This morning sees the launch of RTÉ’s Irish Language Plan as a pre-election licence fee/public service fig leaf.
New language czar Rónán Mac Con Iomaire (top) promises to ‘recast’ the very language itself.
Despotic plans include:
Bi-lingual bulletins on 2fm
Feasacháin nuachta dhátheangacha ar 2fmA new youth-orientated Irish-language radio service
Seirbhís raidió nua Ghaeilge dírithe ar ógánaigh a fhiosrúInnovative content for language learners
Ábhar den nuáil do dhaoine atá ag foghlaim na GaeilgeCentre of excellence in Irish-language media training
Ábhar den nuáil do dhaoine atá ag foghlaim na GaeilgeIncreased use of Irish in television promos, continuity and weather bulletins
Bainfear úsáid níos minice as an nGaeilge ar bhlaisíní teilifíse, sa leanúnachas agus i bhfeasacháin aimsireNext version of the RTÉ Player to include Irish-language option for the navigational user interface
Beidh rogha na Gaeilge ar fáil leis an gcóras nascleanúna don chéad leagan eile den seinnteoir RTÉ PlayerAdvertisers and advertising agencies will be incentivised and supported to provide advertising in Irish on television, radio and digital
Tabharfar spreagadh agus cúnamh don lucht fógraíochta agus do ghníomhaireachtaí fógraíochta fógraí a chur ar fáil i nGaeilge ar an teilifís, ar an raidió agus sa réimse digiteach
TROID!
Read the full action pleann here
Update:
At the language plan launch.
From top: Taoiseach Enda Kenny and gossamer geansai wearing Blathnaid Ní Chofaigh; broadcaster Blathnaid Treacy RTÉ and Eoghan ‘The Gruaig’ McDermott.
Pics: Tony Kinlan
What about Akkadian, if we are going to revive dead languages can we not do Akkadian!
Cad is brí le “sneer”?
a funny one
Akkadian supplanted Sumerian. Support Sumerian!
:D
Not this old castán.
Ar fheabhas!
I’m so torn by this…. On one hand its seem’s like a total waste of time and on the other hand it doesn’t.
It’s a waste of time. Let it die.
Spend all that money on a significant minority? No, I’m fine thanks. Money can be better spent else where, perhaps the Health Care System or the homeless. In fact, a large pile to generate electricity would be a better use of that money. As I’ve said before here, I’d consider myself 75% fluent and would use it every day, but I see absolutely no need for bilingual news bulletins or a ‘youth’ section. How many people can actually follow an Irish new cast? Maybe 5% of the country? How many youths would ‘tune in’? On that note, I can’t remember the last time I watched TV (Let alone RTE) or listened to RTE. Are they on the moon in terms of listener-ship demographics?
I’d rather see the money given to restructuring the foreign language programs in school, ya know, perhaps educate an upcoming workforce for what is essential a completely service based industry with all the high techs in Ireland, a secondary language being a huge bonus.
The horse has been flogged, there is nothing left. Please stop wasting money on Irish.
Will it cost extra money to integrate irish into programming?
Translation costs are astronomical. There is a fair wage to be made if you are fluent and translate. I know first hand from some of the people that put Spongebob into Irish for TG4.
Yeah, but SpongeBob is class in Irish. Worth every taxpayer cent, unbuilt hosteeple and crumbling school mobile classroom with de water dat does be coming in thru de roof an all.
What? Like “Dia Dhuit, A Dhoman” programming?
Money can always be better spent elsewhere.
Uncle Tom
Agree 100%
Complete waste of limited resources
No you were right first time. It’s a compete waste of time
Iontach!
This is what we should do with the Irish language:
http://static.themetapicture.com/media/funny-what-do-opinion-unwrap.jpg
Why?
Netflix and Sky it is, so.
I suspect the presence of Netflix and Sky in the Irish marketplace is the reason why RTE are trying to create a country specific niche for themselves.
You’ll still have to pay your licence.
We already have TG4 which is probably better then RTE, so why dilute RTE’s content with Irish language programming that no one will watch? they are already haemorrhaging viewers so now they just want to get rid of the last few people watching their pathetic service.
If you don’t watch irish language programming, how do you know TG4 is better than RTE?
I never said i don’t watch Irish language content. TG4 makes decent documentaries good drama and shows american tv programs that people actually want to watch RTE does none of that and is now going to do none of that in Irish as well as english.
So you’re saying the language used isn’t the issue; it’s the quality of the programs?
Shouldn’t you be complaining about the latter then, instead of the former?
So if nobody wants to watch RTE, why does it get about 48% share of the audience and TG4 gets 1.6%?? I think its fashionable to like it, but very few people actually do watch it. If everyone who used that phrase “they do good documentaries” actually watched them, they would have more people than were in the GPO in 1916.
Hasn’t RTE already made a huge commitment to the promotion of the Irish language? It’s called TG4. What’s all this about then?
The video answers that question. More integration of Irish into rte programming.
For some reason we have a nation of kids that leave school with a good grasp (usually) of French or German that they only started learning at 12 or 13 but can’t muster a sentence in Irish that they’ve been learning since 4. You’d have to wonder what the people empowered with educating the nation in the Irish language have been up to. Is there still the same dogmatic approach to it by teachers as there was back in my day, the one that says you have to learn it not because you’ll need it (Maths/Science/Geography) or because you’ll like it but because you have to. To bury the head on the reality of the matter and just have a few die hards forcing this stuff above through is just delusional.
Agreed. I got a D in Pass Irish many years ago. Went to the gaeltacht last year as an adult learner. Was struck dumb for first few days but by the end of the week I was able to at least have a conversation.
It was all deeply buried somewhere but the biggest problems are confidence in actually speaking out loud.
Well at least you got the D
hahah
Exactly this.
The manner in which Irish is taught is frighteningly bad; there seems to be no attempt to relate it to learning languages more widely which may ensure that Irish school leavers have a significant advantage worldwide. It’s a broken system, and throwing money to broadcast to an audience that doesn’t understand the language is utterly pointless; in fact, I think its harmful. Language learning depends on good pedagogy which has been established for a number of languages, I do not see why teaching practice for Irish should be any different. Owning up to failure is difficult, and it seems the nothing will change until that happens.
+1
In terms of admitting failure, surely all you’d need is a new minister of education who wants to look good.
Would it be that hard to establish better pedagogy for Irish?
What is the hold up I wonder?
A New Minister with a commitment to change would certainly be an advantage.
As for the pedagogy – I simply don’t see how it could be difficult. Establish a solid grammatical foundation (which is extremely useful when learning other languages), work through goal-orientated sentences (working through English-Irish, Irish-English). Move into larger, more complicated sentence structure (subjunctive, conditional etc.), and build on that. The rest is vocabulary building. I just think it’s important not to see Irish as exceptional, it’s a language like many others, so teach it the same. As the previous comment pointed out, we learn Irish from a very young age but many leave school with little ability in the subject. This is not a student problem, it’s a structural problem that has gone on for far too long.
Thanks for that.
Totally off the wall idea but perhaps ask people what they want
P.S. I love you Peig
People just love Irish in the media – look at all the thriving private sector businesses just falling over themselves to cater for the tiny minority of people in Ireland who use Irish on a daily basis.
Lots of people, while having no desire to speak Irish themselves, do want ‘something to be done’ to promote the language – so I suppose the above is probably more-or-less what is required.
That’s me, apart from the no desire bit. I don’t have Irish but I wish I did and would live to see more of our culture on telly.
Meh
Last point is being done already, and I’m sure a few bits of the rest are too, just repackaged with a couple of add ons.
….the fact their announcement had to also be given in English proves what an epic fail the ‘National Language’ curriculum is.
Eoghan McDermott is getting a little bit long in the tooth for that get-up.
+A h-aon
So is Blathnaid Ni Chofaigh (44).
Edna hasn’t a chance throwing that right hook (see what I did there?) at a media person. You know what they’re like… Allegedly.
http://www.evoke.ie/showbiz/sheana-keane
I hope those of you who actively campaign for the death of Irish realise that you are on par with ISIS as they thrash cultural relics around the Middle East. Your argument is basically the same, its old and useless. A modern lab would be better than a bunch of ancient columns.
I know you have your psychological reasons for wishing Gaeilge’s demise (school, waste of money, west brit etc), but think of the vulgarity of what you are suggesting and the kind of visceral self loathing it exhibits.
Sin é :-)
1) ISIS? Hhmmm, chopping the head off the odd journalist and taxi-driver (ponders)….
2) Surely ISIS is in FAVOUR of the ancient… face it, Jihadi Seanie is hardly gonna get the Guardian Reader of the Year Award (not least because of 1, above).
People who wish the money spent forcing Irish down the throats of uninterested teenagers could be better spent on helping homeless people, healthcare etc are indeed exactly on par with civilian murdering terrorists, you are correct.
This sort of fantastic logic is exactly why people have such negative opinions of Gaeilgeoirs.
Ah here, the homeless are entitled to speak Irish too. As one chap sitting outside Spar with an Insomnia cup raised towards me said:
“Níl aon hostel mar do hostel féin.”
I like English. How come RTE doesn’t spend millions on it? Huh?
Oh, the hatred is big with this one! Who stole your bainne?
Ah now. Not all Gaeilgeoirs vote Sinn Fein.
It is sanctimonious fáinne-bothering zealots like you that give Irish a bad name, Antaine.
Never wore one in my life a Bhob. Deal with what I said. Or attack an fear. Its all they seem to do on here. And build endless hospitals and homeless shelters with everybody else money. Sanctimonious gits.
Pity about the ISIS comparison Tony; the rest of your comment was spot on.
Both groups have the same goal, to destroy culture. Sorry if you don’t like the comparison. Sometimes one must use a hammer to crack a nut. Half of the haters on here would probably agree with Tintin O Fool today about allowing Disney to use the Skelligs. But they dont see Irish in the same vein.
Comparing people to ISIS is one thing, but to Fintan O’Toole! Now you’ve gone too far.
(Sorry Fintan, that was said in jest. You’re a lovely lad.)
Well said. The Irish cultural cringe is alive and well. Why are so many Irish ashamed of their heritage? The Irish must be the only people who reject their own language in favour of a foreign tongue. Shame on the lot of you.
Great news for Irish people
Eoghan ‘The Gruaig’ McDermott.
Surely:
Eoghan ‘An Gruaig’ McDermott.
Perhaps higher Gaeilge was not your thang.
That should be “an Ghruaig”. Obviously not your thing either.
A dead language actually costing me actual money.
Mental.
Men tal.
Méantâál
You know they do Latin for the leaving? And they pay people to supervise the exams and correct the papers as well as teach it? That’s an actual dead language that costs you money.
Unlike Irish which is alive alive o.
I believe that if every school was a Gaelscoil .. Every school !… Within 3 years all the English only kids would b fluent in Irish… Who would b against this?… Haha !.. Yes the English only teachers would fight it !!… True.. The teaching of Irish for last. 50 years is a disgrace .. Years learning… Can’t speak… The English have really fucked up the Irish … Along with the church and west Brit power brokers
While I agree with you, the cost would be prohibitive – it would cost loads to retrain teachers, who would then inevitably want a lot more money (with some justification, it has to be said).
Think of the furore surrounding teachers marking junior cert papers – the unions would have a field day.