Well they’ve dropped Peig from the syllabus. That’s about it as far as I can tell!

The teaching of Irish seemed to reflect the guilt complex conditioning of catholic education – nothing was worthwhile unless you were miserable. I mean, for example, why was the self pitying bleating of an elderly woman (Peig Sayers) from the wilds of the Blaskets considered suitable study material for teenage students?

I’ve spoke to many survivors of the Christian Brothers who initially trumpeted this line. But in reality violence in the classroom wasn’t exclusively directed to the irish language yet you and hundreds like you use this excuse to justify your hatred of Irish. You need to look a little deeper for why the language was “beaten” out of you….

@Mairtin,

Surely you would have had the option to learn it? You just weren’t obliged to learn it.

Is that not more of a personal failure or a state failure then? While our teaching of languages leads a lot to be desired compared to continental Europe, sure the answer is not to eradicate the subject but to improve the methodology behind teaching it. Why is it for exams that someone can feel better at speaking French after 5 years then at Irish despite learning it for over a decade?

I wish i could say that it is a personal failure but i genuinely liked irish but i never had the opportunity to become fluent as there is more emphasis on learning poetry and stories rather than speaking the language. And it is not that i am more confident with speaking french, the simple fact is that i can speak more and write more french that is not learnt off!

@ Stephen You are 100% correct.

When I started learning french in secondary school it was useful day to day stuff such as finding directions, purchasing tickets etc. Whereas secondary school Irish was inevitable god loving brit hating scutter in poetry and prose…nothing day to day.

In primary school I got taught by a husband and wife team in a class of 84 students and when they wanted to argue or talk privately between them they used Irish…..how is that for faith in your own teaching.

Also there is no doubt that Irish has been hijacked or is perceived to have been hijacked by shinners so at lot of people get turned off as a result.

And you are 100% correct Gavin.
- A constant stream of maudlin self pitying crap where hardship and misery was the route to salvation and anything beyond these shores was the work of the devil.

”Ah sure, after all the misery, pain, death, destitution and squalor I never lost my belief in god, never missed a days mass and a prayer was never far from my lips”

Now translate that into past present and future tenses for tomorrow like a good lad!

The teaching of Irish in schools has been poor with syllabus and individual teaching ability at the root of it.

But lets not forgot that our education system still produces illiterates (although in the last 5-10 years big steps have been taken to improve this), people with a below average grasp of basic mathematics (such as percentages and multiplication) and people who think that Donegal, Cavan and Monaghan are in Northern Ireland and use Sterling….

If you can speak one language surely you can speak another? Tóg an méar amach agus bain triail as!

Táim bréan den nath sin.

Well ! ansin dul go dtí ceann eile snáithe ….. Seamus !

I wouldn’t depend on Google Translate Susie, it’s not very good at translating full sentences.

Lol !

What does a country having a soul actually mean, Cóilín?

HI Niall
Thanks for that , funny I actually heard about this kind of carry on …. Tragic,We must make sure that can not happen here. The worst thing that can happen a child is to be put into state care …So this is why I look forward to reading the proposals. Surely this government can’t make a pigs ear of it ? I live in hope ??

oops !!!
Wrong thread .

hi John,I think that language carries the rhythm of a people through song and speech, a turn of phrase, humour, how we see ourselves in the world and how we see the world. When we lose our language we lose a big part of our identity, what differentiates us from other countries. That is the soul of which I speak. I am not for a moment saying that we shouldn’t speak English, it’s a great language and very useful for commerce etc. but we should preserve what we have. We would be the poorer for it if we lost our language completely and that is a real danger. It is strong in areas like Conamara and the other Gaeltachts. But we have an appalling school system that has let us down badly. There are many teachers outside the gaeltacht areas who can’t speak the language and are teaching it, how the hell was that supposed to work???
But hey, it’s only my opinion.

@ Aodhán – I suppose Google using ‘Irish Gaelic’ is merely to differentiate it from Scottish Gaelic, while also acknowledging that they’re both Gaelic and two branches thereof.

Your “fact” is not a fact.

A dead language is one that has no native speakers. There are still native Irish speakers, so it is not dead.

The language is “endangered”, not “dead”.

For your information, Irish is not a dead language. I hear it and use it on a daily basis, where i live in the Gaeltacht (an Irish speaking area in Ireland). You should educate yourself on these matters before embarrassing yourself any further with your ignorance and factual inaccuracies.

Lol – every socio-linguist in the world disagrees with you

Níl sé sin “fact” ar chor ar bith! Labhrím Gaeilge chuile lá agus is an-bheo dhomsa í. I also speak English every and see no reason why we can’t be proud of and celebrate accomplishment and creativity in both languages. Tá neart scríbhneoirí agus filí den scoth ag scríobh as Gaeilge sa lá atá inniu ann. It’s not all Peig Sayers and ochón agus ochón ó shite!

@ Marko Burns – why not celebrate BOTH? What’s the the strange one-or-other attitude?

yeah, we also have self-defecating and self-loathing “Irish” people. Too many of them in fact.

You dont need to speak Irish to be an Irishman.
You dont even need to like Peig, enjoy Irish language poetry or agree with the teaching methods used to teach Irish in schools.
But only an person who hates the Irish culture and nation could show such disregard for the language which is still spoken to infants from the cradle in this country as it has been for centuries. If you hate your own nation and its culture what are you still doing here?

When I was over on my honeymoon in the West (Mayo, Galway, Clare, Limerick, Kerry, Cork, and Tipperary) in 2010, I was amazed at how much Gaeilge I heard being spoken around me. Perhaps you just weren’t listening?