[lg policy] Scots language in the UK census in Scotland

[Dave Sayers]

The census stories are hotting up alright. Here's another about the 
translation bogeyman, for those pesky foreigners.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/politics/8339114/UK-census-expected-to-cost-nearly-500m-due-to-translation-fees.html

...and another about the census monster having its feet tickled by 
mischievous respondents:

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-02-21/u-k-powerless-to-stop-jedis-witches-spoiling-2011-census.html

These stories would be getting a lot more mileage right about now if not 
for earthquakes, revolutions, financial collapses and so on.

In other under-reported news, Wales goes to the polls this week on 
further devolution:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Welsh_devolution_referendum,_2011

(The Yes vote is supposed to have a comfortable lead, but on a low turnout.)

Dave

--
Dr. Dave Sayers
Honorary Research Fellow
College of Arts & Humanities
and Language Research Centre
Swansea University
dave.sayers at cantab.net
http://swansea.academia.edu/DaveSayers/About


On 19:59, Damien Hall wrote:
> As part of this year's UK census, people in Scotland will be asked to 
> say if they can understand speak, read and / or write Scots. There's a 
> nice-looking website about it here:
>
> http://www.ayecan.com/
>
> (geddit?). Alas, this may not be the beginning of a nice time-series 
> of UK data on lesser-spoken autochthonous languages there, as the new 
> Government originally planned to do away with the census as currently 
> implemented, to save money; though I can find no trace of this online 
> now, after a quick search, so perhaps the idea of changing has been 
> dropped?
>
> Damien
>
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