Too much of Gaeilge?

Darren J. Prior

Darren J. Prior wrote: »

In Dublin alone we have forty gaelscoileanna. The number sounds surprising because we only have eight second-level. There are campaigns for eight more second-level in Ireland at the moment and they have the numbers. Now, if these schools got recognition that would make a big difference I have to say!!!

I was referring to outside the education system, I believe that the only urban Gaeltacht is in Belfast.

DJP

I don't think I would call Ráth Cairn in Meath remote.

DJP

The same with An Cheathrú Rua/Carroroe and Gaoth Dobhair!

Well, they're remote from me

deirdremf

Mike 1972 wrote: »

Plenty of lives were ruined through leaving school without qualifications because they had failed an Irish exam too.

I've often seen this claim, but have you any figures to back it up?
On the other hand, my mother was unable to go to university because she didn't pass Latin in the Leaving.
Perhaps this was the reality of the situation, while other people who were pretty poor at school generally and also failed other subjects blamed their failure on Irish rather than on not studying or being thick, sorry, intellectually challenged.

deirdremf

Wibbs wrote: »

Of course some can(though it does depend on ones definition of sophisticated, regardless of the group referenced). That's not the point. The point is the general environment that a language exists in. The latin of the plebeian was on average less sophisticated, more mundane than that of the patrician, again on average.

Some years ago Liam ó Sé, a doctor from Co. Clare, wrote a book called Crannóga. In it, he describes how he was in charge of admissions to a hospital in Co. Clare, and was able to put a number of native Irish speaking men in the age-group from the late 40s to 84, into the same ward. I quote:
"Of most interest, however, was the subject-matter of their discussions. It must be remembered that they had never gone beyond Primary School and, apart from one retired shopkeeper, who may have had some further education, their present or past occupations had been those of small farmer, inshore fisherman or similar recipe for poverty. One would not have been surprised, therefore, if their conversation was a mundane recital of farming and fishing matters, with a leavening of politics. In fact, for every day of their stay in hospital, from morning to night, their entire preoccupation - not to say delight - was with and in poetry".
p. 3,Crannóga, Liam Ó Sé.
I think extract this goes to show that the poor pleb can easily reach much greater heights than Wibbs has postulated.
I think it also gives us a glimpse at how much has been lost in the language shift that has affected our country.
I don't claim that we will get this back if we change our daily language back to Irish, but who knows just what the change would bring?

DJP

When was that?

Deleted User wrote: »

Well, they're remote from me

And my parents house outside Castlerea is remote to me and the people from Castlerea.

Dionysus

Mike 1972 wrote: »

Plenty of lives were ruined through leaving school without qualifications because they had failed an Irish exam too.

Scapegoat-seeking bollocksology engaged in by losers. "Oh I would have been a great student but for Irish... " Embarrassing, really really embarrassing, that anybody would even try and pull this one.

Get a grip. Take responsibility for your own mistakes/intellectual limitations/chip on your shoulder. Move on.

I said here a year or two ago that I failed Irish in my LC. It was my fault, and nobody else's. I was entirely responsible. It would have been a cop-out on my part to blame teachers and the like. It would have been pathetic to do so. Yes, teaching needs to be improved but the emphasis given to it by certain people here who are hostile to Irish culture generally is more often than not a means to justify their own failings. Contemptible stuff.

deirdremf

nisior wrote: »

Even I hated that!!! They really need to have some more modern material to engage teenagers with. They aren't doing the language any favours forcing people my age to study Peig!!

Sardonicat wrote: »

I wouldn't read it at my age, and I did my LC 20 years ago.

I was spared Peig when I was at school and I am very thankful about that.
The reason is that I read Peig recently, and was able to appreciate it. Instead of a dreadful boring book, I found an easy-to-read biography in simple (but not simplistic) Irish about a girl growing up in the west of Ireland in the third quarter of the 19th century, and getting married and going to the Blascaod Mór to live. Her life on the island was tragic in many ways, and is probably the reason so many teenagers were turned off the book; but the first two thirds is really lovely. I'd recommend it to anyone who has grown out of their adolescence.

randylonghorn

deirdremf wrote: »

Some years ago Liam ó Sé, a doctor from Co. Clare, wrote a book called Crannóga. In it, he describes how he was in charge of admissions to a hospital in Co. Clare, and was able to put a number of native Irish speaking men in the age-group from the late 40s to 84, into the same ward. I quote:
"Of most interest, however, was the subject-matter of their discussions. It must be remembered that they had never gone beyond Primary School and, apart from one retired shopkeeper, who may have had some further education, their present or past occupations had been those of small farmer, inshore fisherman or similar recipe for poverty. One would not have been surprised, therefore, if their conversation was a mundane recital of farming and fishing matters, with a leavening of politics. In fact, for every day of their stay in hospital, from morning to night, their entire preoccupation - not to say delight - was with and in poetry".
p. 3,Crannóga, Liam Ó Sé.

That doesn't surprise me. What people tend to forget is that Irish has a very strong oral tradition (as indeed does Scots Gaelic and probably Welsh, though I'm not too familiar with the latter). It's a tradition which can be traced back to the Bardic poets, and which survived down through the centuries and which in turn helped the language to survive.

This is the reason why Robin Flower and other international scholars visited the Blaskets and other remote western locations to study the language, and to record the stories of the inhabitants and the treasure trove which they carried with them in their memories, derived not from any formal schooling but from their parents, grandparents and neighbours, as it had always been. This is the reason, for example, why one tiny island of circa 100 inhabitants could produce a half-dozen books in a couple of decades with the encouragement of Flower and others who knew that with the Irish-speaking population shrinking it was essential to record the oral tradition on paper for the future.

For that matter, I can remember as a child listening to my grandmother gently arguing the origin and meaning of a nineteenth century poem with a professor of Irish from one of the universities, one of them on each side of the open fire and the discussion helped along by vast quantities of strong tea. He eventually conceded that she most likely had the right of it, too ... though this was a woman who had never progressed beyond national school in terms of formal education.

deirdremf wrote: »

I was spared Peig when I was at school and I am very thankful about that.
The reason is that I read Peig recently, and was able to appreciate it. Instead of a dreadful boring book, I found an easy-to-read biography in simple (but not simplistic) Irish about a girl growing up in the west of Ireland in the third quarter of the 19th century, and getting married and going to the Blascaod Mór to live. Her life on the island was tragic in many ways, and is probably the reason so many teenagers were turned off the book; but the first two thirds is really lovely. I'd recommend it to anyone who has grown out of their adolescence.

I quite liked "Peig", but I had the advantage that I knew the area she wrote about. My classmates didn't, and had little empathy for what they saw as the keening of an old woman who had lived a life quite alien to their experience. I could and can see their point, too.

DJP

randylonghorn wrote: »

My classmates didn't, and had little empathy for what they saw as the keening of an old woman who had lived a life quite alien to their experience. I could and can see their point, too.

I've seen since I was 12- when I first went to the Gaeltacht- that generally you have to have spent significant time in the Gaeltacht to love and respect the language, regions and culture generally. There are exceptions of course but I have only known of one or two Irish speakers who have not been to the Gaelacht and of no person who ever went to the summer colleges there and who didn't at least respect the culture although many may not have much of an interest in becoming fluent in the language. They still respect it though! The irrational hatred of it generally comes from people who haven't experienced the culture at first hand and had fun in doing so.

nisior

I'm a native Irish speaker and when we'd get a new teacher with learned irish we used to mess with them a bit. This one teacher we had for Tír Eolais asked us what the Irish for 'grapes' was, we told her it was 'grápaí' which doesn't mean anything. I wondered after if she had taught any other class and used the word 'grápaí'....I hope not