http://www.irishgaelictranslator.com/translation/ftopic24591-0-asc-0.html

Here is a link (I don't want to post it direct) to a clipped Irish Times letter from last month. The author seems to be of the opinion that simplifing gaelic grammar is the key to its 'sucess' (or re seeding accross Ireland).

This is an odd position, to co-relate a) dispersal and high social prestige of a langue with grammatical complexity or lack thereof, and b) the cause of such can be manipulated by direct basic grammatical modifications. Sounds like black magick to me...

I personally think anyone who is so sore for Irish and will do anything (including debassing it) in order to see it more socially accepted has a fetish about the langue, and perhaps needs a psychiatrist rather that a teacher.
(Includes a link to the Tomasocarthaigh 'de(master)bate'.

"Ligh mo bhuataisí leathair, buachaill!"

I was part of this conversation on the other site as well.

I think that in some instances, language simplification benefits a language. Doing away with gender and cases when they aren't needed for comprehension makes the language more accessible to learners and gives it a greater "economy."

I have studied Irish, French, Latin, Dutch and teach English. Of the bunch, I feel that English would be the hardest to learn for an outsider. English is an example of having gone too far, doing away with diacriticals etc. (like the "suggestion" in the letter). Latin would be next, as all the cases make for alot of memorization. It is much easier to express those things with syntax etc.

Irish, I feel, is one of the easiest to learn. It has already done away with most of its cases (retaining nominitave, genitive, and vocative) and is intuitively phonetic with only two diacritical marks (fada and séimhiú). It also has a wonderfully simple verb system with very few irregular verbs.

Irish shoots itself in the foot three ways, from where I'm sitting
First, it has a wonderful phonetic system, but undermines it by replacing a diacritical with a pseudoletter (h). This creates alot of confusion for beginners who are english speakers (which is where most, if not all of the learners of irish will come from). i'm not saying to resurrect seancló, but reinstate use of the dot, which is available on most computers now and will be available on more as time goes by.

Second, it has a ridiculous system of gender, where few of the rules defining gender are more than just "suggestions" or "guides"

Lastly, Irish is not fighting to win. It seems the government wants to preserve Gaeilge as the antiquated langauge of a sparsely populated rural district. They've drawn borders around it as a cultural preserve and have gone on the defensive.

Antaine,
I cannot agree very strongly on the question of the séimhiú manifest as 'h'. bh, ch, dh, fh, gh, ph, th, are not such a difficulty. If someone is so 'linguisically ethnocentric' that they cannot unlearn the anglo-saxon 'th' for a /h/ (~th) when in a gaeilge context, are they really going to have the steel to master the langue?

Irish as not 'fighting fit'. Traditionally the gaelic districts were not as anti-English or pro seperation (from the UK) as were the Hiberno-English districts (just a term to act as distinction). They tend to been rather docile. It is true Gweedore and Conemara have looked for self management in the past, but they gave up as Dublin began to turn the screw.

Here in Leitrim the old gaelic O'Rourkes were for centuries one of the most anti-Norman, then Tudor, lords in ireland. The Scots were kicked out when they tried to take land, (even tho English did settle).

In the 18th and 19th century record show how peoples in the next parish to where I type were 'much afeared' to see the 'Ultachs' (gaelic speaking poeples), spinners, weavers and small tradesmen and their families kicked out of Ulster and were much concerned that the Ulster-Scots would come down and do the same to them (it is a border area). So near, there is a town called Newtowngore nearby which is the only village in Connacht I know of that has annual 12th July Orange marches.

Viking, Norman, english, scots, and British. All have lived around here and there is living memory of standing up the last one, and historical records of the involement of the prior ones. The surviving gaeltachtaí tend to be in areas that do not have records of standing and fighting, but due to their isolated location and a post independance government that left them alone and provided some income support, ahve managed to survive.
(In fact on Leargas tonight Ráth Cairn was in focus. The local Meath people used to say that the Conemara people who came there did not deserve the land as they failed to stand up to Cromwell...which is not very fair, but anyway).

Also, Ireland tends to expect that people integrate...the gaeltacts are not seen as foreign soil.. and apart from a few disaffected individuals in Conemara, I belive they don't see us as 'gall' either. There is a tendency for Ireland to homogenise, which puts pressure on areas that are different. This has good and bad aspects to it. When a small kid was in my house, the father from Ghana, the mother Spanish, I took him to be Irish unconsciously. It was only due to the then empasis on darkskinned peoples been moved out of Ireland by 'justice' minister, Micheal McDemigogue, I wondered on his legal position. (He was OK).

That is why I dont like a lot of the 'full blooded Irish' and 'gettign in touch with my roots' crap you get here. There tends to be a racial element in it. And all (young at least) Irish Americans I have met have made racist statements within the first 10 minutes of initial conversation. I never got that from Mid-Westerners or West Coast Amercians, when in the states or in Ireland.

One tings I will say on the reductions in the case system and gender. the same thing occured to the forms of gaelic in places like the Shannon estuary in Limerick a century ago. It occured as part of a process of the population switching to English. How far it will go I dunno in this contempory age. That is why i personally, would prefer to ahve communities speaking a more grammatically complex Irish as the complexity acts as a barrier to English reductive tendencies.

I'm afraid you misunderstand what I meant by "not fighting to win." What I mean is that if the government is going to do anything at all, it needs to take more agressive measures. It seems that the goal is currently to "preserve" Irish, and I feel that is a losing battle. Either they will work to see it expand and globalize, or it will slowly shrivel and die. It just strikes me that currently they're fighting to stand still, rather than shooting for the moon to land among the stars so to speak. They need to draw a line around the whole island and declare the whole kit 'n' kaboodle a "gaeltacht," with all requisite social programs. Start by re-signing the roads Gaeilge-only...not just in the Gaeltacht but the whole country over. Massive bonuses to broadcasters and publishers who have over 50% content as Gaeilge. stuff like that.

as for the séimhiú, most learners of Irish are English speakers, and are also notoriously "linguocentric." You aren't going to change that about them, but Gaeilge needs them...it needs every speaker it can get (within reason). To use the h was a change made out of necessity that no longer holds true. We no longer rely on typewriters and physical "type" where a minority accent mark would be difficult to get. With computers and modern publishing there is no reason to misrepresent an accent mark as a letter - especially when the combinations it produces make confusion specifically for Gaeilge's biggest "student base" (english speakers).

I find the "Irish American" thing interesting...the only "full blooded Irish" I've ever met have been people from Ireland. The vast majority of Irish Americans are typically between 50 and 25 per cent Irish, with Irish/Italian and Irish/German being the most popular combinations.

I don't see it as an undesirable "dumbing down" to ditch gender. From the linguistics I've taken in the university, languages tend to get simpler over time and drop gender and case (English has already done both, and Irish has greatly simplified its case system), and when new verbs are coined they tend to be regular rather than irregular (again, Irish has managed to have very few irregular verbs).

Anyway, don't misunderstand my assessment of Ireland's "fighting spirit" as I meant Gaeilge's 'fight' against shrinkage and english-language encroachment.

=)

about complexity :


It is important not to mix everything up.

Orthography does NOT make a language. It is ridiculously complicated in English, very tricky in French, and very simple in Italian. But it's only a code that represents le language in a written form, and is not the language itself.

there are different intertwined levels in a language, such as phonology, syntax, semantics, prosody, morphology. A language can be simple somewhere and much more complicated elsewhere.

Languages were not coined complicatedly to evolve toward simplicity.

e.g.
genders: sex (simple because obvious) evolves into gender (complicated because arbitrary ; like in French) evolves again into sex (like in English)

cases : postpositions (simple because clearly indentifyable) evolve in cases (complicated because undistinguishable from the noun itsel ; like in Latin) that are replaced by post- or prepostions (like in French).


And one should always remember that what is irregular was once totally regular ; like plenty verbs in French which were regular in Latin, but due to also regular phonetic changes are now irregular.

Antaine,
I only meant that the gaeltacht peoples who still care for thier langue might get a bit of fire in their bellies (as have the Unionist poplulations in the past). As for the goverment, one of its characteristics is that it is Dublin based, and dublin thinks nothing of Ireland, whatever langue is spoken. Get to Palmerstown in west dublin and you see signs for the 'West' (i.e. meaning the rest of Ireland, or so I'd like to believe!).
As for the 'fight', I tend never to use metaphoric qualities in human objects or faculties, so I assumed been ag troid as to refer to the people, not the langue they spoke and culture they wish or do not wish to develope.

Max,
I know that orthographic symbols are not the langue itself (the sign not been the object, and all that).

If they simplify Irish grammar in order to make it survive better, it won't be Irish anymore, and it will be the ONLY case in the History, that a government has simplified the language of the people. It's completely stupid: since they're ENglish speakers, simplifying Irish will be transforming Irish into a kinda English hidden under Irish words (and Irish already looks like that today on some websites or papers).

Really, i've never heard anything that stupid in my life. If they don't want to have any difficulty with Irish, they just should speak only English.

If they suppress initial mutations, Irish would be the only Celtic language without mutations. Nonsense.

They want to make the language easier just because most people are too lazy to learn it !!! Incredible!

Ok, next time i'll try to make English easier in order to help me (non English native speaker):

child > plural childs
man > plural mans
verbs: to do > I doed, I have doed. To be > I are, I ared, I have ared.

I are too lazy to learn correct English, so i will write like this now.

(Or better: French translated literally: even easier for me)

I are too lazy for learn from english correct, so now i go write like that.


Why not, if they want to do that with Irish grammar?

" I think that in some instances, language simplification benefits a language. Doing away with gender and cases when they aren't needed for comprehension makes the language more accessible to learners and gives it a greater "economy." "

I have to admit that whenever I hear talk about making a language simpler by reducing things that "aren't needed for comprehension", I think of Orwell's newspeak in 1984. Very few grammatical things are needed. Many languages function perfectly without tenses. Why having "I do", "I did" and "I will do" when just "I do" is sufficient "I do yesterday", "I do today", "I do tomorrow". Or the whole preposition thing? Redudant, isn't it?? :-)

I know that English has neither gender nor cases. It is in fact the only language in all of Europe (don't know about the rest of the world) that has neither many cases nor gender. For that reason, the idea that those two concepts aren't necessary sounds extremely anglo-centric in my ears.

(Frenched version): I am in part at agreement with Lughaidh here...
that what is ridiculous is the fact that some people want so desperately that irish not disappear not, that they think that if they it simplify, the people go want it learn, and will can it learn better...


In any case, usage has always been and will always remain uttermost. For instance, French spelling (the very tricky one), has been officially simplified (in a very slight way), but people (whether they are good at spelling or not) have ignored the reform (it's not taught at school, etc.).

I'm not necessarily saying to make changes for simplification purposes. As a living language, it is ever evolving, but I think that new conventions are being held back in an effort to "preserve" it. I think that there are some things that would be inevitable evolutions of the language, which exists in a mostly-english-speaking country. Initial mutations would, and I believe should, stay.

Something that I think the language if left totally on its own would tend toward would be the evolution of a "yes" and "no." I don't think it would be a simplification of the language for the benefit of english speakers, but a natural evolution given the society in which the language exists.

There's another interesting twist to all this. The fact is that many people learning Irish outside of Ireland now - either online or in groups across the world - will have an effect on the way the language develops (and all languages do change over time). I suspect that already we are seeing many people accepting the abandonment of the feminine in many cases (eg - Tá mé ag foghlaim na Ghaeilge...agus is maith liom é (rather than í).

This and other technically wrong idioms will enter the language because most people you practice with are not native speakers. Is this a problem? Only if you support the "preservation" of the language - not if you are just interestd in speaking it.
just my two pennies...Dáithí

While you're at it we may as well just turn:

He went.
She went.

into:

It went.

or better yet, indicate "it" by the absence of a pronoun:

Went.

"I suspect that already we are seeing many people accepting the abandonment of the feminine in many cases"

this was exactly the "natural tendency" to which I was referring, with regards to gender.

we are getting to the point that for irish to really live as a viable langauge it will need to pick up more students than are currently native speakers. And the point at which the majority of speakers use a certain convention, that *is* the language.

Languages evolve in order to survive. I'm not talking about forcing changes, but rather letting the changes that want to happen, happen.

The other one that I see happening is going to be the emergence of Yes and No, and my money is on them simply using Tá and Níl.

the problem is you can't coerce people into speaking one way or another. they always speak the way they want eventually.

some care about it and dislike those changes because they have a strong attachment to the language itself,

some care because they are attached to "irishness" but are too lazy and simply accept the changes by lack of pugnacity,

some don't care because language is only to them a means of communication.


considering the situation in ireland, i feel that if one's goal is just to communicate, they can as well use english...

quote:

considering the situation in ireland, i feel that if one's goal is just to communicate, they can as well use english...

which brings the argument that one language may allow more elaborate communication than another...

Or at least a different set of nuances.

Which is why english (in particular) borrows heavily from other languages

quote:

The problem with defending the purity of the English language is
that English is about as pure as a cribhouse whore.
We don't just borrow words; on occasion, English has pursued other
languages down alleyways to beat them unconscious and rifle their
pockets for new vocabulary.
-- James D. Nicoll

my point was:

those changes occur because the native speakers are outnumbered by those who have learned it as a second language.
but since the native speakers are also bilingual in english, if you just want to communicate with them but are not a native speaker yourself, you can as well use english.
i don't understand the point of learning irish if it's not to learn it the way it's spoken by the native speakers.


"which brings the argument that one language may allow more elaborate communication than another..." (Fear_na_mbróg)
some people think so indeed, which is of course completely wrong...

I don't think anybody sets out to learn "incorrect" Irish. But the fact that most native speakers are concentrated in the Gaeltacht means that most learners interact with other learners, and changes propagate.

Well when we've seen the entreched what-was-to-become-a=bugbear that IPA'd-ness became here with all the spilt ink in the apologists vs. decriers wars, once can see from the denouncers that if some one cannot eb bothered to learn to do even a skimmy-job on a word in the pronouncment, how are they ever to bother to do a whole langue in all its strcutural nuances?

Most of the question of learners altering the langue is a dead duck. The learners are not forcing the gaeltacht poeple to change. Most learnersnever learn event he basics -they are not 'learners but 'balls', rolling about but tacking nowhere, to use an odd metaphor. They are creating no linguist community.

The gaelscoileanna movement is a different kettle of fish (or balls?), as they are to me, at least, embroyonic in potential to provide a langue for a community were they to be in once fixed place using their combined tongue as lingue franca.

It would seem that all communities that switched langues has brought their own linguistic peccadilos to the plate (Gaulish thru Latin in French, Irish thru English in Hiberno-English). What can you do?

Anyway, the brain aint so malleabel that it helps the learner to the langue too easy too quick and so too many dead soldiers fall by the wayside

"i don't understand the point of learning irish if it's not to learn it the way it's spoken by the native speakers. "

Personally, I would like to see the number of fluent speakers rise. That is my reason for wanting to learn it. I love the language and would like to feel by the end of my lifetime that we don't need to worry about Irish going extinct anymore - that it is safe, healthy and on the rise.

As non-Gaeltacht residents undertake to learn the language, you may then see "Gaeltacht Irish" "Gaelscoil Irish" "American Irish" "Aussie Irish" etc develop in much the same way as you have French French, Swiss French, Creole French and so on.

Swiss French is actually a very good example. Looking at the differences between the French number system and the Swiss French number system (quatre-vingts (four twenties) vs huitante (eighty)) shows the kind of changes I imagine would become the norm due to learners bringing their english with them. We have already had this debate (which ended inconclusively) regarding whether or not Tá fáilte romhat was developed independent of the english or if it is irish words placed on an already endemic english form.

What I would be suggesting in that case would be to teach the Swiss French (and I believe it is also used in Belgium, Luxembourg, and a few other places) number system instead of the Parisian number system to english speakers.

Thinking about numbers in a fundamentally different way caused untold problems in every French class I took (four years of high school and two semesters in college). Selecting the dialect closest to the english method to teach american students would allow them to communicate, understand, and then move on to more complex things, all the while using a completely authentic French.

As a secondary learner, I know I will never be able to fool a frenchman into thinking i'm really french, so why make that the goal? wouldn't being able to travel or live in france and be able to communicate effectively be a more productive goal?

Or, you could learn Quebecois french. 7-8 million speak it, and it is within driving distance of all the big eastern US cities. There is a huge amount of media that you should be able to pick up easily too. Half of all my tv channels are in French for example.

"As a secondary learner, I know I will never be able to fool a frenchman into thinking i'm really french, so why make that the goal? wouldn't being able to travel or live in france and be able to communicate effectively be a more productive goal?"

I totally agree. Since French are reluctant to speak English, you'll have to speak French to communicate effectively. And if you want to live in France, then you should definitely speak French because French don't appreciate much those who live in their country without bothering to speak there language.
But the situation is different in Ireland I presume.


The problem with numbers is complicated: it requires a much greater effort to switch languages than when it's just words (like nouns or verbs); and generally, the hardest is not to say them in another language because you can take all the time you want, but it is to understand them...
I don't know why it is so...

"i don't understand the point of learning irish if it's not to learn it the way it's spoken by the native speakers. " (me)

I was refering to the sentence in the first post:

"The author seems to be of the opinion that simplifing gaelic grammar is the key to its 'sucess' (or re seeding accross Ireland)." (Jax)

Yes, the situation is different. Speaking Irish in Ireland is not a necessity. While all language is political, Gaeilge is more than most. For 800 years the English government tried to kill the language and culture of the Irish. If the langauge dies they will have succeeded. Only by reviving the language can a long-oppressed people snatch a victory from the jaws of defeat.

In addition, Ireland is the sole independent Celtic state. For its langauge to die would be a travesty, especially when one takes into account the role of a literate Ireland in the history of Europe and therefore the world.

In other words, Gaeilge has the distinction of being much more than a language. In a way, it is the soul of Ireland. Not one person here is learning Irish because he (or she) *needs* to...actually, it is terribly impractical to learn it for actual usage in the sense one learns other languages.

As far as I'm concerned, anyone who would lay claim to irish heritage is honorbound to do their part and add one more speaker to the total.

"In other words, Gaeilge has the distinction of being much more than a language" (Antaine)

This statement is not exactly true in the sense that generally, a language is always more than just a means of communication. (Ask the Quebecois who feel very threatened by English)

"In a way, it is the soul of Ireland" (Antaine)

This is often what happens when a nation is deprived of its language: its symbolic value increases tenfold.


As for France, the post-revolution politic of the government has successfully eradicated all but a very few of the Roman dialects which were spoken on the territory. The fact that these dialects were close to French was an asset in the sense that people were told they spoke a debased, decayed, sort of French and had to get rid of it.

quote:

To God I speak Spanish, to women Italian, to men French, and to my horse - German. - Charles V
which was then used by a descendant,
I speak French to my ambassadors, English to my accountant, Italian to my mistress, Latin to my God and German to my horse. - Frederick the Great of Prussia
In addition Charles believed,
A man who knows four languages is worth four men. - Charles V

http://www.everything2.com/index.pl?node=Charles%20V

quote:

"As a secondary learner, I know I will never be able to fool a frenchman into thinking i'm really french, so why make that the goal?

I disagree. The goal of convincing others that one is french isn't impossible. I'm sure there's plenty of people who've done it. I bet you I could do it if I tried.

quote:

I totally agree. Since French are reluctant to speak English, you'll have to speak French to communicate effectively. And if you want to live in France, then you should definitely speak French because French don't appreciate much those who live in their country without bothering to speak there language.

Stereotypical bullshit. Some people are plain assholes, others aren't. I myself know that it takes years to grow one's hair long, and that it takes a long time to learn a language. I'm not going to shout at some-one for having short hair, nor for their inproficiency in a language.

Ofcourse on the other hand I would advocate that if you're going to employ some-one to work in a shop (or any job that deals with the public), then they should speak good English. I was in McDonalds the other day and after having been given my food, I asked the cashier for change. She looked at me like I'd ten heads. "Change, please". Still nothing. "Change... I'd like a note for these coins.". At this point I'm starting to get a bit stroppy... and I was contemplating calling the manager to make a scene asking why the hell their employee didn't speak English... anyway some-one from behind where they actually cook the food eventually walked out to me and gave me change.

So to sum-up: I don't mind if they don't speak English -- just don't give them a job that deals with the public.

FnaB,
from my experince of spending 3 months in France (and trying to find work with my palty Francais) I would be of the opinion that the French do not like it if one does not have fluent French. Attemting to speak ti is a greater crime than murder to some of them. Not to mention their racism -many times in shops and on one occasion where I worked statements about been amercian or british were muttered under breaths, and once i was taunted for it.

As for foreigner in ireland, I percieve an arrogance about them at times; whether it is a defence mechanism or what I don't know, as if by not following rules (like paying for luas tickets), they can maintain a differance that is some advantage to them.

Fear_na_mbróg ,

stereotypes don't always come out of the blue.


The French have an extremely formal attitude towards their language.

Maybe it's due to the fact that French was once the most prominent language in Europe.
There is also another fact: For a long time, what was spoken in France was considered a decayed version of Latin. But it shifted a very few centuries ago, and French was then said to be as pure and perfect as Latin.
This is all very subjective but it has seeped into people's mind.

I'm not saying that all French have the same attitude, but still:
- French is the only Roman language that hasn't have its spelling reviewed. The largest majority will tell you they can't spell properly, but tell them about a spelling reform and they'll be horrified to hear something so outrageous. I think France is the only country in the world that has a spelling contest aired on TV.
- It's a bit like the French have put their language in a shrine. This is why you always hear people say they can't speak proper French, even though it's the only language they know. (Last night I saw a French actor in a show on TV. He was talking about cycling, and he said: "en vélo... non, à vélo, parlons français (let's speak French)"...

To this you can add the fact that the French feel somehow theatened by English because of the English words that penetrate the French lexicon. Plus the fact that anglophones, because English is today's worldwide communication language, don't always bother to even say "bonjour" or "merci".

The result of all this is what Jax experienced.

"I disagree. The goal of convincing others that one is french isn't impossible. I'm sure there's plenty of people who've done it. I bet you I could do it if I tried. "

My French teacher spoke French so well, she was never guessed to be an American. They knew she wasn't French, but assumed her to be Vietnamese (her mother was Chinese, her Father Caucasian) rather than American. She spoke Parisian French.

Without years upon years of total immersion one can never get all the pronunciation and idiom exactly correct. They may not be able to place you as an American, but they'll know you're not a native.

I think the two overlap - there's native speakers you'd confuse for foreigners, and vice versa.

quote:

think France is the only country in the world that has a spelling contest aired on TV.

I doubt it. The Americans have a competition called Spelling Bee. And given the illogical phonetics of English, it's probably more challenging.

I'm fairly sure that other countries have similar competitions.

Canada has it as well.

Canada has it aswell.

hehe : )

(Message edited by Fear_na_mBróg on May 06, 2005)

(Message edited by Fear_na_mBróg on May 06, 2005)

"given the illogical phonetics of English, it's probably more challenging."

when it comes to reading, the probability to pronounce a word correctly given the spelling is:
in French about 80%
in English about 55%

when it comes to writing, the probability to spell a word correctly given the pronounciation is:
in French about 55%
in English about 55%

Where are those statistics from?

One of my professors at the Sorbonne runs a lab that deals with alphabetization, and how children deal with language at school (spelling, reading, etc.).

He gave us those.


for instance:
in english:
[i:] can be spellt: "ea" (eat), "ee" (see), "e" (me), "ei" (receive"), ...
"ae" can be pronounced as in: leave, heard, hearken, steak, ...

in french:
[ã] can be spellt: "an" (an), "en" (en), "ang" (sang), "ent" (lent), "anc" (blanc), ...
"an" can only be pronounced [ã]

I have seen similar statistics. the ones i saw took the accepted spelling rules, and all the occurrances of it in the lexicon and came up with the average being something around 50% of the time can you count on a spelling rule. I don't remember the exact number.

I do remember that they also did grammar rules in similar fashion and came up with 60%. At least that was what we were taught in Structure of American English (although, the course encompassed englishes from around the world).

This site
http://pinker.wjh.harvard.edu/articles/media/2000_03_landfall.html
gives the number of irregular verbs in english as 180, though I have seen almost twice that number. I don't recall how many french has, but I remember being taught an acronym for roughly twenty. Irish has eleven, maybe twelve if you count clois/cluin separately. Are these all of them?
bí (be), déan (do), feic (see), téigh (go), faigh (receive), abair (say), clois/cluin (hear), tar (come), ith (eat), tabhair (give), beir (carry)

beyond that, just two families of regular verbs (instead of -er, -ir, -re) that are based on the number of syllables of the root. One syllable roots belong to 1st conjugation, all others to 2nd (is there an exeption I'm forgetting. anybody?)

I think Gaeilge's verb system is the best thing goin'...

>In any case, usage has always been and will always remain uttermost. For instance, French spelling (the very tricky one), has been officially simplified (in a very slight way), but people (whether they are good at spelling or not) have ignored the reform (it's not taught at school, etc.).

Yeah, but the difference is that every French citizen (or almost) speaks French, and it is the mothertongue of most of them. With irish, most irish speakers aren't native speakers. What most people speak (or try to) is what they've learnt at school (or at least it's very influenced by school Irish) > most of the time bad Irish (incorrect grammar, English-like pronounciation...). So, Gaeltacht usage isn't uttermost in Irish. Gaeltacht Irish doesn't influence much the Irish of the learners, except those who really make an effort for it. Many people outside the Gaeltacht speak a blend of school Irish and several dialectal features. Gaeltacht Irish is considered as the best Irish (i think), but it isn't taught in schools, so...

The problem in French is the fact that instead of having 1 type + irregular verbs (like in English), or 2 types + irregular verbs (like in Irish), we have plenty of different types based on both the different conjuguations and the changes undergone by the roots.

My dictionary "Le Petit Robert" gives more than 60 types.

The "Grammaire Fonctionnelle du Français" (by André Martinet) gives 49 types + 22 irregular verbs because they don't fit in any type.

I don't how difficult it is for a stranger to learn the French verbs. Personnally, there are certain verbs that I avoid with certain tenses because I don't know how to conjugate them.

Another problem is the tenses and moods:

présent (present),
passé composé (perfect),
imparfait (imperfect),
plus-que-parfait (pluperfect),
passé simple (preterite),
passé antérieur (past anterior),
futur (future),
futur antérieur (future anterior),
subjonctif présent (present subjunctive),
subjonctif imparfait (imperfect subjunctive),
subjonctif passé (perfect subjunctive),
plus-que-parfait du subjonctif (pluperfect subjunctive),
conditionnel présent (present conditional),
conditionnel passé (past conditional),
impératif (imperative),
impératif passé (past imperative)

(preterite and past anterior are used for writing only, and perfect/pluperfect subjunctive are almost never used at all)

what i meant by "usage" is "the way people speak" as opposed to "standard".

There may be a standard Irish, but if people don't speak it, well, they just don't...

Non-native speakers speak it.

I'd say nobody speaks it. the natives are certainly those who are the closest to speaking it. but "standard" means the established version of a language that you'll find in a grammar book, and it is supposedly variationless and evolutionless (fixed). nobody speaks exactly like in a grammar book, that's why "standard" is reviewed from time to time if usage has drifted too far.