XPost: rec.arts.drwho, alt.usage.english   
   From: snidely.too@gmail.com   
      
   Peter Moylan asserted that:   
   > On 03/01/26 04:57, Hibou wrote:   
   >> Le 02/01/2026 à 15:37, The Doctor a écrit :   
   >>> Hibou wrote:   
   >>>>   
   >>>> [...] We native English speakers are lucky people.   
   >>>   
   >>> Exactly!   
   >>>   
   >>> Still how are the Scots doing to preserve Scottish Gaelic?   
   >>   
   >> Badly:   
   >>   
   >>    
   >>   
   >>  There's no percentage scale there, but Gaelic speakers are currently   
   >>  about 1% of the population - and there's a question about how well   
   >> they speak it. No-one in Scotland speaks Gaelic but not English.   
   >   
   > In that respect, Irish is worse off than  Scots Gaelic. The native   
   > speakers live in little corners of the country.   
   >   
   >> It is essentially impossible to preserve a language like Gaelic. If   
   >> it's to handle all aspects of modern life, then it must acquire a   
   >> mass of new words, and its nature changes. If one rejects that course   
   >> and seeks to preserve it as is, then it becomes limited and   
   >> obsolete.   
   >>   
   >> IMHO, it's no use being able to say, "Put some more peat on the fire,   
   >>  Donald" in Gaelic, and then having to resort to English to discuss   
   >> Morag's doomscrolling on Facebook.   
   >   
   > That doesn't have to be a problem. I've just been learning some   
   > computer-related terms in Irish. The words -- e.g. riomhaire for   
   > computer -- have the look and feel of native Irish words. Occasionally   
   > you see a word that looks similar to English -- e.g. idirlión for   
   > internet -- but overall the language is handling the new concepts   
   > without introducing a pidgin.   
   >   
   > The real problem is that the English language so dominates the society   
   > that you can't function properly -- get a job, do the shopping, etc. --   
   > unless you're fluent in English. That's also the problem for minority   
   > languages in other countries.   
      
   Heck, it's a problem for minority languages around Hindi.  A couple   
   years ago I posted a link (to SciAm, IIRC) to a minority culture and   
   its way of dealing deaths in the family, and that culture is beset by   
   the same issue.   
      
   /dps "aue only"   
      
   --   
   potstickers, Japanese gyoza, Chinese dumplings, let's do it   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)