The future of Irish

DEFTLEFTHAND · 17-06-2012 12:04AM

I'd like to see it preserved and remained to be taught in schools. It won't ever be a dominant language in Ireland again, If anything it will probably further regress unfortunately.

gsxr1 · 17-06-2012 12:08AM

There is a patronizing wanker at work who goes around speaking the few sentences he knows in Irish, knowing fine well no one understands him.

It is a common agreement between all 25 men that the lad in question is in fact A Dickhead.
This is mainly because of his insistence in speaking in Irish and making everyone say back to him "stop being an arse hole and tell me what you said", when all they want to do is get on with their work.

Make the horrible sound go away. It's worse sounding than German..

Bombay Allee · 17-06-2012 12:11AM

ich hoffe Irisch wird immer mehr gesprochen. ich gebe selber ganz viel múhe.

PrincessLola · 17-06-2012 12:17AM

Ficheall wrote: »

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0dyuxRA2gis

What are you trying to say??
You're gonna have to reply in words, not videos of stand-up comedians.

SusieBlue · 17-06-2012 12:23AM

I know most people think the language is pointless, but myself and my friends are fluent (went to a Gaelscoil) and we find it very handy.

Especially abroad on holidays and the likes, we're able to have full blown conversations and have no one understand. Particularly useful if we're trying to avoid people, we can ask each other to leave the club/bar without anyone knowing what we're saying

byhookorbycrook · 17-06-2012 12:26AM

I work in a Gaelscoil. We are now seeing the children of past pupils starting to filter in. This ,to me, is a measure of hope.

Bombay Allee · 17-06-2012 12:53AM

D'éirigh mé ar maidin, is chuaigh mé ag bla na Bó

senor incognito · 17-06-2012 02:22AM

WhiteRoses wrote: »

I know most people think the language is pointless, but myself and my friends are fluent (went to a Gaelscoil) and we find it very handy.

Especially abroad on holidays and the likes, we're able to have full blown conversations and have no one understand. Particularly useful if we're trying to avoid people, we can ask each other to leave the club/bar without anyone knowing what we're saying

So many folk I know, have used it for some variation of this: if language is a tool for communication, what does it say about irish that we use it to ensure we will not be understood?

Stained Class · 17-06-2012 02:37AM

Jesus Christ!

When will people learn!

Still look at the people we put into Govt over the years.

Us Irish have an unending capability to see the good from lost causes.

Alright for the lads going to Poland right now. At least they're paying for the experiance!

Gaelgoers, fook offfff. Yer're just parasites on the rest of us!:mad:

gammygils · 17-06-2012 02:47AM

Rahoo! Rahoo! Rahoooo! Ta an Hector ag labhairt Bearla anois san Breakfast Show - Breakfast with Hector

Agus Spanish freisin. Agus Polish

books4sale · 17-06-2012 09:02AM

WhiteRoses wrote: »

Especially abroad on holidays and the likes, we're able to have full blown conversations and have no one understand.

What makes you so paranoid that anyone would be interested in what you have to say?

Remember when I was a young lad at 10-12 years old going to England with the ould pair, the two of them would start breaking out the 'cupla focail' thinking they were the bees knees.

Two spanners was more like it.

Princess Consuela Bananahammock · 17-06-2012 09:09AM

WhiteRoses wrote: »

I know most people think the language is pointless, but myself and my friends are fluent (went to a Gaelscoil) and we find it very handy.

Especially abroad on holidays and the likes, we're able to have full blown conversations and have no one understand. Particularly useful if we're trying to avoid people, we can ask each other to leave the club/bar without anyone knowing what we're saying

The chances of no one understanding you are not as high as you might understand. I once heard a converstaion while in an ATM queue in Berlin.

Wibbs · 17-06-2012 09:16AM

senor incognito wrote: »

So many folk I know, have used it for some variation of this: if language is a tool for communication, what does it say about irish that we use it to ensure we will not be understood?

Yea the "tee hee, secret code" types. There are enough of them alright. Understandable as language is not just a communication tool. It's also a tribal/cultural marker(both organic and fake) and can be utilised in an exclusionary manner. You even see this among class language and accent divisions.

However there are also people out there with a genuine love for and fluency with the language who you'd never know about if you weren't a fellow Irish speaker, because they don't pull this kinda thing. Why? Because it's rude and exclusionary.

Nailz · 17-06-2012 10:39AM

I was never any good at Irish in school, I have no real interest in the language purely for the fact it's useless in day to day life as everyone who speaks Irish here speaks English anyway, and the whole usefulness of it being pinned on how you may need it for your Leaving Cert and other such things is nonsense, it's only made out to be useful by the people who decide it's need, when it shouldn't be like that, hopefully that will change eventually for the sake of those still in the 2nd level school system.

Although, having said all that, I wouldn't ever wish for it to be completely gone, in fact I would like to see it grow, seeing more and more people speak it fluently; really just for reasons of cultural identity as that is important to a lot of people. The way they should go about such a thing is the opposite of what they are doing in the education system where Irish starts off at second level mostly mandatory, piling all sorts of kids with no interest in being there into the same classes as those who do, disrupting the flow of learning for those wanting to learn. I was in Irish classes like this myself, I was bad at Irish anyway, but you could see how the class bogged down by a good few messers and idiots.

Those who really wanted t be there probably would've gotten a more desirable learning experience had they not have been there and had a class with a common interest. Therefore, I obviously believe that the subject should be 100% optional across the board — the same way as Geography and Business is — to hopefully achieve such a result that has students wanting to learn Irish learning Irish with no distractions. Of course, how it's taught should also be reformed, but I'm not sure how to go about it.

Aimsigh · 17-06-2012 10:44AM

PrincessLola wrote: »

You want to force people and private companies to speak Irish all the time?
How would you pull that off?
Are we just going to throw freedom out the window?

Seriously though, the Irish language supporters need to get better aquinted with reality.

I don't want to force people to speak Irish at all, what do you think I ment when I specifically excluded individuals, ie people, from any kind of coercion

As for private companies, there would be no need to for them to speak Irish all the time, just be capable of dealing with their customers through Irish when they want to, the general rule that the purchaser chooses the language of transaction seems to be lost on Irish companies.

number10a · 17-06-2012 11:31AM

dlofnep wrote: »

Doesn't matter what I want. All that matters is the reality. Irish will gain a bit of strength over the next decade or two, but it won't be the majority language in Ireland. The future of the Irish language is not in the Gaeltacht, that much is for sure.

I have never come across a group of people that give less of a shìt about Irish than those in the Gaeltacht. When I was doing my stint in the Kerry Gaeltacht for primary teacher training, we met not one single local (apart from the teachers) who could speak Irish. We tried very hard to speak it while we were there, but nothing. One guy in my group even got shouted at in the local one night by a barmaid who just said "FFS, would ye all stop speaking Irish to me!!" The only places that I have ever heard Irish being naturally spoken is in the cities, namely Dublin, Cork and Galway. And Dublin far outstrips anywhere else from my own experience.

The government really should abandon designating places as Gaeltachts and save a bit of money and gain a (tiny) bit of credibility in the process. They're pointless. They suck in money. And for what??

The Gaelscoileanna are the way forward, and in my opinion all primary schools should gradually move to this system. It should only take eight years (with a couple of years of planning and persuading the unions beforehand). Start with the next intake of Junior Infants in every school and keep gradually moving on until they reach sixth class. This gives the linguistically weaker teachers a few years to brush up on Irish if they're given the English speaking higher classes at the beginning of the phasing in process. Though in my opinion, if a teacher says that their Irish is not good enough to work in a Gaelscoil, then they really should not be teaching at all.

Aimsigh wrote: »

As for private companies, there would be no need to for them to speak Irish all the time, just be capable of dealing with their customers through Irish when they want to, the general rule that the purchaser chooses the language of transaction seems to be lost on Irish companies.

This works in places like Catalonia and Quebec. Companies are required to be able to deal with customers in both official languages, depending on the customer's choice. In Catalonia, you just begin your transaction in a shop with "Hola, buenos días" or "Hola, bon dia" and it goes from there. The shop assistant is required to be able to deal with you in either Spanish or Catalan.

As well as this, in Quebec, a company has to be able to deal with its staff internally in the worker's choice of French or English.

While there is obviously no "Sure no one speaks it" attitude to French in Quebec, we can look to Catalonia for a lot of inspiration if we want to revive Irish. Up until the 1970s, it was illegal to speak Catalan, and now huge proportion of the population can speak the language and virtually everyone can understand. The Catalan government gives free classes to migrants from other parts of Spain, and to immigrants too.

Wibbs · 17-06-2012 11:56AM

number10a wrote: »

Up until the 1970s, it was illegal to speak Catalan

Not quite. It was illegal to publish literature and other media in Catalan under Franco, but people still spoke it to each other and it kept a larger speaking percentage of population than Irish. Basque was more oppressed by comparison. In Franco's early days even naming your kid with a Basque name was illegal. While I agree with much of what you suggest by way of reform on one point I'd suggest something, Catalan while a different language is significantly closer to Castellano compared to Irish and English, so less effort is required to achieve fluency. The Basque example might be a better one(though even Irish and English are closer than Basque and any other language)?

What I find interesting about such languages elsewhere is how they did survive such cultural oppressions and stigma, whereas Irish in the last century has continued to contract even with large scale promotion of the language. Those languages(inc former Soviet Bloc ones) bounced back very rapidly after the cultural oppression and legal barriers were lifted. We did not see that in the Irish model. We seem to be contrary as usual.

PS

Though in my opinion, if a teacher says that their Irish is not good enough to work in a Gaelscoil, then they really should not be teaching at all.

Way to make it so we reduce the pool of good teachers in other subjects. Subjects we're seriously lacking in some areas. When a report shows 1 in 4 male secondary school students are functionally illiterate in any language you have to ask questions. When you see the lack of training in areas of IT and the smart economy you really have to ask questions.

Aimsigh · 17-06-2012 12:03PM

number10a wrote: »

The government really should abandon designating places as Gaeltachts and save a bit of money and gain a (tiny) bit of credibility in the process. They're pointless. They suck in money. And for what??

I would disagree to an extent, there are some places still in the Gaeltacht that are an embarrasment, Dingle town springs to mind, but there are other parts of the Gaeltacht where Irish is still the dominant community language, areas identified as class A Gaeltachts, I think it would be a grave mistake not to support these areas, If the language can not survive in the areas where it is still the primary language, there is no hope of reviving it elsewhere.

The Gaelscoileanna are the way forward, and in my opinion all primary schools should gradually move to this system.

Again, I agree that Gaelscoileanna, and more importantly Gaelchiolaistí are the future of the language, but I dont think it is possible or desirable for all schools to be made Gaelscoileanna, the reality is that the difference in the standard of Irish required to teach Irish in a normal primary school, and to teach in a Gaelscoil is huge.
The pool of teachers capable of teaching in a Gaelscoil is way to small, it is better to concentrate them in a smaller % of schools, and allow the pool of teachers capable of teaching in Gaelscoils to increase over time with the expansion of the sector.
Gaelscoil education represents around 7% of primary education currently, that will increase over the next few decades, probably to around 15% in 20 years time, by which time Gaelcholaiste(Second Level) education will hopefully have increased to around 8-10%. This will represent a strong minority of young people for whom Irish is a major part of their lives, that will iniveatably lead to pressure on government and the private sector to make services available in Irish.

Aimsigh · 17-06-2012 12:09PM

Wibbs wrote: »

PS Way to make it so we reduce the pool of good teachers in other subjects. Subjects we're seriously lacking in some areas. When a report shows 1 in 4 male secondary school students are functionally illiterate in any language you have to ask questions. When you see the lack of training in areas of IT and the smart economy you really have to ask questions.

Kinda ignoring the fact that the national council on curriculum has published a report in which they found that literacy skills are transferable from one language to another, ie teaching Irish will help improve English Language Literacy.

I agree with your general point, if we make all primary schools Gaelscoils then the quality of teacher will decrease because you have a much smaller pool to choose from, but literacy is not a good argument to use.

twinQuins · 17-06-2012 12:21PM

Aimsigh wrote: »

[...] that will iniveatably lead to pressure on government and the private sector to make services available in Irish.

Because they'll be incapable of communicating in English, of course.

Bambii_ · 17-06-2012 12:28PM

It would be nice to have the majority speaking Irish, but most likely it will be completely gone. There's an awful stigma attached to learning Irish, no one wants to. We've been forced to learn it since a young age in school, and were constantly tested on it. The Irish exams in both the Junior and Leaving cert are based on how well you can learn off essays/letters, answers to a story or poem, or how well you can pick out a line in an article that might have something to do with the question. It's all about how well you can do something, other than speak it. Even for the oral, we are told to learn off by heart certain answers to questions that might be asked. We are not taught to understand the language, just to memorize paragraph after paragraph of useless phrases so we can pass the test.

If the whole way of teaching Irish is changed and then set on learning to understand the language and enjoy it then it might just be slightly possible to have some people speak it.

Aimsigh · 17-06-2012 12:28PM

twinQuins wrote: »

Because they'll be incapable of communicating in English, of course.

No, because Irish will be important to them, using it will be natural, and they wont be too happy with Irish being treated as a second class language.

number10a · 17-06-2012 12:40PM

Wibbs wrote: »

Way to make it so we reduce the pool of good teachers in other subjects. Subjects we're seriously lacking in some areas. When a report shows 1 in 4 male secondary school students are functionally illiterate in any language you have to ask questions. When you see the lack of training in areas of IT and the smart economy you really have to ask questions.

I'm not talking about secondary teachers where someone is specialised in a particular subject. I'm talking about primary school teachers, who are supposed to teach Irish every day of their working lives. If they cannot speak it properly, they shouldn't be teaching it. If they do not have a good enough knowledge of maths, they shouldn't be teaching that either, and so on with every subject taught.

Wibbs wrote: »

Not quite. It was illegal to publish literature and other media in Catalan under Franco, but people still spoke it to each other and it kept a larger speaking percentage of population than Irish. Basque was more oppressed by comparison. In Franco's early days even naming your kid with a Basque name was illegal. While I agree with much of what you suggest by way of reform on one point I'd suggest something, Catalan while a different language is significantly closer to Castellano compared to Irish and English, so less effort is required to achieve fluency. The Basque example might be a better one(though even Irish and English are closer than Basque and any other language)?

I suppose Catalan was a bad example. I speak Spanish and took a few classes in Catalan and as a result I can understand most of the language. You're right mentioning the Basque example, or the revival of Latvian is also another good example.

Aimsigh · 17-06-2012 12:56PM

@ number10a

I'm not sure how you managed to get my name in the quote, but that was wibbs, not me.

As for primary school teachers, it is quite obvious that most teachers would not have the necessary standard of Irish to function in a Gaelscoil, whether this should or should not be the case, it is the reality.

You have to have fluent Irish to teach all subjects through it, the pool of teachers actually able to do that is too small to allow for the entire primary system to be converted to being Irish medium, they tried and failed to do this in the past, I don't see any reason for it to work now.

number10a · 17-06-2012 01:31PM

Aimsigh wrote: »

@ number10a

I'm not sure how you managed to get my name in the quote, but that was wibbs, not me.

No idea how that happened!

Fixed now anyway.

Niles · 17-06-2012 02:11PM

I like the idea of the majority speaking it, but would be happy with a stronger minority.

Of course until the powers that be decide to restructure how it's taught from primary school up (make it less exam/literature focused, keep it mandatory but only as a spoken, social language module) I don't see any improvement; the current system only alienates people when they might well like it if there was less pressure associated with it. No reflection on teachers themselves though, they're only doing what the syllabus tells them.

Lord Bafford · 17-06-2012 02:37PM

Irish is a particularly horrible language to listen to, so a bleak future is all that can be expected.

You would've thought the Irish would be delighted to inherit English as their primary language.

Seanchai · 17-06-2012 02:59PM

Gaelscoileanna are the key, but when the state subverts them by refusing to fund a gaelscoil even when it has the required numbers and thus ensures that parents have to send their children to the state-funded English language school, gaelscoileanna are in trouble. This is precisely what happened in Ratoath Co Meath in the past two years. State prejudice is working against the growth of gaelscoileanna and forcing Irish parents to send their children to English-medium schools. And not a word from the anti-Irish lobby here, who apparently detest force, about that injustice.

The Irish state has refused to recognise any gaelscoil since 2008 (source), despite the preferences of parents across Ireland. It has, however, recognised English-medium schools and parents have had no choice but to send their children to them. What's the point in paying Irish taxes when you're given an education system that you could get for much lower taxes in England? Without the language, music and sports, Ireland is merely culturally a region of England/Britain. Irishness is nothing but an Irish identity, a mere identity, without Irish culture. A sign of the delusion of those that share that identity, but reject Irish culture, these days is that Irish efforts in English sports like rugby and soccer are now signs of "Irish culture". :rolleyes:

Princess Consuela Bananahammock · 17-06-2012 03:18PM

Lord Bafford wrote: »

Irish is a particularly horrible language to listen to, so a bleak future is all that can be expected.

You would've thought the Irish would be delighted to inherit English as their primary language.

In order for us to inherit doesn't someoen or soemthign have to die?

Anyway. Agree with yoru first point. Don;t like the way it sounds. That said, there's no reason to think that that will be a factor in it's progress.

Enkidu · 17-06-2012 04:01PM

number10a wrote: »

I have never come across a group of people that give less of a shìt about Irish than those in the Gaeltacht. When I was doing my stint in the Kerry Gaeltacht for primary teacher training, we met not one single local (apart from the teachers) who could speak Irish. And Dublin far outstrips anywhere else from my own experience.

I honestly have to say that you must have had a totally different experience from me. Perhaps you were in Uíbh Ráthach (the west of the Iveragh Peninsula), which hasn't been Irish speaking really since the 1950s, but I don't know how anybody could go out to Baile an Fheirtéaraigh, Dún Chaoin, e.t.c. in the Dingle peninsula and say that Dublin far outstrips it in the level of Irish spoken.

The Gaelscoileanna are the way forward

I think some changes would have to be made to the Gaelscoileanna system before this would be viable. The still have the problem that people come out with heavily Anglicized Irish (this is factually true, see the studies of Brian Ó Broin and the monograph of Raymond Hickey "Dialects of Irish. Study of a Changing Landscape"). I'm not sure how the language will function if it evolves from such a base. Also the fact that many from Gaelscoileanna find it difficult to read books by native speakers makes me suspicious as to their level of control over the language. Other may not mind this, but I'm not really sure what we'd be saving aside from lexical items (essentially English with Celtic words) if we continue down this track.

The future of Irish

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