|
 |
Welsh in a summer | ||
Tags: Welsh | ||
Share with:
| ||
 Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log |  | |
| TheElvenLord Diglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 6072 days ago 915 posts - 927 votes  1 sounds Speaks: Cornish, English* Studies: Spanish, French, German Studies: Portuguese, Mandarin | Message 9 of 22 17 July 2008 at 2:47am | IP Logged |
|
(Why is it that everyone elses logs get loads of posts, and any of mine get a few! lol)
Did lesson 3 and reviewed lesson 1 & 2. Finding the amount of new vocabulary quite difficult, but other than that, fine. As I am writing this, I am listening to Lesson 4. Observations on MT and Catchphrase Catchphrase are giving words, then getting the student to practise it. They are building upon what he already knows. They are getting him to form sentences All like MT BUT MT is rather calm, and relaxed, and laid back, but the teachers in Catchphrase sound like they are rushing through the course, this really puts me off. They don't clearly enunciate, and some of the words they go through so fast, I can hardly catch them, let alone remember them! TEL 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Sunja Diglot Senior Member Germany Joined 6077 days ago 2020 posts - 2295 votes 1 sounds Speaks: English*, German Studies: French, Mandarin | Message 10 of 22 17 July 2008 at 3:08am | IP Logged |
|
Hi there, TEL.
I was reading in the BBC how Welsh is enjoying a linguistic revival. Is Catchphrase shadowing? 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| TheElvenLord Diglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 6072 days ago 915 posts - 927 votes 1 sounds Speaks: Cornish, English* Studies: Spanish, French, German Studies: Portuguese, Mandarin | Message 11 of 22 17 July 2008 at 7:44am | IP Logged |
|
Catchphrase is a sort of podcast, made by the BBC.
There are 2 teachers (alternate between lessons) and one student, Nigel. From what I can gather, he is a rugby player for Cardiff. They teach him the language in steps, although its not 100% MT, I feel that if they slowed down the speaking, It would be very close. Luckily, they include a word document with a transcript and extra vocab (as well as the ones already included) so you can study the vocab however you like. But I feel I have made significant progress in the few I have done. It has 144 lessons, which cover pretty much everything I can think of. The problem is, i dont think you could learn it solely with the audio, you must use the text as well. Welsh is going through a revival, it has become the best Celtic language. Cornish is going through a similar one, but is further behind, maybe by about 30 years. TEL 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| mawkernewek Newbie United KingdomRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5973 days ago 11 posts - 14 votes Speaks: English* Studies: German, Cornish, French, Russian, Welsh | Message 12 of 22 17 July 2008 at 8:16am | IP Logged |
|
Probably about 100 years. 100 years ago we had 1 fluent speaker of Cornish, Henry Jenner. When Wella Brown first learnt Cornish in the 30s or 40s we had about 5 so Pol Hodge told me, now we have several hundred.
If that rate of growth continues we'll have 100000 or about 1/5 of the population of Cornwall fluent in 100 years which is about where Welsh stands now. I believe Welsh was in decline until the 1981 census and since then has slowly increased. Now we have some official funding and potentially Cornish going into schools we might be able to accelerate the process, but it's still a long road ahead. 3 persons have voted this message useful | |
| mawkernewek Newbie United KingdomRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5973 days ago 11 posts - 14 votes Speaks: English* Studies: German, Cornish, French, Russian, Welsh | Message 13 of 22 17 July 2008 at 9:05am | IP Logged |
|
Slovenian also was threatened with dying out and in the 19th century was spoken by only a third, mostly illiterate people in rural areas, but is now the universal language of the country.
link We certainly have further to go than they did but it is possible as Hebrew is another example of a successful language revival. Edited by mawkernewek on 17 July 2008 at 10:42am 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
| TheElvenLord Diglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 6072 days ago 915 posts - 927 votes 1 sounds Speaks: Cornish, English* Studies: Spanish, French, German Studies: Portuguese, Mandarin | Message 14 of 22 17 July 2008 at 10:38am | IP Logged |
|
I doubt it will take 100 years.
I believe you are calculating this on a straight line graph ( / ), taking what it was like in the previous 100 years, taking its growth, and projecting it forward. I believe it to be more like a curve, it starts out quite shallow, and then becomes steep! I reckon that in 30-40 years, over 1/2 of Cornishmen (thats all people living in Cornwall, Cornish, English, and any other) will speak Cornish. Cornwall is alot smaller than Wales, it will take less time. TEL 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| mawkernewek Newbie United KingdomRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5973 days ago 11 posts - 14 votes Speaks: English* Studies: German, Cornish, French, Russian, Welsh | Message 15 of 22 17 July 2008 at 11:11am | IP Logged |
|
Well, it took 600 years for it to die out from 1200 to 1800 so even if it does take 100 years it isn't long in the grand scheme of things.
I am using a geometric rate of growth, if we've expanded the number of speakers by a factor of 300 in one century, it will reach approximately 100000 in another. If I was using a linear rate of growth we would have 600 speakers in 100 years. For 1/2 of Cornwall, or about 300000 to learn Cornish in 30 years, it would require the number of speakers to grow 26% year on year. So far the rate of growth in the past century has been about 6% assuming ~ 300 speakers at present. It may be that official funding and getting Cornish into the schools boosts this. Actually you're missing the point with saying Cornwall is smaller than Wales. Wales has 20% of the population speaking the language, Cornwall has about 0.1%. So to have everyone speaking the language, Wales only has to expand the number of speakers by a factor of 5, Cornwall has to be a factor of 1000. The one factor in our favour is that we have already expanded the number of speakers by about 300-fold so if we can keep up this momentum the revival will succeed, dreckly! Na wra ankevi, yma "degree" sterennieth dhymm! 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| TheElvenLord Diglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 6072 days ago 915 posts - 927 votes 1 sounds Speaks: Cornish, English* Studies: Spanish, French, German Studies: Portuguese, Mandarin | Message 16 of 22 18 July 2008 at 2:50am | IP Logged |
|
Almost nearing the end of the "Starting phase" - Not very intensive study, like I have been doing.
But on Tuesday 22nd July, It will turn intensive. Mainly because at that point, I have the whole day free to study. TEL 1 person has voted this message useful |
|  | 
Printable version
|
| Copyright 2024 FX Micheloud - All rights reserved No part of this website may be copied by any means without my written authorization. |
