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An Introduction to Celtic Languages - Page 2

© Kelly Vincent

One of the fundamental facts of Celtic languages, or anyone interested in them, is that languages will not survive without learners. There simply are not enough native speakers to guarantee endurance. The importance of learners is particularly clear from the fact that although Manx and Cornish are both officially extinct, there are now people who claim to speak them (or, in the case of Cornish, an artificial language derived from the original). This may seem a negative thing for language "purists", but most people recognize that it helps to keep cultures alive. Another revealing fact is that Dublin had the highest concentration of Irish speakers and Glasgow has a high proportion of Gaelic speakers. In both of these cases this is largely due to the presence of academics (often learners), and the immigration of native speakers. So clearly there is no rule that mandates speakers of Celtic languages to live in any certain area.

Celtic Language Resources on the Internet

Fortunately, despite the endangered state of Celtic languages, information about them is proliferating at lightning speed on the Internet. There are many resources for Celtic languages offline, in the “real world”, and so many of the Internet resources are merely extensions of these. For example, one of the best sources of information on Scottish Gaelic is the website of Sabhal Mór Ostaig, the Gaelic college in Ostaig, Skye. The address is http://www.smo.uhi.ac.uk/beurla/. But many of the sources are designed specifically for the Internet and use this new medium well.

The type of resources available on the Internet are varied. If you are interested in learning one of the languages, it helps to know what you are getting yourself into. See the "General Information, or Too Comprehensive to Classify" category for a variety of useful resources. This can be particularly good if you are wanting to know about the history and development of any or all Celtic languages.

There are also several websites that offer lessons in the various languages, many of which include soundbites so you can actually hear it. This can be excellent if you live in a place where classes are not available. See the links in the category “Online Courses and Learning” (with the specific language following), to the right, to find out more about the learning resources on the Internet.

Besides courses, there are other resources handy for both learners and native speakers. There are several email discussion lists in the “Mailing Lists” category. Practice your reading by looking at the many resources in the "Literature and Texts" category. And of course every user of a language needs a good dictionary, and there are several useful ones online. They are listed in the “Dictionaries” category.

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