The Welsh don't seem to be doing too badly at reestablishing their language and the English went for that big time as well.
AH Challenge: Gaelic-speaking Ireland
- Thread starter Fleetlord
- Start date
Yeah, I think the most likely reason for any language shift is "occupation and settlement," with settlement alone possibly also being able to cause it, but probably not occupation without settlement, because I can't think of any examples of occupation flipping the language spoken where there wasn't significant settlement and intermarriage as well.
So, to sum up, I would conclude that a language shift occurs when a community becomes mixed due to an influx of speakers of a new language, AND due to political reasons such as conquest the new language is the more prestigious one (otherwise the migrant language is likely to be subsumed by the original one). This means that future generations in those communities will prioritize learning and passing on the new language over the original language, causing the new language to eventually replace the original language as the native language of speakers there. Agree? Disagree?
So why did Anglo-Saxon subsume Norman-French rather than the other way round? I know that it is a resilient language and saw off British (which would become Welsh) and the Viking languages but by those arguments we should be speaking a form of French. Mind you compared to Scandinavian languages, German and Dutch perhaps we do!
What broke the back of the Irish language was the potato famine of the 1840s. It hit the Irish speaking areas hardest.
After the famine Irish speakers made sure their children learned to speak English and it was need to get a job in the British army or civil service and many other state jobs. After this emigration was highest in Irish speaking areas most of these people went to America, England or other place where they need to speak English.
The 20 years after the famine was when most damage was done to the language.
The only way for the language to survive is to have better economic prospects for people who speak Irish in Ireland
[FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif][SIZE=+2]Great Famine rang the death knell for Irish language[/SIZE][/FONT]
http://www.irishidentity.com/extras/heritage/stories/language.htm
After the famine Irish speakers made sure their children learned to speak English and it was need to get a job in the British army or civil service and many other state jobs. After this emigration was highest in Irish speaking areas most of these people went to America, England or other place where they need to speak English.
The 20 years after the famine was when most damage was done to the language.
The only way for the language to survive is to have better economic prospects for people who speak Irish in Ireland
[FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif][SIZE=+2]Great Famine rang the death knell for Irish language[/SIZE][/FONT]
http://www.irishidentity.com/extras/heritage/stories/language.htm
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There weren't enough Norman immigrants. Those nobles weren't enough, though they left a lasting impression on the language. Compare the amount of Normans who migrated to England to say, the amount of Spaniards who came to what is now Mexico.
Butterfly out Trevalyn/somehow make Trevalyn use measures similar to what he used to fight the Scottish potato famine in Ireland. This can probably cut the famine down to 2 years duration, similar to the situation in the rest of Europe.
Or, perhaps a more creative solution. Instead of settling english-speakers in Ulster, settle them in Scotland and deport Scottish Gaelic speakers to Ireland. A justification for this might be the English deciding to put all those Gaels in one place - why garrison two rebellious areas? This of course would need an earlier POD, and would probably lead to significant Scottish influence on Gaelic... and a much more anglicized Scotland.
Any particular reasons why the English wouldn't do this, anyone?
I presume that this way they thought that they would keep both. Also it would have been difficult at the time to round up all the Scottish gaelic speakers. Easier to transplant relatively willing people than very unwilling ones.
if the Corn laws did not happen the Irish tenant farmers might not have been as dependent on the potato and the rents not as high.
Then the famine would not have been as bad.
Not all of the settlers that came to Ulster were English speakers.
A POD where the 1798 rebellion is a success might help.
What might help to explain why Welsh is so vibrant as opposed to the Scots Gaelic and Irish would be that after the 15th century, how many revolts do you see occurring in Wales?
The Normans had pretty much been assimilated, outside the Pale you;ve the old saying "They became more Irish than the Irish themselves". They'd have used Irish themselves, look at stuff like the Statues of Kilkenny trying to prevent Englishmen wearing Irish dress, using the language or playing games like hurling.
The Elizabethan conquest was probably the end of the honeymoon period, there'd been failed plantations before that but the last stand of the Gaelic lords in the Desmond Rebellions was the end of the traditional order. The Ulster plantation brings in the settlement of a large number of primarily English speaking settlers (I'm not sure if its just a story or not, but they say a lot of the Border Reivers from the old Anglo-Scottish border were moved there in an effort to pacify that region). And control is guaranteed outside the Pale.
You've the Confederate wars beginning in 1641, the Cogadh an Dá Rí as we call the Williamite War in Ireland from 1689-91. Jacobite sympathies continue amongst Gaelic speakers for years, sure look at the risings of 1715 and the famous '45 in Scotland. Detachments from the French Army's Irish Brigade even got in on the action for the second one. You've the Highland Clearances then evicting Gaelic-speaking highlanders.
The point is, it was suppressed a lot more since it was associated much more with rebellion and violence. A rebel was much more likely to be an Irish speaker than some English speaking Palesman who's happy with his lot in Dublin.
And its easy to see how emigrants dropped the language. Centuries of rulership was showing you that by speaking English, it was a lot easier to get ahead in life, especially if you were heading to America. Irish has quite a limited use(you'd have been able to speak it in Ireland, parts of Scotland, the Isle of Man and the odd Welsh town back in the 6th century!).
POD wise, I'd say if you're to try and keep it as the majority tongue, maybe an Irish victory at Kinsale? Winning the Nine Years War won't see a large English-speaking minority planted in Ulster and it'll limit English speakers to pretty much those landowners brave enough to stick it outside the Pale. Plus you still have Gaelic nobles existing.
Post that, Irish while it's still the language of the majority, its not the one of the ruling class except for a few exceptions and you'll still have those trying to uplift themselves socially by learning English.
That said, the Irish Brigades abroad were said to have had all their orders/commands in Irish and many of the officers were expected to know it so they could converse with their men. I think even in the Napoleonic Wars you had to have sergeants translate orders for westerners who only spoke Irish, as well as immigrants in the States fighting in their Civil War not speaking a word of English!
I like the idea though of the Highland Clearances evicting our Alban kin to Ulster, no Nova Scotia but still preserves the languages a bit and maybe stops them drifting so much!
The Normans had pretty much been assimilated, outside the Pale you;ve the old saying "They became more Irish than the Irish themselves". They'd have used Irish themselves, look at stuff like the Statues of Kilkenny trying to prevent Englishmen wearing Irish dress, using the language or playing games like hurling.
The Elizabethan conquest was probably the end of the honeymoon period, there'd been failed plantations before that but the last stand of the Gaelic lords in the Desmond Rebellions was the end of the traditional order. The Ulster plantation brings in the settlement of a large number of primarily English speaking settlers (I'm not sure if its just a story or not, but they say a lot of the Border Reivers from the old Anglo-Scottish border were moved there in an effort to pacify that region). And control is guaranteed outside the Pale.
You've the Confederate wars beginning in 1641, the Cogadh an Dá Rí as we call the Williamite War in Ireland from 1689-91. Jacobite sympathies continue amongst Gaelic speakers for years, sure look at the risings of 1715 and the famous '45 in Scotland. Detachments from the French Army's Irish Brigade even got in on the action for the second one. You've the Highland Clearances then evicting Gaelic-speaking highlanders.
The point is, it was suppressed a lot more since it was associated much more with rebellion and violence. A rebel was much more likely to be an Irish speaker than some English speaking Palesman who's happy with his lot in Dublin.
And its easy to see how emigrants dropped the language. Centuries of rulership was showing you that by speaking English, it was a lot easier to get ahead in life, especially if you were heading to America. Irish has quite a limited use(you'd have been able to speak it in Ireland, parts of Scotland, the Isle of Man and the odd Welsh town back in the 6th century!).
POD wise, I'd say if you're to try and keep it as the majority tongue, maybe an Irish victory at Kinsale? Winning the Nine Years War won't see a large English-speaking minority planted in Ulster and it'll limit English speakers to pretty much those landowners brave enough to stick it outside the Pale. Plus you still have Gaelic nobles existing.
Post that, Irish while it's still the language of the majority, its not the one of the ruling class except for a few exceptions and you'll still have those trying to uplift themselves socially by learning English.
That said, the Irish Brigades abroad were said to have had all their orders/commands in Irish and many of the officers were expected to know it so they could converse with their men. I think even in the Napoleonic Wars you had to have sergeants translate orders for westerners who only spoke Irish, as well as immigrants in the States fighting in their Civil War not speaking a word of English!
I like the idea though of the Highland Clearances evicting our Alban kin to Ulster, no Nova Scotia but still preserves the languages a bit and maybe stops them drifting so much!
Part of the reason Welsh was more successful was the industrial revoulation also happen in Welsh speaking areas. As a Welsh speaker you could get a well paid job.