do all Scottish, Irish and Welsh speak English?

Your an idiot adam
Do you think you will ever grow up or do those two brain cells not allow for much more.
If so don't strain yourself to much or you might lose them.
Even though I dought you would notice a great difference.

dought?

Doubt sorry

The idea that welsh speakers use english amongst themselves and only use welsh to initmidate english people is absurd and a complete myth.

In the fro gymraeg (welsh west) welsh is till the everyday language for most people most of the time.

Similarly I have never met anyone in Monmouthshire (my own county) who considers themselves english apart from people born in England, and even when the status of Monmouthshire was 'confused' the only people who considered themselves english were universally perceived to be either social climbers (snobs/crachach) or genuine english people who had moved there from elsewhere over the border, or whose parents had and had social pretensions of grandeur based on their perceived ethnicity/origins.

Since at least the 1960s even those people I have met from the 'far east' of what was Monmouthshire claim to be welsh and from Wales, and that includes those whose family are of english origin. It is certainly true that for some border people the issue of welshness was never really important in the way that it is and has been for those from the Valleys or the fro gymraeg, except for when there is/was a rugby international I suppose. But Adam's deluded idea that a quarter of welsh speakers are english people living in hereford or shrewsbury or wherever is nonsense and betrays his silly english imperialism that would be easily dealt with by spending some time in Wales whether it be in Llanystumdwy or Llandogo and opening his ears and heart to reality.

English or welsh speaking ?? WELL THAT'S FOR US TO DECIDE and if you don't like what we chose then hard luck old boy

<"I still speak Irish and dress Irish and live and breath Irish.....YOU FAILED!!!">

Richard Lyons - what is 'dressing Irish' ?? Do you only wear emerald green?


<I can imagine the English chuckling to themselves and saying, "it took centuries, but, we finally did it, we wiped the Irish out, maybe not phiscally, but, spiritually and Nationally and cuturally...in all intents and purposes, they are now at last ENGLISH, they speak our language and dress like us and live as we do.....we have finally civilized them........">

You're a true mind reader - that's exactly what I was muttering to myself, grinning and dribbling insanely, as I ate my corn flakes yesterday morning. How did you know?

<the English are habitual offenders of Peoples and their cultures and languages>

Now, who is being offensive in this forum....?
Oh, and have you been to London? If we're so terrible - what are all these immigrants doing here? - How can they bear the the incessant 'habitual' offensiveness?

Does Monmouthshire still exist? I thought it's known as Gwent now.

History shows that it could never make up its mind whether to be part of Wales or part of England...it's been switching back and forth throughout history.

It was the home of the Tudors though....the town of Monmouth takes pride in being the birthplace of King Henry V of England.


guest said:

***Oh, and have you been to London? If we're so terrible - what are all these immigrants doing here?***

I'm an "immigrant" to London! I'm having a fantastic time working and playing here but my "immigration" is short(ish)-term then back hame to Bonnie Scotland come the autumn. :-)

Hello,

I've been reading the posts and looking at the topic of discussion and I can firmly say that there are still quite a considerable population of monolingual Irish speakers in Ireland. There are a great deal of Irish speakers from a Gaeltacht who have lived isolated from the rest of Ireland, essentially, those who have not lived outside a Gaeltacht region. Now a days, the generation under I would say 60 have been either taught in English, have an English speaking parent, speak English at home, or in the Gaelsgoil system, have of course been taught English. So bilingualism is very common among younger speakers. Until the Gaeltacht regions were officially recognized by the Irish government, there was a great deal of poverty in the Irish speaking areas, and most people were commercial fishermen, sheep farmers and general farmers, so Gaelic was left generally untouched, for these people, they had no need to learn English because they could function in their communities in Irish. I would say that there is a reasonable population of people over 60 or 70 who speak very broken English, or English at a basic level, hence making them essentially monolingual Irish speakers.
My grandparents are both a clear example of this.. my grandfather was a fisherman in Gweedore, my grandmother was essentially a house wife, neither had to leave the Gaeltacht, and managed not to learn to speak English. My grandfather knows some English, but it is very hard to understand, and his Gaelic is very clear, and ironically not a muddled mix with English words thrown in here and there, it is pure Irish.. which is rarely heard! Both are still alive, still on the same Gaeltacht, and do not ever come across English... their friends and a great deal of people in their age range are much the same provided they have not lived or been outside the Gaeltacht area.
The sad part is, the children on the Gaeltact prefer English to Gaelic even though their education is usually done in Gaelic. The media is largely to blame, as is the internet. TG4 is rarely watched among the young ones, and almost every Gaelic programme has English mixed in somewhere along the line. Because of this, children opt for English, and Gaelic is something that despite the active attempts by the government, it is becoming a language of the older generation by choice. Even people I know in their twenties, were raised in Gaelic, have children, and speak English to the children, not Gaelic.. and they LIVE ON THE GAELTACHT!
Anyways, just to let people know, people who speak broken English aren't as uncommon as first thought. They are generally functionally monolingual... It is in one way good to see this, but at the same time, it is sad to see the language being silenced as each new generation comes along.

Gwent doesn't really exist anymore though does it? It's Torfaen

>>I can't believe that a knowledge of Welsh would be of much use in places such as Gwent (or Monmouthshire as it once was called) or in the other areas bordering onto to England, or in the cities of South Wales, or the Anglicised areas of North East Wales, but my mate will put me wise on that one.<<

It is :) Coming from a 'gwent' (torfaen) girl. I love being able to speak it

I bloody hate the Welsh, they are so anti English it's beyond a joke.They hate the way we talk,look,behave.But at the same time they want to retain us,because when they are abroad and say there from Wales knowone knows where that is,so they just end up saying there british.The truth is that Great Britain became the country it is because of Englishmen and Scotsmen,who gave us some of the worlds best scientific discovery's and inventions.you welsh are just freeloaders and contribute sod all.

Since being in London I have met up with a really cool guy (I'm due to meet up with him in just over an hour's time at 23:15hrs to go out for a pizza and a drink when he finishes work - he's been a police officer in the Metropolitan Police for 3 years although he comes from Devon...great accent!...he says the same about mine). We were actually talking about accents the other night and he told me about the loads of laughs he and his police colleagues have when working the control rooms for one reason or another, especially misunderstandings with London having such a multitude of accents, many of them not British.

This is one story he told me:

After injuring his back off duty playing rugby he had a spell in the Telephone Reporting office, taking crime reports over the phone, quite a change from patrolling the beat in the cars and stuff.

One of the many questions asked to victims of crime is:

"What is your self defined ethnicity?"

When Paul asked this question of a guy who sounded a wee bit pissed and with a very strong Southern Irish accent and he replied: "Whats your opinion?"

Paul responded politely stating that he couldn't really give an opinion as he couldnt see him over the phone.

The guy interrupted by saying: "No! No! What's your opinion?"

Paul reiterated what he he had said previously, but the Irishman continued to ask: "Whats your opinion?" this time his voice displaying increasing irritation.

Only after a few embarrassing moments Paul realised that all the while the guy had actually been saying: "It's White European"....but in a very broad Irish accent. DUH!

***you welsh are just freeloaders and contribute sod all***

Fanny:
As a Scotsman who is over the moon to have a fluent Welsh speaking Welshman as one of his best friends I have to chew you up big time on this scandalous slur on my fellow Celtic brothers/sisters in Wales.

I won't waste time talking to you that much as I don't have the time right now but I saw your post just as I was about to log off.

I take it you're English. Your post indicates an attitude that certainly wouldn't go down too well in Wales, and talking of behaviour, have you seen the way a whole lot of English people behave when abroad, or at home for that matter? By abroad you can include both Wales and Scotland in the context of this particular topic. Not always nice is it, and that's putting it mildly.

Wales has produced so much in the way of great men and women in so many fields of the arts, politics, industry, philosophy and...yes, in the world of science as well if you care to check out the facts and the records. All this quite some way out of proportion for the size of the Principality of Wales with fewer than 3million inhabitants.

They are to be applauded with fanfares and firework displays for retaining their native Language, Welsh, one of the very oldest in Europe...ensuring it's survival now in the 21st century after so many attempts over the years by its Giant Neighbour to the east to wipe the Langauge out once and for all and make all future generations of Wales speak only English.

It's now 2006 and the Lngauge is flourishing. It's compulsory in all Welsh schools up to a certain age, and voluntary thereafter. In some parts of Wales Welsh is still the first Language of the majority in those areas, in total defiance of English dominance and arrogance and toatl lack of concern or understanding.

Is it any wonder the Welsh have the sort of attitude you described?

Noswaith dda i chwi a phob hwyl!
(Good evening to you and cheers!)
And that's coming from a Cymrophile Scot exiled in London - England.

I was so irritated by Fanny's post I forgot to log in my name.

In Ireland, whoever I met spoke English.I don't want to speak Irish.It doesn't sound me really enthusiastic.I find it very rough and rush!Although I am an Irish, however I don't like it really.Sorry Irish, but I don't ;)

You seem really Irish. You are bound to be able to speak a few phrases.
Conas atá tú?