New Words

source

Hi all,

Just wanted to share a little story with you and see what your opinions are.

Recently I was out walking with my wife and a taxi drove passed with the Irish 'tacsai' written on the roof sign. My wife started giving out about it, as it's not a 'real Irish word'. Apparently she doesn't like the introduction of English words into the Irish language.

My argument was that if new words aren't created for things, then the language will definitely die. That languages need to grow along with the culture of its people, otherwise it becomes obsolete and people will abandon it completely in favour of English, as they would be able to say what they want in English and not Irish. She does not agree.

What are your opinions on this?

johnolocher

source wrote: »

Hi all,

Just wanted to share a little story with you and see what your opinions are.

Recently I was out walking with my wife and a taxi drove passed with the Irish 'tacsai' written on the roof sign. My wife started giving out about it, as it's not a 'real Irish word'. Apparently she doesn't like the introduction of English words into the Irish language.

My argument was that if new words aren't created for things, then the language will definitely die. That languages need to grow along with the culture of its people, otherwise it becomes obsolete and people will abandon it completely in favour of English, as they would be able to say what they want in English and not Irish. She does not agree.

What are your opinions on this?

It's natural that words will be translated into language, as far as I am aware this usually happens naturally and through popular usage it's added to te dictionary.

The new Irish-English dictionary has introduced many new words into Irish including stupid ones like Tvuít for Tweet. For me this is an example of where academics shouldn't meddle, people were already using translations like Tuít, but some egg head decided V was the best way to represent W despite V not being in the Irish alphabet, so what you have there is a non Irish word Tweet being made into a word that isn't Irish either.

So I'm divided, my opinion is if it's in popular use add it to the dictionary, but I don't think it should work the other way round where people at the top translate something new and then tell people to use it.

I don't agree that by not translating something the language will die out, people can still talk Irish and say Tweet just as French people say Computer.

source

johnolocher wrote: »

It's natural that words will be translated into language, as far as I am aware this usually happens naturally and through popular usage it's added to te dictionary.

The new Irish-English dictionary has introduced many new words into Irish including stupid ones like Tvuít for Tweet. For me this is an example of where academics shouldn't meddle, people were already using translations like Tuít, but some egg head decided V was the best way to represent W despite V not being in the Irish alphabet, so what you have there is a non Irish word Tweet being made into a word that isn't Irish either.

So I'm divided, my opinion is if it's in popular use add it to the dictionary, but I don't think it should work the other way round where people at the top translate something new and then tell people to use it.

I don't agree that by not translating something the language will die out, people can still talk Irish and say Tweet just as French people say Computer.

I would agree with you to an extent.

The difference between French and Irish is that French has a common ancestry with English, in Latin and shares thousands of words already.

I do agree that academics shouldn't go inventing words, especially when using letters that don't exist in the language. But for a language to survive it does need to grow and expand or it will become irrelevant.

P. Breathnach

source wrote: »

...
Recently I was out walking with my wife and a taxi drove passed with the Irish 'tacsai' written on the roof sign. My wife started giving out about it, as it's not a 'real Irish word'. Apparently she doesn't like the introduction of English words into the Irish language...

So what would she want to call it, then? We need a word for it. I'm happy enough that we take it into the language and spell it in a way that reflects Irish orthography. [The word "taxi" is also used in, among other places, France, Spain, and Germany, so it is not solely an English word.]

johnolocher wrote: »

... French people say Computer.

They might, but they also have their own word for it, which I think is more widely used: ordinateur.

johnolocher

True just as nobody is going to wire Tvuít!