Why the hell do we HAVE to do Irish?!!!?

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Crazygirl

Shure I answered this before. Mr N.I is right. You will get some not so nice responses for saying Irish is a dead language. I see a few already, ha, ha.

Latin is a dead language. A dead language is not used anymore. Some use Irish. It has its own T.V station and all. Hence it is not dead

There are loads of people that can speak Irish up here on Y.A. It is very important to them. They love it so much they want to speak it a lot in Y.A and get their accounts suspended.

Use the form people, like I suggested and poll for it. Then ye can use it as much as ye want. And future people can too. They should also sort out our flag, or lack of a flag up here.

http://suggestions.yahoo.com/?prop=answers

If a system is in place, to make change then use it. But shure you wonâ€™t listen to a Cork person about such things. Shure act like martyrs with your suspended accounts and achieve nothing. When you could do it the proper way and get a result.

Anyway
How could you say Irish is a dead language when so many people are wiling to do that? Or when people spend hours trying to learn it.

My friend loves it and is doing a course to perfect hers. And she is as old as myself. If you want to do acting or presenting. If you have fluent Irish you have a better chance of getting in. My friend that does the acting told me this.

Personally my Gaeilge is terrible. I would love to be fluent. Shure it would be great if I were able to write dark poetry or humour poems in Irish. But I can't and it makes me kind of sad. I am not good at any language. Even with English, I had a grammar and spelling problem for years. I still do. But Microsoft Word writes half the stuff these days. Thank you Mr Clip.

For fluent Irish, I must get locked into a room with a sexy fluent Irish speaker. He could teach me. Wink, wink.

But I answered this question before. Basically what I said was:

Well it is our first Language as stated in our constitution. I think the way it is taught is the major problem. You have studied it 11 years when you sit your leaving cert, yet most are not fluent with it that stage. Some foreign countries have better English myself at 18.

It is a total disgrace we are unable to speak Irish. I mean over 20% of the Welsh can speak fluent Welsh.

They focus too much on grammar and poems in Ireland. You get to hate it then. I mean we spent 13 years in school and cannot have a proper conversation in Irish. That is horrendous. You should have to do Irish for the Leaving, but the syllabus should be dramatically modified

Good Luck

gaspipe

I no it seems like a pain in the butt, and personaly i think it should be a subject you choose to do like french and spanish, but its not and thats how it is!
but it can be quite useful after school for example if you go to england or america you can have a private conversation amongst your selfs wich can be quite enternaining as people get paranoid about what your saying!
its also good to know irish because its your heritage, and i know it doesnt mean much now, but iv left school now nearly 3 years and i wish i knew more irish than i do, all i can say in irish is may i go to the toilet please :(

Ant7

B proud of our language jus because we dont speak it we shouldnt dish it it is part of our culture we should hold on 2 it!other countries wouldnt complain about ther language!

James G

left school in 1984. was constructively expelled by the 7th Irish teacher i had at secondary level. I still bear half a grudge.

As to the language the grÃ¡ beag i have for it i got at home. i know a few sentences and can help my daughter with her homework but in the end its just a bit of a laugh really.

one of those little irky things about life in ireland. bite down and work to make it possible for your kids to opt out. i dont know if its relevent but my daughter taught me more of texting (a new age language!!) in an hour than 13 years at school taught me of Irish.

TÃ³g go bog Ã©

James H

I learnt it and am glad I have - its fun when you are overseas and want to talk about the natives and you can use a language that they wont understand. They will do that to you by the way in their native tongues! If you really don't like it - drop it down to lower level and take up a language you are interested in. A monkey could pass the lower level!

Kit

Hey you cheeky monkey : )

Take it easy, because you have it soooo much easier than your previous brethren, just imagine what it would be like to have to learn it without the internet : P

Here's what to expect for your leaving certs:
http://www.allhonours.ie/content_179?page=1

I guess I'm lucky I never had to learn American Indian Cherokee or Souix or something XD

Just Spanish. Practically a mandatory requirement now in order to get a job....

Soul Jacker

hehe I think you may have a few angry responses in the not to distant future for the 'dead language' remark.

1st of all can I say I completely understand where you're coming from. In my high school (not a grammar where they have much more choices of subject) in NI we did French and Irish in 1st year only and then had to choose which one we were going to continue to do as a GCSE.
I chose French because of 2 reasons

1 I didnâ€™t like languages and found it easier
2. Because Irish is only spoken here I felt French would be more useful.

In Northern Ireland mandatory subjects end at 16 (GCSEs). Now if I had to do Irish up to A level never mind GCSE I think I may have cried and it certainly would have turned me completely against the language.

As it stands now Iâ€™ve learnt a different language outside of school (Spanish) and I would like to be able to attain some level in Irish.
I donâ€™t think either of these things would be true if Irish was mandatory to 18 up here.

I have to say I much prefer our system to the leaving cert because you can specialise in 3 or 4 subjects at A level (which you most likely enjoy) and cover a lot more ground than someone who has to study 6 or 7 subjects more generally.

I think primary school is the time to build a love of the Irish language, by making it fun and allowing more people to fall in love with the language (as so many do) but I fervently believe forcing someone after the age of 15/16 to learn something is counterproductive and only leads to prolonging the hatred of that subject.

Guillaume D

i totally agree with you and have spent most of my secondary schooling ignoring irish.its a thorn in my side and if i was head of the country i'd make it optional.can you believe irish is a recognised european language? its laughable.i dont want to live here, when i'm older, i want to travel.no irish needed for that.down with irish!

Aisling xx

Why are you asking this question again?

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index;_ylt=Anu4TKNGeS1mTaZ3CCzUODjty6IX;_ylv=3?qid=20090123133456AAZWwbX&show=7#profile-info-EPK6FzCdaa

We should learn Irish, its our culture. I'm 16 but i still think losing it would be like losing a part of ourselves!

Siobhan

I wonder how the people of Spiddal, Rannafast Gweedore etc feel about you saying their everyday language is dead.

ayhartlasketchup

I love it it's good to know it and it's a rare language so embrace it

Ka W Its about time JB 4 life :D

Its good 2 know a dead language, but ya, a current 1 helps better would you tell me what u learn, I'n interseted in dead languages, lol :D

Orla C

Can I remind you that there is now the Irish language television station, TG4? It wasn't there when I was a child. Good going for a dead language, wouldn't you say?

It's not so hard for the Leaving Cert, and you don't have to do Honours Irish for your Leaving if you feel you can't cope with it.

poppa fluff

Some of the replies are so dishing and negaitve...

I think you should be proud of being able to speak Irish..
When it is time for u to travel it will be gr8 to have the ability of conversing in Irish, and teaching locals in whatever area a few words..

Be happy with the chance of learning it.. I wud give anthing to be able to speak it again

Honey B

i think it's good to know a dead language! but that's how i feel.

Ella :D

Cos its out national language.....ya need some pride there...and......yeah......it really is rubbish......!!
Im doing pass for the LC...so ill be grand!! :P

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