LL-L "Language promotion" 2010.01.03 (04) [EN]

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L O W L A N D S - L - 03 January 2010 - Volume 04
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From: Hellinckx Luc <luc.hellinckx at gmail.com>
Subject: LL-L "Language promotion"

Beste Liëglanners,

Another way to revive interest in a minority language could happen by way of
reading mass in vernacular. For the sixth time already, this happened today
in Brussels:

http://www.brusselnieuws.be/artikels/stadsleven/mis-in-brussels-dialect-doet-kerk-vollopen

Religion going back to its roots? ;=)

Anyway, church was too small to accomodate all the visitors, and people were
queueing outside to get in.

Who knows, maybe next time the pope addresses the world with an "Urbi et
Orbi", maybe he's willing to include Low Saxon in the list.

Kind greetings,

Luc Hellinckx,Halle, Belgium

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From: Heiko Evermann <heiko.evermann at gmx.de>
 Subject: LL-L "Language promotion" 2010.01.03 (02) [EN]

Hi Marlou,

> Wow! The Welsh seem to have been quite militant. I don't think you will
see
> such resolution, even violence among Plattspeakers...
Indeed. They even write their out-of-office autoreplies in welsh...
Have a look at http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/wales/7702913.stm
 "E-mail error ends up on road sign"

Heiko

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From: Sandy Fleming <sandy at fleimin.demon.co.uk>
 Subject: LL-L "Language promotion" 2010.01.03 (02) [EN]

> From: M.-L. Lessing <marless at gmx.de>
> Subject: LL-L "Language promotion" 2010.01.02 (04) [DE-EN]
>
> Very interesting, Sandy! I immediately wikipeded S4C and found this:
>
>         During the 1970s, Welsh language activists had campaigned for
>         a TV service in the language, which already had its own radio
>         station, BBC Radio Cymru. Both the Conservative and Labour
>         parties promised a Welsh-language fourth channel, if elected
>         to government in the 1979 General Election.[8] Shortly after
>         the Conservatives won a majority in the election, the new home
>         secretary Willie Whitelaw decided against a Welsh fourth
>         channel, and suggested that, except for an occasional opt-out,
>         the service should be the same as that offered in the rest of
>         the UK. This led to acts of civil disobedience, including
>         refusals to pay the television licence fee, thereby running
>         the risk of prosecution or even a prison sentence, and sit-ins
>         in BBC and HTV studios. Some took more extreme measures,
>         including attacking television transmitters in Welsh-speaking
>         areas. In 1980, the former president of Plaid Cymru, Gwynfor
>         Evans, threatened to go on hunger strike if the Conservative
>         government of Margaret Thatcher didn't honour its commitment
>         to provide a Welsh language TV service.[9] The channel started
>         broadcasting on 1 November 1982, the night before Channel 4's
>         opening.
>
> Wow! The Welsh seem to have been quite militant. I don't think you
> will see such resolution, even violence among Plattspeakers... But all
> you write sounds very good. Another question please: Wikipedia tells
> us there is advertising on S4C. Is it profitable? Is Welsh activism --
> or Welsh conscience, or whatever you call it -- an economical factor
> (in the region)? How many % of S4C's funding is advertising, do you
> have any idea?

Very interesting! I moved to Wales in 1979 but didn't watch TV until
some years later when subtitling became common, so it looks like I
missed out on a lot of the fun  :)

S4C advertises, but I don't know anything about the funding other than
clues such as the financial crisis that led them to barter with the BBC
over Pobl-y-Cwm and suchlike.

The Welsh do tend to be militant when it comes to the English ignoring
their issues. Many Welsh people have spent years in jail because of it.

I left Wales in 1997, I don't know how much of it still goes on these
days. But life in Wales was always very peaceful: it's all right to be
English or Scottish or whatever, just don't be an idiot about it  :)

Sandy Fleming
http://scotstext.org/

•

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