AIBU to think these Welsh language requirements are ridiculous (and bordering on discrimination?)

[DimDimDiolch]

Context: I run a micro business in urban South Wales, where I rarely hear Welsh spoken, and many Welsh born-and-bred people don't speak a word of Welsh. I lived my whole life in England (no Welsh lessons at school - or anywhere else!) until about 18 months ago. I've picked up the odd bit of Welsh here and there (diolch, dim, croeso, nos da, bara, araf - that sort of thing) but I'm far from fluent. My business isn't yet big enough to employ anyone else.

My business is the sort of business where you attend events, pay for a pitch and sell products to the general public.

I've now been denied pitches at a couple of events purely on the grounds that I don't speak Welsh, even though literally everyone locally speaks English (except those who only speak Polish or Urdu...). AIBU to think it's a matter of anti-English sentiment, bordering on discrimination, that I'm experiencing? It all feels a bit 'jobs for the boys' to me, when my Welsh speaking ability has nothing to do with the products I sell.

Oh and as the Eisteddfod has come up a few times my great-great grandad won the chair.... shameless ancestor boast.

As you were....

@Coldemort - that is an awesome ancestor boast (and a great username)

Bipbopbee

How lovely to read your post. I hope you will be warmly welcomed into the community. I'm English but would love to live in Wales again at some point. Many, many happy memories of my time there.

so should all Welsh nationals who can’t speak Welsh be making more effort to learn their own language?

Those who want to claim they are being discriminated against by not being able to speak Welsh yes!
if you want to live in Wales you can't expect everyone to deal with you in English - very very few will fail to oblige but they are not discriminating if they refuse.

Wales is trying very hard to retain the Welsh language. Once it's gone, it's gone. They've been incredibly successful and it is really starting to flourish.

I live in the same town as you OP - there is loads of Welsh speakers around! Many have learned the language and use it passionately every day. Its great to chat in Welsh in the shop/post office etc.

It's the language of my youth, its what I used to speak to my grandparents and elders as a child.

I really think that if you are starting a business in Wales - you should put a bit of effort in known a little bit about it.

It's a really lovely language to speak. I speak Welsh and I recently was looking up the old Cornish language - its so incredibly similar that I can easily understand it. However, there is only a handful of people in Cornwall who can speak it well. It's in danger of being gone forever.

I have a small business in France. I have learned French because of it. I think it would be a little disrespectful not to bother!

QQ for those of you that speak other languages- when you think - do you think in that language?

Sorry to derail op just always wondered

In Brittany I found I could understand street signs in those places which have them in Breton, just by using my very very rusty school Welsh.

Make a little effort OP. However, as an English person myself, I think it's a very typical English attitude - think of all those English people who live in Spain and can't manage more than Dos cervecas, por favor.

@clunkyinthebackend

I am an English native speaker, and speak Welsh nearly native. I do now sometimes think in Welsh and have little chats in my head in Welsh. I has taken a long time. Watching Welsh TV helped a lot.

I also speak French for work. I definitely don't think in French, because I don't use it every day and I use it for specific admin/timesheets for work, so I can do that, but would struggle to have a chat in the post office.

@bookwitch Thank you for answering my question

The human brain is a fabulous thing, I’d love to have bilingual chats with myself!

So go on, don't be coy, what are these events then? If they're big events you won't out yourself be saying what they are. I'm intrigued as I've never come across this as a non fluent Welsh speaking half English half Welsh person

It is a thing.
I'm Welsh and can speak/understand quite a bit but by no means would I be able to say I speak Welsh. My DP is also welsh but doesn't speak it all.

In our respective professions we can't get jobs unless we spoke Welsh. It's always in the essential part of the job spec.

We live in England but would like to live back in Wales but can't due to this.
We will probably retire there.

SaySomethingInWelsh is a great website with a series of half an hour lessons if you want to learn Welsh but can’t afford lessons.

Learn Welsh? Cos yeah, that’s easy!

Having lived in Cardiff, the only person who spoke Welsh had learned it (and was Welsh) and she was the Welsh teacher at the school we worked in. Yes, it’s important to protect the language, but it’s a bit unrealistic to tell someone to learn Welsh when they live in a majority English speaking area.

Is it a bit like a French exports which are all meant to be purely in French (despite the Académie fighting a losing battle)?

My grandparents were native Welsh speakers. I've never lived in Wales, but if I moved there I'd definitely make an effort to learn!

I live in a country with several minority languages in different areas. Those which haven't been protected have all but disappeared. Those which have been protected are flourishing. Some people complain about it like the OP does here, but to be frank: all native minority language speakers are forced to learn a second language. Why shouldn't it work the other way sometimes? It's a matter of respect! I'm currently learning the language of the region where I live. It's not necessary - everyone is bilingual, and I speak the national language - but people are delighted that I have chosen to learn it.

Oh, and to answer a question upthread: I speak two languages (and am learning a third), and think in both. It depends on what I'm thinking about!

So is it urdd/eisteddfod OP? It's a Welsh language event FFS

You see, I genuinely find this fascinating. OP hasn't said what kind of event this is - as the "?" in the quoted sentence shows - and yet an exasperated "FFS" is still shoehorned in on the offchance it might be a Welsh cultural one

The voting's interesting anyway ...

Some incredibly shocking responses on here.

If an English person says that a Polish person should learn English and if they didn't want to, they should 'go back to Poland' there would be uproar. That person would be accused of being racist and xenophobic.

Replace that with a Welsh person saying it about an English person and that's ok?

I am so glad my Welsh mother had the sense to move us away from South Wales (to England) where we wouldn't have to listen to this kind of attitude.

The OP is being discriminated against, pure and simple because she doesn't speak Welsh in a City where 90% of the population don't speak Welsh and we have posters telling her to learn Welsh or go back to England.

You make me ashamed of my Welsh ancestory.

Having lived in Cardiff, the only person who spoke Welsh had learned it (and was Welsh) and she was the Welsh teacher at the school we worked in. Yes, it’s important to protect the language, but it’s a bit unrealistic to tell someone to learn Welsh when they live in a majority English speaking area.

People manage to learn other languages despite living in a majority English speaking area!

If an English person says that a Polish person should learn English and if they didn't want to, they should 'go back to Poland' there would be uproar. That person would be accused of being racist and xenophobic. Replace that with a Welsh person saying it about an English person and that's ok?

Of course that's not OK. People who move to England should learn English. People who moved to France should learn French. Most do, some don't, the world isn't perfect.

But if you are trying to run a business in that country, learning the language to a basic (not fluent) level is surely just a given?

Nationalism has been growing in Wales for years, and the language politics play a very large part. I'm actually glad to see this thread as many people in England do not realise the extent to which Wales is a separate country now, or the extent of hostility towards England and the English. If you want to stay there op, I'd start learning it. Right or wrong, it is the way things are going.

To learn a language fluently you have to be using it everyday. Doing some lessons will not make you fluent. I did French GCSE, I can speak basic French but am no way fluent.

Lily193 thank you!

Both mine and DH’s grandparents were Welsh so it will be lovely to go back! Hope you manage to go back at some point too.

Harry Flashman said the best way to pick up a language was to bed a local ..get shagging OP 😉

Very well said, Lucyccfc68. Nobody denies that learning the local language and respecting a culture is valuable, but there's a difference between that and rabid nationalism

And rabid nationalism's unpleasant no matter where it comes from - especially when, as seen on here, it involves suggesting folk should "go home"