Duine beag sleamhain...

Today's post is a tweet. 

Hate is a horrible feeling, but every so often a person deserves it. In spades...

The Gaelic for a slippy wee fella is Duine beag sleamhainn...

BTW - Trident renewal is an anachronistic and abhorrent aberration. 

Feel free to spread the joy by joining the SNP today. 

Saor Alba. 

© McNoddy

Published by Toy Town™ Times

Can Seo

 

Over on Twitter the low oxygen level up yon munros has clearly got to Muriel Gray.

I like Muriel Gray.  I bought her books.

Can I refer all involved in the resultant furore to this evidential work.

Back in the very early eighties, following Varsity, I worked as a Field Researcher and Analyst for a very similar and indeed the first National Opinion Survey on Scots Gaelic under the auspices of An Comunn Gaidhealach. I can only say read the research and findings there. 

I also found this article to sum up what needs saying. 

Am I a native Gaelic speaker? Chan eil. 
Do I speak Gaelic? Tha, beagan.

But back to the hyperventilation over at Twitter.

Some observations:

• Many countries have bilingual road signs where there is a significant linguistic rationale for doing so. Off the top of my head I recall Magyar script on Eastern Austrian road/village signs. This pleases me because my family name is Hungarian, although admittedly our lot emigrated back circa very early 18th century and well before UKIP!
• Gaelic was, and indeed is, spoken well past (i.e. south) Inbhir Nis agus An Gearasdan for the information of a few so called intelligenti of the SNPout coven. 
• My recollection and the stats confirmed that the attitude to Gaelic was surprisingly favourable even in the most unlikely spots such as Kirkcaldy and East Kilbride!
• The comments on Muriel's tweet, and the significant follow up blog by Paul Kavanagh, have now become a political football with #SNPbad and rabid nationalism attributes being flung about in relation to the well intentioned actions to reverse the decline in the language due to the linguistic colonialism of English. This is all the more disappointing as it was George Younger, aye him, Thatcher's Secretary of State for Scotland, that was at the head of the queue pushing Gaelic to the forefront as he had a deep affinity to, and what I like described as, the Gaelic Community. (Jen Topping was deceptively close with her assertion that it was The Iron Lady herself that was the promoter of Gaelic back in the early eighties).  Language has no direct political hue.
• My forebears on three sides were undoubtedly Gaelic speakers (from Rothes, Strathdon and Scalpay, Harris), the late MiL was a downtrodden native speaker and I have a significant past supporting what I liked to jokingly call the Gaelic mafia. My view was simply that the language, and the cultural strings attached, were being trampled on by the Beurla stampede and some significant positive discrimination was needed. 

Finally, the author of our 1981 survey had this to say to the Leveson Enquiry about Gaelic. If you've ever heard Ken speak in depth about Gaelic, his Rayleigh accent knocks you right off your stot! More fun even than that was myself and his loon (nepotism alert!), whilst surveying in Castlebay, entering a local hostelry and abidy hearing our accents (mine is a Heinz 57 mix of mainly Buckinghamshire and a few other RAF airbase twangs coupled with couthy Doric and his; piercing Essex) and the patrons yapping to each other in Gaelic clearly believing we hadn't a scooby what they were saying.  Like I say, I speak a little Gaelic, but wasn't letting on. My cohort, however, despite the foregoing is fluent. He timed the reveal to perfection. Oh and we both have a particularly appropriate first name for that particular island. Mine is the standard English spelling. Unsurprisingly, Ken's loon is the Gaelic version. The jungle drums went feel thereafter........

Chan eil aon chànan gu leòr.

UPDATE: Auntie and the PnJ have now had their say too.

BTW - Trident renewal is an anachronistic and abhorrent aberration. 

Feel free to spread the joy by joining the SNP today. 

Saor Alba. 

© McNoddy
Published by Toy Town™ Times

Election Eve Message from Toy Town™

#voteSNP projection @HyperlapseApp #GE15 pic.twitter.com/wEuPywKoFq

— Ross Colquhoun (@rosscolquhoun) May 6, 2015

BTW - Trident renewal is an anachronistic and abhorrent aberration. 

Feel free to spread the joy by joining the SNP today. 

Saor Alba. 



© McNoddy 
 Published by Toy Town™ Times

A' Ghàidhealtachd

From the STV series "Highlands" comes this episode about God's own country; Assynt.

Enjoy.

© McNoddy
Published by Toy Town™ Times

Alba

Once upon a time, before Noddy became Mr Plod, he was a Researcher for a Scottish Office funded national survey and opinion poll on Gaelic. I travelled far and wide up and down and across my wondrous nation asking the good folk about our 'ither tongue'. Well, nearly 30 years later we get a dedicated Gaelic TV station (and still it has to wait for switchover day to go onto Freeview.)

Progress can be slow where 'minorities' are concerned!

Update: Due to popular demand from Joe Public, here's a couple of links to the original song performed by Runrig.

The first Gaelic Music Video - n.b. Serious mullet warning.

Live at Edinburgh Castle.

© McNoddy
Published by Toy Town™ Times

Tha i fliuch.

Well that's the tourist trade done for again.

Apparently it's WET in Scotland and this causes us Jox to drop down dead at an alarming rate. I'm told we get only as much sun as those folk up north of the Arctic Circle.

Funny that, I'm sure we had a season called summer due some day soon.

All this weather might explain some other daft Scottish traits.

Meanwhile, PeePee and all you monoglots doon south can get to grips with the other language spoken in these pairts as of the 19th. and then you might just understand the post title.

Global warming my posterior!

It's a fraud. Just what are the Polis doing about this?

Listening to: The Silencers - Scottish Rain
via FoxyTunes

© McNoddy
Published by Toy Town™ Times