Do you Speak Irish?

Wibbs · 01-11-2012 11:59AM

dlofnep wrote: »

I know exactly the type of ilk you are referring to who bring up the "who's more Irish than who" argument - and the majority of them only have pigin Irish at best themselves. They are knuckle-draggers, and to try and label Gaelgeoirí as common amongst their ranks is disappointing from you.

I'm being genuine when I say it D. I'm not taking the piss and it was what put me off the language after school. I've met a fair few Gaelgoiri over the years from the days of the Fainne(sp) to today and it has been my experience that you get that attitude more than you don't. You would certainly be notable as the rarer type, who isn't like that. I seriously doubt my experiences are isolated.

Maybe you don't see it because you're in it so to speak? You're not so likely to get that attitude as you'll be seen as part of the club. Hell look at the folks who post on such threads as a microcosm. Very very few don't fall back on the "West Brit defence(tm)" to some degree or other.

Of course on the other side you get the equally daft "sure it's shíte and a dead language" types too, but I'm just relating my experiences of the more vocal Irish language people.

01-11-2012 11:59AM

PrettyBoy wrote: »

Absolutely pointless language, wish I could have spent all the classes during the 12 years in school learning a real language that would be of some use.

Europe, let alone the world has many countries that have national languages that are exclusive to those countries and have no problems with them being unique, they just have an "international" language taught to their citizens to allow them to converse with foreigners.

Iceland, Finland & Denmark spring to mind as countries with small populations that have retained their languages, in Finland's case successfully revived it after centuries of Swedish occupation.

LordSutch · 01-11-2012 12:05PM

Deleted User wrote: »

Iceland, Finland & Denmark spring to mind as countries with small populations that have retained their languages, in Finland's case successfully revived it after centuries of Swedish occupation.

So whats been the problem here? Dublin took over the administration (from London) way in the 1920s, and one of the 1st things they did was to make Irish the 1st official language of the State, yet here we are many decades later and 'the people' still don't embrace it in any meaningful way.

This despite Irish being compulsory in all schools since the 1920s/30s :cool:

Iwasfrozen · 01-11-2012 12:09PM

That username is already in use. wrote: »

You'd want to lay off on the personal attacks, both here and via PM, or I'll start reporting your posts.

PM? What are you talking about? I've never PMed you.

Wibbs · 01-11-2012 12:16PM

Deleted User wrote: »

Iceland, Finland & Denmark spring to mind as countries with small populations that have retained their languages, in Finland's case successfully revived it after centuries of Swedish occupation.

+1 and all the former Soviet satellites that did the same after the Russians buggered off. Welsh is another example where there was a fair revival. Basque another. Catalan has kept going and growing too. Modern Hebrew an example where a Jewish "esperanto" was required and caught on(though not a good comparison with Ireland).

Why the same success hasn't happened here puzzled me somewhat. Yea we have the crappy schooling in it, but we also have huge, some would say out of proportion support for the language in legislation and action as well. Hence I started to look at the Irish all over the world and compared to other cultures we do seem to drop the language, or don't have enough of a cultural attachment to it to preserve and use it(beyond lip service anyway).

Chips Lovell · 01-11-2012 12:20PM

Wibbs wrote: »

+1 and all the former Soviet satellites that did the same after the Russians buggered off. Welsh is another example where there was a fair revival. Basque another. Catalan has kept going and growing too. Modern Hebrew an example where a Jewish "esperanto" was required and caught on(though not a good comparison with Ireland).

Why the same success hasn't happened here puzzled me somewhat. Yea we have the crappy schooling in it, but we also have huge, some would say out of proportion support for the language in legislation and action as well. Hence I started to look at the Irish all over the world and compared to other cultures we do seem to drop the language, or don't have enough of a cultural attachment to it to preserve and use it(beyond lip service anyway).

Perhaps its because most Irish people felt relatively secure about their Hiberno-English speaking cultural identity that they felt little need to adopt a new language?

An Coilean · 01-11-2012 12:31PM

Wibbs wrote: »

Why the same success hasn't happened here puzzled me somewhat. Yea we have the crappy schooling in it, but we also have huge, some would say out of proportion support for the language in legislation and action as well. Hence I started to look at the Irish all over the world and compared to other cultures we do seem to drop the language, or don't have enough of a cultural attachment to it to preserve and use it(beyond lip service anyway).

You think so? It took the state 80 years to give Irish speakers outside the Gaeltacht any kind of legislative right to access services through Irish.

In the Gaeltacht over that time the state was the biggest single anglicising force. To such an extent that by the 60's you had the Gaeltacht civil rights movement, the supports that exist for Irish in those communities such as RnaG and TG4 only came about through protest and civil disobidience from within the Irish speaking community.

The biggest support currently for the Irish Language, the Gaelscoil movement came about from the ground up, it was not and is not led by the state, if anything the state has tried to obstruct it at several points.

From my point of view there was almost no legislation and less action by the state in the area of the Irish Language. The state may have wraped the Irish language round its self for symbolic purpouses, but it never implemented any kind of strategy that would actually allow the widespread use of the Irish Language.

gbee · 01-11-2012 12:35PM

An Coilean wrote: »

The biggest support currently for the Irish Language, the Gaelscoil movement came about from the ground up, .

The rules about migrants in Primary schools was not enforceable in the Gaelscoileanna, thus adding to their attraction.

dlofnep · 01-11-2012 12:36PM

Wibbs wrote: »

I'm being genuine when I say it D. I'm not taking the piss and it was what put me off the language after school. I've met a fair few Gaelgoiri over the years from the days of the Fainne(sp) to today and it has been my experience that you get that attitude more than you don't. You would certainly be notable as the rarer type, who isn't like that. I seriously doubt my experiences are isolated.

Maybe you don't see it because you're in it so to speak? You're not so likely to get that attitude as you'll be seen as part of the club. Hell look at the folks who post on such threads as a microcosm. Very very few don't fall back on the "West Brit defence(tm)" to some degree or other.

Of course on the other side you get the equally daft "sure it's shíte and a dead language" types too, but I'm just relating my experiences of the more vocal Irish language people.

Well see, here's the thing. I hang out with Gaelgeoirí all the time, some brought up through An Ghaeltacht, some through Gaelscoileanna, some through their own means. I've never seen this attitude displayed that you're referring to. And I think if it were to be even considered, I would have seen it during our pub sessions when people are relaxed and more inclined to say what they believe.

I'll share an anecdote with you. A year or so ago, an Irish man who had been living in London from 20 years popped into our ciorcal comhrá. He started harping on about foreigners, the brits, and how he wanted to learn Irish so he could become more Irish. He was told flat out by many people that night that our group was inclusive, and not exclusive - and that he was seeking to learn Irish for all the wrong reasons.

There's nothing that annoys me more than his ilk. When people like him realise that learning a language is more about making friends, the journey of seeing your progress, and having a personal accomplishment in learning something that you've been routinely told is too difficult to learn - rather than some hyper-nationalist pipe-dream, they quickly drop it for something less time consuming.

You'll find that Irish language speakers are comfortable with themselves and really don't give a care about whether someone speaks Irish or not. It's the guys who walk around throwing random fadas on words like "mó chárá" but don't actually speak it, are the type who set a bad example for the Irish speaking community.

I think your view of Irish language speakers is tainted, and misinformed. I'm not sure how it came to be that way - But I can assure you, if you ever popped into us for a pint (and I know you're not in Waterford) - You'd see that our community is very inclusive, and rejects hyper-nationalist sentiment.

This topic saddens me, because it's almost impossible to have a balanced and reasoned discussion about Irish. I wasn't going to respond to your original post, because you know I like you as a poster - but I really have to step in where it's needed.

An Coilean · 01-11-2012 12:38PM

gbee wrote: »

The rules about migrants in Primary schools was not enforceable in the Gaelscoileanna, thus adding to their attraction.

What rules? And how are they not enforcable? Source please?

If your going to throw around accusations the very least you can do is back them up.

gbee · 01-11-2012 12:45PM

An Coilean wrote: »

What rules? And how are they not enforcable? Source please?

Irish Schools were considered private as mentioned already above. National Schools had to take all students. There was an explosion of interest in Irish Schools that seemed to coincide at the time.

01-11-2012 12:48PM

Wibbs wrote: »

I'm being genuine when I say it D. I'm not taking the piss and it was what put me off the language after school. I've met a fair few Gaelgoiri over the years from the days of the Fainne(sp) to today and it has been my experience that you get that attitude more than you don't. You would certainly be notable as the rarer type, who isn't like that. I seriously doubt my experiences are isolated.

Maybe you don't see it because you're in it so to speak? You're not so likely to get that attitude as you'll be seen as part of the club. Hell look at the folks who post on such threads as a microcosm. Very very few don't fall back on the "West Brit defence(tm)" to some degree or other.

Of course on the other side you get the equally daft "sure it's shíte and a dead language" types too, but I'm just relating my experiences of the more vocal Irish language people.

I would say my experience would be very different, in that foreigners learning Irish,and speaking Irish, were made very welcome by the wider Irish language community. In the advanced class I attended a few years ago, there was a lad from the Czech Republic, another guy from the Sudan, and a girl from England.
Any events we attended,they were certainly made welcome,the Czech republic guy, now works through the medium of Irish in DCU, ( he reckoned Irish was easy compared to any Slavic language), while the Sudanese guy sent his kids to a Gaelscoil, and the English girl qualified as a primary school teacher.
Again, while I was involved with an`Irish language organisation, foreigners were certainly made feel part of the group.

dlofnep · 01-11-2012 12:49PM

gbee wrote: »

Irish Schools were considered private as mentioned already above. National Schools had to take all students. There was an explosion of interest in Irish Schools that seemed to coincide at the time.

Gaelscoileanna have always had a huge demand, even prior to mass immigration into Irish. It's only in recent years that the Government is actually acquiescing to the demand, and building more schools.

01-11-2012 01:18PM

LANA BUS

01-11-2012 01:33PM

LordSutch wrote: »

So whats been the problem here? Dublin took over the administration (from London) way in the 1920s, and one of the 1st things they did was to make Irish the 1st official language of the State, yet here we are many decades later and 'the people' still don't embrace it in any meaningful way.

This despite Irish being compulsory in all schools since the 1920s/30s :cool:

Apathy, the expectation that they'll never need Irish as there is a high chance that they'll have to emigrate to find a "better life" or the belief that is backward.

Al of those things provide a huge barrier to the language ever becoming as widely used as Welsh is in Wales for example. Having generations of people saying it useless has made it useless.

01-11-2012 01:48PM

Sorry for shouting on my previous post, but nobody has given me a rational explanation for the expense and bother of changing the cryptic and frankly impenetrable 'Bus Lane' to the much clearer 'Lana Bus', other than, 'we made them change it because we could'.
Particularly useful in - I hope this is not a controversial thing to say - English speaking Dublin.
Was it to make it easier for our many (and welcome) Polish and Nigerian bus drivers.
Anybody?

01-11-2012 02:15PM

9959 wrote: »

Sorry for shouting on my previous post, but nobody has given me a rational explanation for the expense and bother of changing the cryptic and frankly impenetrable 'Bus Lane' to the much clearer 'Lana Bus', other than, 'we made them change it because we could'.
Particularly useful in - I hope this is not a controversial thing to say - English speaking Dublin.
Was it to make it easier for our many (and welcome) Polish and Nigerian bus drivers.
Anybody?

I think the fact that it bothers you so much, says more about you than anything else.

Grayson · 01-11-2012 02:20PM

dlofnep wrote: »

Well see, here's the thing. I hang out with Gaelgeoirí all the time, some brought up through An Ghaeltacht, some through Gaelscoileanna, some through their own means. I've never seen this attitude displayed that you're referring to. And I think if it were to be even considered, I would have seen it during our pub sessions when people are relaxed and more inclined to say what they believe.

I'll share an anecdote with you. A year or so ago, an Irish man who had been living in London from 20 years popped into our ciorcal comhrá. He started harping on about foreigners, the brits, and how he wanted to learn Irish so he could become more Irish. He was told flat out by many people that night that our group was inclusive, and not exclusive - and that he was seeking to learn Irish for all the wrong reasons.

There's nothing that annoys me more than his ilk. When people like him realise that learning a language is more about making friends, the journey of seeing your progress, and having a personal accomplishment in learning something that you've been routinely told is too difficult to learn - rather than some hyper-nationalist pipe-dream, they quickly drop it for something less time consuming.

You'll find that Irish language speakers are comfortable with themselves and really don't give a care about whether someone speaks Irish or not. It's the guys who walk around throwing random fadas on words like "mó chárá" but don't actually speak it, are the type who set a bad example for the Irish speaking community.

I think your view of Irish language speakers is tainted, and misinformed. I'm not sure how it came to be that way - But I can assure you, if you ever popped into us for a pint (and I know you're not in Waterford) - You'd see that our community is very inclusive, and rejects hyper-nationalist sentiment.

This topic saddens me, because it's almost impossible to have a balanced and reasoned discussion about Irish. I wasn't going to respond to your original post, because you know I like you as a poster - but I really have to step in where it's needed.

Bit is this like a white person saying they don't think racism exists? I'm not saying a white persons opinion is completly useless, but they wouldn't have the experience a non caucasian would.

Princess Consuela Bananahammock · 01-11-2012 02:36PM

Deleted User wrote: »

Apathy, the expectation that they'll never need Irish as there is a high chance that they'll have to emigrate to find a "better life" or the belief that is backward.

Al of those things provide a huge barrier to the language ever becoming as widely used as Welsh is in Wales for example. Having generations of people saying it useless has made it useless.

Apathy specifically towards the language. Which is a right and freedom that men died for. A lot fo people lead very active and friutful lives withotuthe language.

You don't need to emigrate to find a better life without the need for Irish.

01-11-2012 03:05PM

Deleted User wrote: »

I think the fact that it bothers you so much, says more about you than anything else.

As I said in a previous post, what bothers me is the pettiness and zealotry of those involved in seeking such a - literally useless - change.
That's why 'Lana Bus' is important as an example of the nit-picking wastefulness of the Irish Language Hawks.

Also, it was someone else on this thread who pointed to the Barna to Bearna rubbish - or is it the other way 'round - as another example of this type of language fascism.

Again, anyone on this thread willing to defend the expense and bother of 'Lana Bus', rather than the tried and tested personal gibe type of response of dolanbaker's quote at the top of this post?

Sorcha16 · 01-11-2012 03:06PM

Ikky Poo2 wrote: »

As an "average English speaker" I try to avoid "spoting horse manure", so perhaps you could enlighten me as to whom specifically you are referring to and what passes for horse manure.

I ask because, as an average English speaker, I'm not sure whether I should take this personally and you, presumably not being an average English speaker, have not given us any input into the various points raised on the thread as to the alleged over-empahis on the Irish language in society and the need to impress it on every secondary student in the country.

See -don't like your preferred language being criticised, do you?

I rest my case

Princess Consuela Bananahammock · 01-11-2012 03:12PM

Sorcha16 wrote: »

See -don't like your preferred language being criticised, do you?

I rest my case

In that case, the prosecution shall make two observations:

1) The defendent did not crticise the langauge, he criticsed some of those who spoke it, did he not?
2) The idea that I have a "preferred" langauge is an assumption based on fallacy. I have no prefered language. (Although I do find the rhythms of Elvish to be very pelasing to the ear).

In short, my "prefered language being cirticised" did not nor could not have happened.

Srill resting your case?

01-11-2012 03:13PM

9959 wrote: »

As I said in a previous post, what bothers me is the pettiness and zealotry of those involved in seeking such a - literally useless - change.
That's why 'Lana Bus' is important as an example of the nit-picking wastefulness of the Irish Language Hawks.

Also, it was someone else on this thread who pointed to the Barna to Bearna rubbish - or is it the other way 'round - as another example of this type of language fascism.

Again, anyone on this thread willing to defend the expense and bother of 'Lana Bus', rather than the tried and tested personal gibe type of response of dolanbaker's quote at the top of this post?

It is unlikely that anyone will put up strawmen for you to demolish, so my response is valid in this particular situation.

01-11-2012 03:18PM

Sorcha16 wrote: »

See -don't like your preferred language being criticised, do you?

I rest my case

.....cue round of applause and shouts of 'Hear, hear' in it's Gaeilge equivalent.

Only, eh, what are you talking about?

01-11-2012 03:24PM

Deleted User wrote: »

It is unlikely that anyone will put up strawmen for you to demolish, so my response is valid in this particular situation.

I didn't erect a strawman named 'Lana Bus', 'twas your fellow Irish language lovers.

Wibbs · 01-11-2012 03:50PM

Vladimir Kurtains wrote: »

Perhaps its because most Irish people felt relatively secure about their Hiberno-English speaking cultural identity that they felt little need to adopt a new language?

Maybe. We certainly seem less inclined as a culture to hang onto this aspect of our history.

An Coilean wrote: »

You think so? It took the state 80 years to give Irish speakers outside the Gaeltacht any kind of legislative right to access services through Irish.

In the Gaeltacht over that time the state was the biggest single anglicising force. To such an extent that by the 60's you had the Gaeltacht civil rights movement, the supports that exist for Irish in those communities such as RnaG and TG4 only came about through protest and civil disobidience from within the Irish speaking community.

The biggest support currently for the Irish Language, the Gaelscoil movement came about from the ground up, it was not and is not led by the state, if anything the state has tried to obstruct it at several points.

From my point of view there was almost no legislation and less action by the state in the area of the Irish Language. The state may have wraped the Irish language round its self for symbolic purpouses, but it never implemented any kind of strategy that would actually allow the widespread use of the Irish Language.

Symbolic purposes? While the state certainly went about the language arseways, to suggest they were pushing English is a tad odd. Any Irish schoolkid that has to go through the school system taking Irish would disagree. As would all those career paths that require it(much more on that list in the past).

Put it another way, if the majority of Irish people actually wanted the language there was certainly enough support for them from the founding of this state to follow through and they didn't. A minority did, but the majority most certainly did not. Compare it to say Basque in Spain where the state actively discouraged it's use, even down to banning Basque origin names for kids at one point and the second that jackboot was off the language kicked off again. There are many examples that are similar. Yet the Irish state more than encouraged the use of the language on a few levels yet we as a nation rejected it.

Your contention that "It took the state 80 years to give Irish speakers outside the Gaeltacht any kind of legislative right to access services through Irish" is partially true. True in that yes it took that long to have it passed into law, however untrue that Irish speakers didn't have access to services in that language. Until the competancy in Irish rule was abolished in the Civil Service in 1974, it didn't need to be in law as Irish speakers from anywhere in the state could have accessed public services through Irish if they so chose. After that date, as I've noted the public service workers abandoned the language en masse, so today they have too small a pool of fluent speakers to call on.

1ZRed · 01-11-2012 03:52PM

I speak it fluently but I never use it.

01-11-2012 04:12PM

1ZRed wrote: »

I speak it fluently but I never use it.

Genuine question here.
Why not?

Canard · 01-11-2012 05:18PM

I'm also fluent pretty much...I got an A1 in HL in my leaving cert for it, but I never use it and I have a huge disdain towards it. I'm sorry, but having given it a chance and clearly learned it well, it's useless in my opinion. I was in America during the summer and there was a German man who no one could understand - there are a thousand languages more useful than Irish.

It's barely even a language anymore. Perhaps it was nice once, but there's an obvious fault somewhere. It stopped developing properly when it stopped being spoken by the entire country, and as a result we have extremely odd looking words with no links to english (like fear and bean), which is the way it should be if that's how it occurred naturally, and then we have words like "carr" and "raidió". You're almost learning someone's gibberish.

It's a joke that it's still compulsory. I did like it a lot in many ways (I'm a bit of a language fanatic

), it's cute when you see things that translate literally as "I have love in my heart for you", but learning about things like the recession, the state of the language etc is beyond pointless.

edit: upon rereading, this post is coming across the wrong way. i like that we have our own language and i think thats pretty cool, not every country can say it, but i think the forced nature of it and the desperate attempt to keep it modern has ruined it. but i would be sad if i didnt know how to have a conversation in it - even if i never do again. :P

An Coilean · 01-11-2012 06:00PM

gbee wrote: »

Irish Schools were considered private as mentioned already above. National Schools had to take all students. There was an explosion of interest in Irish Schools that seemed to coincide at the time.

Who considers Gaelscoils to be private? Any source?

Can you show a difference in the enrolement policies of Gaelscoils compared to English Medium Primary schools?

When was this explosion and what did it coincide with?

Do you Speak Irish?

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