The creeping prominence of the Irish language

If schools are not a means for promoting Irish outside schools why is there an obsession with having Irish in schools at all?

Your use of the word obsession tells me a lot about where you are coming from.

As I have said previously, schools are how our state imparts a certain level of education to our children, they are not at the centre of a community's social life. If you feel they should be, maybe you would be better off getting involved in politics rather than Boards.ie?

You talk as if Irish is a dead language like Latin.

I hope you were looking in a mirror while you wrote that ... because it is one of my main means of communication. Certainly very far from dead. In fact if we could be having this interchange in Irish, I would prefer it.

 What's the point of a language if its not used to communicate?

Which language is not used to communicate?

Even referencing TG4 and RnaG is not a good sign as people increasingly move to media outlets like Netflix, YouTube etc. Look at government and talk about moving away from the TV licence due to less and less people owning a TV.

Certainly many more people watch stuff online and it is a threat RTÉ and TG4 in many ways, but I wouldn't write the local broadcast media off just yet. Or do you expect all those commercial stations to disappear in the near future?

More money is required for teaching education through Irish compared to English for a number of reasons.

One English is the primary native language in Ireland. Its the first language the vast majority of the population learns to speak as a child. A huge amount of English education is effectively free as its done at home by parents and care givers. Irish with a vastly smaller amount of speakers(outside the education system that is) means the same education is not given in Irish and the relevant language skills and knowledge for Irish are not as developed.

If you were to cost that - in the Irish context - it might help your argument. (I'm assuming that we are talking about primary and secondary education in Irish vs in English here BTW)

Two English as the most wide spread International language has educational resources Irish will never match. https://www.shrm.org/resourcesandtools/hr-topics/behavioral-competencies/global-and-cultural-effectiveness/pages/viewpoint-the-silencing-of-esl-speakers.aspx Approximately 75% of English speakers are not native speakers. Therefore if you want to teach something through English you have far more ready to use resources available. A perfect example is Wikipedia and the amount of articles in English on the site when compared to every other language.

While Wikipedia is free to use, the rest of the materials available come with a cost, and indeed may not be suited to the Irish educational system for a variety of reasons. I cannot see how the existence of those materials does not reduce costs in the Irish primary and secondary school systems - perhaps you could explain, showing the specific savings involved, because a bare opinion not backed up with facts doesn't mean much here.

Three there is far more incentive to learn English than Irish and learn things through English. If you go outside your own country English is a good language to know because it aids communication with people who don't speak your language. The number of non native speakers of English is testament to that. And remember a lot of these non native speakers will be native speakers of languages that have many multiples of daily speakers when compared to Irish.

Ah, this old chestnut "What use is Irish when you go past Galway", "What use is Irish once you get off the train in Tralee".

Now it's "what use is Irish when you leave Ireland" - well that's progress of a sort, although nobody here is suggesting that education through Irish makes us forget our English, or indeed stops us from picking it up at school.

Do you think they ask much the same question in Estonia and the Netherlands, too?

Oh, and while we are here - could you demonstrate the cost reductions involved here?

Four and this is really a summary of my previous points English as a language has a wider eco system. More speakers more and wider variety content creators/services etc which means teaching through English will always be cheaper by a wide margin when compared to Irish. Now obviously that extra cost isn't a show stopper. However money isn't limitless and even at that why spend money on some that doesn't work and that goes for anything.

This is once again a statement of opinion - or maybe even just wishful thinking, with no facts backing it up. Pretty worthless really.

You also make the point of having people who speak the language but only listen to TG4 and RnaG.

I certainly did not mention anything about people who "only listen to TG4 and RnaG". I'd assume everyone who isn't a native Irish speaker, and many who are, has more than those two sources of entertainment & news.

(I'm presuming you meant ... who don't speak the language, and whose only contact with the language is listening to TG4 and RnaG ... )

But from my point of view I wouldn't view them as speakers of the language.

Passive speakers/users of the language. They form part of the Irish-language community, as consumers rather than producers, just as when you watch tv or a film in English you use your knowledge of the language. In fact a lot of people find comprehension of the spoken language more difficult than actually speaking the language.

 If you don't use a language you begin to forget it and a person's ability to understand it declines over time.

Which is precisely the reason my point about consumers of radio/tv is important - it keeps them up to date in the language, including new vocabulary etc.

...

And to bring it back to my question point why are Gaelscoils a sign of the strength of the Irish language at least as a living language? Based your response Gaelscoils are irrelevant to the discussion .

No, that's purely your spin. Gaelscoileanna are important because they produce new speakers of the language; but I'm repeating myself, and you have clearly decided not to take in anything that doesn't fit in whith your preconceived notions.

It is of course your right to close your mind to facts that you disliike, but don't expect others to engage with you in the future - I certainly won't be wasting my time again.

You can never tell with politics and politicians, though.

Precisely

On the first point:

You - "Indeed, I've seen your posts on the Irish language over several years, and they are generally contemptuous."

Me - "No you haven't, and no I haven't"

You - I've no idea what you are referring to here; but if you are saying you have never posted about Irish in the past, well it must have been a different PCB.

-- I'm refering the the bit that they are "generally contemptuous" - which mysteriously disappeared from you quote above.

Post 822, the words "generally contemptuous" are still there, I've just checked. And yes, I have previously read your thoughts on Irish, and yes, I have previously found them "generally contemptuous".

...

On the third point:

Saying that we need to do more of something you admit doesn't work well is.... kind of stupid. Not to mention arrogant when your stance effects tens of thousands of peope whose opnions you don't care about.

No, it's not stupid (hey, I thought you weren't being contemptuous; or maybe it's just an ad hominem? And indeed one of a sort you don't disapprove of).

The fact is that in the mainstream schools pupils do not get enough contact with Irish to become fluent - therefore (if the aim is to ensure competence in Irish) more contact with Irish is required to meet that aim.

On the fourth point:

It's not a life skill. It might be a career skill if they're teachers for example, but that's not a life skill.

You obviously don't want it to be, but for many of us it is.

And finally, let's not go down the road of ad homeinems. That's just weak. Stick to the arugments presented. I refuse to beleive there is no way to revive the langauge without duress and force, but if there isn't, then what does that tell you about the population? Are they ALL "generally contemptuous"? Is every leaveing cert student who wants to do somethign orther than Irish "generally cotemptuous"?

Well, you've got me there on life skills, I didn't realise they were nessekary, but now I know.

On the amount of contact hours, well to be fully competent there are studies that say you need 5000 hours.

Of course quality also matters, as you say increasing the quantity without improving the quality would be a bit of a waste. But then again contact hours are not achieved only by teaching more Irish, but in a school setting also by teaching through Irish. There have been some moves towards this, but I don't know how much of it has actually been carried out.

That said, research carried out in the Basque country has demonstrated that bilingual education produced a greater proportion of competent Basque speakers, but I do not remember the figures.

Well, if the only rebuttal you have is a typo, then yes we are most certainly finished with that part of the discussion. Gald you agree though.

5000 hours is two hours every day per school day for 14 years, which is a bit disproportionate, but that said even half that should result in some level of competency. Teaching non-Irish subjects through Irish is not going to happen in a non-gaelscoil unless there is a drive amongst parents, who are more than likely going to prioritise their kids' education over the langauge (or unless you do non-essential subjects like PE, which might not be a bad idea).

I still think getting it out of the classroom is he way forward, so kids start seeing it as an actual langauge and not a school subject. The less stressful it is to them, they more their going to enjoy it.

Would you have a link to any government website that calls the Irish language 'Gaelic'?

I answered the life-skill question in post #844 and no one has responded to it yet.

One final point deserves another. I have no intention of tracking down quotes nor need I . My use of the term 'Gaelic' is a predilection of mine for which I require no sanction from any other source. I like it- you don't. That's hunky dory and life goes on. It's not a big deal.

I don't know why revivalists get so worked up about this but then protagonists of the Gaelic revival do come up with some weird thought processes - bless their little cotton socks....so I suppose some allowances must be made.

Well if you know five languages at B2 fluency then good for you. You do have plenty to draw from.

To me it is unusual not to value the language you were educated in though because it's the means through which you got to learn about the world and yourself, but I suppose it's a personal question.