All Estate Names to be in Irish

Powerhouse · 05-12-2009 11:37PM

PirateShampoo wrote: »

The sign changes dont make anyone want to learn Irish, to do that they need better teachers who dont try to force it down your throat.

Tis true for you - Irish teachers should do like Geography, Maths and English teachers (apparently) and give their students a choice of playing snakes and ladders or learning Irish in class. That'd revive the language fairly quick I can tell you.

Buceph · 05-12-2009 11:40PM

Powerhouse wrote: »

Tis true for you - Irish teachers should do like Geography, Maths and English teachers (apparently) and give their students a choice of playing snakes and ladders or learning Irish in class. That'd revive the language fairly quick I can tell you.

Why are geography, maths and English teachers giving their students a choice of learning Irish in their classes?

Whosbetter? · 05-12-2009 11:44PM

Dionysus wrote: »

Godwin's Law (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Godwin%27s_law). Lame.

Well, we all have our hobbies, be it fishing, cars, drinking etc.

The difference between the Irish Language Brigade & the rest of us , is that they expect the rest of us to pay for their folly, sorry hobby.

Powerhouse · 05-12-2009 11:48PM

kowloon wrote: »

I also dislike some attitudes concerning anti-Irish language being one and the same as being anti-Irish.

You disliking this does not change the fact that anti-Irish language attitudes and anti-Irishness - or at least a strong cultural self-loathing -very often do tend to go hand in hand. It is the truth of it that perhaps annoys people.

Powerhouse · 05-12-2009 11:50PM

Buceph wrote: »

Why are geography, maths and English teachers giving their students a choice of learning Irish in their classes?

Because having a choice of activity makes them love Geography, Maths and English all the more. If they rammed these subjects down the students' throats they'd hate them too. Choice is the thing. Try to keep up please.

Buceph · 05-12-2009 11:52PM

Ok.

Dudess · 05-12-2009 11:53PM

Other side of the same coin is the rabidly "proud to be Irish" contingent that considers anyone who deviates from their position a "west Brit" etc. Personally I think Irish should be taught, but not mandatory after junior cert. Nothing to do with "self loathing" - I actually don't think any subject should be mandatory after junior cert, but then again, that would require an entire rehaulage of the system.

Whosbetter? · 06-12-2009 12:00AM

Powerhouse wrote: »

You disliking this does not change the fact that anti-Irish language attitudes and anti-Irishness - or at least a strong cultural self-loathing -very often do tend to go hand in hand. It is the truth of it that perhaps annoys people.

Doesn't need to be the case.

Always hated having to do it in school, (that auld Peig was great craic, wasn't she?).

I'm 100% Irish, & and proud to be so!

Powerhouse · 06-12-2009 12:00AM

Dudess wrote: »

Personally I think Irish should be taught

Why?

Dudess · 06-12-2009 12:01AM

I think it would be a shame to just discard the language.

humanji · 06-12-2009 12:02AM

Powerhouse wrote: »

Because having a choice of activity makes them love Geography, Maths and English all the more. If they rammed these subjects down the students' throats they'd hate them too. Choice is the thing. Try to keep up please.

So basically you've no counter argument and so resort to the good old straw man argument. I wish I could tell you it was a new technique, I really do.

Powerhouse · 06-12-2009 12:02AM

Whosbetter? wrote: »

Doesn't need to be the case.

Always hated having to do it in school, (that auld Peig was great craic, wasn't she?).

I'm 100% Irish, & and proud to be so!

Well obviously it doesn't need to be the case - these are people's opinions and they don't need to be that way but they often are.

Incidentally could you define '100% Irish'?

Whosbetter? · 06-12-2009 12:04AM

Powerhouse wrote: »

Incidentally could you define '100% Irish'?

Well every ancestor I know of was born in this country.

I can go back a long way on this.

aDeener · 06-12-2009 12:08AM

kowloon wrote: »

It would cover the vaccine though, the cost wast six million for the full programme was it not? I could be wrong on that.

i dont know the figures either but you can be damn sure that whatever is being spent on irish is not restricting any of them. the expenditure on irish is immaterial in comparison to government finances. people against irish for the purpose of saving money is rather similiar to people looking to abolish the seanad, it wont save the bloody country, it wont even come remotely close. too many fail to see the bigger picture

aDeener · 06-12-2009 12:09AM

Whosbetter? wrote: »

Well every ancestor I know of was born in this country.

I can go back a long way on this.

and thats your definition?

stovelid · 06-12-2009 12:13AM

It's horrible to think of it going but it will die in a meaningful sense, except in enforced ways like signs and state organs.

I'm sure there are pedagogues that know more than me but I wouldn't even "teach" it any more. I came to taught Irish at 11 years old, and it was torturous. At least back then. The literature in secondary and so on was so irrelevant to kids that age, even when you take the brute, rote learning out of the equation.

Given the crisis in the language, and the loathing felt by kids for it, It would be worth looking into making school Irish a different model, less academic. Trying some way of making the classes a cultural and social affair with the aim of making kids proud to be Irish and speaking it to a reasonable level. A class that would be a break from other classes even. Not stuffing Scotihscealta(?) and Peig into them (well, in my day anyway).

Perhaps even teach through Irish in all schools from lower infants although this would pose problems for foreign students perhaps, or students that enter the Irish school system late as I did.

Not a teacher or pedagogue obviously, just venting. Not sure how practical any of this would be.

Powerhouse · 06-12-2009 12:14AM

humanji wrote: »

So basically you've no counter argument and so resort to the good old straw man argument. I wish I could tell you it was a new technique, I really do.

So basically I am saying that the old yarn that if Irish was not "rammed down people's throats they'd all love it" is a load of bollox. I wish I could tell you that was a new argument, I really do, but it's an old tired argument with more leaks than a tribunal. Compulsion has diddley squat to do with attitudes to the language - how come nobody ever whinges all the complusory subjects they face in Junior cycle?

And spare us the 'straw man' claptrap as if you were a professional arguer with all the jargon. If you want to contradict me grow a pair and do it properly.

Powerhouse · 06-12-2009 12:16AM

stovelid wrote: »

Not stuffing Scotihscealta(?) and Peig into them (well, in my day anyway).

Ah please, come on - "in my day". How can anyone who is so out of touch decide to chip in their tuppence worth? The Irish syllabus changed from that years ago.

Dudess · 06-12-2009 12:18AM

I found LC literature in particular absolutely painful (although some of the poetry was all right). My grades dropped considerably between JC and LC - not due to my working any less, just due to the sheer tedium of the texts. Peig was unbearable.

That was the mid 90s though - maybe things have changed?

06-12-2009 12:18AM

aDeener wrote: »

and thats your definition?

What's yours?

If everyone on your family tree is Irish, you're 100% Irish.

kowloon · 06-12-2009 12:19AM

Powerhouse wrote: »

You disliking this does not change the fact that anti-Irish language attitudes and anti-Irishness - or at least a strong cultural self-loathing -very often do tend to go hand in hand. It is the truth of it that perhaps annoys people.

Not many people would have a problem with the language itself, it's the fact that it's forced on them that matters. A problem with policy as opposed to culture.

Irish speakers don't have some a monopoly on Irishness. The 'cultural awareness' of a lot of proud Irish speakers I've met has extended no further than being Catholic and extremely anti-British, yet I'm not about to tar them all with the same brush as I'm pretty sure it would be wrong to judge an entire group by the attitudes of one parish.

I would agree that people with an interest in our culture might be more interested in learning the language, but lack of interest in learning the language does not equate with contempt for our culture.

Ultimately I believe culture is fluid, it evolves and I don't think that anyone should be trying to control it. Trying to hold onto the past through coercion is conservatism at its worst and will lead to stagnation, not some kind of Gaelic revival that some people seem to think all this social engineering will somehow bring about. /rant

06-12-2009 12:21AM

Powerhouse wrote: »

So basically I am saying that the old yarn that if Irish was not "rammed down people's throats they'd all love it" is a load of bollox. I wish I could tell you that was a new argument, I really do, but it's an old tired argument with more leaks than a tribunal. Compulsion has diddley squat to do with attitudes to the language - how come nobody ever whinges all the complusory subjects they face in Junior cycle?

And spare us the 'straw man' claptrap as if you were a professional arguer with all the jargon. If you want to contradict me grow a pair and do it properly.

I've a cousin in the north who chose to do Irish for his A Levels.. Out of anyone I know, he has more interest in the language and is much better at it than the average person who is forced to do it for the Leavin.

Whosbetter? · 06-12-2009 12:21AM

aDeener wrote: »

and thats your definition?

Yeah.

My family, like most Irish people years ago, were involved in farming.

They cultivated the land.

They ate the produce from the land.

They made the land & the land made them.

IRISH LAND!

With their hard work, contributing to the IRISH econemy for countless decades.

I think that's as good a qualification as any that any money-grabbing Irish Language Enthuisiast can muster.

aDeener · 06-12-2009 12:23AM

Deleted User wrote: »

What's yours?

If everyone on your family tree is Irish, you're 100% Irish.

that would be my definition alright, but it is highly unlikely/impossible everyone on your family tree is irish so there is no way anyone is 100% irish, just pure bullshit being spouted by someone not in favour of supporting the irish language to make it appear he is not biased against ireland in any shape or form

kowloon · 06-12-2009 12:24AM

Dudess wrote: »

Personally I think Irish should be taught, but not mandatory after junior cert. Nothing to do with "self loathing" - I actually don't think any subject should be mandatory after junior cert, but then again, that would require an entire rehaulage of the system.

Agreed, if people had a choice in what they studied, the people that had a true passion for the language would be the ones doing it, and that can only be a good thing. I feel exactly the same way about English, how many have been put off reading for life thanks to the leaving cert forcing them to engage with literature in such a rigid way?

06-12-2009 12:25AM

aDeener wrote: »

that would be my definition alright, but it is highly unlikely/impossible everyone on your family tree is irish so there is no way anyone is 100% irish, just pure bullshit being spouted by someone not in favour of supporting the irish language to make it appear he is not biased against ireland in any shape or form

He said he's 100% Irish and this is your response?

Yea, cause he's spouting BS :rolleyes:

aDeener · 06-12-2009 12:25AM

Deleted User wrote: »

I've a cousin in the north who chose to do Irish for his A Levels.. Out of anyone I know, he has more interest in the language and is much better at it than the average person who is forced to do it for the Leavin.

thats a contradiction and a half, unless of course you know everyone who sat the leaving and calculated the averages of their aptitude and interest for the irish language

aDeener · 06-12-2009 12:26AM

Deleted User wrote: »

He said he's 100% Irish and this is your response?

Yea, cause he's spouting BS :rolleyes:

what is incorrect with what i said?

06-12-2009 12:28AM

aDeener wrote: »

thats a contradiction and a half, unless of course you know everyone who sat the leaving and calculated the averages of their aptitude and interest for the irish language

... So how about we go back on topic and stop picking holes in posts for no reason?

You know what I fuking meant.

aDeener wrote: »

what is incorrect with what i said?

You made a pretty big assumption about why he said he was proud to be Irish. You said it was bullshít.

What was incorrect in what he said? That at some point that he is unaware of, there may be a non-Irish in his family tree?

humanji · 06-12-2009 12:28AM

Powerhouse wrote: »

So basically I am saying that the old yarn that if Irish was not "rammed down people's throats they'd all love it" is a load of bollox. I wish I could tell you that was a new argument, I really do, but it's an old tired argument with more leaks than a tribunal. Compulsion has diddley squat to do with attitudes to the language - how come nobody ever whinges all the complusory subjects they face in Junior cycle?

And spare us the 'straw man' claptrap as if you were a professional arguer with all the jargon. If you want to contradict me grow a pair and do it properly.

Man have you missed out on what I was saying. Maybe you're just not reading you're own posts? You're claiming people are prejudiced because they think Irish is a wasted course. This is a straw man argument. Nobody is saying what you claim they are. You're building up a defence to an argument nobody is talking about. Grow a pair of eyes and read the f*cking thread.

All Estate Names to be in Irish

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