Month: June 2020

Launch of major new study: 02/07/20

June 30, 2020

Researchers from the University of the Highlands and Islands Language Sciences Institute and Soillse will launch a new book on Thursday 2 July 2020.

‘The Gaelic Crisis in the Vernacular Community: A comprehensive sociolinguistic survey of Scottish Gaelic’ is the most comprehensive social survey on the state of Gaelic communities ever conducted. The book presents new sociolinguistic research about  Gaelic communities in the Western Isles, in Staffin in the Isle of Skye and in the Isle of Tiree.

In addition to in-depth analysis of the use and transfer of Scottish Gaelic as a community language, the book presents contemporary data on the societal and spatial extent of Gaelic speakers and Gaelic speaking in the remaining vernacular communities in Scotland.

Professor Conchúr Ó Giollagáin, Professor of Gaelic Research at the University of the Highlands explained the motivation behind the new book: “It is important that we are clear about the immense scale of the challenges involved in reversing the ongoing decline in the use of Gaelic in these areas”.

The book, ‘The Gaelic Crisis in the Vernacular Community: A Comprehensive Sociolinguistic Survey of Scottish Gaelic’, is available from the Gaelic Books Council.

Pre-order: The Gaelic Crisis in the Vernacular Community

June 12, 2020

Now available for pre-order from the Gaelic Books Council:

https://gaelicbooks.org/index.php?route=product/product&product_id=1688&search=gaelic+crisis

This book presents the findings of the comprehensive sociolinguistic survey of the Gaelic vernacular communities, carried out by the Islands Gaelic Research Project at the Soillse sociolinguistic partnership. The survey modules examined: census demolinguistics; preschoolers’ language practice; teenager data; three indicative communities; speaker typologies, providing qualitative and quantitative information on community, family, school and individual language acquisition and practice.