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Why can nobody speak Irish?

The_Gatsby

Why is it that people in Ireland start learning Irish at the age of 5 and most never learn to speak it fluently? In Europe they do pretty much the same with English and most Europeans can hold a decent conversation in English.

Is it the way Irish is taught? I didn't grow up in Ireland so I'm curious to know why so many people seem to have difficulty with it, given that it's taught at such a young age.

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BognarRegis

epluribusunum wrote: »

My answer to this would be:
1) It does not have to be this way, it could be practical in the future if your nation decided to pursue it. You could speak Irish at home, and English abroad- like most nations.

2) Well, if you adjusted the schooling system and learning programs as suggested in #1, then eventually there would be a generation where all the adults spoke it. ...But if your parents know it then it is all too simple.

What if the parents and the children have no interest in learning Irish? And, more importantly, are the rights of our citizens inferior to the ideal of reinistating Irish as common tongue of Ireland?

epluribusunum

BognarRegis wrote: »

What if the parents and the children have no interest in learning Irish? And, more importantly, are the rights of our citizens inferior to the ideal of reinistating Irish as common tongue of Ireland?

I would hope they would be interested. And I think they would if they grew up with it in the house and not learning it in school.

I do not understand how this would infringe upon civil rights at all. It is written in your Constitution, and children have to learn a language so why not Irish? Nothing to do with rights in my opinion.

I know you believe the Constitution part is pointless, but you are arguing that reinstating your national language from your Constitution would inflict upon the rights of the nation's citizens. This makes no sense at all.

Tony EH

epluribusunum wrote: »

Rubeter's post #974 really does say it all. There is not an argument to be made against it. When someone fails to address a point, but continues to post back and clearly avoids it you can guarantee their argument has been defeated.

Balls. Ruberter was acting like a jerk and I have no time or patience for dealing with such people. The discussion is still ongoing. If he wants his points addressed, he can make them in a civil manner.

epluribusunum wrote: »

How can one nationality be inferior at learning an additional language? Makes no sense and the fact that someone would contribute that as a reason belittles their entire argument.

What is the "entire" arguement? That is JUST a single point of contention, not an entire argument.

And IF it is the case that there is a level playing ground in learning a second language, how come there is such a TINY minority of Irish speakers in this country, despite the fact that EVERYONE has to learn the language? And dispite the fact that such importance was placed on it in Irish schools? You're Polish (I presume), so you have no idea how schooling, at that level, operates in this country.

epluribusunum wrote: »

Are other countries with English as their second language able to communicate and do business dealings? Of course. Last time I checked Italy was not a 3rd world country. There is no reason to believe it would affect Ireland's English skills, nor would it affect their business capabilities.

Other nations have had a long history of learning English and other languages of their neighbours. Our history with learning second languages is pretty bad (our own ancient tongue being a prime example). My point on this is that if the current situation was reversed and we spoke Irish as our first language and had to learn English as our second language, there would be a hit involved in that.

I really do not understand some people's problem with this.

Mastering a language is NOT an easy thing. It certainly is not the blaise endevour that some are trying to make it out to be. Otherwise we'd all be speaking both English and Irish with no problem.

And it isn't a case of the Irish being "retarded" or any of that old toss. I am not sure where the malaise lies, but looking at our current situation re: second languages, it's reasonable to assume that we just don't pick them up too readilly. for whatever reason. Out of my own circle of friends and aquaintances and there offshoots, I can think of NO Irish person that knows a second language, in which they could hold a complex adult conversation. Some have a few words, I myself have a tiny smattering of German. But, the only people I know who have a functional second language are my foreign friends.

NTMK

Tony EH wrote: »

And IF it is the case that there is a level playing ground in learning a second language, how come there is such a TINY minority of Irish speakers in this country, despite the fact that EVERYONE has to learn the language? And dispite the fact that such importance was placed on it in Irish schools? You're Polish (I presume), so you have no idea how schooling, at that level, operates in this country.

Its because very few gave a **** about the language
On top of that another massive disadvantage irish compared to learning english as a foreign language is that English has a multitude of modern content from around the world that can help people learn the finer points of the language and content that will interest the person learning it irish simply doesnt its too small of a language to be able to cover everything.

I am proficient at 2 languages other than english. Turkish and German. I learnt turkish out of necessity as i spent a lot of time in turkey when i was young and ive an interest in learning german.

Irish was neither a necessity or interesting for me so i simply didnt care and spent more time in class looking out the window than anything else

Iwasfrozen

epluribusunum wrote: »

The only true arguments these people are making is 1) that it is not currently practical for their life, or 2) that they did not enjoy learning it in school and did not find it interesting.

Add to that list 3) It costs us too much money to continue this cultural fantasy and 4) Children (and in some cases Adults) should not be forced to learn Irish in school. Remove all state sanctioned forced education and let the Universities set their own requirements.

1) It does not have to be this way, it could be practical in the future if your nation decided to pursue it. You could speak Irish at home, and English abroad- like most nations.

And why would I do that? Why would I give up my mother language to speak what is to me a foreign language? If language is tied to identity as Irish speakers are so quick to point out then why would the entire country drop it's identity at the flick of a switch? No thank you I for one will be voting with my tongue.

2) Well, if you adjusted the schooling system and learning programs as suggested in #1, then eventually there would be a generation where all the adults spoke it. When this occurs children would not find it hard or uninteresting in school because they would already be exposed to it before school. They probably found it hard or uninteresting because they were not exposed to it at home. Any scholastic subject, especially languages, that you learn for the first time is hard or uninteresting, but if you grow up learning it as a child it would make it easy as a student. But if your parents know it then it is all too simple.

No matter how you arrange the subject students are never going to enjoy it or find it easy. Languages are hard that's the bottom line and no student is going to enjoy or take to heart any language forced on them by a faceless government.

The only idea I have ever heard from Irish speakers that I would concede as plausible are if all schools in the entire country are made Irish speaking. Pick one year, say 2025 and resolve to have all children entering play school in 2025 entering a totally Irish language environment. Change the primary schools by 2026 and the secondary schools by 2034 then have the colleges speaking Irish by 2050. By 2065 the country would be Irish speaking again because people would only know technical terms needed for their employment in Irish. Would help cure our emigration problem too.

But all the above is politically impossible to implement so the idea won't get off the ground.

Tony EH

Its because very few gave a **** about the language
On top of that another massive disadvantage irish compared to learning english as a foreign language is that English has a multitude of modern content from around the world that can help people learn the finer points of the language and content that will interest the person learning it irish simply doesnt its too small of a language to be able to cover everything.

I am proficient at 2 languages other than english. Turkish and German. I learnt turkish out of nessecity as i spent a lot of time in turkey when i was young and ive an interest in learning german.

Irish was neither a nessecity or interesting for me so i simply didnt care and spent more time in class looking out the window than anything else

But that's a point I've made earlier. The interest makes up a lot of the effort in mastering a second language and even if there's an interest, not everybody is going to be able to master a language, no matter how hard they try.

In my opinion, if the situation was reversed in this country and we had Irish as our primary language (with everything that goes along with that) and the option of having English as a second language, I think that there would be a substantial amount of people with poor English and many with none at all, which would have to have an impact.

Christ, there are many in the country already exhibiting a poor grasp of English.

Rubeter

Tony EH wrote: »

Balls. Ruberter was acting like a jerk and I have no time or patience for dealing with such people. The discussion is still ongoing. If he wants his points addressed, he can make them in a civil manner..

It doesn't matter who makes the point you just keep ignoring it, why don't you address it?

I'll tell you why, because it shows you to be quite wrong and you have no argument against it. Quite simple really.

Tony EH

Rubeter wrote: »

It doesn't matter who makes the point you just keep ignoring it, why don't you address it?

I'll tell you why, because it shows you to be quite wrong and you have no argument against it. Quite simple really.

I am happy to discuss any points with people who aren't being jerks.

Rubeter

Tony EH wrote: »

I am happy to discuss any points with people who aren't being jerks.

That is not true, quite a number of people have brought up the most likely and obvious reason for many Irish people not speaking a second language and you will not even comment on it.
Why don't you? Refusing to address this just shows you have no argument against it.

NTMK

Tony EH wrote: »

But that's a point I've made earlier. The interest makes up a lot of the effort in mastering a second language and even if there's an interest, not everybody is going to be able to master a language, no matter how hard they try.

In my opinion, if the situation was reversed in this country and we had Irish as our primary language (with everything that goes along with that) and the option of having English as a second language, I think that there would be a substantial amount of people with poor English and many with none at all, which would have to have an impact.

Christ, there are many in the country already exhibiting a poor grasp of English.

If irish was our first language we'd learn english no problem because the countries nearest and most important neighbor is english speaking. a lot of the media (movies, books, Music) we would be getting into the country would be in english. we would have the necessity english for a wide range of business.

youd have people that wouldnt know or learn english but you have that in every country. Irish doesnt have a reason to learn it if you hold know interest in it

Tony EH

Rubeter wrote: »

That is not true, quite a number of people have brought up the most likely and obvious reason for many Irish people not speaking a second language and you will not even comment on it.
Why don't you? Refusing to address this just shows you have no argument against it.

What point?

Rubeter

Tony EH wrote: »

What point?

That English speaking peoples have a bad record of learning a second language and we are no different to all the other English speaking countries, it is not an Irish thing. Consequently if we were Irish speaking we would be no different at second language learning than any other European country.

Tony EH

NTMK wrote: »

If irish was our first language we'd learn english no problem because the countries nearest and most important neighbor is english speaking.

How can you say that though? I don't think it would be as easy as that, given our current lack with a second language as it stands.

NTMK wrote: »

a lot of the media (movies, books, Music) we would be getting into the country would be in english. we would have the necessity english for a wide range of business.

But that doesn't mean that there would be nationwide interest in learning the language. There's the very real possibility that a substantial amount of people would be terrible at it, or have nothing to do with it at all.

My point is that because it's been our primary language it has served us very well as a nation.

Tony EH

Rubeter wrote: »

That English speaking peoples have a bad record of learning a second language and we are no different to all the other English speaking countries, it is not an Irish thing.

But that's a point I already made anyway.

I've already said myself that our use of English has possibly made us lazy towards picking up a second language.

You know instead of being a jerk before, you could have actually read the posts.

Rubeter

Tony EH wrote: »

But that's a point I already made anyway.

I've already said myself that our use of English has possibly made us lazy towards picking up a second language.

You know instead of being a jerk before, you could have actually read the posts.

If our speaking English is what has made us lazy, why do you keep repeating that if we were Irish speaking we wouldn't be any good at speaking English?

Once the variable that makes us lazy is gone then we wouldn't be lazy because we would have to learn the language just like the Dutch, Danish etc....
This is the point you keep ignoring.

Iwasfrozen

Rubeter wrote: »

That English speaking peoples have a bad record of learning a second language and we are no different to all the other English speaking countries, it is not an Irish thing. Consequently if we were Irish speaking we would be no different at second language learning than any other European country.

Your second statement was a massive jump from your first statement. There are far more factors at play then being English speaking. Irish people even if they were Irish speaking would still speak English so they would have no incentive to learn French or German.

Rubeter

Iwasfrozen wrote: »

Your second statement was a massive jump from your first statement. There are far more factors at play then being English speaking. Irish people even if they were Irish speaking would still speak English so they would have no incentive to learn French or German.

Address the actual point.

Iwasfrozen

Rubeter wrote: »

Address the actual point.

I did.

NTMK

Tony EH wrote: »

How can you say that though? I don't think it would be as easy as that, given our current lack with a second language as it stands.

we'd have the tools and some would have the necessity to learn the language the same with every other person that learns the language as a second language

But that doesn't mean that there would be nationwide interest in learning the language. There's the very real possibility that a substantial amount of people would be terrible at it, or have nothing to do with it at all.

My point is that because it's been our primary language it has serviced us very well as a nation.

No it wouldnt but go to any country and leave the touristy spots and you'll realise a lot of people dont speak english. it would be the same here

Its a perfectly valid point that english has been a fantastic tool for a small country that doesnt have any business exports compared say norway

But it is wrong to say that the irish are terrible at learning languages as a whole when there is no necessity to do so in ireland. There are thousands of irish living in non-english speaking countries who have had no problem whatsoever learning the native language of the country there in.

Rubeter

Iwasfrozen wrote: »

I did.

Tony says if we were an Irish speaking country we would be crap at learning English and consequently be ****ed.
I say it is our speaking English that has made us lazy, therefore if we were Irish speaking this lazyness would no longer be there, therefore we would be as good at learning English as any other Western European country.
That is the point.
He refuses to comment on that.

Tony EH

Rubeter wrote: »

If our speaking English is what has made us lazy, why do you keep repeating that if we were Irish speaking we wouldn't be any good at speaking English?

Once the variable that makes us lazy is gone then we wouldn't be lazy because we would have to learn the language just like the Dutch, Danish etc....
This is the point you keep ignoring.

I'm not "ignoring" anything. Can you quite the jerkoff attitude please. Otherwise it really will be the last time I reply to you in this discussion.

I've said it's possibily a factor. Another factor is that we're an Island nation and have been somewhat insular. Our general knowledge of other nations (along with their languages) is also rather poor.

I just don't share the opinion that we'd all be multilingual with no bother.

With the hypothetical situation that my addresses, I can see that a substantial amount of people would be poor at English and many would have none at all and that would have a definite impact on us.

Iwasfrozen

Rubeter wrote: »

Tony says if we were an Irish speaking country we would be crap at learning English and consequently be ****ed.
I say it is our speaking English that has made us lazy, therefore if we were Irish speaking this lazyness would no longer be there, therefore we would be as good at learning English as any other Western European country.
That is the point.
He refuses to comment on that.

What Tony says is his business I'm making my own point. You made a huge leap in logic and I pulled you up on it.

Rubeter

Tony EH wrote: »

I'm not "ignoring" anything. Can you quite the jerkoff attitude please. Otherwise it really will be the last time I reply to you in this discussion.

I've said it's possibily a factor. Another factor is that we're an Island nation and have been somewhat insular. Our general knowledge of other nations (along with their languages) is also rather poor.

I just don't share the opinion that we'd all be multilingual with no bother.

With the hypothetical situation that my addresses, I can see that a substantial amount of people would be poor at English and many would have none at all and that would have a definite impact on us.

Go away.

Rubeter

Iwasfrozen wrote: »

What Tony says is his business I'm making my own point. You made a huge leap in logic and I pulled you up on it.

What, that if we were an Irish speaking nation we would be no different to any other non English speaking country in our ability to learn English? Please explain.

HurtLocker

Rubeter wrote: »

Tony says if we were an Irish speaking country we would be crap at learning English and consequently be ****ed.
I say it is our speaking English that has made us lazy, therefore if we were Irish speaking this lazyness would no longer be there, therefore we would be as good at learning English as any other Western European country.
That is the point.
He refuses to comment on that.

As we speak English we are lazy.

Yeah if we were french speaking we would love wine.
If we spoke Greek we would live to riot
If we spoke Spanish we would smuggle more drugs and border hop.
Don't get me started on what we would be like if we spoke Arabic.

Rubeter

HurtLocker wrote: »

As we speak English we are lazy.

Yeah if we were french speaking we would love wine.
If we spoke Greek we would live to riot
If we spoke Spanish we would smuggle more drugs and border hop.
Don't get me started on what we would be like if we spoke Arabic.

Lazy at language learning, just like other English speaking peoples, have you read the actual discussion?

old hippy

I'd love to learn it but I am too lazy and long in the tooth to do so. As dead/dying languages go, it's one of the loveliest to hear. My niece speaks it better than I do but she goes to one of those Gaeilscoiles.

I can get by in French, mind. And I'll be brushing up on the Japanese for the approaching early retirement over there

HurtLocker

Rubeter wrote: »

Lazy at language learning, have you read the actual discussion?

Yes I still don't understand why we would unlearn English to become irish speaking for the sack of then relearning English like a foreigner. Is this just aload of "ifs" and "imagine" scenarios or is there an actual way to make people speak irish as a first language. We already speak the language of business why change that?

Tony EH

Rubeter wrote: »

Go away.

What, this is your level of discussion?

Really?

I'm done with you. You're a child.

:rolleyes:

Iwasfrozen

Rubeter wrote: »

What, that if we were an Irish speaking nation we would be no different to any other non English speaking country in our ability to learn English? Please explain.

We would already have English we wouldn't need to learn it. Since we do have English though our ability to learn useful languages like French or German would still be rubbish.