Taking Gaelic forward — lessons to be learned from Euskadi

 Rob Dunbar (University of Glasgow) agus Wilson McLeod (Sabhal Mór Ostaig)

[West Highland Free Press, 18 February 2000]

A country on the Atlantic edge of Europe notorious for its grey skies and constant rain.  A country where traditional heavy industries are slowly being replaced by an information- and service-based economy.  A country where devolution has opened up new possibilities for innovative and imaginative solutions.

This is not Scotland but Euskadi, the Basque Autonomous Community in the northeast of Spain.  In this country, the government has made the revitalization of the national language a top priority, and its commitment is paying off.  Use of the language in all areas of life is increasing, more young people than old speak Basque, and more parents are speaking Basque to their children than they were just a few years ago.  After centuries of decline, the language shift from Basque to Spanish is being successfully reversed.

Given these achievements, it was appropriate that the main city of Euskadi, Bilbao, recently hosted the Seventh International Conference on Minority Languages, a major gathering of experts on language development from many different countries, including Scotland.  For the Scottish delegates, there was an immense amount to learn.  It was clear that Gaelic development in Scotland lags far behind.  Where the governments of Euskadi and nearby Catalunya have formulated clear objectives and put in place systematic programmes to fulfill them, there has never been any national strategy for Gaelic.  Instead of pursuing concrete, realisable goals based on step-by-step action, Gaelic development has too often been uncoordinated and lacking a clear focus on the key task of getting more people to use more Gaelic in more settings and more situations.

The organisational shake-up
One example of this tendency to sidestep crucial issues is the recent initiative by the Minister for Gaelic, Alasdair Morrison, to re-examine the structure of the different Gaelic development groups.  In some ways this is a peculiar exercise: there was no public outcry for such a move, and no obvious problem that demanded a solution.  The groups involved are all small, hamstrung by limited resources and more limited powers, and if there is some slight duplication of effort it is no matter for grave concern.  On any list of the challenges facing the Gaelic community, this exercise would not rank high.  While those not involved in Gaelic development may find the abbreviations and acronyms confusing — CNAG, CNSA, ACG, CCG and so on — this is not a serious basis for government policy.

More important, this initiative has diverted attention from a much more important issue — the matter of secure status (inbhe thèarainte).  Beginning in 1995, Comunn na Gàidhlig, the principal Gaelic-development body, undertook a major consultation with the Gaelic community, and then submitted two detailed reports containing wide-ranging policy proposals to the Scottish Office.  Among the most important of these proposals were the establishment of a enforceable legal right to Gaelic-medium education and a requirement that all units of government and all public bodies develop schemes to promote the use of Gaelic within their work.  In addition, the reports recommended the formation of three powerful new bodies to oversee the enforcement of a Gaelic Language Act.

While the Government has repeatedly stated its commitment to the principle of secure status, the matter seems to have disappeared into the long grass.  The proposed organisational shake-up is simply not a substitute.  Meaningful new powers and appropriate levels of funding are needed — it is not enough to tinker with the existing structures and budgets.  The language shift from Gaelic to English is an ongoing reality.  All credible evidence points to the imminent death of Gaelic as a spoken community language unless radical action is taken immediately.

Foghlam, foghlam, foghlam
Without question, the mainstay of Gaelic development strategy has been Gaelic-medium education — foghlam, foghlam, foghlam, as then-Minister for Gaelic Brian Wilson put it.  This is obviously essential.  Without an increase in the supply of Gaelic speakers in the future everything else is doomed to failure.

But arithmetic and international experience give rise to some hard questions.  First, the number of schoolchildren in Gaelic-medium education is far too small even to sustain the existing Gaelic-speaking population, let alone reverse the process of language shift.  Professor Kenneth MacKinnon estimates it would need to quintuple simply to offset the existing Gaelic speakers who move on to Tìr nan Òg.  Even in the Western Isles, only a third of children follow Gaelic-medium primary education.

The Gaelic sector must be drastically increased if the language is to have any chance of meaningful survival.  This challenge immediately gives rise to the problem of teacher supply, which has been a significant obstacle to the expansion of the Gaelic sector.  But this is not a problem like the weather — it can be solved with committed education policy.  In Euskadi, with a population half that of Scotland, the government has been committing some fifteen million pounds per year to retraining Spanish-medium teachers as Basque-medium teachers.  The resources committed in Scotland are minuscule in comparison — no wonder the Basques have overcome this problem while it continues to strangle the growth of Gaelic-medium education in Scotland.

Second, international experience suggests that children who acquire a language in school do not generally achieve full native-level competence in the second language.  The prevailing assumption — that a child from a non-Gaelic speaking background who learns Gaelic in school in Kilmarnock or Forfar can be understood as ‘replacing’ a native speaker living in a solidly Gaelic community like Scalpay or Ness — is a potentially misleading one.

Third, even when the school system successfully produces a significant number of genuine bilinguals — an outcome that it probably decades away in Scotland — there are still challenges in making sure they actually use their language skills.  Ability to speak the language is not enough; the point is to encourage the actual use of the language throughout people’s lives.  This requires systematic planning to ensure that opportunities to use Gaelic exist in all aspects of life.

‘Normalisation’ and ‘Offer’
Two of the main topics discussed in Bilbao were the process of ‘normalisation’ and language ‘offer’.  These ideas are related: the principle is to make Gaelic a normal part of life in as many spheres of society as possible, spreading the language to new and different functions.  Gaelic speakers must then be made aware that Gaelic is available in these settings — that it is on offer to them — and proactively encouraged to use it.

The process of normalisation requires careful planning and hard work.  In Euskadi, particular branches of government were targeted for Basque development, and the process has since rippled out to cover the entire public sector.  Specialists worked on developing appropriate Basque terminology for the department in question; officials were trained in professional language and the new specialist terminology; targets and programmes were established to ensure the effective introduction of Basque as a working medium.

Comhairle nan Eilean’s bilingual policy, adopted in 1975, asserts similar aspirations, but its general statements have never been implemented by systematic action.  As such, the comhairle still transacts almost all its business in English, and does not offer Gaelic-medium services to any meaningful extent.

The private sector is also crucial, and here the central principle is best understood as one of consumers’ rights — that Gaelic speakers should be offered Gaelic-medium services for opening bank accounts, booking ferry journeys, arranging contents insurance, and all the other commercial transactions that arise in the course of modern life.  Again, developing Gaelic as a medium for such services and making sure they are readily offered to Gaelic-speaking consumers requires wide-ranging planning and step-by-step implementation.  That work has not yet begun in Scotland, but it is essential if people are to have a reason to transmit or learn Gaelic in the future, and if Gaelic is to be a fully healthy language that people will be able to use as they go through all the stages of their lives.

The ‘Gaelic economy’
This model of language development is very different from the ‘Gaelic economy’ that has been created in recent years.  This ‘Gaelic economy’ consists of some 1,000 or 1,500 jobs in companies or organisations having some connection to Gaelic, all of them funded from the public purse.  It would be difficult to identify a single job involving the use of Gaelic that would exist in the absence of a direct public subsidy.  Gaelic remains almost entirely excluded from the economic mainstream.

Indeed, the local enterprise companies speak of a ‘Gaelic sector’, something separate and distinct from the mainstream, and do not attempt to integrate Gaelic into the ordinary economic life of the Gaidhealtachd.  For example, there is no programme to ensure that companies which are given financial assistance offer Gaelic-medium services to their customers or develop programmes to use Gaelic as a working language.  Nor do the LECs operate as an example to others — no programmes have been put in place to normalise Gaelic within their own operations.

The creation of jobs involving the use of Gaelic has been a welcome boost, helping to soften traditional perceptions that the language has little practical value.  But there is a real danger that the emphasis placed on the ‘Gaelic economy’ has created a perception that Gaelic development policy is just an arm of economic development policy, that it will generate revenue rather than require ongoing public investment.  The risks of such an interpretation have been obvious in the discussions concerning the restructuring of the Gaelic development groups, discussions which have threatened to disintegrate into a squabble about possible redundancies and the location of future jobs.

Popular phrases like ‘cultural tourism’ are also problematic.  Such innovative approaches to tourism may give an economic boost to the Gaidhealtachd, but do not necessarily increase Gaelic language use.  Indeed, without adequate language planning, they may actually hasten linguistic decline in the ‘heartlands’.  The overwhelming majority of visitors to the Gaidhealtachd do not know Gaelic, and employing Gaelic speakers to talk to visitors about Gaelic culture in English will not do much for Gaelic.  Of course, it is far better that the Gaelic-speaking, English-using tour guide has a job rather than being unemployed or forced to migrate in search of work.  But promoting such jobs has little to do with language development, and the two objectives should not be confused.  Many necessary steps for language revival will not bring concrete economic benefits, and it is essential to recognise this.

Conclusion
Gaelic language development is a huge task that must push against negative forces that have been gathering strength for centuries.  But, as the Basque example shows, success is possible with serious political determination, careful planning, systematic application, and clear vision.  Building a support base in Scotland for this complex and expensive task will be no easy matter, but fuzzy thinking and empty buzzwords will consign Gaelic to the cemetery.  Here is the great challenge for the Gaelic community in the new millennium.