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Child Item

Polish as official 3rd language

connundrum

A guy (the editor I think) from Szpila Magazine, a Polish Community mag was on the radio this morning promoting the idea of introducing Polish as the official 3rd language of Ireland.

The reasoning behind it being that there are 250,000 Poles living in Ireland and that life for them is relatively difficult i.e. reading signs, communicating with officials etc. The thinking is that once Polish is recognised as an official language, then all documents will have to be produced in triplicate. (There were a number of other benefits but I was driving and didn't catch the others)

He was all for it, suggesting that Irish people could be learning Polish in schools, that Polish people would benefit from it in that it'd aid integration into Irish society. He even went as far as to suggest that a few Polish history lessons mightn't go amiss.

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Tigger

cornbb wrote: »

With respect to Terry (who is great), this is the funniest post I've read today

'e's not forgien is he?

the_syco

An Citeog wrote: »

I mean, we could've manipulated the Irish gene pool to create some sort of "master race". I'm sure I heard that someone tried this before. Not sure how it turned out though?!

Seconded. German would be a great 3rd languge, esp as the EU HQ is there, and all. Also, it'll help their "master race" policy that they used to have. You know: the one where Germany wanted a united Nazi European Union Europe.

DonJose

Well the first 'Polish-only' school begins classes tomorrow. So much for integration.

http://www.independent.ie/national-news/polishonly-school-begins-classes-1199614.html

Terry

jsb wrote: »

you could become an over bearing mod on the most popular forum of their countries biggest website

I don't speak any other languages, so I'll just be overbearing here for the time being.

Feel free to voice your disapproval of my moderating in this thread.

Hobbes

Official third language? No.

Learn the current languages. Heck the population have problems learning the first two.

AFAIR, most offical documents government related are translated into other languages. For example the Census, and some road signs around airports.

But as something that would be rolled out over the country as an official language. No.

rubie

Just as an aside - if you ring one of the main insurance companies (Allianz - I think) the machine voice gives instructions in English and then Polish. Takes forever to get through all the options.

Zzippy

SimpleSam06 wrote: »

Actually Ireland mostly allowed in so many Polish because the UK was doing it, and we have an open land border with the UK. The UK itself was astounded at the scale of the economic migration, and as far as I know cut back drastically on the numbers it was letting in. Should migrants prove detrimental to Ireland or Irish culture, the same can be done here as well.

Actually, Ireland let in so many Polish because they chose to come to a strong economy with jobs, and because they were an EU member state they had freedom of movement - when the accession countries joined the EU Ireland was one of the member states who did not place restrictions on numbers. They subsequently did do that with Romania, but not with the 10 (IIRC) countries who joined a few years ago. Don't think they could do it retrospectively - and in any case if they wanted to it would be for economic reasons i.e. economic downturn, fewer jobs, in which case many of the Poles would have gone home anyway.

An Citeog

DonJose wrote: »

Well the first 'Polish-only' school begins classes tomorrow. So much for integration.

http://www.independent.ie/national-news/polishonly-school-begins-classes-1199614.html

Did you actually read the article? :rolleyes:

Irish Iindependent wrote:

'Polish-only' school begins classes

Friday October 19 2007

A SCHOOL teaching exclusively in the Polish language, the first of its kind in the Southeast, will begin classes tomorrow.

More than 100 pupils have enrolled for the weekend school in Waterford, which is based at St Paul's Community College and will teach subjects such as history and geography, but from a Polish perspective.

The school in Waterford, and another in Cork, were officially launched last weekend.

Funded by the Polish government, the weekend schools are designed to cater for Polish children that may return to their native country in the future. Children attending the weekend schools are sent with the consent of parents, and they are also obliged to attend Irish schools mid-week.

Principal of St Paul's Community College, Anthony Condron, said: "The Irish have gone all over the world and it is time for us to welcome others into our culture."

It's being funded by the Polish government, it's a weekend school and was designed to give Polish kids the chance to finish their education in Poland should it be necessary.

[Deleted User]

If I move to Spain, I'll learn to speak Spanish. If I move to China, I'll learn to speak Chinese.

If we make polish an official language, does that mean it would be taught in our primary/secondary schools? And if thats the case, what use is it to us?

purple'n'gold

Why didn't anyone else think of that? I mean, we could've manipulated the Irish gene pool to create some sort of "master race". I'm sure I heard that someone tried this before. Not sure how it turned out though?!

[/QUOTE]

Not really worried about anybody else’s gene pool, (especially not Nazi Germany’s) but ours would have benefited hugely if instead of exporting our brightest and best (looking) we had been in the position to welcome beautiful Polish immigrants. (I’m only talking about women; I’ll leave the discussion on men to better qualified people.)

digitally-yours

ned78 wrote: »

I gotta say I'm with eo980 on this too. I'm with my Polish missus for about 2 years now, and we've lots of Polish friends. My other half is happy to stay here, but her friends will return to Poland as soon as they have enough money put away. This Polish in Ireland phase is just that, a phase. We have a great economy currently, and it attracts migrant workers, and as soon as that economy downturns, they'll be off home, or to the next bouyant market.

Making long term plans to change the education of Irish people to suit an immigrant demographic is a little silly. I'm learning Polish at the moment, and it's not easy by any means, and I do think our educational system would be better served teaching students some of the larger economic languages, German, Spanish, etc.

Absolutely Spot on

[Deleted User]

This may seem like a silly question, but how many countries actually speak Polish? Is it solely Poland?

digitally-yours

Deleted User wrote: »

This may seem like a silly question, but how many countries actually speak Polish? Is it solely Poland?

yes i think its only the official language in Poland.

Except that its spoken in other countries as well by the polish migrants.

If i could learn i would love to learn

"Chinese" = They will be leading the world soon
"Japanese" = Their economy is very sound
"Spanish" = necessary as its widely spoken after English
"German" = Their economy is good too and if you know German it has its advantages.

mathie

cornbb wrote: »

Its a dumb idea. Poles and whoever else are welcome in our country as far as I'm concerned but making Polish an official language is a few steps too far.

I agree with the practice of making information available in foreign languages though, this is the case with citizensinformation.ie, bank documentation etc etc already. I also think that a certain amount of government subsidisation for Polish cultural initiatives would be apt; they do make a large tax contribution after all.

I lived in Germany for a year.
Not a sniff of any documents or forms from the banks being in anything other than German.

If you go to a country you need to understand the language.
Otherwise hard luck.

M

purple'n'gold

digitally-yours wrote: »

yes i think its only the official language in Poland.

Except that its spoken in other countries as well by the polish migrants.

If i could learn i would love to learn

"Chinese" = They will be leading the world soon
"Japanese" = Their economy is very sound
"Spanish" = necessary as its widely spoken after English
"German" = Their economy is good too and if you know German it has its advantages.

What exactly do you mean by the Chinese will be leading the world?

digitally-yours

purplengold wrote: »

What exactly do you mean by the Chinese will be leading the world?

Click here

If you know business and read few things apart from Bebo u will know more

purple'n'gold

digitally-yours wrote: »

Click here

If you know business and read few things apart from Bebo u will know more

Apart from making dodgy toys and destroying the environment with their filthy coal fired generating stations, maybe they will lead the world with their wonderful human rights record?
Ps what on earth are you talking about, Bebo????

An Citeog

purplengold wrote: »

Apart from making dodgy toys and destroying the environment with their filthy coal fired generating stations, maybe they will lead the world with their wonderful human rights record?
Ps what on earth are you talking about, Bebo????

The Chinese economy is booming at the moment and it's only going to get bigger. The ignorance in your post is baffling. If I were to learn another language, apart from my brain exploding, it would definitely be Chinese.

digitally-yours

purplengold wrote: »

Apart from making dodgy toys and destroying the environment with their filthy coal fired generating stations, maybe they will lead the world with their wonderful human rights record?
Ps what on earth are you talking about, Bebo????

china is making everything its not just the Dodgy toys

HP = made in china
Nikon= Made in china
Cannon=Made in china
Panasonic=Made in china
and the list goes on ...

Also see the following link.

http://www.finfacts.com/irelandbusinessnews/publish/article_1011468.shtml

syklops

zuutroy wrote: »

Thats one of the stupidest ideas I've ever heard

Im not for it, but there are more people in Ireland who speak polish fluently, than who speak Irish fluently. I know, I know, Its our heritage, cultural right, blah blah blah. But the truth is if you want to communicate with people from other countries, Irish is of absolutely no use what soever(unless you work for Mossad). I loath the 14 years I spent being taught it. If I had instead learnt polish, I could propose to my girlfriend in her native tongue(fyi she is staying here) and manage to communicate with czecks, slovaks and other eastern countries. If I had spent the time learning Arabic, I could get a job with any Intelligence service/embassy/translating company in the world. Heck, even if I had learnt latin, it would have been a help as most european languages stem from it. Polish sounds at times like latin.

When the irish emmigrated to America millions of years ago, most spoke english, some may have spoken mainly Irish with some english, but when they arrived off the boat, at least the street signs were in English, and not in English and Mohican/Iroquis. Would so many have stayed if they were?

Again I want to say I am not necessarily for it, but look at the number of people who actually speak our current national tongue. Personally I think it is too early to decide to add polish. If the population of polish people stays at or above 250,000 for 10 years, then yes, it has my vote.

you can all light your torches and get your pitchforks now.

An Citeog

mathie wrote: »

I lived in Germany for a year.
Not a sniff of any documents or forms from the banks being in anything other than German.

If you go to a country you need to understand the language.
Otherwise hard luck.

M

QFT! You can get away with just English for the general day to day stuff but administrative staff in all local government departments/banks I've encountered only speak their native language. We take it for granted that everybody speaks English but how many Irish/English/American people speak a foreign language with any degree of competency?

syklops

An Citeog wrote: »

QFT! You can get away with just English for the general day to day stuff but administrative staff in all local government departments/banks I've encountered only speak their native language. We take it for granted that everybody speaks English but how many Irish/English/American people speak a foreign language with any degree of competency?

Quite alot actually. In the US you learn french or spanish from a young age. I have friends who speak french and or spanish fluently, and I have one friend wo speaks English, Irish, and french fluently, speaks Dutch and Polish well, and is about to start Hindi.

syklops

Deleted User wrote: »

This may seem like a silly question, but how many countries actually speak Polish? Is it solely Poland?

if you speak polish you can communicate with czeck, slovak, and other eastern countries as they are very similar. I think Czeck is almost exactly the same.

Poland has roughly 35Million people, so its not like your learning some little known language with only a handful of people who use it, like one language that springs to mind....

Tigger

syklops wrote: »

if you speak polish you can communicate with czeck, slovak, and other eastern countries as they are very similar. I think Czeck is almost exactly the same.

Poland has roughly 35Million people, so its not like your learning some little known language with only a handful of people who use it, like one language that springs to mind....

everyone speaks english

Rock Climber

connundrum wrote: »

A guy (the editor I think) from Szpila Magazine, a Polish Community mag was on the radio this morning promoting the idea of introducing Polish as the official 3rd language of Ireland.

The reasoning behind it being that there are 250,000 Poles living in Ireland and that life for them is relatively difficult i.e. reading signs, communicating with officials etc. The thinking is that once Polish is recognised as an official language, then all documents will have to be produced in triplicate. (There were a number of other benefits but I was driving and didn't catch the others)

He was all for it, suggesting that Irish people could be learning Polish in schools, that Polish people would benefit from it in that it'd aid integration into Irish society. He even went as far as to suggest that a few Polish history lessons mightn't go amiss.

What to do...

He must have known that was a non runner.
250,000 polish in Ireland? It's probably closer to 150,000 to be honest. and even that is more than double what the census stated if you allow for a huge amount who didnt fill in a census last year (that might be high but not 190k poles)

http://www.cso.ie/statistics/nationalityagegroup.htm

Scoobydoobydoo

syklops wrote: »

Im not for it, but there are more people in Ireland who speak polish fluently, than who speak Irish fluently. I know, I know, Its our heritage, cultural right, blah blah blah. But the truth is if you want to communicate with people from other countries, Irish is of absolutely no use what soever(unless you work for Mossad). I loath the 14 years I spent being taught it. If I had instead learnt polish, I could propose to my girlfriend in her native tongue(fyi she is staying here) and manage to communicate with czecks, slovaks and other eastern countries. If I had spent the time learning Arabic, I could get a job with any Intelligence service/embassy/translating company in the world. Heck, even if I had learnt latin, it would have been a help as most european languages stem from it. Polish sounds at times like latin.

When the irish emmigrated to America millions of years ago, most spoke english, some may have spoken mainly Irish with some english, but when they arrived off the boat, at least the street signs were in English, and not in English and Mohican/Iroquis. Would so many have stayed if they were?

Again I want to say I am not necessarily for it, but look at the number of people who actually speak our current national tongue. Personally I think it is too early to decide to add polish. If the population of polish people stays at or above 250,000 for 10 years, then yes, it has my vote.

you can all light your torches and get your pitchforks now.

I would not agree with your attitude of showing more concern for a foreign tongue than your own heritage blah blah blah.

I would not agree with this in a million years, let alone ten.

Personally, I'd have more use for French, Italian or German, as I would visit these countries on a regular basis. I've no intentions of visiting Poland on a regular basis, but also the language doesn't appeal to me to want to learn it. I have only met one Polish person in Ireland, but if I was meeting them every day of my life, I still wouldn't want it as an official language. I would be offended if any language was made an official third language.

I wouldn't care if any particular nationality overtook the Irish population in Ireland, I still would be set against any change.

I think it is extremely cheeky for anyone to make this suggestion. This is not compatible with integration. They wouldn't have to bother learning English if this happened.

An Citeog

syklops wrote: »

Quite alot actually. In the US you learn french or spanish from a young age. I have friends who speak french and or spanish fluently, and I have one friend wo speaks English, Irish, and french fluently, speaks Dutch and Polish well, and is about to start Hindi.

Not that many actually! While the US has been forced (to some degree) to learn Spanish, Ireland is terrible for its knowledge of foreign languages. The UK is somewhat better but it's still poor. In most other European countries, people can speak their native tongue and some level of English.

Wacker

knightmare wrote: »

A lot of american schools do teach spanish though! Possibly because of the large number of south american immigrants

The US doesn't actually have an officiial language, unless I'm very much mistaken. Thus it makes sense that the schools would teach in the language of the local majority.

Sponge Bob

Nach féidir leo Gaeilge a fhoghlam má tá siad dáiríre faoin tír seo, agus muna bhfuil nach féidir leo canúint wha bud story Bhaile Átha Cliath a fhoghlam ina h-áit .

Bhfearr liomsa Spáinis mar thriú theanga ....más gá ceann !

digitally-yours

Sponge Bob wrote: »

Nach féidir leo Gaeilge a fhoghlam má tá siad dáiríre faoin tír seo, agus muna bhfuil nach féidir leo canúint wha bud story Bhaile Átha Cliath a fhoghlam ina h-áit .

Bhfearr liomsa Spáinis mar thriú theanga ....más gá ceann !