Welsh needs to be more inclusive...

[nythbran2]

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-64164011.amp has Irish Gaelic already dealt with this issue?

Yeah I hate it when an entire language that’s been around for centuries even millennia is transphobic./s

I haven't heard any complaints about Gaeilge here yet OP. Only a matter of time I suppose. Way to make Irish even more of a minority language eh?

Actually to assuage the nutters I suppose you could just reclassify these nouns as Red and Green. It would make no difference. You can't call them Black and White of course. That would start another war.

BTW what became of the non binary mayor up in Gwynedd...haven't heard much from him / them lately .

There's an earlier thread on this here: www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/4713140-bbc-publishes-an-anti-cymraeg-article-for-gender-fanatics

Irish is truly gender neutral in its possessive pronouns. His/her/their is a/a/a.

We'll just ignore the fact the noun is changed based on whether the "a" is he/she/they. And the rest of the pronouns vary by sex so he/she/they is sé/sí/siad for example.

Never made Hircum? Fecked off to live on a boat in Norfolk, so I heard.

Better ignore the prepositional pronouns too !

@EnfysPreseli, thanks, I'd missed that. An interesting read.

They were included in "the rest of the pronouns".

Although I do accept that it's literal violence on my part not to have explicitly mentioned the prepositional pronouns.

Thanks Enfys

Ridiculous nonsense 🙄 these people are very controlling.

My mother used to tell me about the amazing laws passed under Hywel Da which ensured that women had rights under Welsh law, about a thousand years before it happened in England.

We have nothing to be ashamed of.

Wonder if there's anything going on in Iceland - "dottir" and "sson" etc.

Brehon laws in Ireland were similar. The advent of christianity was a major retrograde step for women.

I saw something about an Icelandic tw who was going by -dottir.

Hadn't thought about it but even It is gendered? Always sé or sí. Never mind , we'll just destroy the oldest written language North of the Alps and start again.

I'm sure the lads at TENI can knock us up a new Irish language in jig time.

@IcakethereforeIam How very dare you ! Norfolk was always the true spiritual home of the Horcrux. He'll be a character in the Archers soon.

I live in an Irish speaking area of Ireland. We are seeing a slow steady increase in people moving here and speaking Irish but such a decline outside of it. We lost so much of our language, stories, history. This could be the death knell for it.

I like to think he looked around him, saw what a hill he had to climb and promptly decided to move to the flattest place in England. The Welsh are well rid of him, Norfolk has my sympathy.

I worry about duolingo going woke on pronouns. I think their demographic wouldn't support it. Should it happen, I really would despair.

As I understand it (which I don't) Welsh has at least two major dialects and several minor, but still important other regional variations. Adding another completely stupid complication, as not all speakers would take it up, is just a disincentive to even bother in the first place. Can't the people bothered just stop thinking of them as masculine and feminine and, in their own heads, see them as something else; up/down, fat/thin, united/city.

Dammit, forgot! Compliance.

It wasn't Christianity per se that was the problem in Wales. Wales has long been Christian by the time of Hywel Dda. It was all the fault of the Normans, bringing laws based very much on Roman law and Roman Christianity.

I've gone and checked and it appears I was misinformed all my life. It was not the arrival of christianity that killed off Brehon Law, although there were conflicts between brehon and canon law in Ireland in the first millennium. The arrival of the Normans did start to lead to its erosion. However, the Normans, who became "more Irish than the Irish themselves" adopted Brehon law except in the Pale (area around Dublin) which was under English rule and some of Munster. It wasn't until the tudor conquest of Ireland that Brehon Law was abolished. So basically, it was the english up to their old tricks, rather than christianity per se.

Every day is a school day. I had known there were vestiges of Brehon Law pre-plantations but I had assumed much more had been abolished before that.

Brehon Law was in use for quite a long time after the coming of Christanity. The Butlers - who ruled East Munster - used Brehon law as well as English Common law. Druids were still knocking around as well. As were witches. Very few witch trials here and they tended to be held by Normans as in Kilkenny . Or Scottish Presbyterians - Carrickfergus.

But back on topic , I hope the loons don't mess up Duolingo. Whatever its flaws it is very useful and popular too.

Off topic but Welsh so....

Didn't want to start a fresh thread, but if anyone else would wish to, please be my guest.

Was noodling around on Glinner's twitter and found a tweet about this. A publication for Welsh women writers. Can you guess where this is going? Check out the submissions.

www.honno.co.uk/

From a quick look they get a grant, which might have strings, so may not be entirely they/them's choice.

Oh look! They have a form you can fill in to contact they/them. They/them love receiving comments.

The 'they/them' is entirely me/I taking the piss.

"The purpose of language is to understand each other and to communicate, so if you're saying words and people don't understand you, that's when language breaks down," Ms Peel said

Not wishing to sound like a whinge.. But but but...this is someone arguing for the inclusivity of the many lettered umbrella people's feelings.

so if you're saying words and people don't understand you, that's when language breaks down,

don't we bloody know it.

anyone know what a woman is these days?

Mx Rixon added: "Representation is so important. You can only be what you see and can talk about."

Yeah? So if I can only be what I see and talk about that puts me as woman as equal (let's be honest lesser than) to a woman called John with a beard and penis.

Fuck that.

So if you want the language you are speaking, whichever one it is, find your own words, invent your own words, lobby to get those words included. But don't you dare appropriate words that already have meanings and subvert them for your own political end.