Black mountain

Cotta

lazer wrote: »

No Divis - which means Black (In Irish)

I see, it's not called Black mountain - it's called Divis mountain?

NI22

qwert_yuiop wrote: »

Dubh. Black. How many years of Irish did the English taxpayer provide for you? You could at least have the gratitude to remember that much.

Read my other post, we have faced discrimination and as a result many cannot speak Irish.

qwert_yuiop

NI22 wrote: »

Read my other post, we have faced discrimination and as a result many cannot speak Irish.

Now that is only caca na tarbh. (BS - but you know that)
Irish is available in all Catholic schools, provided free by the uk government, so any failure to speak it is down to the old school kid reliables of lack of interest, laziness and stupidity.

Interestingly, trips to the gaeltacht are paid for by her maj as well. Down south, the children have to pay for them, so only the rich can go, thereby improving their chances of getting jobs which demand Irish and passing their leaving cert well. Yet again, a form of discrimination against the poor which does not exist here due to our state's generosity and english socialist thinking from 1945. God bless Mr Atlee.

lazer

qwert_yuiop wrote: »

Now that is only caca na tarbh. (BS - but you know that)
Irish is available in all Catholic schools, provided free by the uk government, so any failure to speak it is down to the old school kid reliables of lack of interest, laziness and stupidity.

Interestingly, trips to the gaeltacht are paid for by her maj as well. Down south, the children have to pay for them, so only the rich can go, thereby improving their chances of getting jobs which demand Irish and passing their leaving cert well. Yet again, a form of discrimination against the poor which does not exist here due to our state's generosity and english socialist thinking from 1945. God bless Mr Atlee.

Is that true - how long has that been in place - when I was at School it was paid for.


When I was at School, Irish was taught for 3 months in 1st year of secondary school, and 3 months in 2nd year - after that you were only allowed 2 out of 4 languages (French, Spanish, Latin & Irish) - so many people dropped Irish.
So in 14 years of Catholic School, I learnt 6 months of Irish, not really enough to actually speak it!


I do wish now I could speak it, and will be taking an intensive course sometime in the next year.


Failure to speak it is due to the fact the language was slowly dying out over the years, partially due to British Influence (And I think a ban on speaking it at one stage - not clued up on dates etc!) and partially due to simple lack of interest.


Personally I am very happy to be speaking English - makes travelling much easier as nearly every country at least some people speak English, however I would be happy to speak Irish too.


I like the recent resurgence in the language - its great that children are being taught it in primary schools now, as secondary school is too late to start learning it.

bingo_bango

News to me to. Can you reference that point please Qwerty?

qwert_yuiop

lazer wrote: »

Is that true - how long has that been in place - when I was at School it was paid for.


When I was at School, Irish was taught for 3 months in 1st year of secondary school, and 3 months in 2nd year - after that you were only allowed 2 out of 4 languages (French, Spanish, Latin & Irish) - so many people dropped Irish.
So in 14 years of Catholic School, I learnt 6 months of Irish, not really enough to actually speak it!


I do wish now I could speak it, and will be taking an intensive course sometime in the next year.


Failure to speak it is due to the fact the language was slowly dying out over the years, partially due to British Influence (And I think a ban on speaking it at one stage - not clued up on dates etc!) and partially due to simple lack of interest.


Personally I am very happy to be speaking English - makes travelling much easier as nearly every country at least some people speak English, however I would be happy to speak Irish too.


I like the recent resurgence in the language - its great that children are being taught it in primary schools now, as secondary school is too late to start learning it.

It's actually never been banned, and most of its collapse in numbers occurred post independence. Loads of folks spoke it as their mother tongue when my grandmother was a girl in the longford area. One organization that tried to stamp it out was actually the catholic church.
If anything, the british favoured it over the years - for instance, were they going to turn down lads volunteering to fight napoleon just cause they couldn't speak english? Not a chance - they made sure the officers in the irish regiments could speak irish, with the result that the lads at waterloo took their orders in Irish. Half the british army there was irish.

Remember, schooling was only free from the 1880s and not compulsory till 1921.

There's a lot more to britain and ireland than NI22's simplistic caca na tarbh.

qwert_yuiop

bingo_bango wrote: »

News to me to. Can you reference that point please Qwerty?

Which point?

Cotta

qwert_yuiop wrote: »

Which point?

About Black Mountain being known as Divis.

lazer

Cotta wrote: »

About Black Mountain being known as Divis.

I thought Divis was separate to Black Mountain

Cotta

lazer wrote: »

I thought Divis was separate to Black Mountain

So did I but Quert says otherwise.