The Irish language is failing.

IrishTrajan wrote: »

And that is why we should teach bilingualism rather than monolingualism.

I thought we did, but I'm probably misunderstanding. Most people learn a bit of French or German, nowadays, no? I do, however, think we should be learning those languages, among others, from a far younger age, start teaching them in primary schools.

(I presume he was still relatively fluent, yes?)

No, his native tongue was Irish, second language was English. He was like a normal Spanish or Chinese student, that sort of level of English. Still more fluent than I ever was in Irish. Hadn't stepped foot out of wherever he came from until he was 18 and going to university in Maynooth.

How some guy having trouble with English ... the same as meaning that all Irish speakers will have trouble with English?

Not sure what this means. I was making the point that for that guy, Irish was his native tongue. You'd be hard pressed to find many people like him in the country. Most people's native tongue is English.

Does it not annoy you when you're talking to someone from another country and they ask if you can speak Irish? Every time I have to say "no", I get a little disappointed in myself.

No. As above, I explain it's not the native tongue of most Irish people, it's (if anything) their second language. Like many other Irish people, I know far more of other languages than I ever did of Irish.

Reiver wrote: »

I think the way it's taught in schools is a joke, making it optional would do a lot of good towards removing hostility.

I think most people would agree with the first part of that sentence, and quite a lot with the second. Choosing to do a thing, rather than having it imposed, usually helps my attitude, anyway.

fryup wrote: »

this evening in my local pub...

they were showing the Pro 12 final with the pictures from tg4 and the english commentary from radio 1

What pub was this?

They don't have Sky Sports in your "local pub"?

fryup wrote: »

nope

Tell us the name of the pub.

They show rugby yet won't pay for Sky?

am, no its not backward and its not a sh!thole

nope not bogger either

try again

Deranged96 wrote: »

The philistinism shown by some posters is harrowing. Douglas Hyde, our first president, wrote an essay on the "necessity of deanglicising Ireland" I suggest some of ye read it on the web.

A beautiful language, venerated by linguistic scholars, treated as a paltry relic of no use in our modern Americanised/anglicised/modernised age.

NO! It is so frustrating to hear the language's death knell chime in the media, when there is so much that could be done. How much does it cost to change a ****ing syllabus? To subsidise linguistic excersions to the Gaeltacht? The plight of Irish could so easily be helped. No more stultifying and constraining poetry and prose, spoken work the whole way up along. If someone wishes to explore the wealth of Irish literature- let them do it at third level.

I'm currently in 6th year, and although my oral Irish is of a high standard my written Irish is poor due to my incompetence in spelling (as in any language for me) so I am not going to get a very high grade in my exam next week. But by God am I going to work at my spoken Irish for the rest of my life and use it at every opportunity.

The whole affair would put you in mind of Yeats' "September 1913". Without a doubt I am going to give my first general election vote next year or late this year to whomever has the strongest policy pertaining to arts and heritage (do any candidates even care about the like?).

Pragmatism is an ugly thing

Pragmatism saves lives. You might not realise it since you're just a kid, but we have been in recession for the last 7 years. Public services have been cut back across the board. There simply isn't enough money for any serious change. Where would the money come from? Your taxes?
Or would you remove some other front line services? Sack some paramedics?

Plus the main reason we've been flogging the dead horse that is the Irish language is because of culture nazis. It could have been changed years ago but that would have meant dropping all the ****ty poetry and prose from the course and focussing entirely on speaking the language. That didn't happen because the crap was considered far too necessary. It wasn't just about teaching Irish it was about imposing a particular culture on us. That's the reason stuff like Peig was forced on us.

Want to hear something ironic? Despite going through primary and secondary education in Ireland I can't speak Irish. I can however as a 40 year old atheist still say the Hail Mary and Our Father in Irish. That's what our education system was designed to do. And it was imposed on us by the people who claimed to be saving the language. It wasn't about the language, it was about their romantic ideals of what Ireland should be.

It's reached a point now where there simply aren't enough trained staff who can actually speak the language. In my final year of college one of the girls in my maths class was also studying Irish. Coming up to her orals she was studying like mad with her class. She was learning questions and responses by rote. She was laughing at the stupidity of it. Most of her class were doing the same. They simply couldn't converse in the language. These were university graduates in Irish who wanted to teach primary school and they were far from fluent.

The reason they were so bad was because they were a product of our primary and secondary education.

So, if we change the curriculum, who teaches it? Most teachers can't speak it fluently. It's a case of the blind leading the blind.


BTW, in the next election I'll be looking at how the government intends to spend it's money. Although arts is important (I'm very proud that most of our museums and galleries are free) Irish is not something I'll be focussing on. I'll look to see what economic policies are being pursued. I'll look at what the government is going to do for front line services. I'll see how the government will tackle poverty.

Because at the end of the day, Irish isn't that important. And it isn't for 99% of people. Health, policing, poverty etc are what people care about and for very good reason. Given the choice most people would rather pump money into that.

So honestly I don't think there's a will or even the means to save Irish. We don't have the staff or money and no-one is willing to invest the money into changing that.

Dirty Dingus McGee wrote: »

Most parents don't have the time or the skills to teach a language and I would say the only realistic way to revive it is through the education system.

Good nutrition and health is fairly easy thing for parents to pass on to their children.No fast food ,lots of fruit and veg and a bit of exercise and there wouldn't be as much obesity in this country.Thats pretty much the way things were 30 or 40 years ago and obesity wasn't an issue.

There's more to nutrition than don't eat junk food. There's how to actually prepare a healthy meal. How to eat a balanced diet.

Obesity wasn't an issue but that's not the only diet related ailment that people have (Hell, being obese might not even be that unhealthy).

Dirty Dingus McGee wrote: »

I'm sure there is but I'd imagine seeing as most children are not going on to be pro athletes that sticking to a fairly sensible diet would be fairly good way to start, and if you just eliminated all the sh1te people eat they'd more than likely be a lot healthier.

I'm just back from the far east. They sell M150 (An energy drink that's illegal in the EU) to kids in the playground.

At least we're not that bad