Hey, if you're from Wales, do you speak Welsh?

[raccoon]

Reason I ask is I'm reading an Evan Evans mystery by Rhys Bowen, where the characters in a small town all speak Welsh. (The natives, that is.)

[muriel_volestrangler]

1. In some areas, many do

Whether 'all natives' speak it as their first language in a whole town (or just a village), I'm not sure. If you mean can speak it, then yes, I think in some areas you would find that practially everyone raised there can.

Welsh language use is in the news: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/wales/7863542.stm

[LeftishBrit]

2. Welsh is a compulsory school subject in Wales so in theory all Welsh people know some Welsh

Of course, as we know from general experience of foreign language teaching, this doesn't necessarily mean that they can speak it! However, a significant minority of Welsh schoolchildren (about 20%, I think) attend Welsh-medium schools where they learn all their school subjects in Welsh. All of these children end up able to speak the language, whether they speak it at home or not.

If your question is whether Welsh people speak Welsh as their native language, the majority don't, but some do, and it is increasingly encouraged. Most native Welsh speakers will also speak English as a reasonably fluent second language, though some older people in small communities will not.

The revival of Welsh is an important political/educational issue these days.

I have taught a few Welsh students who were totally bilingual in English and Welsh. One of these later took a research job in Australia which required her to learn the Aboriginal language Warlbiri - so she must be one of the very few people in the world who combines the languages English, Welsh and Warlbiri!

[fedsron2us]

3. Why does Welsh insist on spelling taxi as 'tacsi'

Are there any Welsh words containing the letter X?

[muriel_volestrangler]

4. It seems not:

http://www.ngfl-cymru.org.uk/vtc/ngfl/ngfl-flash/alphabet-welsh/alphabet.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Welsh_alphabet
http://www.madog.org/dysgwyr/gramadeg/gramadeg1.html

[geardaddy]

9. The same reason the Russians spell it ...

такси

Different alphabet

[fedsron2us]

5. My grandfather came from a coal mining community

called Pengam in the Rhymney valley South wales.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pengam

It was right on the border of Monmouthshire and Glamorgan. I can not remember many Welsh speakers amongst the miners I met but it was over 40 years ago and Welsh is probably more widely taught now. Surprisingly the mining community was a bit more cosmopolitan than you might imagine. My grandfather's niece married a collier who was a Pole who had previously worked for years in the coal mines in Belgium and spoke three languages.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

6. In 2006, I spent a week in Hereford, which is on the Welsh border

The signs in the train station were bilingual, English and Welsh, even though Hereford is in England, and I never heard a word of Welsh spoken there.

On my tour's "day off," I took the train down to Bath to meet one of the people who was organizing the next year's translators' conference, and the most convenient route required me to change trains in a town in Wales (and while doing so, I met a young woman from Japan, who was delighted to find someone who could speak her language, but that's another story).

As I was standing on the platform, the most incomprehensible string of consonants came on over the PA system. It sounded like, oh, I don't know, "flwikhwloof" or something like that.

I thought, "Oh no, they're going to make all the announcements in Welsh." But fortunately, that announcement was quickly followed with (I hope) the equivalent in English.

[enlightenment]

7. A good friend of mine is Welsh and yes,

she speaks Welsh.

Beautiful language.

[Albus]

8. Natives? Can you say "natives"? Is that PC?

[geardaddy]

10. I lived in Bangor for a little while

and I would say many if not most people in West Wales (excluding Pembrokeshire) speak Welsh; many as a first language. The official surveys show Welsh speakers at around 20% (both first and second language speakers), but it's surprising how many people understand a least a little Welsh.

Here's an interesting program from a few years ago:

http://www.s4c.co.uk/popethyngymraeg/e_index.shtml