Post by connacht4096 on Jun 3, 2022 23:30:03 GMT
Aside from the ethical problems of "harsh" methods, there's also the pragmatic problem that such methods could never actually be applied. People wouldn't stand for it. If people won't voluntarily speak the language, do you really think they can be coerced or pressured into doing so? There would be a massive backlash. This isn't a productive way to spend your mental energies, in my view.
Besides, the actual survival of Irish is fairly secure, in my view. In the fascinating book Guthanna in Éag/Voices Silenced by James McCloskey, the author puts forward the interesting claim that, although ninety per cent of languages are in decline today, Irish is not actually one of them. It has the support of a State, which is crucial to the survival of a language.
just to be clear; is the number of first language speakers at least going to hold steady? because they are the launchpad off of which any attempt to reverse the decline of the language must go; I do not care too much about monoglot speakers (meaning people who understand know other language); in part because languages can survive without monoglot speakers, and globalization is likely to make it impossible to be a monoglot speaker of anything but English, Spanish or Mandarin (but this actually gives me hope that languages can survive having many native speakers but no monoglot speakers; if such significant languages as French, Italian, Russian, Arabic and Japanese are also in that boat; then it becomes even easier); what I care about is the native speakers, the people who have acquired Irish from the cradle; who think in Irish; who jump directly from the Irish word for a concept to the idea it represents without in-between steps; who have learned English through equivalent words in Irish; who can rely on their own gut feelings to determine what is grammatically correct in it (I actually think a native speaker's gut instinct is the best guide to the grammar of a language; and non native speakers have to learn formal grammar rules only because they do not have a native speaker's gut); as long as those do not go away; the people who speak a language nativly are the way the language remaigns alive and part of people's lives everyday; as long as Irish is not loosing those; it can survive