“New speakers” of Gaelic: perceptions of linguistic authenticity and appropriateness

Wilson McLeod · Bernadette O’Rourke

54 citations0/0 files storedApplied Linguistics Review

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Linguistic and Sociocultural Studies Linguistic Variation and Morphology Multilingual Education and Policy

Abstract

Abstract This article considers the experiences and views of “new speakers” of Gaelic, focusing on how they characterise their language production and its relationship to the language of traditional speakers. In contrast to some other European minority languages, a significant population of new Gaelic speakers in Scotland has emerged only recently, particularly with the development of Gaelic-medium education since 1985, provision that increasingly serves children who do not acquire Gaelic in the home. Given the ongoing decline of Gaelic in traditional “heartland” areas, it is apparent that new speakers of Gaelic emerging from urban Scotland will become increasingly important in coming years. This study of 35 new speakers in the cities of Edinburgh and Glasgow builds on emerging research on new speakers of minority languages across other European contexts (see O’Rourke et al. 2015) where traditional communities of speakers are being eroded as a consequence of increased urbanisation and economic modernisation. This article considers issues involving legitimacy, authority and authenticity amongst new speakers of Gaelic and the extent to which new speakers are producing their own set of contexts of language use and their own standards of performance or conversely, if they continue to reproduce ideals of localism, tradition and linguistic purity. Participants expressed contrasting views on these topics, some of them endeavouring to accommodate what they perceived as native speakers’ perceptions and preferences, others expressing a rather more oppositional viewpoint, rejecting practices or assumptions that they view as impeding the modernisation and normalisation of the language.

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References

2010Language as a Local Practice 2011The sociolinguistics of globalization 2010The Commodification of Language 2003Sociolinguistic nostalgia and the authentication of identity 2015New speakers of minority languages: the challenging opportunity – Foreword 2013Competing ideologies of linguistic authority amongst new speakers in contemporary Galicia 2002Foreign language learning as global communicative practice 2015New speakers, new language: on being a legitimate speaker of a minority language in Provence

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