did a trip around Ireland, using only Irish along the way.. He said that he had most problems in Dublin using it, getting odd looks from people - but the further away from Dublin he got - the more people engaged with him in Irish, even if they only had a small bit.

you're talking about Mangan who acted like a muppet and a smart alec. he got odd looks because he behaved in an odd manner.
i speak Irish if I think the other person will undertsand me. otherwise it could be contrued taht am trying to make them feel small. if i start shouting in the streets i will attract negative attention.
i could round up 200 galwegians for you who don't have a wrd of irish and 200 Dubliners who can converse in our ancestral tongue. mangan serves his own agenda. it's all about how you approach people.

dlofnep

Can't remember the chap's name.

This is the programme you are referring to.

NO BÉARLA - SERIES 1 (2007)

No Béarla, is a four part series in which Manchán Magan attempts to live his life (eat, travel, socialise, find accommodation, shop, etc) through Irish. It is a journey to find out whether the 1.6 million people who claim they can speak Irish in the national census really can and whether one can survive in Ireland today without speaking a word of English.

In the course of his travels Manchán gets kicked out of bars, served the wrong food, given the wrong directions, the wrong clothes, the wrong haircut. He gets abused, insulted, treated as an imbecile. When his car breaks down he finds he can’t get a mechanic - directory enquiries simply laugh at him. Likewise, he gets jeered at trying to chat up girls in a nightclub in Donegal. On the Shankill rd, he is warned that he’ll end up in hospital if he continues speaking the language. In Galway he tries busking, singing the filthiest, most debauched lyrics he can think of to see if anyone will understand - old ladies smile and tap their feet merrily as he serenades them with filth. In Killarney he stands outside a bank, promising passers-by huge sums of money if they help him rob it, but again no one understands. He may as well be speaking Kling-on.

In short, No Béarla is a thousand mile road trip around Ireland involving a lot of pointing, miming and desperate gesticulation. It casts a cold eye on the state of Ireland’s first official language - watch it and weep, or laugh . . .

A Dearg Films production for RTÉ/TG4
January 2007

Ulsteryank

@ Fuinseog
Oh, I understand your viewpoint, it's perfectly valid. I'm not even an Irish national, so I was just trying to throw my 2 pence in there. I'm just kind of a traditionalist you might say, I like all of that traditional stuff. I was once i nGaoth Dobhair not too long ago, and didn't hear a lick of Irish, and a week later stopped off at a restaurant in Carlingford with the wife, and heard a whole table talking as Gaeilge, you never really know when you'll run into it?

I think up here the language is cherished as a way for people that identify as Irish, to hold onto their heritage. A good friend of mine, that I met in the States, is from Lurgan, and his whole family speak it because of this. Since the language is an official language of Northern Ireland, it's recieved a lot of posotive press along with the promotion of Ulster Scots as well. I hope this takes that Republican edge off of it, because I don't like the political aspects anymore than you do. Things are changing here though, there's a growing community behind the language, that take it upon themselves to get billingual signs.

Fuinseog

Fuinseog wrote: »

before anyone brands me as a seoinin or a west brit I should really mention that I speak Irish.

i was in Mayo over the summer and i encountered the Gaeltacht. the signs were just in gaelic, yet my map just had english. that was difficult. I stopped the car I asked two middleaged people as Gaeilge for directions and they said they couldn't speak Irish. it seems there is a lot of wishful thinking here.
while i like the fact that its widely spoken in the north I dislike its strong connection with the IRA.

Maybe the problem lies with the map makers?
In the Sud Tyrol region of Northern Italy, you will see signposts and maps in 3 langauges, Italian German and Laidin.

Fuinseog

Fuinseog wrote: »

before anyone brands me as a seoinin or a west brit I should really mention that I speak Irish.

if people don't understand the placenames in irish then they serve useful purpose.
.

Does anyone understand place names in English? at least the Irish versions have a meaning.

conchubhar1

hhhmm


What does kildare mean exactly? derry? whats a dublin?


You ''speak'' irish - you should see the point I am getting at here....