to start a new Scottish Indyref thread?

[FannyFifer]

Round 2 folks, ding ding!

It was East Renfrewshire Council. They should be ashamed of themselves. I'm not a fan of Alistair Darling, but I don't think these kind of insults are acceptable. People just use social media now to level all sorts of abuse, it's ridiculous.

NCforAye Never mind. And no, I will not go away

No, you misunderstand. You only have to go away with your poetic voting references to scientific types like me. Theres no way ever I'm going to vote poetically, whatever that is. Would be a round peg in a square hole, but in all seriousness, I don't need anyone to tell me how to vote or how to behave, and you won't get far going down that avenue.

I'm voting Yes for solid, logical reasons (a political system that doesn't work being replaced by one that sees politicians with power over Scotland held to account for what they do to improve Scotland). But yes, I also possess the idealistic view that, given the chance to finally vote upon a Union which was formed in an entirely undemocratic process in the first place, people should vote for positive reasons. A No vote is a vote of confidence in the Union, not just a vote for the status quo or a vote against Salmond.

There's been a lot of talk about how the aggressive Salmond / Darling debate has put people off. I can take the heat just fine but it would be a shame if people didn't interact on here because they saw things getting personal.

Dugdale, Labour MSP being mistaken about prenegotiation and the Edinburgh Agreement.

IrnBru gaelic was always a minority language . It has no relevance to Edinburgh or the East Coast. It is cultural imperialism to plaster the stations on the east coast line with gaelic signage to try to pretend it was or is Scotland's language.

Why not invent Doric and Lallans place names and plaster them all over the Highlands because that is what is happening with these ridiculous gaelic made up names.

If Gaelic signs are up and about children will pick up the language quickly, just as they see English signs up and about everywhere too.

Yes let's propagate a virtually dead language which was never the national language and is of no use whatsoever . In your wildest, widest dreams are you seriously suggesting a scenario where scots gaelic wil be spoken as an everyday language?

Irish Gaelic is compulsory as part of the education system in the republic.

Many Gaelic placenames on the west coast and islands are Gaelicisms of Scandinavian names anyway. For instance, anything ending in "baigh" is simply Gaelic for the Scandinavian word for an island "ey" or "oy". You would be as well to have Norse road signs instead, since Norse was also spoken until recent times on some of the islands, and at least it would be in keeping with the SNP's desire to turn us all into Norwegian clones.

Am I missing something but do all comparisons with Norway fail to mention that it has a Sovereign Wealth Fund of approx $890 billion?

Wow, Phaedra why so hostile? Gaelic is compulsory in Ireland in the education system(I'm very proud of the few bits I can remember/ understand) , as it is In wales where we live ( cardiff)

Neither language ,- particularly welsh is dead by any stretch of the imagination. You hear it spoken on the streets of cardiff every day.
Didn't you say you were going to leave scotland in the event of a yes vote though, so it wouldn't be a problem would it?

Personally I'd rather that the money spent on trying to establish Gaelic in areas where it was never a dominant language anyway was spent on improving teaching of useful modern languages within primary schools. I'd far rather DD learnt French, German, Spanish, Cantonese, Mandarin etc than a historical language with pretty much no relevance outwith parts of the highlands. There were figures on a previous thread for how much had been spent on the Edinburgh Gaelic primary school - it was about £2.x million if I remember correctly.

I strongly doubt tourists come to see Gaelic signs either.

I've never claimed that lots of people speak the language in the lowlands, but I don't personally have a problem with having the signs around even though I personally don't speak Gaelic. Why not just accept that the Scottish Government actually care about keeping the language alive for those travelling through busy parts of the country??

I know it may be extremely difficult to grasp, but those who speak Gaelic perhaps do appreciate travelling Glasgow/Edinburgh rail links and seeing where they are in Gaelic. Why not?? I don't speak the language but appreciate that Gaelic speakers may travel down to parts of Scotland where it isn't widely spoken/read. So therefore it's not a waste of money if the signs are being acknowledged by those who speak Gaelic.

WTF would a tourist be interested in a Gaelic sign????

It's aimed at Gaelic speakers who travel around the country, surely?

Grovel they normally mention it as a demonstration of how hard done by Scotland is and how we should have had one too and our money's been squandered and and and...

Chelsy

(Quote from an article in the Glasgow Herald - but I think the figures are true enough.)

.....when Norway held its referendum on independence from Sweden in 1905, the yes vote was 99.95%......Only 184 Norwegians voted no. They didn't make the mistake of holding an independence referendum before people were ready for it.........

I worry deeply about the state of Scorland after the referendum - whatever the vote. People are already not talking to each other because of the independence issue and as far as I can see, no party has come forward with substantive proposals for what they will do to heal the bitter divisions that will be left behind.

I agree about modern foreign languages, but it's hardly either/or.my Dd learns welsh, Spanish and German in her cardiff school.

There was someone upthread (been skim reading on phone) who had commented about it in context of tourism. BUt, why do we need Gaelic signs for gaelic speakers travelling around the country? As far as I am aware (happy to be corrected) aren't pretty much all gaelic speakers bilingual or have english as their dominant tongue.

As for languages, I don't see what difference it makes what languages children learn at secondary level. I learned German in school and I can hardly remember any of it now. That's how useful it was. It would also be the same if I'd learned Gaelic and didn't use the language in my daily life.

Unless you use it, you lose it.

I think most are bilingual Stat but that doesn't mean they don't appreciate having Gaelic signs around when they're out and about travelling? If you've a preference for Gaelic then it's not a waste of money is it, if that's the language you speak most of the time in your daily life?

I don't feel strongly one way or another about Gaelic, but used to have a friend who came from Stornoway and whose first language it was. She was, however, illiterate in it, and was highly amused when the roadsigns first went up in the Hebrides.

Agreed CosieTosie, I think this issue is deeply divisive and I don't see how it is going to be fixed easily.

lol Old

aren't pretty much all gaelic speakers bilingual or have english as their dominant tongue.

Yes, at least Gaelic and English.

Over 50,000 people in Scotland speak Gaelic, most dominantly though in the Outer Hebrides. Still quite a substantial amount of people.

You'll notice I said primary level - as I understand it, one of the reasons other countries (including Scandanavian ones I believe) are much better at languages is that they start at a far younger age. Whereas we pretty much leave it until high school with maybe a smattering of words at most primary schools.
However, it's a minor point. I just think that in a country where, as the yessers frequently point out, we have people eating at food banks, money can be spent in a whole load of better ways than on road signs in two languages for people who can almost certainly read both of them anyway.