Celtic Languages and Cultures

La notion de norme et de référence à la norme est absolument fondamentale pour qui s’intéresse aux langues humaines. Langues, dialectes, parlers et accents suivent tous des règles rigoureuses, que l’observation permet de déterminer. Il n’y a pas de langue sans grammaire : la langue est une norme.
Cependant, les langues du monde ne jouissent pas toutes de statuts égaux. Dans certains États, le ou les idiomes parlés par la majorité de la population sont normés (pourvus d’une norme de référence) et normalisés, c’est à dire soutenus par un appareil administratif et éducatif conséquent.
À l’inverse, de nombreuses communautés linguistiques, minoritaires ou trop pauvres, sont obligées d’utiliser d’autres langues que leur langue maternelle pour avoir accès à l’enseignement ou aux services publics. La normalisation des langues vernaculaires de ces groupes laissés pour compte est souhaitable pour deux raisons : 1. la préservation de la diversité culturelle de la planète ; 2. l’établissement de systèmes éducatifs et d’information plus performants, parce qu’utilisant la langue maternelle des communautés considérées.
Fixer la norme d’une langue peu décrite est loin d’être une sinécure, comme le montre l’exemple capverdien. Et en fin de compte, cette nouvelle norme n’aura d’utilité que si les pouvoirs publics favorisent sa normalisation, à savoir sa diffusion systématique auprès des populations concernées. L’aventure de la normalisation des langues vaut cependant la peine d’être vécue, en particulier dans nombre de pays du Tiers-Monde. En normant et en normalisant, le linguiste a un rôle essentiel à jouer dans les processus de développement économique.

The Chinese provinces are a crazy patchwork quilt of languages and dialects, where the histories of migrations and cultural enclaves, the tides of influence from empire and commerce, the sperm trails that follow rivers and railway lines ... are recorded in a tangle of codes that no one has yet made a serious attempt to untangle. Note that these comments are obviously informal, not a part of systematic research. Chinese scholars themselves are now (2013) taking a much more thorough interest in dialects than was the case even in 2000.

Deusanas (angl. Jasonas) Bondas moko škotų gėlų kalbos (Gàidhlig), kurią dar visai neseniai mokėjo vos keliasdešimt tūkstančių žmonių Škotijos šiaurėje, kalnuose ir salose, taip pat Naujojoje Škotijoje (Kanada). 2019 m. rudenį šios kalbos programą pasiūlė nemokama kalbų mokymosi platforma Duolingo, šiuo metu apie pusė milijono žmonių daugiau ar mažiau rimtai mokosi škotų gėlų kalbos.

Šiuo metu gyvos keturios keltų kalbos (škotų gėlų, airių, velsiečių ir bretonų), dvi atgaivintos (meniečių ir kornų), bet jų situacija ne itin gera. Bene geriausiai laikosi valstybės ir ES remiama airių kalba, kuri Airijoje pripažinta valstybine, be to, ji – viena iš ES kalbų. Velsiečių kalba irgi pakankamai gyvybinga, tiek ji, tiek škotų gėlų kalba turi savo radijo kanalus BBC. Keltų kultūra žavisi daug kas, tačiau norinčių mokytis kalbėti gana sudėtingomis jų kalbomis ryžtasi net ne kiekvienas šių tautų palikuonis.
Su Deusanu Bondu, kuris moko egzotiškos, nors europietiškos, gilias tradicijas turinčios, deja, nykstančios keltų kalbos, aptarėme susiklosčiusią situaciją.

This essay highlights the main characteristics of the architecture of the Welsh house and provides an analysis of the influences on its design over the centuries. The various terms involved in the field are clearly explained before the discussion is expanded, and pertinent examples are used of different forms of architecture in Wales and their locations, demonstrating effectively the factors that influenced design and its development over the years.

Books in the Broadview Editions series don't include a bibliography. For many readers this removes a distraction. Others, students and professors alike, may want to have a reading list, and so I have assembled this one. Books in the Broadview Editions series don’t include a bibliography. For many readers this removes a distraction. Others, students and professors alike, may want to have a reading list, and so I have assembled this one.

This list is not exhaustive. It focuses on works consulted when preparing the translation, and on recent publications. Many items here are not for everyone, but may be helpful for working on papers and theses. Sources for the supporting documents (Welsh Laws, Triads, Gerald of Wales) are not repeated here.

Throughout history, the Druids have always been seen as sorcerers who had a strong bond with nature. Ancestral knowledge holders within Celtic society, directed all religious activity as the highest authority linked to the gods, practiced human sacrifices and festivals organized as Imbolc, Beltaine, Lugnasad or Samain, etc.. all aspects of which are discussed in this article.

This is a small explanation of how Scottish Gaelic dialects can differ from the standard spelled form, using mainly the Arran dialect from the Argyle Dialect group as an example. I also gone on to discuss the Galloway Gaelic dialect and the extinct Cumbric language.

In this article, I intend to concentrate on one type of process by which Scots has found new legitimation as a language, and how discourses surrounding the issue of Scots might seek to contribute to the creation of a new Scottish society. I whish to show how history is used as a legitimating discursive device by the various components of the Scots language revitalisation movement.

Despite being dormant during the nineteenth century, the Cornish language has been recently recognised by the British Government as a living regional language after a long period of revival.
The first part of this paper discusses the history of traditional Cornish and the reasons for its decline and dismissal. The second part offers an overview of the revival movement since its beginnings in 1904 and analyses the current situation of the language in all possible domains.

For know the controversial history of the Druids in the Celtic world, will investigate the sources of its origin, through stories of classic texts and medieval legends of Gaul, Britain and Ireland. His role in Celtic society surpassed the religious sphere, covering war, politics, medicine and the law. Almost unknown is the participation of women in this institution.

Principally in response to the public debt crisis, the process of European political integration appears about to make further advances. This, in turn, brings a need to reflect on the emergence of a new legal culture shared by many legal systems that are
gradually moving closer to each other in many ways. The language issue is an important aspect of this: the greater the sovereignty transferred by the Member States to the Brussels institutions, the more essential it becomes that these institutions speak the languages that Europeans know best, generally their national language.
This poses a considerable challenge to the EU, where language diversity is now recognised under Article 22 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union, and, after the Lisbon Treaty, under Article 3 (3) of the TEU. If the EU truly intends to
guarantee that language diversity is respected, it must allow every EU citizen to speak any of the 23 official languages and, at the same time, issue its rules in every citizen’s own language.
A useful key to understanding the EU situation is provided by Canada, which, with its two official languages, French and English, has long faced a similar challenge. It has been possible to protect the identities of both the English-speaking and the French-speaking communities by recognising that both communities are entitled to have all written documents drafted in their own language. However, this federal-level decision has
led to a model of regulation that is marked by strong separatism in the Province of Quebec, where the French-speaking population constitutes a significant majority.
The co-existence of the two communities raises several issues for legal scholars. This paper looks primarily at the classic constitutional problem of the rights that the linguistic minority are entitled to, and a review is provided of the main rulings issued by the Supreme Court of Canada. After the introduction (§ 1), and a short survey of relevant constitutional provisions (§ 2), an account is provided of the debate over the Provinces’ powers when constitutional amendments impinge on their sphere of activity (§ 3), and the key regulations relating to the day-to-day administration of Canadian bilingualism are described (§ 4). The article then examines cases and key issues arising from them, in
chronological order (§ 5). The last chapter provides a critical evaluation of the way in which language rights have been shaped in Canadian constitutional jurisprudence (§ 6).

Prevalentemente in risposta alla crisi del debito pubblico, il processo di integrazione politica europea sembra in procinto di raggiungere nuovi traguardi. Ciò pone a propria volta la necessità di riflettere sulla nascita di una cultura giuridica comune a molti
ordinamenti che si stanno progressivamente avvicinando l'un l'altro sotto molteplici aspetti. Un aspetto importante di questa riflessione attiene al "problema linguistico": infatti, più quote di sovranità vengono trasferite dagli Stati Membri alle istituzioni di
Bruxelles, più diviene fondamentale che tali istituzioni parlino nella lingua che i popoli europei comprendono meglio, il che significa normalmente la loro lingua nazionale.
Ciò pone una sfida notevole per l'UE: se vuole realmente assicurare il rispetto della "diversità linguistica" (ora riconosciuta dall'art. 22 della Carta dei Diritti Fondamentali dell'Unione Europea e, dopo il Trattato di Lisbona, dall'art. 3(3) del TEU), deve consentire ad ogni cittadino europeo di parlare in una qualunque delle ventitré lingue ufficiali, e allo stesso tempo deve imporgli i propri comandi nella sua lingua.
Lo studio del caso canadese è particolarmente utile a comprendere questa sfida: con le sue due lingue ufficiali, l'inglese e il francese, il Canada ne ha infatti conosciuta a lungo una
simile. In questo Paese, riconoscere a ciascuna comunità, quella anglofona e quella francofona, il diritto di avere tutti i documenti ufficiali scritti nella propria lingua è stato un modo per proteggere le rispettive identità. In particolare, l'opzione bilingue adottata
dalla federazione canadese ha tradizionalmente consentito alla minoranza francofona di salvaguardare un elemento essenziale del proprio patrimonio culturale. Tuttavia, quest'opzione scelta a livello federale fa spazio a un modello di regolamentazione improntato a un forte separatismo all'interno della Provincia del Quebec, dove la popolazione di lingua francese è largamente predominante.
La coesistenza delle due comunità solleva diverse questioni per i giuristi. In questo lavoro, l'attenzione è rivolta principalmente sul classico problema costituzionale di quali diritti sono riconosciuti alla minoranza linguistica: vengono passate in rassegna le
principali pronunce della Corte Suprema del Canada in tema di diritti linguistici. Dopo un'introduzione (§ 1), e un breve resoconto delle disposizioni costituzionali rilevanti (§ 2), della controversia sui poteri delle province in materia di modifiche costituzionali
incidenti sulla loro competenza (§ 3), e delle regole principali nell'applicazione quotidiana del bilinguismo canadese (§ 4), l'articolo segue un ordine cronologico, esaminando le sentenze e analizzando le questioni principali che esse rispettivamente
hanno sollevati (§ 5); nel paragrafo conclusivo, vengono svolte alcune considerazioni (prevalentemente critiche) sul modo in cui i diritti linguistici sono stati declinati nell'esperienza costituzionale canadese (§ 6).

It is often asserted that the term "Celtic", when used in relation to languages, culture, history or, specifically, a people or group of people, is a modern invention, is inaccurate and inappropriate, and should not be used. This essay offers a brief discussion of the historicity of the use of the term.

This paper is a preliminary report on a sociolinguistic field survey. It records the beliefs which 834 permanent residents of Suva, Fiji had about their own language and literacy skills in 1988-89. The interview subjects were selected from five census enumeration districts with populations ranging from 430 to 1200, and chosen for having a roughly equal ethnic composition of Fijians and Indo-Fijians. Bilingual interviewers (linguistics students) invited and assisted subjects to complete an extensive questionnaire, and offer unstructured comments. The collated and analysed outcome gives a complex and sometimes surprising picture of urban language change.

Can we dispense with lawyers as intermediaries between the law and its subjects? Can laypeople have direct access to the law? The Plain English Movement (PEM) has long promoted the use of plain language in legal writing as the way to demystify the law, and many governments and private corporations have expended significant resources on drafting legislation and legal documents in plain language. This article argues that the PEM has exaggerated the capacity of plain language to render the law intelligible to the non-lawyer, obscuring the deeper question of legal complexity by focusing solely on language and style. Using the law effectively requires expertise that goes far beyond understanding the meaning of the words used to communicate it: certain complex aspects of the law cannot be eliminated by mere simplification of language, and this article demonstrates that other specialized skills are required over and above the ability to penetrate technical language. The paradigmatic illustration of the need for such skills is litigation.

This paper aims at offering a revision of the relationship between the names of indigenous family units in genitive plural attested on the inscriptions of Ancient Hispania and the indigenous names found in onomastic formulae that can also be used to refer to these units. As a continuation of a Veleia 2016 study on the various suffixes used for deriving these names, we present in this paper the results of a comprehensive reexamination of the documents including kinship terms together with names of family units, and paying special attention to the third Botorrita bronze. The data support the idea that these family units
were not big tribes or clans, but smaller groups with a limited duration in time. This can be connected to the information provided by a number of inscriptions concerning the emergence of new family units provided with a new name inside previously existing units that we dealt with in the first part of the paper.

The iconography of Celtic coins in the following article is explained within the framework of the system shaped by the structural metaphor of SPEECH / POETRY IS FIRE, functioning in the tradition of Indo-European oral cultures. The personalization of the above metaphor at its Vedic beginning was the god of fire Agni, who was also the god of divine speech that is poetry. He was a model of all the chief gods of later Indo-European tribes functioning within the tradition of oral cultures. The unity and continuity of this tradition is visible in the epithets of Apollo, Hermes, Dionysus, Janus, Lugus, Odin. Their similarity and the same initial status was later blurred by the transformation of the oral tradition into written cultures. The iconography of Celtic coins shows the connection of the god of poetry with the original metaphorical system found in Vedic literature. Abstrakt Ikonografia monet celtyckich w poniższym artykule jest wyjaśniania w ramach systemu metafor poezji, ukształtowanych przez metaforę strukturalną MOWA/POEZJA TO OGIEŃ, funkcjonującego w tradycji indoeuropejskich kultur oralnych. Personalizacją powyższej metafory na jej wedyjskim początku był bóg ognia Agni, uważany również za bóstwo boskiej mowy, czyli poezji. Był on prawzorem wszystkich naczelnych bogów późniejszych indoeuropejskich plemion funkcjonujących w ramach tradycji kultur oralnych. Jedność i ciągłość tej tradycji jest widoczna w epitetach Apolla, Hermesa, Dionizosa, Janusa, Lugusa i Odyna. Ich podobieństwo oraz identyczny status początkowy uległ później zatarciu w wyniku przekształcania tradycji oralnej na kultury o przekazie pisemnym. W ikonografii monet celtyckich widać związek boga poezji z systemem metaforycznym, jaki znajdujemy w literaturze wedyjskiej. Słowa kluczowe: metafora strukturalna, kultura oralna, poezja, mowa, bogowie poezji, kapłani, poeci Wstęp Najlepszym początkiem artykułu o takim tytule mogą być jedynie słowa Juliusza Cezara z Wojny Galijskiej opisujące proces nauki poetów, członków społeczeństwa galijskiego, którzy zamierzali zostać kapłanami nazywanymi powszechnie przez świat hellenistyczny druidami.

This volume provides accounts of well-established themes of general Celtic inquiry from new theoretical perspectives, in addition to addressing new areas of research that have remained largely unexplored. The collection includes contributions by both established and young scholars on diverse aspects of culture, literature and linguistics, reflecting the multidisciplinary character of current trends in Celtology. The linguistic section of the book includes chapters dealing with Welsh phonology and possible areas of influence of the Brittonic language on English, as well as with the issues of translating culture-specific aspects of medieval Welsh texts and the problems of standardising Irish orthography and font. The second part of the volume is devoted to literature and considers neglected, and heretofore unexplored, aspects of Welsh-language poetry, fiction and children’s literature, the work of John Cowper Powys, and Scottish film in the theoretical context of post-humanism. Approa...

This volume provides accounts of well-established themes of general Celtic inquiry from new theoretical perspectives, in addition to addressing new areas of research that have remained largely unexplored. The collection includes contributions by both established and young scholars on diverse aspects of culture, literature and linguistics, reflecting the multidisciplinary character of current trends in Celtology. The linguistic section of the book includes chapters dealing with Welsh phonology and possible areas of influence of the Brittonic language on English, as well as with the issues of translating culture-specific aspects of medieval Welsh texts and the problems of standardising Irish orthography and font. The second part of the volume is devoted to literature and considers neglected, and heretofore unexplored, aspects of Welsh-language poetry, fiction and children’s literature, the work of John Cowper Powys, and Scottish film in the theoretical context of post-humanism. Approa...

Over the last decade, Cornwall Council and other partners have grant funded around one Cornish language film project per year. In order to develop the impact and wider benefit of Cornish language film making, the Cornish Language Lead intends to commission a framework for Cornish language film making to identify:
• potential partners who could provide match funding,
• how to integrate Cornish language film commissioning into UK film-making strategies and funding opportunities,
• how to contribute to develop film-making skills and expertise in Cornwall that are of value to the wider creative industries sector in Cornwall
• how to maximise the impact of Cornish language films in terms of distribution and international festivals.

FylmK is a short piece of work to encapsulate the above as the basis for future Cornish language commissions. This has been prepared by an expert with detailed knowledge of the film industry and with knowledge of the specific requirements and capacity of Cornish language.

The report sets out findings of potential funding and distribution partners, with guidance on criteria to maximise opportunities for future film commissions to secure partner match funding or distribution.

This volume provides accounts of well-established themes of general Celtic inquiry from new theoretical perspectives, in addition to addressing new areas of research that have remained largely unexplored. The collection includes contributions by both established and young scholars on diverse aspects of culture, literature and linguistics, reflecting the multidisciplinary character of current trends in Celtology. The linguistic section of the book includes chapters dealing with Welsh phonology and possible areas of influence of the Brittonic language on English, as well as with the issues of translating culture-specific aspects of medieval Welsh texts and the problems of standardising Irish orthography and font. The second part of the volume is devoted to literature and considers neglected, and heretofore unexplored, aspects of Welsh-language poetry, fiction and children’s literature, the work of John Cowper Powys, and Scottish film in the theoretical context of post-humanism. Approaching these issues from different angles and using different methodologies, the collection highlights the connections between long-established academic areas of interest and popular culture, broadening the horizon of Celtic scholarship.

Chapter One 
Prolegomena to a Study of Welsh Vocalism
Sabine Asmus and Cormac Anderson
Chapter Two
Diphthongs in the North of Wales
PawełTomasz Czerniak
Chapter Three
Translating or Mistranslating Celtic Law in the Polish versions
of the “Four Branches of the Mabinogi”
Katarzyna Jaworska-Biskup
Chapter Four
Revision of the Most Known Celtic Features of English
Ireneusz Kida
Chapter Five 
An Irish Solution to an Irish Problem: The (Neverending) Issue
of Standardising Irish
Mark Ó Fionnáin
Chapter Six
Hiraeth as Allegorical Form: Fflur Dafydd’s Atyniad
Aleksander Bednarski
Chapter Seven
Is this Machine Alive? Machine-like, Biotic, Autopoietic Systems in Contemporary Cinema
Maciej Czerniakowski
Chapter Eight 
A Postcolonial Traveller? A Take on the Poetry of Iwan Llwyd
Siôn Pennar
Chapter Nine
Barti Ddu: A Welsh Colonial Hero in a Post-colonial Text?
Awen Schiavone
Chapter Ten 
“History is not to be trifled within this way”? Re-contextualising
John Cowper Powys’ Owen Glendower (1940)
Angelika Reichmann

O encanto que permeia a cultura celta faz-se notável por seus elementos alegóricos, sua configuração mitológica caleidoscópica e por seus dialetos de traços peculiarmente melódicos e enigmáticos. Ao defendermos que a língua naturalmente comporta em sua constituição elementos intrínsecos às afirmações de identidades nacionais, faz-se imprescindível, àqueles que se interessam pela língua inglesa, desmistificar os existentes retratos reducionistas das comunidades celtas formadoras do arcabouço cultural-linguístico do atual Reino Unido. A presente oficina se vale de Jessi (1999) e define mito genuíno como a realidade pela qual o conhecimento humano chega em contado com a verdade. Tal definição nos permite traçar uma semelhança entra a função desempenhada pela língua e pelo mito na existência humana e é, com base nessa afinidade, que a presente oficina pretende introduzir aos ouvintes o vasto acervo místico-religioso e linguístico de origem celta na Bretanha. Nos momentos iniciais, planejamos dar um resumido panorama histórico da formação e organização dos povos célticos insulares, para, então, apresentar suas figuras cultuadas, animais sagrados, etc. Acreditamos que o conhecimento que se pretende construir nesta oficina é pertinente até mesmo para aqueles envolvidos no processo de ensino-aprendizagem do Inglês como LE, visto que a língua está vitalmente atrelada aos contextos socioculturais em que se inserem os mitos e as crenças formadoras de um país. Finda a seção expositiva da oficina, planejamos também simular alguns rituais celtas seguindo as descrições e especulações de arqueólogos e antropólogos aplicados aos estudos célticos. Será também realizado um contato por parte dos participantes com o legado celta na sociedade atual, por meio de mostra de músicas, lendas, levantamento de alusões feitas pela mídia, e até mesmo por meio de um breve vislumbre das línguas célticas modernas, como o cornish (córnico) e o welsh (galês).


The charm that surrounds the Celtic culture is visible for its allegorical elements , its kaleidoscopic mythological configuration  and its dialectal traits peculiarly melodic and enigmatic . Once one believes that the language naturally supports in its constitution elements intrinsic to the assertions of national identity, it is essential to those interested in the English Language to demystify the existing reductionist portraits of Celtic communities, forming  cultural-linguistic framework of the current UK. This workshop draws from the theory of Jessi (1999) and defines myth as genuine as the reality by which human knowledge has contact with the truth . This definition allows us to trace a resemblance between the role played by language and by  myth in the human existence and is based in such affinity that this workshop aims to introduce to its listeners to the vast collection of mystical-religious and linguistic Celtic origin of Britain . In the early stages, we plan to take a brief historical overview of the formation and organization of the Celtic peoples  in the British island, to then present their figures of worship, sacred animals , etc.  We believe that the knowledge that we intend to build in this workshop is relevant even for those involved in the teaching and learning of English as Foreign Language, since the language is naturally linked to the sociocultural contexts in which myths and beliefs operate, forming a country. Once ended the expository section of the workshop, we also plan to recreate some Celtic rituals following descriptions and speculations of archaeologists and anthropologists dedicated to Celtic Studies. We will also demonstrate the Celtic continuity  in today's society  through songs , legends, lifting allusions made by the media, and even through a brief glimpse of the Celtic​​ modern  languages such as the Cornish and the Welsh.

While this book ostensibly analyzes the seven symphonies of the Anglo-Irish composer Charles Villiers Stanford (1852-1924), written between 1876 and 1911 as Ireland lurched towards Home Rule and civil war, it is much more a work of historiography, trenchantly questioning the way in which Irish history continues to be viewed as a subset of British history. As he did in his magnificent novel Fontenoy, Mac Cóil is writing an alternative history of the Gael, taking that right away from the victor-colonialist. He is putting the Gael alongside Anglophone culture and removing him as a subset of that culture (this has yet to happen in America, where Irish studies is almost always a subset of British studies). Because he knows that history is fiction, and that it is used as a political tool, he very consciously (and very rightly) proposes that the Gael rewrite history. As he says, most profoundly, his feet firmly planted on the floor of Club Ráth Chairn, his local community center, gineann muid ár sinsear [agus] ní bhíonn duine gan aird i measc a phobail féin (we beget our ancestors, and nobody is overlooked in his own community) (324). It is a thought-provoking first step towards a reevaluation of Ireland on its own terms, not those of anglophone colonialists or outsiders.

La notion de norme et de reference a la norme est absolument fondamentale pour qui s'interesse aux langues humaines. Langues, dialectes, parlers et accents suivent tous des regles rigoureuses, que l'observation permet de determiner. Il n'y a pas de langue sans grammaire : la langue est une norme. Cependant, les langues du monde ne jouissent pas toutes de statuts egaux. Dans certains Etats, le ou les idiomes parles par la majorite de la population sont normes (pourvus d'une norme de reference) et normalises, c'est a dire soutenus par un appareil administratif et educatif consequent. A l'inverse, de nombreuses communautes linguistiques, minoritaires ou trop pauvres, sont obligees d'utiliser d'autres langues que leur langue maternelle pour avoir acces a l'enseignement ou aux services publics. La normalisation des langues vernaculaires de ces groupes laisses pour compte est souhaitable pour deux raisons : 1. la preservation de la diversite culturelle ...