Why Irish language still exists?

Johnboner

tomwaterford wrote: »

Sure that logic follows we may make school non compulsory :rolleyes:

Fail

Beanntraigheach

Iwasfrozen wrote: »

The revival failed, not because schools taught Irish badly (though that was a factor) but primarily because people didn't want to learn and speak Irish in their everyday life.

Outside of living in a situation which allows daily immersion, learning a language to proficiency, never mind fluency, takes a great deal or dedication, time, and effort.
Most people, anywhere, will never achieve this (particularly when interaction with the language is confined to a normal school setting), except when there is an immediate practical necessity to acquire some level of functionality.

The "options" of (a) the mass of the population collectively learning and using the Irish language in everyday life, or (b) simply not doing so , aren't comparably feasible.
One requires great effort and change, the other requires none.
It's not as simple as just "wanting" or "choosing".

Iwasfrozen

Beanntraigheach wrote: »

Outside of living in a situation which allows daily immersion, learning a language to proficiency, never mind fluency, takes a great deal or dedication, time, and effort.
Most people, anywhere, will never achieve this (particularly when interaction with the language is confined to a normal school setting), except when there is an immediate practical necessity to acquire some level of functionality.

The "options" of (a) the mass of the population collectively learning and using the Irish language in everyday life, or (b) simply not doing so , aren't comparably feasible.
One requires great effort and change, the other requires none.
It's not as simple as just "wanting" or "choosing".

It certainly is a case of choosing and you've said so yourself in this post. The major deciding factor in the failure of the revival was lack of will power. People simply didn't want to speak Irish enough.

Caoimhgh1n

"Why Irish language still exists?"

- Due to the fact people still speak it.

Willfarman

I think what's worrying is a passive aggressive minority here trying to paint the country green with almost nazi like zeal when our culture and ingrained in red white orange and green and a thousand shades in between.

I think what's being lost under our noses without us even noticing is regional dialect.

Grayson

Deleted User wrote: »

I work with Indian IT staff and when they're having conversations in their own language works like SCSI, RAID & windows spring up all over the place,
So yes, technical terms are universal and there's no real point in creating locale variants that could add another layer of confusion in the technology.
Technology is complex enough, without adding a translation element.

I agree. The post I was referring to was talking about two Irish speakers having trouble talking about modern cars. Thing is that i wouldn't expect them to know the irish words for it because like you say it's just too complicated and the words already exist in english.

feargale

FortySeven wrote: »

I worked with folks who spoke Irish. It's funny listening to the peppering of English every few seconds to describe all the modern things they dont have words for.

Since the Tower of Babel or thereabouts languages have been thieving and borrowing from each other in a manner that might embarrass magpies and seagulls.
It's not surprising that English is the chief supplier of words, it being the dominant world language of our time. French occupied that position in the 18th and 19th centuries, Latin at an earlier time. And it should certainly be no surprise that Irish, living in the shadow of that great language, should be especially influenced by it.
Here are some expressions I've heard: "Lifestyle choices" and "Mother's Day" in Maltese; "Bumper to bumper" in Dutch.
Dutch has taken so much from English in the last 50 years that it is probably more peppered with English words and expressions than Irish ever was or will be.
To find a language today that isn't peppered with English would probably necessitate a journey to the jungles of New Guinea or Brazil.

Iwasfrozen

Iwasfrozen wrote: »

The revival failed, not because schools taught Irish badly (though that was a factor) but primarily because people didn't want to learn and speak Irish in their everyday life.

To say that parents don't support their children while learning Irish would be a lot nearer to truth. In Wales, parents want their children to speak Welsh and the language is flourishing!

feargale

feargale wrote: »

Dutch has taken so much from English in the last 50 years that it is probably more peppered with English words and expressions than Irish ever was or will be.
To find a language today that isn't peppered with English would probably necessitate a journey to the jungles of New Guinea or Brazil.

Dutch and English are sister languages anyway, they both already share many words so there was no real need to borrow words, but yes the Dutch are now using English words that they have borrowed.

Deleted User

Deleted User wrote: »

Dutch and English are sister languages anyway, they both already share many words so there was no real need to borrow words, but yes the Dutch are now using English words that they have borrowed.

Steve McClaren made the seamless transition anyway

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2ZnoP4sUV90

Iwasfrozen

[Deleted User] wrote: »

To say that parents don't support their children while learning Irish would be a lot nearer to truth. In Wales, parents want their children to speak Welsh and the language is flourishing!

The problem is far more to do with parents themselves not learning Irish. One big factor in the failing of the government's revival plan was the over reliance on schools.

Welsh is not a useful comparison. The percentage of welsh speakers was never as low as Irish speakers in Ireland.

Iwasfrozen

Iwasfrozen wrote: »

The problem is far more to do with parents themselves not learning Irish. One big factor in the failing of the government's revival plan was the over reliance on schools.

Welsh is not a useful comparison. The percentage of welsh speakers was never as low as Irish speakers in Ireland.

Welsh is the nearest relevant comparison, due to the fact that Welsh people for generations were "encouraged" to speak English, many schools were English only the and the welsh not was in use.
The only real difference was the language shift that happened here in the middle of the 19th century when parents wanted their children to be English speaking and actively abandon Irish, that never really happened in Wales.

Junkyard Tom

Berserker wrote: »

Irish nationalism is great if you are white, Catholic and Irish. Not much equality otherwise ....

We've had hundreds of thousands of immigrants to Ireland in recent years who'd probably disagree with that rubbish.

Iwasfrozen

[Deleted User] wrote: »

Welsh is the nearest relevant comparison, due to the fact that Welsh people for generations were "encouraged" to speak English, many schools were English only the and the welsh not was in use.
The only real difference was the language shift that happened here in the middle of the 19th century when parents wanted their children to be English speaking and actively abandon Irish, that never really happened in Wales.

Exactly, so Welsh isn't a good comparison since its condition has never been as bad as Irish. Irish is more like Scots Gaelic.

mazwell

I was in the middle of replying to this last night when my daughter had a bad dream. We're from an Irish speaking area and she has English but that's not what she freaks out in. She freaks in her dream in gaeilge cus that what she speaks. I agree that people shouldn't be made to speak gaeilge in their leaving cert. But those of us who grew up with Irish shouldnt have to explain ourselves to the rest of "ireland"

BabyE

Ireland is a nation of philistines, no surprise there is no appetite for the language, people dont have the awareness here to embark on such a cultural endeavor

Atari Jaguar

BabyE wrote: »

Ireland is a nation of philistines, no surprise there is no appetite for the language, people dont have the awareness here to embark on such a cultural endeavor

:rolleyes: on the Ireland bash this evening yeah? This is the second time I've seen you making us out to be a bunch of clowns.

LordSutch

Johnboner wrote: »

Why Irish language still exists?

Because it was made the 1st official language of the State in the 1930s, hence it was then introduced into all Irish schools as a mandatory subject, with the intent that all children would then adopt Irish as their 1st spoken language. This project has now been running for approximately 80 years . . .

BabyE

Atari Jaguer wrote: »

:rolleyes: on the Ireland bash this evening yeah? This is the second time I've seen you making us out to be a bunch of clowns.

I'm currently learning Irish, love Irish history, its not Irish bashing, it's ethnic criticism.

Iwasfrozen

Iwasfrozen wrote: »

Welsh is not a useful comparison. The percentage of welsh speakers was never as low as Irish speakers in Ireland.

More bigoted, ignorant anti-Irish raiméis out of you, different day.

'This religious revival brought with it a huge increase in printed production. Over 2,500 books were published during the eighteenth century, with the number of titles per year rising from ten in the 1730s to forty in the 1770s. While the trend over time was similar to Irish, the volume was far greater. We can illustrate this by comparing the comprehensive bibliography of Welsh books before 1820, which takes up two large volumes, about half of which were inWelsh, with the admittedly incomplete listing made in 1905 of books in Irish for the same period, which is a twenty-page pamphlet. The contrast is all the greater when it is borne in mind that there were maybe four times as many Irish speakers as Welsh in 1800....' (Niall Ó Ciosáin, 'Print and Irish, 1570-1900: An Exception among the Celtic Languages?', Radharc, Vol. 5/7 (2004 - 2006), p. 92.)

Princess Consuela Bananahammock

Johnboner wrote: »

Latin is more useful than Irish yet it is taught in schools. How about teaching the kids something useful like French or German talking about mandatory Irish in schools. Our government institutions at its finest again. Should listen to what a smart man once said. "Nationalism is an infantile disease, it is the measles of humanity." - Albert Einstein

It exists because lots of people enjoy it and find it an interesting way of communicating and expressing themselves, simple as.

While there's no way in hell it should be mandatory - that's just counterproductive on all sides - don't fall into the trap of thinking everything in school should be purely about being practical and getting jobs or education courses. Education should also be about freedom of expression and leanring how to express yourself and be creative.

"Laws alone can not secure freedom of expression in order that every man present his views without penalty there must be spirit of tolerance in the entire population."
- Albert Einstein again.

Iwasfrozen

Deleted User wrote: »

The contrast is all the greater when it is borne in mind that there were maybe four times as many Irish speakers as Welsh in 1800

Not what I wrote. Try again.

Dirty Dingus McGee

Computer coding being taught in Irish now.

http://www.independent.ie/irish-news/education/an-cd-now-children-can-learn-computer-coding-in-irish-for-the-first-time-35267864.html

Dirty Dingus McGee

The language could be revived very very quickly if the government had any balls.

Make every single primary school in the country a gaelscoil and within a generation we'd have all children going forward being fluent in irish and eventually the whole country would be fluent once the older generations die off.

This should have been done as soon as we gained independence and to be honest it's mystifying as to why it wasn't done.There would have been no negative effects to having a 100% bilingual country.

LordSutch

Dirty Dingus McGee wrote: »

The language could be revived very very quickly if the government had any balls.

Make every single primary school in the country a gaelscoil and within a generation we'd have all children going forward being fluent in irish and eventually the whole country would be fluent once the older generations die off.

This should have been done as soon as we gained independence and to be honest it's mystifying as to why it wasn't done.There would have been no negative effects to having a 100% bilingual country.

But then what about speaking it at home with their non Irish speaking parents?

I have been told that in order for Irish to become a widely spoken language, it must flourish in the home as well as being taught in school. It really needs more than countrywide gaelscoils .... The people/ parents also need to embrace it as their 1st language, and realistically I can't see that happening in the short term.

Princess Consuela Bananahammock

Dirty Dingus McGee wrote: »

The language could be revived very very quickly if the government had any balls.

Make every single primary school in the country a gaelscoil and within a generation we'd have all children going forward being fluent in irish and eventually the whole country would be fluent once the older generations die off.

This should have been done as soon as we gained independence and to be honest it's mystifying as to why it wasn't done.There would have been no negative effects to having a 100% bilingual country.

Been over this: you dont have right to force it on people who dont want it, and it wasn't done at Independence because people knew that.

nice_guy80

Princess Consuela Bananahammock wrote: »

Been over this: you dont have right to force it on people who dont want it, and it wasn't done at Independence because people knew that.

look at Israel

revived an almost dead language - Hebrew within two generations

maudgonner

Dirty Dingus McGee wrote: »

The language could be revived very very quickly if the government had any balls.

Make every single primary school in the country a gaelscoil and within a generation we'd have all children going forward being fluent in irish and eventually the whole country would be fluent once the older generations die off.

This should have been done as soon as we gained independence and to be honest it's mystifying as to why it wasn't done.There would have been no negative effects to having a 100% bilingual country.

The single biggest problem with this is that there is nowhere near the amount of teachers with the fluency required.

I know primary school teachers are meant to be competent in Irish, the sad truth is that many of them are shockingly poor at it.

Princess Consuela Bananahammock

nice_guy80 wrote: »

look at Israel

revived an almost dead language - Hebrew within two generations

Maybe so, but doesn't really challenge my point.

LordSutch

LordSutch wrote: »

Because it was made the 1st official language of the State in the 1930s, hence it was then introduced into all Irish schools as a mandatory subject, with the intent that all children would then adopt Irish as their 1st spoken language. This project has now been running for approximately 80 years . . .

The problem is the implementation was completely botched by a useless education system that failed everyone