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From: rathmann@brahms.berkeley.EDU (Michael Ellis such as he is)
Newsgroups: sci.lang,soc.culture.celtic
Subject: Celtic Languages
Message-ID: <92@cartan.Berkeley.EDU>
Date: Sat, 25-Oct-86 05:58:51 EST
Article-I.D.: cartan.92
Posted: Sat Oct 25 05:58:51 1986
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Reply-To: rathmann@brahms.berkeley.EDU (Really Michael Ellis)
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Xref: watmath sci.lang:39 soc.culture.celtic:69

> ccplumb@watnot
 
[from a conversation about American vs. British spelling practices..]

>> Are there any Brits (or Scots, Welsh, or Irish) out there who've
>> felt this American linguistic imperialism?

> Speaking of linguistic imperialism, the Scots, Welsh and Irish
> already have felt it to such an extent from England, that Gaelic is
> dying out.  Tell me, do the French Canadians feel any more
> linguistic imperialism from "color" as opposed to "colour"?  I doubt
> it.

    Indeed, why should the Scots, Irish, or Welsh have any attachment
    to Saxon language practices?

    I do not know how many genuine native Gaelic speakers actually
    exist, but by the accounts I've heard the number is vanishingly
    small. I suppose those Irish or Scots who give a damn about
    their spelling by definition give a damn about the spelling of
    "Saxon" (English) since that appears to be the only language
    they use.

    I suspect that Gaelic culture was as much the victim of English
    cultural imperialism as of the mass exodus to America, for
    centuries a factory of mass Saxonization on a scale that
    King Alfred could not ever have imagined even in his wildest
    dreams. We turned Celts, along with Poles, Germans, Italians..
    into Anglo-Clones by the millions.

    Pity.

    On the brighter side, Welsh, from the reports I have heard, is a
    living language that is commonly spoken, employed in textbooks, in
    business, in legal documents, streetsigns, etc. Welsh language
    "activists" and other pranksters purportedly enjoy misdirecting
    English language streetsigns so that you must read Welsh to go
    anywhere, since placenames are often rendered incomprehensible to
    the Saeson due to the grammatical effect of initial consonant
    mututations. Such stories sound too good to be true, at least to
    Celtophiles. 

    A related language, Breton, which is much closer to Welsh than
    Gaelic (I've heard it said that the Welsh and Breton are perhaps as
    mutually comprehensible as Spanish and Italian) is spoken in France.
    Breton is the only case I know where a Celtic language has successfully
    reconquered lost territory: sometime between 500-1000 some
    proto-{Breton/Welsh} left Wales for Brittany. On paper, Breton
    looks very much like a Frankified Welsh, particularly in its
    vowels and vocabulary additions.

    I have not heard either way as to the vitality of Breton -- is it
    used in daily life, commerce, law, public schools, etc? Is there
    anyone out there who firsthand knowledge of day-to-day linguistic
    usage for any Celtic language?
    
-michael

    A'r gyfreith honno a ddroes Alfrydd frenhin o Gymraeg yn Saesneg
    (And that law did turn King Alfred from Welsh into Saxon)

-from the Red Book of Hergest