There is active debate going on at the moment opposing the use of Gaelic as well as English on road signs in the Highlands of Scotland.

There has always been strong moves to suppress Gaelic as a language, so now that it is reviving somewhat, some people want it stopped.

They claim that the use of 2 languages on a road sign is going to cause accidents.

What is the experience of people driving in Wales or other countries where they have bilingual signs?

the bilingual signs in wales take about 4 seconds to get used to.

there are some idiots in this world!

Why should there be a problem? I don’t recall ever having issues in Wales except when some of the English names were given a Welsh spelling… Overton to Owrtyn or something like that! WTF!

when I lived in Wales i could speek/read/write welsh as well as if not better than english. English was my first language, but the school’s are set up to teach everything in Welsh, so thats what you learn.

In Wales (the north in particular) bi-lingual signs make sense as people speek welsh as a first language. Has Gaelic had that much a revival that its now the first language, or is this a stunt by the tourism board?

Has Gaelic had that much a revival that its now the first language, or is this a stunt by the tourism board?

I suspect it is something of the latter. I’d be interested to know the number of people who actually use Gaelic on a day to day basis. From what I remember the numbers for Welsh are actually rising.

Bilingual signs make no difference to me when driving in wales, though they take up more room. It’s helpful when they’re in 2 colours, so you dont think that Traeth Beach is just a really really long beach that stretches down the entire coastline…. 😳

Flashy, I think the numbers of Welsh speakers were declining rapidly before official push towards making everything bilingual happened.

I suspect it is something of the latter. I’d be interested to know the number of people who actually use Gaelic on a day to day basis. From what I remember the numbers for Welsh are actually rising.

Around 1.2% according to Wiki. Distribution here :-

FWIW,I think it’s really important to keep all of the Celtic languages of these islands alive if only because of their significance to our heritage rather than their practical usefulness.

The only hassle I’ve ever had with Gaelic, is the use of Gaelic place names on OS maps. I found that everyone who was born in the Aviemore area seemed to use English names for hills (White Lady, Shepherd etc.), which are no longer on the map, due to someone deciding to use Gaelic place names in order to respect their culture like.

Joe

is that 1.2% actualy speeking gaelic like some welsh speek welsh (i.e. a first language, using english only when they have to?), or is it more like 50% of english people can speek french/german/spannish?

I live in Lochaber where all the signs are bilingual. They are no harder to understand than uni(?)lingual signs. The Gaelic and English are in different colours. What’s more, in the time I have been here, they have never been cited as a cause for an accident. I think it’s a crap argument.

For me the whole point of a road sign is so that people who don’t know where they are going can find out where they are and where to go next, now I imagine that any gaelic speakers around here already know where they are so whats the point in having the signs in gaelic, I think it’s all a stunt to try and make us look twee, shortbread tins and plastic pipers, If the powers at be realy must have bilingual signs why not french or german? that would help those who realy don’t know where they are find their way about, I’m born and bred in the highlands and can trace my family right back in the west coast I don’t have a problem with gaelic until incomers try and ram it down your throat, admittedly it’s not as bad as it was a couple of years ago, rant over :0)
PJ.

For me the whole point of a road sign is so that people who don’t know where they are going can find out where they are and where to go next, now I imagine that any gaelic speakers around here already know where they are so whats the point in having the signs in gaelic,

Because gaelic speakers come from all over the country and don’t necessarily know the town layout in your particular town, so also need signs? I mean I dont go to London and ask why all the signs are there as I already speak English so must already know where I am and where I’m going? 😀

Hmm. I’m all for support of the Gaelic language and culture. My wife is a native Gaelic speaker (i.e. she had to go to school to learn English). But I do wonder about the bilingual road signs. They certainly look very “busy” and I think the argument is that they take longer to read while driving and are therefore potential distracting. Personally, I like to see the differences in spelling, and the way in which some place names are completely different.

I really like the gaelic signs even though they are a bit pointless – it’s interesting to see how the original placenames were corrupted into English. Once you know a few common gaelic words (I call it “hillwalking gaelic”), you can usually see what the placename actually meant before it was changed.

Also – I think the reason that the vast majority of the placenames in the highlands are in gaelic on the OS is simply because that is their name and always has been (some of the meaning of mountain names for instance are obscure and have never been “officially” translated into english) – nothing to do with preserving culture. Personally I love the gaelic hill names – they sound great once you work out how to say them. 2 of my favourite mountains – Bidean a Choire Sheasgaich and Sgurr nan Ceathreamhnan are affectionately known as “Cheesecake” and “Chrysanthemum” to help English visitors avoid embarrassment when describing their route for the day 😉

The White Lady’s a ski piste Joe 😉 Similarly folk refer to the East and West Walls but these are just pitches on what is collectively referred to as Coire na Ciste i.e the full gaelic name.

Could be wrong but I dont think folk from Aviemore anglicise the gaelic hill names – except The Devils Point perhaps – so named in order to avoid embarrassing she who was ‘not amused’

I’ve alway’s quite liked the lack of the signs in Scotland aren’t in Gaelic. It’s always struck me as a country more at ease with it’s national identity than say Wales and thus not having need of such things.
Though obviosuly that’s a rather simplistic view of things 🙂

It’s always struck me as a country more at ease with it’s national identity than say Wales and thus not having need of such things.

I’d say Wales has need for such things because of its large number of native language speakers and its corresponding national identity.

We’ve had the same argument in Wales and it got laughed out of the Assembly IIRC.

Utterly pointless waste of money IMHO much as Welsh is. Surely to God it would make more sense in the modern world to teach the kids English/French/Spanish and more relevantly Mandarin Chinese than a “dead” language which nobody else knows, understands or gives a toss about. All this does in a world where everyone else is getting more cosmoplitan, is to make already insular communities more so.

No issues about people choosing to keep it going, but definately not if it’s at the cost of imposing it on the populace, (which incidentally includes us non Gaelic/Welsh speakers).

G, you clearly have never lived in Wales (either that or you’ve just moved there and still think people stop talking in English as soon as you enter the pub/shop). Where I grew up English was most definatley the second language, so maybe we should just ditch the english signs instead if they’r confusing you soo much?

Actualy, maybe your right, maybe they should leanr english, just like the french, german and chineese should?

I think that the population of Gealic speakers on the Scottish border/D&G boundary is down to teh fact that no one can understand anyone from Langholm.

thisisnotaspoon – Member
is that 1.2% actualy speeking gaelic like some welsh speek welsh (i.e. a first language, using english only when they have to?), or is it more like 50% of english people can speek french/german/spannish?

As explained above, it’s people over 3 years old that use the language on a day to day basis.

The signs should absolutely be preserved. No Englishman can step in and say what should or shouldn’t be done with them. Arrogance like that shown by G above belongs south of the Tweed (mind you, I’d become like him if I lived in Ipswich for long enough too).

In Switzerland you have signs (and lots of other things) in up to 4 languages (German, French, Italian, Romansch and English strangely I’ve never seen 5 that I can remember), in Sweden Sami and Finnish are sometimes used alongside Swedish, plenty of other places are similar. It’s never been a problem for anyone anywhere, in my opinion, unless perhaps when you get two alphabets alongside one another (Cyrillic and Roman) for example. Even then, I can’t imagine how anyone would demand that one should not be used on the grounds of confusion it causes.

One thing I don’t really get is the gaelicisation of English place names that aren’t in a Gaelic-speaking area. Sraid na Banrighinn (for example- apologies to any Gaelic speakers if that’s wrong, should be the translation for Queen St. Station). Can’t really see any objections to this though, just that it seems more like a show for the tourists rather than any real commitment to gaelic culture.

[Edit- Oh, and I remember talking to someone once about the naming of hills. Heather is more or less right, but it’s pretty complex as the naming became politicised as locals could use the naming process as an act of resistance. Hence Gaelic names were sometimes introduced where they hadn’t been used previously etc. Seemed an interesting theory]

sorry, my mistake, didnt read the blurb properly

Arrogance like that shown by G above belongs south of the Tweed (mind you, I’d become like him if I lived in Ipswich for long enough too).

Speaking as a Scot I find that a bit rich frankly. (Incidentally I’ve always wondered and perhaps you can answer this question murdoch, if its so **** great up there, how come there are so many of us everywhere else?

The bottom line on it IMHO is as stated above. There are plenty of other things we should be worrying about well before we start wasting money on resurrecting a dead language, or perhaps, down here we ought to be reverting to latin, or any of the other languages that once were spoken here, surrendering as we do it one of the few genuine advantages that we have in the greater world.

Regarding Wales, Welsh was not a first choice language for the vast majority of the population until the teaching of it became compulsary in schools. Since it has been what real difference has it made to the average kid in the street? Please enlighten me, as I’m beggared if I can figure it out.

Arrogance like that shown by G above belongs south of the Tweed

Nice piece of national/racial stereotyping there. Keep it up, it’s nice to get an opinion from all sides even bigotted ones.

G, brilliant argument, succinct and robust. While we’re at it, why don’t we burn all those useless old books that no-one reads, get rid of all art that falls below a certain popularity threshold, and generally homogenise the culture of the UK as much as possible, until everywhere looks and sounds the same. 🙄

When I went to school I was never given the chance to learn Welsh, now it is compulsory and I for one think the country is the better for it. I have friends on the Lleyn peninsular for who Welsh is their first language. They can go for weeks not speaking English.

I think G fails to see that Welsh was being actively killed off in the 60’s and 70’s it was only the protests of Plaid that kept it going. Now we seem to be in more enlightened times where culture and history are cherished that Welsh is again thriving. It gives us a sense of pride and allows the line out calls to be unintelligible to the opposition. Some fab Welsh language bands about as well.

There is a downside though and that is the rise of idiot nationalists, being told I was not really Welsh as I didnt speak the language is a bit annoying, mum from Blaina, dad from Clydach and I was born in Tredegar. I am not sure you can get more Welsh.

I think any language and culture is worth saving, bi lingual road signs arent anything to get upset about.

Nicely put Mr Agreeable 🙂 . What price a culture?

It’s an interesting problem. I like the bilingual signs myself, and I like the Gaelic names on the OS maps – once you know your “hillwalking Gaelic” (great term, BTW) it helps you understand the locations you are in because many of them are descriptive.

Background: My Grandparents were native speakers and were thrashed at school for speaking the language. My parents understood the language but did not speak it much. I was raised speaking English and taught Latin and French at school, but not allowed to take Gaelic. My daughter has chosen it a language to learn in school instead of say French.

I went to school in a Gaelic speaking area (Sth Uist) when I was wee, and kids were told off for speaking Gaelic in the schoolyard (this was a long time ago), but I think by then it was because it was felt they would be disadvantaged if they didn’t perfect their English by speaking it as much as possible.

Now Gaelic is recognised by law as an equal language to English by the Scottish parliament. The bilingual signs are part of the measures to implement this, but they seem to outrage a very vocal minority.

What the Welsh have done to save their culture is inspiring.

It would be a great idea to read what I said before criticising it. At no point have I said burn anything or stop anything, except spending our money on what is a fairly pointless exercise when less than 1.2% of the population of Scotland, let alone the rest of this country (NB: We are one country BTW) can read it.

Regarding Welsh, please do explain to me the benefits of literally forcing kids to learn it, as opposed to one of the other languages I mentioned. For example my sons girlfriend is Welsh and training to be a teacher. She has to learn Welsh if she ever wants to teach in her home country, but she is very likely to spend a good percentage of her career elsewhere, so the welsh bit is forcing her to do her teaching course in Wales, and is frankly completely useless to her, unless she at some point chooses to teach there. This at a time when everyone else in the world is looking outwards and trying to expand their horizons.

Presumably wode is the next thing to bring back eh?

The modern world being what it is, unless some intervention happens then languages die out. You only have to contrast Welsh, which is thriving , and Gaelic, which has barely any official support and is on the verge of extinction, to see that. Language is a part of culture, perhaps the most important part of all, and if you’re happy to see your culture destroyed for want of a few pence from your tax bill then good luck to you.

And I don’t see why you should get so het up about a country having its own language as a compulsory subject in its schools. Perhaps they should just give up on being a country and pretend to be English, American or Chinese?

G – Member
Speaking as a Scot I find that a bit rich frankly. (Incidentally I’ve always wondered and perhaps you can answer this question murdoch, if its so **** great up there, how come there are so many of us everywhere else?

Bit rich… oh dear!

And surely you already know the answer to your question if you’re someone that has moved. I have stayed in Scotland and couldn’t guess why ‘so many of us are everywhere else’…

The modern world being what it is, unless some intervention happens then languages die out

So where do you draw the line? Norse? French? Latin? Middle English?

Surely, the idea is to pay due respect to the past, but to look to the future at the same time. Or should we be rushing about banning acronyms and insisting that every mobile phone message is correctly punctuated. Language is a living moving thing, and develops as part of a culture. It should never restrict it or move it backwards.

Put another way, I would love to see the world using one language (English obviously 😉 alongside retaining the local language where it is desirable to the locals. Minfd you bet there would be a war over that one.

surely you already know the answer to your question

Yep, place is full of xenophobic cocks!

G, English is already a mixture of Anglo-Saxon, Latin, French and whatever else gets thrown into the pot. Latin might not be used every day but it is still around, and there are plenty of people who understand and speak it (it’s the official language of the Vatican for a start).

If until relatively recently you had your own language and national identity, and these had been hidden, bastardised and suppressed, you wouldn’t feel that they belonged in a museum or a library. You would want to be out there speaking them. Or maybe not, but it would be good to have the option…

If the signs need to be monolingual then use gaelic place names only IMO.

forced to learn Welsh? The way I remember it most kids were forced into learning english (which goes some way to explaining my complete lack of ability to spell in English).

Anyway, why is she wingeing about learning it, its possibly the simplest language on the plannet (maybe)!

The only dissadvantage i found was it took me a few weeks to get my English upto scratch when i started School in England.

If until relatively recently you had your own language and national identity, and these had been hidden, bastardised and suppressed

No real argument with that point, except that its no more relevant to most Scots or Welsh for that matter than Middle English is to most English.

Its the nationalistic and aggressive thing which I do have issue with, especially when it costs me money for no good reason.