Is Irish actually spoken in the Gealtachts?

Sorry if I am intruding a little but I have some thing to add to the above discussion regarding English as a universal language or whatever. I don't know about Ireland, or England, but I do know that in Canada one of the largest English speaking countries, French is still spoken side by side with English so even a lot of Canadians who speak English do not exclusively do so. And here in the US there are parts of the country were English is only spoken at school everywhere else it is the local regional language.

I grew up in an area of Nevada where in my school everyone, myself included spoke Spanish, class reports were often in Spanish, dances were all spanish music with announcers speaking in spanish, the road signs and government notices all posted in English and Spanish but Spanish always came first because less people spoke English than Spanish and that was right here in America.

There are parts of a lot of southern states similar to this people will know and use more Spanish than English, in fact it has become a political topic of sorts in recent years because Spanish is starting to over take English in the US and pretty soon the most powerful and prominent English speaking country will be divided between English and Spanish and Spanish has already over taken English in world wide speakers.

A hundred years ago, before WWII German was the second most spoken language in the US and at that time it was actually spoken in schools and many parts of the US were exclusively German, especially in the Mid-west and the colonies that were settled by German immigrants. For over a hundred years German news papers were published side by side their English counterparts, and German was on the rise and was nearly popular enough to over take English in several states, WWII changed that suddenly it was outlawed in several states the speaking of German in public places government documents had to be in English only and German was wiped clean from our countries culture and collective minds where today even today if you are German or German descent you are a second class citizen, I know this all to well as my grandfather came straight over from Germany speaking German till the day he died.

The same happened to the natives, my grand mother is full blooded Shoshonee so I have some indian in me too so I can speak on this subject, there used to be MILLIONS of Native American speakers of hundreds of native languages, today there are FIVE native American languages left and of those five only two have a chance to survive the others are spoken only by elderly men who are near death and their children have already assimilated into American English society. There are a few other Native languages that limp along in back woods areas of their Reservations used only for ceremonies but not even taught in their own schools.


Friends the English speakers of this world are snobs about their language and the Spanish are the first to stand up to them and say NO we will not give up our language and culture and if you call any phone number to any business SPANISH comes up first then you have to press 2 for English.


I say this because Irish is actually a rich language, your language is older than English and your culture is a hell of a lot more defined than "ours" American culture is mix and match what we like throw out what we don't and piss on everyone else. I used to love being an American until I grew up and realized our country sucks we hate everyone and we are the most arrogant stubborn asses ever to walk the Earth.



If you are serious about saving Irish take a lesson from the Mexicans FORCE it on people. Just stop dead cold turkey using English and be a snob about it right back. When you call into a business to ask questions about your bill start up in Irish and if they can't accommodate you GET ANGRY at them and repeat your demands and stick to your guns. You can not be passive about it you HAVE to be aggressive about it the British were sure as hell not anything close to passive about forcing it on you, nor were the Americans passive about forcing it on me, I could have been fluent in German had my dad not been afraid of his neighbors and here I am as English as you can be sitting in the middle of America wondering what went wrong? I am taking a stand I have set myself on a quest to learn all the languages of my ancestors and I am not going to sit down and let the Spanish be told they have to give up and assimilate because that is what my Irish and German forefathers did no sir I am standing up and fighting back you know why, because ENGLISH is the most damn complicated and confusing language ever conceived.

It was forced upon me and my family and we were conditioned "we are white and white people speak English" screw that I traced my family tree we haven't a drop of English blood in us it's all Irish, German, some French and my Native Shoshone roots I don't have any desire to hide. Am I white skinned yeah sure so what Italians are white but they speak Italian French people are white but they speak French why do I have to speak English because I live in America, I read our Constitution there is NO official language in this country.

If you are complacent and passive your language will die that is a fact, there are more people here in the city I live in than the entire Irish speaking population in your entire country, the country where Irish originates and the Irish are scared to use it that is just like the Cherokee ever heard of them? Or the Choctaw or the Shoshone, or how about the Aztecs their language is long forgotten. Hell consider back to the Spanish that is why they are so aggressive is because Spanish was already forced upon them once and they had to give up their native tongue already why should they do it again.




EDIT: Hey sorry if that came off wrong it was not meant to be in anger just trying to be supportive.

A few pages back I posted a map of the State, and the amount of self acclaimed Irish speakers, county by county. I think somebody replied that it was strange that a 'solidly monolingual' Clare had returned such a high number. But, I read this week in Gaelscéal that Clare is not so solidly monolingual as all that.

http://www.gaelsceal.ie/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1325:gaeltacht-an-chlair-le-heiri-aris&catid=2:nuacht-naisiunta&Itemid=290

Fuinseog wrote: »

what do you mean by Irish? the language taught in school is book irish and essentially dead a doornail and completely artificial.

That's a bit of an over simplistic exaggeration don't you think?

The Irish taught in school's is generally the Official standard of Irish, given that this is a compromise between the Dialects it is hardly fair to call it completely artificial. Certainly it is no more artificial than the Standard of any other language.
Thanks to the Gaelscoils, there are thousands of fluent speakers of that kind of Irish, so its hardly accurate to call it dead.
As for people coming out with Nonsense translated google style directly from English into Irish, the worst example I ever heard of that was from a girl who grew up in the Gaeltacht. (Oh mo dhia, Tá tú ag freeckáil amach mé.)