A chara, – Quite apart from the many advantages which flow from Irish being an official EU language, such as software being available in Irish as a matter of course, the positive impact for the State is profound ("Morale boost for Irish language as number of translators in Brussels rises", News, December 31st).
With more and more decisions which affect our lives being made at EU level, it is imperative that we maximise the number of Irish people working in European institutions.
In order to secure a position with an EU body, a candidate needs to be proficient in two EU languages. In order to be promoted, one needs three EU languages. Because Irish is an official EU language, this career path is facilitated for more Irish people.
One must also remember that of the 200 EU Irish language experts working in Brussels, Luxembourg and in Grange, Co Meath, many will progress to policy areas such as agriculture, transport, and trade, with positive impacts for this country.
The fact that laws rarely make the bestseller list is no argument for not making them available as widely as possible in all EU languages. At home Irish suffers from exclusion in the public sector because legislation underpinning their activities is available only in English. This real exclusion affects real people in real time leading to language shift from (excluded) Irish to (included) English. The EU has shown how this can be remedied.
The EU’s entire translation budget is €2 per EU citizen per year, a budget which Ireland pays into in any event. Irish becoming a full EU working language means that Ireland now gets a full return on this investment.
Fluency in both one’s own language and in English is very common across the EU. There is no reason why it should not also become common here in Ireland.– Is mise,
DÁITHÍ
Mac CÁRTHAIGH,
Baile Átha Cliath 7.
Sir, – So Irish is now an official language of the EU. I haven’t seen any significant benefits of this other than some job opportunities in translating documents into Irish for those fluent enough in the language.
In reality practically everyone who speaks Irish is also fluent in English so how will translating dry, arcane documents into Irish really benefit the revival of the language? Will it encourage someone like me with passable Irish to practise speaking to my children or my spouse? Will it encourage young people away from a Netflix-based diet of Anglophone media? Certainly not. This is not how Welsh or Catalan regained strength and it will not achieve anything for Irish.
Presumably some people will be happy to take these new jobs in Brussels, though personally I could not think of a more dispiriting job than translating arcane technical documents which will most likely never be read. The notion that the entire effort is not a waste of money because the EU is paying rather than Ireland is rather petty. The Gaelgeoir lobby may see this as a victory; in reality it’s a folly that underlines the tokenism and self-interest behind most of the efforts of the clique who purport to speak for the language. The attractive and charismatic young presenters who have emerged on TG4 have done far more for Irish and its image than this new cadre of Brussels-based translators will ever do. – Yours, etc,
MATTHEW GLOVER,
Lucan,
Co Dublin.