quote:

David Crystal said that one of the biggest threats to minority languages comes from people attacking each other from within

What David Crystal may be overlooking is that people attacking other people's taste/politics/religion/accent/spelling/you-name-it is a natural and largely inescapable aspect of human behavior. It takes a village to have two warring clans, six political parties, and eight different churches. Just look at all the religious schisms in the Hebrides, with their tiny population! Language (ownership, correctness, etc.) is a natural arena of combat. It's not something we can wish away, and decrying it is just so much pious noise. The only thing we can do about it is make the best of it: ionsaí a dhéanamh ar a chéile I nGAEILGE seachas i mBéarla! :-)

Well my opinion 4 wat it is worth, is that one needs not 'purity' in all its forms, for human ideas of prefection tend to be a form of statis, and stopping the world in a 'perfect' moment cannot happen. Rather we need 'standards', and high ones at that.

If there were tight standards in the various elements of the language then students would ahve something to aim for. If the trainers and teachers were fluent themselves, then the current poverty of skills would not be the problem it is. If a standardised method for aquisition existed, then students woudl ahve a timetable for aquisition, and this would give hope and inspire confidence.

So, in essence, we need a set of standards, but not within the narrow remits of the 'lárchanuint' consisting of just lexicalar entries, broad phonetics, and grammar, but the full gamut of elements that each native idiom possesses. If anyone is fluent in one dialect, the rest are near to hand (or mouth)

If there are no constraints, any sort of rubbish will be deemed OK, like going to an Irish class and finding the 'teacher' is 'teaching' by reading from a book, and they not knowing the tongue themselves!

I think the challange is not just a personal one of learning and self-challange, but one of group issues of social intent. How can we engineer a linguistic community that nurtures the social element of aquistion? Daltaí provides a much needed format for continuity, as one example. Also, what research allows us to speed up aquisition? What technologies are there that could assist? Are we willing to develope them?

As I see it, langauge is a cultural feature, and more than just the linguistic aspects must be focused on for real success.