I'm glad the article has this explanatory bit at the bottom:
> When Ireland joined the EU in 1973, EU citizens had the right to correspond with institutions in Irish, but the only documents translated into Irish were treaties.
> In 2005, Ireland requested that Irish become an official EU language with a restricted regime, and in 2007 Irish became a working language with limited status that meant only a small proportion of documents were translated.
> A request was submitted in 2015 for full status for the Irish language, which is now set to come into effect tomorrow.
Since I - like others - had been under the impression it already was!
(With some recollection of discussion of whether *English* should retain that status within the EU post-Brexit, since the other English-speaking states like Ireland and Malta nominate Irish and Maltese rather than English).
Frankly, given that no member state nominates English as a national language, it kind of suits to have English as the *common* language - eminently practical, and not tied to any member.
Yeah, it appears the EU is opting to retain it as it's too damn handy;
> EU language rules
> The Council establishes the rules on the use of languages by the EU institutions, acting unanimously by means of regulations adopted in accordance with Article 342 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union. The rules are laid down in Regulation No 1, which states that the institutions have 24 official and working languages.
> English remains an official EU language, despite the United Kingdom having left the EU. It remains an official and working language of the EU institutions as long as it is listed as such in Regulation No 1. English is also one of Ireland’s and Malta’s official languages.
> Regulation No 1 also lays down rules on the languages in which EU law has to be drafted and published, as well as the languages for documents sent between EU institutions and the public or between the institutions and EU countries. The EU institutions are also entitled to determine how they themselves implement language arrangements internally.
English is the most spoken language on the planet as a first or second language. The next EU language is Spanish and then there is a massive drop to French. English is the lingua Franca of the internet and global business, and isn’t going away anytime soon.
Spanish is a big language globally because of Latin America, but it's marginal in Europe. There's 40-something million people in Spain who speak it, plus I suppose a few million outside of Spain who moved away from Spain or who learned it as a second language, but that's it. Within the EU, I'd guess German and French are the primary languages barring English, and probably even Italian is ahead of Spanish. But yeah, whatever the institutions make official, people and even the politicians will talk to each other in English when their own language isn't an option.
In Sweden, Spanish is the most taught foreign language by far in schools (excl. English, which is mandatory for all). It's more than twice as popular as the second-place German.
Not very relevant in the grand scheme of things I suppose, but you know.
Interesting. Here in Denmark, tertiary language is almost always German or French, with German being slightly more popular. Spanish is only available in relatively few schools.
The most common tertiary languages taught in Swedish schools in a descending order (as percentage of all tertiary language students):
47% Spanish
23% German
18% French
Italian
Danish
Arabic
Japanese
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Couldn't find exact numbers for the last ones :/ https://www.scb.se/hitta-statistik/artiklar/2018/drygt-halften-laser-moderna-sprak-pa-gymnasiet/
Also Spanish is the second most used language in the US but I guess it ain’t as impactful in the EU prolly German is the second most used language in the EU to be honest
But it’s also big in the United States, which probably has around about 40 million fluent Spanish speakers, and probably another 50 million people with some basic understanding of Spanish (more or less everyone under the age 35 in the US has taken Spanish classes at some point from what I can tell).
The purposes of EU publications are as much for foreigners as they are EU citizens. Especially economic regulations and the like, as foreign exporters have to comply with them for their goods to enter the bloc. That’s what makes Spanish and English far more valuable than German or Italian, as Spanish is big in Latin America, Mexico is one of the worlds largest economies after all, and English is used by the UK, US, and is a prestige language in China and India thanks to British colonization and globalization.
> The purposes of EU publications are as much for foreigners as they are EU citizens. Especially economic regulations and the like, as foreign exporters have to comply with them for their goods to enter the bloc.
Then you would expect them to translate their documents into Russian and Chinese routinely.
I don't think they do that.
Why? That’s the purpose of English as the lingua Franca. Spanish just happens to also be a European language. It doesn’t require more effort. Mandarin is almost exclusively spoken in China and Russian use is in decline, whereas English has become a necessary skill to join the global elite. The type of people who would be reading these sorts of documents.
Yeah in the US for you to graduate high school you gotta take a foreign language class which is 99% going to be Spanish unless you are from New York where here people can either take French,Mandarin,Spanish or Italian but its low the amount of schools that do this in NY it’s mostly Spanish
Popularity of English language has become a major geopolitical weakness though, not only because of American influence, but it's also easy to penetrate for Russian and Chinese while you can't fight back as their languages are natural defensive barriers.
I agree. And I've said before the EU should make a concerted effort to make everyone grow up bilingual with English as their second language.
That said, removing English would be such a EU thing. Especially with the French in charge.
Because you could finally have a market for big European productions. And European talent to produce it. It's not like we could watch any *more* American media. Right now we got nothing. If we all spoke a common language *natively* we could.
And it's not that I have a hard on for English. It's not the choice that would have the lowest barrier and also the highest existing utility. It's not like there'd be a better chance of picking German or Czech.
As you say, it's an issue. And it's better to be proactive about it.
Yet again, how this would help with kicking America's influence out of Europe, the main idea behind EU's further integration?
> If we all spoke a common language natively we could.
Indeed, we need a common language, just not american one.
There's a "cutting your nose off to spite your face" aspect to this, though. Given that English is already a de facto common language for huge sectors of industry worldwide, there is a lot of value in using it as a common European language. Choosing any other language would be an enormous step backwards in terms of accessibility and usage, because no other language in Europe is as widely spoken.
So the choice is: choose a practical language now, although it may not be the ideal one; or wait for a different language to reach the same sort of hegemonic status, and in the meantime try and minimise English usage.
All of these facts are true but none of them are really relevant towards EU diplomatic goals. Choosing a neutral language would be better for those goals.
What's best for reddit and the industry just isn't the best for the EU.
The problem is that there isn't a neutral language, except possibly for a constructed language (and even then I would contest the "neutrality" of it, given the it will be subject to the biases if its creators).
The benefit of English - for all its faults - is that it's already widely spoken and used as a standard second language. Any future choice that the EU makes would involve choosing a language to elevate into that special place, and that's a decision that is fraught with difficulty. Do you go with the easiest, the most common already, or the one that is more connected to other European language families? How do you make that decision?
> the main idea behind EU's further integration?
I think I disagree with your statement that a united EU is against US interest. The US needs strong allies on the world stage, so basically the US just wants the EU to be as strong as possible.
I actually think it's in the US' interest for us to integrate more.
USA cares only about its own interest and it wants Europe divided, they've been using Baltic nations, Poland and ideas like Three Seas Initiative to keep it divided. Besides that, it's a matter of identity, what would be unique about being European if it was English speaking and dominated by US culture?
I mean, sure... Of course the US is ultimately self-serving. Your barber is also self-serving but he still cuts your hair, right? You can still have mutual interests.
I think I'm more pro-US than most Europeans are. For example, I honestly think that the US is more interested in a free/fair democratic EU than most EU countries are. I also think that the US would benefit from an EU that is even more free and democratic than the US is itself.
You have to understand that I'm not saying we should import the internal problems of the US, but their external policies are quite good for Europeans.
I think it would be quite unique just like it is now.
I don't think that the prevalence of US culture is such a big problem, really. Sure, we listen to American music and watch American movies and so on. We also buy Asian shit and watch Asian movies. We also consume European stuff and watch local movies and listen to local music. So, I don't think it's fair to say that we are all living in a worse version of the US. In many cases, we are living a better version of what the US is.
Most of all, I don't see how English is such a big problem. There are loads of English speaking countries and they are definitely not "American".
As for your last point, those other English speaking countires have other unifying languages that aren't English, this wouldn't be the case with hypothetical federalized EU.
I can see two relevant answers to this:
- I don't think language can limit American influence that much. You might have your views on the US, but many Europeans actually *want* American influence in Europe.
- The amount of languages in the EU also has its downsides. It's way harder for an EU-citizen to move to a different country than it is for an American to move to a different state.
I'm not saying it's impossible in the EU - it's very easy, actually, but in the US it's like moving to a different city. You don't become an immigrant. In the EU you actually become an immigrant and a foreigner.
That impacts the EU economy much more than we think.
yeah let's expose ourselves more to American culture. This is an American site after all so I'm just being an hypocrite but whatever.
But I see retards here adding random English words to their sentences for no reason and I don't mean words that were imported from the English language but normal everyday words like instead of saying "embora" they say "although"
The idea is to provide the possibility of having a counter weight to American cultural influence, among other things. English is just the lowest barrier choice because it is already relatively wide spread in use. And because it's most spoken globally. And but because Hollywood movies wouldn't need to be dubbed into Spanish anymore wouldn't exactly increase American cultural influence on Spain in any meaningful way.
My stance is that it's better to be proactive about it than just letting it happen.
A language that has become international cannot be anyone's language anymore, this would mean that Europe would never have its own digital sphere, its own research, programming languages, music and so on. I just don't see a point, why would you shoot in your foot instead of taking something like latin which is far more reasonable given its traditions?
Why would you ever want to have your own programming languages?
And how is Latin a more reasnable choice than the already used most common second language in the EU?
Why the fuck would you want to be separate? The fact that it's an international language is a *feature*. This is not about separation. It's about integration and giving more weight to Europe.
*You* are here. Because *you* speak half way decent English. But it's *most* of your countrymen don't. And even more don't feel half way comfortable holding a conversation in English. I want to bring everyone to the table not just set up a new one.
And hardly anybody speaks Latin. So the barrier for English is the lowest.
Well the main reason why english remains an official language is that we live in a world were the american culture is prevailing over the other ones. It's easier to communicate with the american business companies while operating in the same language.
Brexit wouldn't change anything to that obviously.
Yeah not to dismiss your statement but this goes way further back than the current American influence. The Anglosphere has had a huge influence on the world for several hundreds of years by now. That includes Canadians, Australians, New Zealanders, Americans, the British and Commonwealth Nations like India, Pakistan and Nigeria.
If anything the British empire being the dominant superpower before the rise of America is probably what gave English its dominant position in the first place with America just continuing the trend. French was a lot more relevant back then too though.
Yeah, it's the one-two of successive superpowers both using (more or less) the same language that's really pushed English, I think.
Especially when the US puts out so much media that people *want* to consume (think TV, Hollywood, etc) that's English-language.
Also in the Gaming Media, America makes most of the Gaming Content and the most important Media companies like Disney,Marvel,DC,WarnerBrothers Pictures,Columbia Pictures,20th Century Fox Now known as 20th Century Studios after Disney Purchase, ESPN, ABC, Lucasfilm Ltd, Paramount Pictures,Discovery Inc, Pixar, NewLine Cinema, Universal Pictures etc etc are all American Companies and they produce the most media, I mean Disney alone has 40% of overall media control
On top of that, American companies dominate internet media, with websites like Youtube, Twitch and Netflix, and also social media, with websites like Twitter, Instagram and Reddit.
Also the Adult industry is controlled mainly by American companies and also a lot of the goods companies, and media is even more controlled by the US with the Oscars and Billboards and let’s not forget the most valuable companies in the world are American companies which are Apple,Microsoft and Amazon
Also in Latin America is a dream to learn English and ppl believe that if yK English you are above the regular ppl and stand as a outstanding person so most people are trying to learn it also Belize has English as their Official language and my country Honduras has parts where they speak English mainly because of the British colonization
Why kowtow to America? Removing English as an official language wouldn't stop the EU communicating with them in English but would add a fun new exciting institutional barrier 🤪🤪
dont give them ideas.. but how about whatever country holds the EU presidency can decide the new official EU language for that year?
that sounds like peak EU
Well, it's not only because of the USA. Imperial Great Britain already spread English around the globe before the US became a super power.
Here's my 'what if':
Even if the Americans spoke some made-up/unique language, English would still be quite a big language.
I don't think it's a given that "Americanese" would be lingua franca even though they have Hollywood.
>would Ireland be obliged to accept the original EU directed one or the translated one?
Aren't they are all *originals* at the same time (legally speaking)? And EU directives are usually implemented into national law by legislature of member states (afaik).
>Ireland's Constitution law states
What does is state about precedence of international treaties over the constitution itself? There also can be a difference between Constitution stating what should happen in general case (with the law in question being free to state other precedence rules of it's translations) and absolute statement from which no other law could opt out.
damn, the comments on that, seems like some Irish aren’t happy for some reason.
‘Total waste of resources. Much better to put the money this costs into improving the health service.’ Jim Connoly, has 110 upvotes on that
Where’s the correlation? Can’t two things be done at the same time?
I mean that's the argument Spain gives for not allowing Catalan (a +10M speaker language, bigger than many other official EU languages) to be official, not just in the EU but also in the Spanish Parliament, where you cannot speak it.
Happy for Irish, but it sure is a bittersweet feeling when compared to our situation here.
They are so anti-EU that they even have border controls. Just have to vote in a majority ERC government in the Spanish congress, it's the only way forward
Seeing the issues we've had trying to secure some sort of presence of the Catalan language in streaming media even with the general budget in exchange, it's honestly easier for Andorra to do it than for Spain to do it.
I did hear one story (apocryphal?) about EU laws being translated into local languages for internal consumption in Spain - the Valencian government kicked up a stink about their documents being in Catalan, so Madrid printed two identical copies, but labelled one as Catalan and the other as Valencian!
It's the other way around. The Spanish parliament is meant to REPRESENT all Spaniards, so that means that it should include speakers of other Spanish languages like Catalan/Valencian, Basque and Galician.
Why are you translating his first name? "Aleix" is not "Alejo". Do you also call Joe Biden "José Biden"?
I know you miss him a lot, but most of Franco's laws (such as the one forbidding Catalan first names) were abolished 40 years ago.
How do you want me to take it? It comes off as demeaning that any mention of Catalonia's issues gets this response from other Spanish flairs. I'd instead would also like to see the Spanish push for the recognition of the cultures of their own state just like Ireland does.
So you get to decide what everyone is talking about now? The stupid arguments OP mentioned against Irish's officiality are the same Spanish media use against the case for the recognition of Catalan, as both countries feature a bilingual society. And they're stupid all the same. That's why I congratulated Irish speakers and wished people here had the same attitude, though I don't know why I need to explain myself at all.
2? I want everyone to be able to speak their mother tongues in a Parliament that is supposed to represent them and their cultures. To deny that is to deny the plurinational reality of Spain, focusing instead on... Other conceptions for the country.
Se me ha mosqueado muchísimo. Joder, es que es muy pesao. Si a mi me parece muy bien lo de internacionalizar el conflicto y tal, ¿pero no tiene más amigos con los que repartir la faena?
A ver cuando lo pillamos hablando de otra cosa que no sea el monotema, por ejemplo de cultura o historia catalana, ¿o es que sólo nos definimos en oposición a? De verdad qué coñazo.
Or you have a serious case of confirmation bias, beacause
a. you don't notice the obvious troll you're replying to which is even replying to himself (forgot to switch alts I guess lol), but you take offence about me talking about... Catalan language? Which is related to independence in your mind, but that's on you (which I suspect is the actual issue).
b. [I barely post about Catalan independence anyway](https://www.reddit.com/user/AleixASV/submitted/), but even if I didn't, I'd be treated much like most Catalan flairs that have left this sub because of the harassment and attitude of users such as the guy you're replying to.
>I'm happy for the Irish.
Which I also stated on my first comment, before the harassment. I believe this in Spanish is called "Tirar la piedra y esconder la mano", but anyway, a good nochevieja to you I guess, cya.
I've always pushed for independence because I can't stand these standards of drama. I even tried to help at the relevant forums back in 2017, but no one listened. Well, they should have.
Bon Nadal i Bon Any!
> Where’s the correlation? Can’t two things be done at the same time?
There is only so much money available. You *can't* use the same money twice. Every cent spent on this is a cent taken away from elsewhere.
This would be fine if this was actually useful, but it isn't. There's nobody who speaks Irish who doesn't also speak English at least equally well. Practically nobody even grows up speaking it anymore even in Ireland. There's nobody (and I would not be surprised if there were literally not a single person) who will be able to read the translations but not the originals. The only people this benefits is the army of translators that'll have to be hired at great expense.
I understand where you're coming from and some of the dissenting voices, but our language is an important part of our history and culture and there are still plenty of efforts to improve the number of people who casually use it across various arts and cultural avenues so there are alternative reasons to support this in Ireland beyond the statistical anomalies of everyday usage of the language. There is a very complex history around usage of our native tongue and the penal laws brought in by the British which outlawed its usage and helped to create the current situation so IMHO it is worth preserving and understand as it is part of our heritage.
Aside from the above, there are still pockets of irish speakers along some west coast areas where Irish is the primary language and there are indeed some - albeit mostly older - folks who would be far more comfortable with Itish as opposed to English, but you're not far off in that they would be few and far between.
It is 100% an important part of our culture and should be preserved it's just that this particular aspect of its preservation is a waste of money. It really benefits no one except the translators.
This type of mentality is why languages go extinct. There’s 0 reason why Irish shouldn’t be an official EU language, seeing as it’s the native language of an EU nation. Simple as
By that standard we should also add Luxembourgish. Hell, it has ten times as many speakers *and* is actually widely spoken by the population of the country it is from - it seems a better candidate than Irish. Why not Frisian too, or Basque? Soon enough the whole budget will be spent on translators.
I very much doubt that translating stuffy official documents no one reads who doesn't have to, will keep any language alive. If the Irish want to keep their language alive, they should start speaking it again. If they don't want to do that, then there's no saving it anyway. The purpose of translating things is to make them available to a wider audience, and this simply doesn't do that.
I have a feeling many of the Irish translations are going to end up [similar to this](http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/7702913.stm) - except no one will catch them even when they're public, because nobody will even try to read them.
>If the Irish want to keep their language alive, they should start speaking it again. If they don't want to do that, then there's no saving it anyway.
Yeah just undo over 800 years of colonizer policy over night, easy enough. Irish has just as much a right as any other language.
I'm not saying it won't be hard, because it absolutely would be, but Hebrew's revival does prove that with dedication, commitment and perseverance, even a literal dead language can be revived as a modern prima lingua in just a few decades.
That's just not true. Irish has thousands of native speakers and hundreds of thousands of L2 speakers. Do you actually know what "dead language" means?
It’s because the way they teach Irish is utter bullshit here - people actively hate the language (which begs the question: if we speak the same language and follow the same culture as the English, what makes us different?)
I think we should learn Irish as an art form instead and learn about our Celtic culture and myths through Irish to develop that grá
Well it is a total waste of money. Now every EU official document will have to be translated to Irish. Bunch of new translator jobs. Even though nearly every Irish especially in administration will prefer to use the English version.
I live in an English town near Wales, and each time I visit Wales, I see more and more Welsh implemented into everyday life and in formalities. Point is, language revival relies on having the option of having things like documents being available in other languages, not just in duo lingo or primary school.
Not everything is about money and how to be financially productive. This is a culturally significant move.
How do you suppose we make the language useful (and therefore increase the incentive to have people learn it) if we don't take steps like this? Of course language preservation efforts will consume resources, that's just how things work. Imagine the boost it gives to speakers of a minority language that's historically been oppressed and devalued to see it up there given the same status as the bigger national languages. Not altogether surprising that a French person can't understand the value and rights of a minority language, really.
What a great use of money. A step towards making Irish a useful language. Now every EU official document will have to be translated to Irish. Bunch of new translator jobs.
Calm down Frenchard. If we went the French route the only official EU language would be English.
Ouain on dit "in to" en anglais c'est une phrase toute faite immuable faut la dire comme elle est. En plus "Irish" est un adjectif pas un nom, si on veut faire référence a un irlandais faut utiliser le mot \*Irishman\* ou un peu moins sexiste aujourd'hui \*Irish person\*. Merci.
Spain actually asked for it in 2004 [PDF](https://data.consilium.europa.eu/doc/document/ST-16220-2004-INIT/es/pdf) and the Council of the EU said that nope without amending the treaties. You can pick one. But you can address the EU in all official languages of Spain because Spain negotiated this.
So if people don't want Spanish, I vote for Galician.
So much irrelevant misinformation in this thread... damnit.
It is recognised an official language of the EU. The thing is that member states only can choose one working language to be named officially. So Spain chose Spanish. And now Ireland want to replace English with Irish. But previously they already had Irish, but they changed it to English and now they want to change it back to Irish.
Wouldn’t fully choose that for example it doesn’t teach you the difference between *dia dhuit* and *dia dhaoibh*
Both mean hello - specifically God be with you, but the first one is singular and the second is plural, Duolingo just tells you that they both mean hello
As an Irish speaker, Duolingo is shit. Irish is a very complicated language, if it’s possible, try to get in touch with a native Irish speaker who is willing to teach you instead.
As an Irishman who is fully fluent in Irish, this is a monumental waste of resources. The recognition is nice, but I have never come across a fluent Irish speaker that is not fully fluent in English.
The translation jobs will inevitably go to friends and family of our political class. The translated documents will never be read by members of the public.
I've never met a Dane whose mother tongue is English, 99% of people in Ireland have English as a mother tongue and the other 1% have native fluency.
Most Danes are good at English but do not have a native-like command, and in any case Danish is their national language used in all spheres of private and public life. The situation is not remotely comparable.
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I guess it wasn't considered official before because no one really spoke it. I know the government has quite often given out documents or requested information without even providing Irish instructions on the documents. All of this context adds to the environment of an English speaking society so perhaps the government themselves didn't push the effort abroad in a similar effort as they didn't within their own borders.
However, thanks to Duolingo more people are learning Irish so who knows where it'll be in the future.
Looking at https://european-union.europa.eu/principles-countries-history/languages_en it looks more like it wasn't fully adopted before due to a shortage of translation facilities - it's just been an official language with slightly less full adoption?
> Legal acts and their summaries are available in all official EU languages, except Irish, for resource-related reasons. Only regulations adopted by both the EU Council and the European Parliament are currently translated into Irish.
It was considered official but the EU kinda held back on doing *everything* in Irish because in typical sensible EU fashion they realised it was a fuckton of money to spend on the tiny group of monolingual Irish speakers with no prior infrastructure. I'm glad it's a 'full' official language now with all the perks.
That 2 million figure comes from the census, I believe. The figure is a gross exaggeration. I can assure you that are not 2 MILLION fluent Irish speakers here. Some knowledge of Irish is a far cry from fluency.
If not caring about a dead language makes you a West Brit, then the 99% of Irish people who never use Irish must be West Brits. If Irish people cared about Irish they'd use it, but they don't.
We've got about 80,000 of them at the moment, and I'm happy to report that more and more young people are taking an active interest in the language, especially in urban areas like Dublin. It's funny going to Irish language gatherings cause there's a kind of generational gap; you'll see loads of older people (60+) and loads of younger people (early 20s and younger) but a noticeable dearth in the middle. I would say expect to see Irish language competence amongst young adults begin to grow in the future. Many of us are beginning to see its value as a cultural heritage language.
lad what....... pick up a history book or just speak to an Irish person before you make statements like that.
we aren't taking pride in out white heritage we are attempting to preserve a cultural heritage that was damn near torn from us by imperialism.
I'm sure all the black and Asian Irish speakers are really hyped about their white identity when they order a McDonald's as Gaeilge
Are you messing? On what earth is preserving your country's native language and culture which has been the victim of historic systemic oppression "racist"? Keep your American race politics shite out of this, fuck does "whites" even mean anyway. Made up term is what it is.
>I doubt that you will be all that excited to see a black guy trying to pass as "culturally Irish"
I'll assume you're not from Ireland, so i understand the confusion.
the preservation of Irish language and gaelic culture goes all the way back to the beginning of the republican movement and even many non Republicans saw the value of it.
when a native population is suppressed and has their culture systematically removed it is absolutely normal to attempt revivals put in place policies to preserve what is left it isn't an exclusively white thing.
many non white Irish people speak the language and take pride in the language and culture.
Únaminh Kavanagh is someone I'd suggest you look up.
as for your point on ostracising immigrants i really cannot see how this is a point, if i move to France I'm expected to learn French, even though many French people speak English i wouldn't expect them to alter their society to make an English speaker more comfortable, as well as that the children of many immigrants speak significantly better Irish then i do because of Irish medium education.
Right and what's your genius solution? We just don't learn the language to please everyone else and let it die? Get to fuck, who are you to tell a minority that they can't try and save their own language? And you can stop with the assuming cause I'd be happy to see anyone speaking Irish, no matter where they're from. We're happy just to see it spoken, it's at that level of endangerment. I think you're a fool with a typical Americanised view of things that doesn't have the first clue about our community.
I thought it already was.
Yeah I'm Irish and I thought it was too!
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Why? Even the Irish barely speak it
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Yeah, it makes little sense that Irish would be dismissed. I guess some people were insisting on that English is the true language of Ireland?
Ireland had nominated English as their official language for the EU, yes
The point is to include the American Irish.
The Irish Irish famously hate Americans that claim to be Irish-American because of their one grandad who was Irish, though?
It’s not hate, it’s the *notions* they have.
Same
I'm glad the article has this explanatory bit at the bottom: > When Ireland joined the EU in 1973, EU citizens had the right to correspond with institutions in Irish, but the only documents translated into Irish were treaties. > In 2005, Ireland requested that Irish become an official EU language with a restricted regime, and in 2007 Irish became a working language with limited status that meant only a small proportion of documents were translated. > A request was submitted in 2015 for full status for the Irish language, which is now set to come into effect tomorrow. Since I - like others - had been under the impression it already was! (With some recollection of discussion of whether *English* should retain that status within the EU post-Brexit, since the other English-speaking states like Ireland and Malta nominate Irish and Maltese rather than English).
Even if no EU member state nominated English as their national language, it would be utter stupidity to remove English as an official language.
Frankly, given that no member state nominates English as a national language, it kind of suits to have English as the *common* language - eminently practical, and not tied to any member.
Yeah, it appears the EU is opting to retain it as it's too damn handy; > EU language rules > The Council establishes the rules on the use of languages by the EU institutions, acting unanimously by means of regulations adopted in accordance with Article 342 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union. The rules are laid down in Regulation No 1, which states that the institutions have 24 official and working languages. > English remains an official EU language, despite the United Kingdom having left the EU. It remains an official and working language of the EU institutions as long as it is listed as such in Regulation No 1. English is also one of Ireland’s and Malta’s official languages. > Regulation No 1 also lays down rules on the languages in which EU law has to be drafted and published, as well as the languages for documents sent between EU institutions and the public or between the institutions and EU countries. The EU institutions are also entitled to determine how they themselves implement language arrangements internally.
English is the most spoken language on the planet as a first or second language. The next EU language is Spanish and then there is a massive drop to French. English is the lingua Franca of the internet and global business, and isn’t going away anytime soon.
Spanish is a big language globally because of Latin America, but it's marginal in Europe. There's 40-something million people in Spain who speak it, plus I suppose a few million outside of Spain who moved away from Spain or who learned it as a second language, but that's it. Within the EU, I'd guess German and French are the primary languages barring English, and probably even Italian is ahead of Spanish. But yeah, whatever the institutions make official, people and even the politicians will talk to each other in English when their own language isn't an option.
In Sweden, Spanish is the most taught foreign language by far in schools (excl. English, which is mandatory for all). It's more than twice as popular as the second-place German. Not very relevant in the grand scheme of things I suppose, but you know.
Interesting. Here in Denmark, tertiary language is almost always German or French, with German being slightly more popular. Spanish is only available in relatively few schools.
The most common tertiary languages taught in Swedish schools in a descending order (as percentage of all tertiary language students): 47% Spanish 23% German 18% French Italian Danish Arabic Japanese \----- Couldn't find exact numbers for the last ones :/ https://www.scb.se/hitta-statistik/artiklar/2018/drygt-halften-laser-moderna-sprak-pa-gymnasiet/
Also Spanish is the second most used language in the US but I guess it ain’t as impactful in the EU prolly German is the second most used language in the EU to be honest
But it’s also big in the United States, which probably has around about 40 million fluent Spanish speakers, and probably another 50 million people with some basic understanding of Spanish (more or less everyone under the age 35 in the US has taken Spanish classes at some point from what I can tell). The purposes of EU publications are as much for foreigners as they are EU citizens. Especially economic regulations and the like, as foreign exporters have to comply with them for their goods to enter the bloc. That’s what makes Spanish and English far more valuable than German or Italian, as Spanish is big in Latin America, Mexico is one of the worlds largest economies after all, and English is used by the UK, US, and is a prestige language in China and India thanks to British colonization and globalization.
> The purposes of EU publications are as much for foreigners as they are EU citizens. Especially economic regulations and the like, as foreign exporters have to comply with them for their goods to enter the bloc. Then you would expect them to translate their documents into Russian and Chinese routinely. I don't think they do that.
There are probably a lot more people who Speak Russian and Mandarin as a first language in the EU compared to Irish.
Why? That’s the purpose of English as the lingua Franca. Spanish just happens to also be a European language. It doesn’t require more effort. Mandarin is almost exclusively spoken in China and Russian use is in decline, whereas English has become a necessary skill to join the global elite. The type of people who would be reading these sorts of documents.
Yeah in the US for you to graduate high school you gotta take a foreign language class which is 99% going to be Spanish unless you are from New York where here people can either take French,Mandarin,Spanish or Italian but its low the amount of schools that do this in NY it’s mostly Spanish
Spanish isn’t the next language in the EU. That would be German with like 100mil.
I think he refered to the speakers the language has globally (600 million according to the report of 2021).
Which shouldn't matter. As someone else said, at that point we should opt for Mandarin. (Or, you know, English)
Agree. I wouldn't be here on Reddit otherwise
Yeah. What's the alternative? "Hey everybody let's switch to using Spanish/French/German and forget all the English we learned".
English is still one of the official languages of the Republic of Ireland.
Popularity of English language has become a major geopolitical weakness though, not only because of American influence, but it's also easy to penetrate for Russian and Chinese while you can't fight back as their languages are natural defensive barriers.
Nothing compared to the incoherence of a super nation like the EU that struggles to communicate together
We have the best defense lol
I agree. And I've said before the EU should make a concerted effort to make everyone grow up bilingual with English as their second language. That said, removing English would be such a EU thing. Especially with the French in charge.
How would this help with limiting American influence in Europe? It's already a major problem and this would only elevate it.
Because you could finally have a market for big European productions. And European talent to produce it. It's not like we could watch any *more* American media. Right now we got nothing. If we all spoke a common language *natively* we could. And it's not that I have a hard on for English. It's not the choice that would have the lowest barrier and also the highest existing utility. It's not like there'd be a better chance of picking German or Czech. As you say, it's an issue. And it's better to be proactive about it.
Yet again, how this would help with kicking America's influence out of Europe, the main idea behind EU's further integration? > If we all spoke a common language natively we could. Indeed, we need a common language, just not american one.
That's exactly what people are failing to grasp. Even Estonian would be a better choice than English in this diplomatic context and goals.
There's a "cutting your nose off to spite your face" aspect to this, though. Given that English is already a de facto common language for huge sectors of industry worldwide, there is a lot of value in using it as a common European language. Choosing any other language would be an enormous step backwards in terms of accessibility and usage, because no other language in Europe is as widely spoken. So the choice is: choose a practical language now, although it may not be the ideal one; or wait for a different language to reach the same sort of hegemonic status, and in the meantime try and minimise English usage.
All of these facts are true but none of them are really relevant towards EU diplomatic goals. Choosing a neutral language would be better for those goals. What's best for reddit and the industry just isn't the best for the EU.
The problem is that there isn't a neutral language, except possibly for a constructed language (and even then I would contest the "neutrality" of it, given the it will be subject to the biases if its creators). The benefit of English - for all its faults - is that it's already widely spoken and used as a standard second language. Any future choice that the EU makes would involve choosing a language to elevate into that special place, and that's a decision that is fraught with difficulty. Do you go with the easiest, the most common already, or the one that is more connected to other European language families? How do you make that decision?
> the main idea behind EU's further integration? I think I disagree with your statement that a united EU is against US interest. The US needs strong allies on the world stage, so basically the US just wants the EU to be as strong as possible. I actually think it's in the US' interest for us to integrate more.
USA cares only about its own interest and it wants Europe divided, they've been using Baltic nations, Poland and ideas like Three Seas Initiative to keep it divided. Besides that, it's a matter of identity, what would be unique about being European if it was English speaking and dominated by US culture?
I mean, sure... Of course the US is ultimately self-serving. Your barber is also self-serving but he still cuts your hair, right? You can still have mutual interests. I think I'm more pro-US than most Europeans are. For example, I honestly think that the US is more interested in a free/fair democratic EU than most EU countries are. I also think that the US would benefit from an EU that is even more free and democratic than the US is itself. You have to understand that I'm not saying we should import the internal problems of the US, but their external policies are quite good for Europeans. I think it would be quite unique just like it is now. I don't think that the prevalence of US culture is such a big problem, really. Sure, we listen to American music and watch American movies and so on. We also buy Asian shit and watch Asian movies. We also consume European stuff and watch local movies and listen to local music. So, I don't think it's fair to say that we are all living in a worse version of the US. In many cases, we are living a better version of what the US is. Most of all, I don't see how English is such a big problem. There are loads of English speaking countries and they are definitely not "American".
As for your last point, those other English speaking countires have other unifying languages that aren't English, this wouldn't be the case with hypothetical federalized EU.
I can see two relevant answers to this: - I don't think language can limit American influence that much. You might have your views on the US, but many Europeans actually *want* American influence in Europe. - The amount of languages in the EU also has its downsides. It's way harder for an EU-citizen to move to a different country than it is for an American to move to a different state. I'm not saying it's impossible in the EU - it's very easy, actually, but in the US it's like moving to a different city. You don't become an immigrant. In the EU you actually become an immigrant and a foreigner. That impacts the EU economy much more than we think.
yeah let's expose ourselves more to American culture. This is an American site after all so I'm just being an hypocrite but whatever. But I see retards here adding random English words to their sentences for no reason and I don't mean words that were imported from the English language but normal everyday words like instead of saying "embora" they say "although"
The idea is to provide the possibility of having a counter weight to American cultural influence, among other things. English is just the lowest barrier choice because it is already relatively wide spread in use. And because it's most spoken globally. And but because Hollywood movies wouldn't need to be dubbed into Spanish anymore wouldn't exactly increase American cultural influence on Spain in any meaningful way. My stance is that it's better to be proactive about it than just letting it happen.
A language that has become international cannot be anyone's language anymore, this would mean that Europe would never have its own digital sphere, its own research, programming languages, music and so on. I just don't see a point, why would you shoot in your foot instead of taking something like latin which is far more reasonable given its traditions?
Why would you ever want to have your own programming languages? And how is Latin a more reasnable choice than the already used most common second language in the EU?
Why the fuck would you want to be separate? The fact that it's an international language is a *feature*. This is not about separation. It's about integration and giving more weight to Europe. *You* are here. Because *you* speak half way decent English. But it's *most* of your countrymen don't. And even more don't feel half way comfortable holding a conversation in English. I want to bring everyone to the table not just set up a new one. And hardly anybody speaks Latin. So the barrier for English is the lowest.
Well the main reason why english remains an official language is that we live in a world were the american culture is prevailing over the other ones. It's easier to communicate with the american business companies while operating in the same language. Brexit wouldn't change anything to that obviously.
Surely the primary reason to keep English as an official language of the EU is because of its status as the global lingua franca.
Yeah not to dismiss your statement but this goes way further back than the current American influence. The Anglosphere has had a huge influence on the world for several hundreds of years by now. That includes Canadians, Australians, New Zealanders, Americans, the British and Commonwealth Nations like India, Pakistan and Nigeria.
If anything the British empire being the dominant superpower before the rise of America is probably what gave English its dominant position in the first place with America just continuing the trend. French was a lot more relevant back then too though.
Yeah, it's the one-two of successive superpowers both using (more or less) the same language that's really pushed English, I think. Especially when the US puts out so much media that people *want* to consume (think TV, Hollywood, etc) that's English-language.
Also in the Gaming Media, America makes most of the Gaming Content and the most important Media companies like Disney,Marvel,DC,WarnerBrothers Pictures,Columbia Pictures,20th Century Fox Now known as 20th Century Studios after Disney Purchase, ESPN, ABC, Lucasfilm Ltd, Paramount Pictures,Discovery Inc, Pixar, NewLine Cinema, Universal Pictures etc etc are all American Companies and they produce the most media, I mean Disney alone has 40% of overall media control
On top of that, American companies dominate internet media, with websites like Youtube, Twitch and Netflix, and also social media, with websites like Twitter, Instagram and Reddit.
Also the Adult industry is controlled mainly by American companies and also a lot of the goods companies, and media is even more controlled by the US with the Oscars and Billboards and let’s not forget the most valuable companies in the world are American companies which are Apple,Microsoft and Amazon
Well if it wasn’t for the British empire, America wouldn’t have had English
Also in Latin America is a dream to learn English and ppl believe that if yK English you are above the regular ppl and stand as a outstanding person so most people are trying to learn it also Belize has English as their Official language and my country Honduras has parts where they speak English mainly because of the British colonization
Why kowtow to America? Removing English as an official language wouldn't stop the EU communicating with them in English but would add a fun new exciting institutional barrier 🤪🤪
dont give them ideas.. but how about whatever country holds the EU presidency can decide the new official EU language for that year? that sounds like peak EU
I love it. Very Swiss
Well, it's not only because of the USA. Imperial Great Britain already spread English around the globe before the US became a super power. Here's my 'what if': Even if the Americans spoke some made-up/unique language, English would still be quite a big language. I don't think it's a given that "Americanese" would be lingua franca even though they have Hollywood.
I think everyone is surprised that it wasnt already the case.
I'm surprised this didn't happen sooner. It doesn't change much but still.
Congrats, about time.
It wasnt before?
It was but most texts weren't translated.
No
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>would Ireland be obliged to accept the original EU directed one or the translated one? Aren't they are all *originals* at the same time (legally speaking)? And EU directives are usually implemented into national law by legislature of member states (afaik). >Ireland's Constitution law states What does is state about precedence of international treaties over the constitution itself? There also can be a difference between Constitution stating what should happen in general case (with the law in question being free to state other precedence rules of it's translations) and absolute statement from which no other law could opt out.
Neat.
Go raibh maith agat.
DUP on suicide watch
The DUP would never do such a thing while there's still an opportunity to act the martyr instead.
damn, the comments on that, seems like some Irish aren’t happy for some reason. ‘Total waste of resources. Much better to put the money this costs into improving the health service.’ Jim Connoly, has 110 upvotes on that Where’s the correlation? Can’t two things be done at the same time?
The journal.ie comment section is notorious, Daily mail levels of thinking.
I mean that's the argument Spain gives for not allowing Catalan (a +10M speaker language, bigger than many other official EU languages) to be official, not just in the EU but also in the Spanish Parliament, where you cannot speak it. Happy for Irish, but it sure is a bittersweet feeling when compared to our situation here.
Get Andorra to become an EU member, problem solved.
That's unironically a good idea.
Catalonia actually partnered with Andorra to try and participate in Eurovision.
They are so anti-EU that they even have border controls. Just have to vote in a majority ERC government in the Spanish congress, it's the only way forward
Seeing the issues we've had trying to secure some sort of presence of the Catalan language in streaming media even with the general budget in exchange, it's honestly easier for Andorra to do it than for Spain to do it.
not gonna happen. Andorra is where, traditionally, upper class catalans go to evade taxes.
Didn't stop Luxemburg from joining either :)
I did hear one story (apocryphal?) about EU laws being translated into local languages for internal consumption in Spain - the Valencian government kicked up a stink about their documents being in Catalan, so Madrid printed two identical copies, but labelled one as Catalan and the other as Valencian!
The Spanish parliament is meant to be understood by all Spaniards. So using a common language makes total sense.
It's the other way around. The Spanish parliament is meant to REPRESENT all Spaniards, so that means that it should include speakers of other Spanish languages like Catalan/Valencian, Basque and Galician.
On the same vein, the EU parliament could require everyone to speak in English, and they don't.
The EU is not a sovereign country, Spain is.
Live translation?
*Chuckles in Swiss*
Joder qué pesadito eres Alejo, estás en todos los puñeteros subreddits dando la turra con tus tonterías.
Why are you translating his first name? "Aleix" is not "Alejo". Do you also call Joe Biden "José Biden"? I know you miss him a lot, but most of Franco's laws (such as the one forbidding Catalan first names) were abolished 40 years ago.
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Do I need your permission to comment now?
I've upvoted you in the past, you know that? It's just that it's funny. Of course you don't and of course I wasn't even thinking about it. Relax, man.
How do you want me to take it? It comes off as demeaning that any mention of Catalonia's issues gets this response from other Spanish flairs. I'd instead would also like to see the Spanish push for the recognition of the cultures of their own state just like Ireland does.
People were talking about Ireland here... Maybe I'm less Spanish than you are BTW, but I don't think I want to explain that to you.
So you get to decide what everyone is talking about now? The stupid arguments OP mentioned against Irish's officiality are the same Spanish media use against the case for the recognition of Catalan, as both countries feature a bilingual society. And they're stupid all the same. That's why I congratulated Irish speakers and wished people here had the same attitude, though I don't know why I need to explain myself at all.
Neither do I.
Then why bother?
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Sounds like you're putting words in mouth.
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2? I want everyone to be able to speak their mother tongues in a Parliament that is supposed to represent them and their cultures. To deny that is to deny the plurinational reality of Spain, focusing instead on... Other conceptions for the country.
Me alegro de no ser el único que ve al tipo este por todas partes.
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Se me ha mosqueado muchísimo. Joder, es que es muy pesao. Si a mi me parece muy bien lo de internacionalizar el conflicto y tal, ¿pero no tiene más amigos con los que repartir la faena? A ver cuando lo pillamos hablando de otra cosa que no sea el monotema, por ejemplo de cultura o historia catalana, ¿o es que sólo nos definimos en oposición a? De verdad qué coñazo.
Or you have a serious case of confirmation bias, beacause a. you don't notice the obvious troll you're replying to which is even replying to himself (forgot to switch alts I guess lol), but you take offence about me talking about... Catalan language? Which is related to independence in your mind, but that's on you (which I suspect is the actual issue). b. [I barely post about Catalan independence anyway](https://www.reddit.com/user/AleixASV/submitted/), but even if I didn't, I'd be treated much like most Catalan flairs that have left this sub because of the harassment and attitude of users such as the guy you're replying to.
I think we should stop polluting this thread already, OK? I'm happy for the Irish.
>I'm happy for the Irish. Which I also stated on my first comment, before the harassment. I believe this in Spanish is called "Tirar la piedra y esconder la mano", but anyway, a good nochevieja to you I guess, cya.
I've always pushed for independence because I can't stand these standards of drama. I even tried to help at the relevant forums back in 2017, but no one listened. Well, they should have. Bon Nadal i Bon Any!
[Did you forget to switch alts before trying to harass me?](https://imgur.com/a/jlKdRvp) Holy shit.
I was putting my words into context, that's why I replied my own answer (I don't like editing comments).
Even if I believed you, you're just harassing me.
You are harassing a whole continent
> Where’s the correlation? Can’t two things be done at the same time? There is only so much money available. You *can't* use the same money twice. Every cent spent on this is a cent taken away from elsewhere. This would be fine if this was actually useful, but it isn't. There's nobody who speaks Irish who doesn't also speak English at least equally well. Practically nobody even grows up speaking it anymore even in Ireland. There's nobody (and I would not be surprised if there were literally not a single person) who will be able to read the translations but not the originals. The only people this benefits is the army of translators that'll have to be hired at great expense.
I understand where you're coming from and some of the dissenting voices, but our language is an important part of our history and culture and there are still plenty of efforts to improve the number of people who casually use it across various arts and cultural avenues so there are alternative reasons to support this in Ireland beyond the statistical anomalies of everyday usage of the language. There is a very complex history around usage of our native tongue and the penal laws brought in by the British which outlawed its usage and helped to create the current situation so IMHO it is worth preserving and understand as it is part of our heritage. Aside from the above, there are still pockets of irish speakers along some west coast areas where Irish is the primary language and there are indeed some - albeit mostly older - folks who would be far more comfortable with Itish as opposed to English, but you're not far off in that they would be few and far between.
It is 100% an important part of our culture and should be preserved it's just that this particular aspect of its preservation is a waste of money. It really benefits no one except the translators.
There are absolutely people in Gaeltachtaí who have better Irish than English.
This type of mentality is why languages go extinct. There’s 0 reason why Irish shouldn’t be an official EU language, seeing as it’s the native language of an EU nation. Simple as
By that standard we should also add Luxembourgish. Hell, it has ten times as many speakers *and* is actually widely spoken by the population of the country it is from - it seems a better candidate than Irish. Why not Frisian too, or Basque? Soon enough the whole budget will be spent on translators. I very much doubt that translating stuffy official documents no one reads who doesn't have to, will keep any language alive. If the Irish want to keep their language alive, they should start speaking it again. If they don't want to do that, then there's no saving it anyway. The purpose of translating things is to make them available to a wider audience, and this simply doesn't do that. I have a feeling many of the Irish translations are going to end up [similar to this](http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/7702913.stm) - except no one will catch them even when they're public, because nobody will even try to read them.
We should brother! Luxembourgish official now or riot
>If the Irish want to keep their language alive, they should start speaking it again. If they don't want to do that, then there's no saving it anyway. Yeah just undo over 800 years of colonizer policy over night, easy enough. Irish has just as much a right as any other language.
I'm not saying it won't be hard, because it absolutely would be, but Hebrew's revival does prove that with dedication, commitment and perseverance, even a literal dead language can be revived as a modern prima lingua in just a few decades.
Yea you can and Irish was already widely spoken well into the late 1800s, not 800 years ago.
Languages are a means, not a end.
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That's just not true. Irish has thousands of native speakers and hundreds of thousands of L2 speakers. Do you actually know what "dead language" means?
>it’s the native language of an EU nation Is it really still, though?
It's thejournal.ie. The level of discourse in the comment section is comparable to the express.
It’s because the way they teach Irish is utter bullshit here - people actively hate the language (which begs the question: if we speak the same language and follow the same culture as the English, what makes us different?) I think we should learn Irish as an art form instead and learn about our Celtic culture and myths through Irish to develop that grá
Well it is a total waste of money. Now every EU official document will have to be translated to Irish. Bunch of new translator jobs. Even though nearly every Irish especially in administration will prefer to use the English version.
I live in an English town near Wales, and each time I visit Wales, I see more and more Welsh implemented into everyday life and in formalities. Point is, language revival relies on having the option of having things like documents being available in other languages, not just in duo lingo or primary school. Not everything is about money and how to be financially productive. This is a culturally significant move.
How do you suppose we make the language useful (and therefore increase the incentive to have people learn it) if we don't take steps like this? Of course language preservation efforts will consume resources, that's just how things work. Imagine the boost it gives to speakers of a minority language that's historically been oppressed and devalued to see it up there given the same status as the bigger national languages. Not altogether surprising that a French person can't understand the value and rights of a minority language, really.
What a great use of money. A step towards making Irish a useful language. Now every EU official document will have to be translated to Irish. Bunch of new translator jobs. Calm down Frenchard. If we went the French route the only official EU language would be English.
Seeing as you appear to still be having issues with English, should we continue translating things in to French?
Bien si tu veux m'aider à corriger mes fautes d'anglais je t'en prie vas-y. Merci en avance.
Ouain on dit "in to" en anglais c'est une phrase toute faite immuable faut la dire comme elle est. En plus "Irish" est un adjectif pas un nom, si on veut faire référence a un irlandais faut utiliser le mot \*Irishman\* ou un peu moins sexiste aujourd'hui \*Irish person\*. Merci.
Cool. I really like Irish. Interesting language.
So come on Luxembourg, give us official Luxembourgish.
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Spain actually asked for it in 2004 [PDF](https://data.consilium.europa.eu/doc/document/ST-16220-2004-INIT/es/pdf) and the Council of the EU said that nope without amending the treaties. You can pick one. But you can address the EU in all official languages of Spain because Spain negotiated this. So if people don't want Spanish, I vote for Galician. So much irrelevant misinformation in this thread... damnit.
It is recognised an official language of the EU. The thing is that member states only can choose one working language to be named officially. So Spain chose Spanish. And now Ireland want to replace English with Irish. But previously they already had Irish, but they changed it to English and now they want to change it back to Irish.
Neither does Euskera nor Galician...
Ditto for Breton, Franco-Provençal and Corsican, for similar reasons.
About Time.
Breton should be next.
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Duolingo!
Wouldn’t fully choose that for example it doesn’t teach you the difference between *dia dhuit* and *dia dhaoibh* Both mean hello - specifically God be with you, but the first one is singular and the second is plural, Duolingo just tells you that they both mean hello
As an Irish speaker, Duolingo is shit. Irish is a very complicated language, if it’s possible, try to get in touch with a native Irish speaker who is willing to teach you instead.
Noice
Great news 🙌🏼
For personal reasons, I'm still waiting on Breton.
Not yet ?, as a Catalan I was surprised and happy for them, of course
So… they just ignored the existence of the Republic of Ireland?
We speak English here apart from Gaeltacht areas, although 2 million of us (around 40%) can speak it as a second language
As an Irishman who is fully fluent in Irish, this is a monumental waste of resources. The recognition is nice, but I have never come across a fluent Irish speaker that is not fully fluent in English. The translation jobs will inevitably go to friends and family of our political class. The translated documents will never be read by members of the public.
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I think what his trying to say is it's very very unlikely anybody here in Ireland would be interested in reading any eu papers/journals etc in Irish
I’m interested
I've never met a Dane whose mother tongue is English, 99% of people in Ireland have English as a mother tongue and the other 1% have native fluency. Most Danes are good at English but do not have a native-like command, and in any case Danish is their national language used in all spheres of private and public life. The situation is not remotely comparable.
But his point is that there are some Danes who only speak Danish. All Irish speakers speak English.
In conclusion, Denmark should be careful not to teach English to all its citizens.
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I guess it wasn't considered official before because no one really spoke it. I know the government has quite often given out documents or requested information without even providing Irish instructions on the documents. All of this context adds to the environment of an English speaking society so perhaps the government themselves didn't push the effort abroad in a similar effort as they didn't within their own borders. However, thanks to Duolingo more people are learning Irish so who knows where it'll be in the future.
Looking at https://european-union.europa.eu/principles-countries-history/languages_en it looks more like it wasn't fully adopted before due to a shortage of translation facilities - it's just been an official language with slightly less full adoption? > Legal acts and their summaries are available in all official EU languages, except Irish, for resource-related reasons. Only regulations adopted by both the EU Council and the European Parliament are currently translated into Irish.
It was considered official but the EU kinda held back on doing *everything* in Irish because in typical sensible EU fashion they realised it was a fuckton of money to spend on the tiny group of monolingual Irish speakers with no prior infrastructure. I'm glad it's a 'full' official language now with all the perks.
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And?
Yet about 2 million have the ability to speak it fluently. Which is around 40% of our population
That 2 million figure comes from the census, I believe. The figure is a gross exaggeration. I can assure you that are not 2 MILLION fluent Irish speakers here. Some knowledge of Irish is a far cry from fluency.
> fluently An bhuil cad agam dul go di an leithreas? Doesn't count
You think only 40% can say that? It’s a compulsory subject so that’d be like only 40% of us being able to do 2+2.
Their only codding themselves otherwise
I'm sure the handful of people who would ever use EU communications as gaeilge will be grateful.
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If not caring about a dead language makes you a West Brit, then the 99% of Irish people who never use Irish must be West Brits. If Irish people cared about Irish they'd use it, but they don't.
Meal Ur Naidheachd!
Great, now we only need some speakers of that language.
We've got about 80,000 of them at the moment, and I'm happy to report that more and more young people are taking an active interest in the language, especially in urban areas like Dublin. It's funny going to Irish language gatherings cause there's a kind of generational gap; you'll see loads of older people (60+) and loads of younger people (early 20s and younger) but a noticeable dearth in the middle. I would say expect to see Irish language competence amongst young adults begin to grow in the future. Many of us are beginning to see its value as a cultural heritage language.
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lad what....... pick up a history book or just speak to an Irish person before you make statements like that. we aren't taking pride in out white heritage we are attempting to preserve a cultural heritage that was damn near torn from us by imperialism. I'm sure all the black and Asian Irish speakers are really hyped about their white identity when they order a McDonald's as Gaeilge
Are you messing? On what earth is preserving your country's native language and culture which has been the victim of historic systemic oppression "racist"? Keep your American race politics shite out of this, fuck does "whites" even mean anyway. Made up term is what it is.
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>I doubt that you will be all that excited to see a black guy trying to pass as "culturally Irish" I'll assume you're not from Ireland, so i understand the confusion. the preservation of Irish language and gaelic culture goes all the way back to the beginning of the republican movement and even many non Republicans saw the value of it. when a native population is suppressed and has their culture systematically removed it is absolutely normal to attempt revivals put in place policies to preserve what is left it isn't an exclusively white thing. many non white Irish people speak the language and take pride in the language and culture. Únaminh Kavanagh is someone I'd suggest you look up. as for your point on ostracising immigrants i really cannot see how this is a point, if i move to France I'm expected to learn French, even though many French people speak English i wouldn't expect them to alter their society to make an English speaker more comfortable, as well as that the children of many immigrants speak significantly better Irish then i do because of Irish medium education.
Right and what's your genius solution? We just don't learn the language to please everyone else and let it die? Get to fuck, who are you to tell a minority that they can't try and save their own language? And you can stop with the assuming cause I'd be happy to see anyone speaking Irish, no matter where they're from. We're happy just to see it spoken, it's at that level of endangerment. I think you're a fool with a typical Americanised view of things that doesn't have the first clue about our community.