The Futures Company

Russ Wilson writes:

Following on from the earlier post on the subject of ‘nudging’, I was recently in Dublin and Limerick and found the variable dominance of Gaelic and English intriguing- It appears that there has been some attempt to promote the use of the Gaelic language in both public and private life – similar to the Welsh renaissance and the protectionist policy in France.

The result of this seems to be that the majority of public information signs are now either exclusively in Gaelic, or with both Gaelic and English present but the Gaelic very much foregrounded.

However, where it was more important that the sign was immediately accessible – warning signs, security messages, or temporary diversions on the motorway, the signs were exclusively in English. So it seems that the policy of promoting Gaelic is secondary to public safety.

Although there might be some teething problems, I’d have thought that a policy of making all the really important signs exclusively Gaelic would be a pretty strong incentive for people to  to learn and use the language.