Is Gael mé | Bláthnaid Ní Chofaigh | TEDxMerrionSquareWomen 

click on cc for the subtitles in english!

@@tedxmerrionsquarewomen209 thanks for the reminder, I'm so used to subs not working for Irish that I didn't even consider trying. So nice to be able to follow along now.

Blathnaid never had that fadhb!

Actually, I don't think that's the core of her argument. She's actually arguing that speakers of Irish should be respected as they are. It's not about promoting Irish, it's not about "better teaching in the schools", rewarding the "cúpla focal", etc. They're not some exotic group to be put on a pedestal. It's simply about recognizing that Irish is not a hobby for them, not some niche interest, they're not "an example". It's simply that Irish is as fundamental to their lives as English is to most Irish people. And that should be respected and valued. I'm Irish myself, agus Gaeilge Chonamara réasúnta líofa agam, but always struck when I hear these arguments that there's never parallels drawn to other situations in the world with similar situations. It's almost like there's an assumption that Irish is the only language in this situation currently or ever, so there's nothing to learn from anyone else. The French language in Canada is on a different scale (~8million speakers), but the power of English is global, and the battle is similar, even if the scale is different. If anyone reads this with knowledge of those situations, I would love to hear about parallels, not just with Canada, but other similar linguistic situations. It's not clear that anyone has the answer, but it would be interesting to hear about how others deal with linguistic drift.

seo an chéad cheann a rinneadh as gaeilge ceapaim