Cultural Activism Options

[Malkavian_1]

Lately I've been thinking about pressure on cultures and how they react, such as situations in Brittany, Ireland, Wales, Catalonia, the Basque country, and I suppose to some extent Palestine.

For example, the Welsh language is in decline; it has about 600,000 speakers worldwide. In Wales alone roughly 3% of children are brought up in a Welsh-speaking household. The pressure group Cymdeithas yr Iaith Gymraeg (The Welsh Language Society) is a pressure group for the language and has made many gains such as bilingual road signs, Welsh TV, and the Welsh language acts. They also heavily protest in Wales.

for example:



This McDonald's (In Wales) was graffitoed for not having signs in Welsh. 9 Members of the society were arrested.

In another example:



This is a protest at a government building in 2005 in Caernaerfon (The sign reads "OUr Communities Must Live")

I know a fair bit about cultural repression in celtic countries, but I'm really ignorant of what goes in in the Americas, the Middle East, and Spain. I know that in some cases cultures have reacted violently (e.g. Basques, Palestinians) and sometimes nonviolently.

[defiance]

Well I know there is still a lot of struggle to keep Native American culture alive; you know, religion, customs, tradition, language, that type of stuff. For a long time the government was overtly trying to wipe it out through reservation schooling, church, and other institutions and a number of anti-Indian laws. It was only n more recent times that that began to stop, and it still goes on to a large extent. We just don't hear anything about it in the media. There's also constant efforts by the government and by many people to make foreign immigrants "assimilate" to "American culture." But you don't have to look very far to see that one.

[freedom_mumia]

I know in my own family only my grandmother and my father speak Sioux and they speak it very little. I only know I few words, I wished I knew more.

[Outsider]

In terms of language it is practical that everyone speaks one...don't know how English became that though
But yea, if people decide to speak English instead of welsh maybe its because they like English more? ...then again perhaps it's because TV and media is broadcasted in English so the parents feel they must teach there children English.

I can totaly understand the Cymdeithas yr Iaith Gymraeg anger but only 3% being tought it looks grim.
It's sad that part of a culture is dying out but what can be done? Ecspecialy in such a small country.

This post has been edited by Outsider: Jun 20 2005, 03:27 PM

[Malkavian_1]

In terms of language it is practical that everyone speaks one...don't know how English became that though blink.gif
But yea, if people decide to speak English instead of welsh maybe its because they like English more? ...then again perhaps it's because TV and media is broadcasted in English so the parents feel they must teach there children English.

I can totaly understand the Cymdeithas yr Iaith Gymraeg anger but only 3% being tought it looks grim.
It's sad that part of a culture is dying out but what can be done? Ecspecialy in such a small country.

Those statistics are actually somewhat misleading. There's about 600,000 Welsh speakers worldwide. There's just problems in Wales with immigrants from England who enter Welsh-speaking communities and refuse to speak Welsh or have their children enroll in Welsh classes.

[Outsider]

Those statistics are actually somewhat misleading. There's about 600,000 Welsh speakers worldwide. There's just problems in Wales with immigrants from England who enter Welsh-speaking communities and refuse to speak Welsh or have their children enroll in Welsh classes.

Sorry my bad >.<
In either case welsh has still little practicality in modern society, so it is ultimately inevitable that the language will be spoken significantly less.

[Malkavian_1]

Those statistics are actually somewhat misleading. There's about 600,000 Welsh speakers worldwide. There's just problems in Wales with immigrants from England who enter Welsh-speaking communities and refuse to speak Welsh or have their children enroll in Welsh classes.

Sorry my bad >.<
In either case welsh has still little practicality in modern society, so it is ultimately inevitable that the language will be spoken significantly less.
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How so? What do you think makes a language have little practicality?

[Lostphoenix]

my country was oppressed by austrians for two hundred years and culture germanised, czech language was thrown underground, so you can say it was impractical to speak it, yet it was preserved by the artists who protested this by stubbbornly speaking, writing czech and distributing it so people would not forget their own language. its only thanks to them, that my language survived those two hundred years of germanic culture's oppression, however impractical that was and even to however much trouble it could get you, those artists spend a lot of time in jail for what they were doing.
while its important to be able to communicate in universal language, which is these days enlish, people should still hold their culture and language is one of the reflection of culture.

[Outsider]

Ok then - Wales suddenly makes all schools teach welsh- road, public, blablahblah signs all go up in welsh. You can change that but then they got a big problem - the media are still speaking English. I've never heard of the WBC?
So children can get much better ahead in life by speaking English, most music and books are English (in whales most are not worldwide) - by enviromental affects slowly welsh will die out. Latinis is still alive because it is the basis for many languages, spanish, English, french etc. And that it is rich in historical background. Welsh does not have those benefits. The only soloution i can think of is teaching it in schools but i don't think that will lead to it being spoken regularly between people. I am not saying it is a good thing at all, im saying it is inevitable.

This post has been edited by Outsider: Jun 21 2005, 03:30 AM

[Lostphoenix]

while its practical to speak english, there is no reason for welsh people not to keep their language alive. i've been to holland a lot and majority of dutch people speak english and so do scandinavian countries very fluently, but it doesn't mean they don't speak dutch/swedish/norwegian etc....there's no reason for people to stop speaking welsh just 'cos there's so much of enlgish...

its a known fact that children can grasp languages very easily and be not just bilingual, but multilingual, there's no reason for a welsh child not to learn both language as one doesn't negate the other.

ha ps,...edit my previous post, it was more then two centuries we were under austria...

This post has been edited by Lostphoenix: Jun 21 2005, 05:35 AM

[Outsider]

while its practical to speak english, there is no reason for welsh people not to keep their language alive.

I agree but i also can recognize how difficult this is when English is spoken so much by them and to eachother. I believe it will die out - and I think thats a bad thing.

its a known fact that children can grasp languages very easily and be not just bilingual, but multilingual, there's no reason for a welsh child not to learn both language as one doesn't negate the other.

Didn't think of that - good point. Perhaps schools could start teaching it...

[Malkavian_1]

Ok then - Wales suddenly makes all schools teach welsh- road, public, blablahblah signs all go up in welsh. You can change that but then they got a big problem - the media are still speaking English. I've never heard of the WBC?

The media speak Welsh in Wales, actually .

So children can get much better ahead in life by speaking English, most music and books are English (in whales most are not worldwide)

If they live in the English-speaking world, yes. So do you think that, say, a chinese person could get much better ahead in life by speaking English? Or a South American if s/he dropped Spanish or Portuguese?

by enviromental affects slowly welsh will die out.

I actually doubt it.

Latinis is still alive because it is the basis for many languages, spanish, English, french etc. And that it is rich in historical background. Welsh does not have those benefits. The only soloution i can think of is teaching it in schools but i don't think that will lead to it being spoken regularly between people. I am not saying it is a good  thing at all, im saying it is inevitable.
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Actually, Welsh does have those benefits. It's the main Brythonic language and is usually heavily studed by linguists because of it's connection with the theorized Ivernic language family, and it's relation with Cornish & Breton.

I personally don't think Welsh will 'die out'. As i said, there are 600,000 speakers; most of them will probalby raise their children to speak Welsh. I doubt that the number of Welsh speakers will increase heavily; but I doubt it will shrink all the same. It's a recurring situation in most of the Celtic language communities, except the Gaelic language communities, which are actually growing in their homelands and around the globe.

Didn't think of that - good point. Perhaps schools could start teaching it...

Schools do teach it. There are schools in Wales that use Welsh as a medium for teaching, actually.

I agree but i also can recognize how difficult this is when English is spoken so much by them and to eachother. I believe it will die out - and I think thats a bad thing.

It really isn't. I think somewhere around 50% of the Welsh popultaion uses Welsh on a regular basis; most towns in the north and east have Welsh as their primary language. I'm not sure though, it might be the south that's mostly Welsh and the north that speaks more of English.