Welsh Language Whys isnt it an Option?

Question

I see languages with few speakers in the list and yet welsh isnt an option?

It seems that a lot of people here are american and so many will have welsh ancestry. Before Englands concerted efforts it was very widely spoken and any welsh ancenstors pre 1900 will have spoken it.

Its very disheartening to select "Other" for most of my family.

This place has a Wales Project and well... at about 4000 years old its one of the oldest living, spoken languages in the world. Particularly cheeky that you have Irish as an option(a related language but very few speakers unfortunately).

Sort it out

Comments

Here is the reason for language selection when creating a new Profile Mike.  It is not meant as a dis when a language is not available.

Help:Language Selection

My Welsh ancestors were mostly from the Swansea area.

---

Well it would be handy to have it even if just for the place name suggestions. Wales is a prime example of a country with odd place names. England anglicised or stright renamed many places.

Us Welsh speakers are proud and somewhat defensive of our language and English attempts to wipe it out (pretty successfully). My Dad was subjected to the "Welsh not" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Welsh_Not and was on the receiving nd of many a birch beating so probably wouldnt be happy with his language being listed as other :)

---

Cymru am byth

---

The language selections come from the FamilySearch locations API. They will have to add it as a supported language.

---

Jamie, are you saying that Wikitree can not add language options, but rely on what FamilySearch are doing ?

Jo

---

My mother and her sister told me that the Welsh language at their schools in the Rhondda was actively discouraged in the 1920’s and 30’s and if they weren’t punished in schools the minister’s in the “chapels” certainly would meet out punishments in no uncertain terms.

---

Yes, it's what was called the "Welsh-Not" and was pretty barbaric if you ask me. Poor kids Exactly the same thing happened with the Sami people in Sweden. If the weren't beaten for using the Sapmi language, they were made to stand in corner of the classroom wearing a fools hat. Imagine being rediculed for your own language !? Thankfully both languages survived.

Jo

---

Yes, those language options come from the FamilySearch places API that we use to generate the place suggestions.

Answer 1

what do  you mean by an Irish option?

Comments

In the list of language options.

Irish (we call is Irish Gaelic) is an option. Its a Linguistic cousin to Welsh.

I find it odd to have Irish but not Welsh. If the site is aiming for accuracy these languages need adding. Particularly the still living spoke ones. Many of my Ancestors spoke Welsh only. Feel rather odd to put their Language as other.

Also if Irish Gaelic is there, they should add Scots Gaelic too.

Answer 2

I couldn't agree more Mike !

We definitely need the Welsh language as an option. I keep banging my head against a wall when trying to explain that Cymru isn't a place in England to the keen but often ignorant Americanwyr

Jo

Comments

Wonder what the system for location names would make of Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch, Cymru?

---

Oh my, even us actually living in Wales are struggling to get that one out !

Guess it's a bit like when Danes ask foreigners to say Rødgrød med Fløde

https://forvo.com/word/r%C3%B8dgr%C3%B8d_med_fl%C3%B8de/

---

https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Category:Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwyllllantysiliogogogoch%2C_Anglesey

will find it for you

---

Steve

Answer 3

Hi Mike,

Visit the Wales Project, even join the Wales Project?

If you start at the top with https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Category:Wales you can tunnel down through the traditional counties e.g. https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Category:Caernarfonshire until you get to your required Place. You can then add this Place Category e.g. https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Category:Llanfihangel_Bachellaeth%2C_Caernarfonshire.

You will also see from my profile that I speak some Welsh, and there are others of us in the Wales Project who are much more proficient than I am.

We are certainly trying to "SORT IT'' in the Wales Project.

Incidentally, we discourage the use of Welsh within profiles as the vast majority of us genealogists have the lingua franca of English. We are as proud of our heritage as anyone, but we cannot share it if we do not communicate.
 

Equally we recognise that ancestors may have used the Welsh rather than the English name, so e.g.https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Category:Newmarket%2C_Flintshire Newmarket has a Welsh counterpart https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Category:Trelawnyd%2C_Flintshire