So, like I said in my Nahuatl review post, it’s been a little tricky getting back into the swing of things around here. That’s why this post is going up the day I’m finishing with Welsh—and why, sadly, I didn’t do any of my Welsh updates! However, I’ll be by with my Welsh review (and video!) tomorrow, so I’ll be back on it after that, promise!
What is Welsh?
Welsh is a Brittonic language that nowadays is spoken natively in Wales, by some in England and in a Welsh colony (Y Wladfa) in Argentina. It developed from the language of the Britons, becoming a separately identifiable language perhaps as late as the ninth century. It is the only language that is de jure official in any part of the United Kingdom and there are significant efforts in Wales to encourage more people to learn and use it in their daily lives. This includes Welsh-medium education, bilingual signage, and a Welsh-language television challenge, among other initiatives. There are estimated to be around one million Welsh speakers worldwide.
Why did I choose Welsh?
When I was choosing languages for this project, it was important to me to cover as many languages native to the United Kingdom (and its neighbours—hey, Irish!) as possible. The dominance of English—and England—has pushed all of our other native languages to the brink. Add that to the fact that most people in the UK only speak one language, the one they do learn is often something considered more ‘useful,’ like French, or German, meaning that our languages are endangered further. Besides, before this year I didn’t know all that much about these languages and it seemed only right to educate myself on them a little!
What can I expect to achieve in 18 days?
Ha, well I feel bad about answering this just about at the end of the journey! I’d hope to be able to introduce myself, at least, maybe have a basic conversation about things I like, or things I do.
What resources am I using?
Here’s what I’ve got:
- This Step-by-Step Welsh for Beginners Memrise deck.
- The Duolingo Welsh course (sadly with computer-generated audio but, eh, I’ll take what I can get!).
- uTalk Welsh.
- This Duolingo Welsh complete vocab Memrise deck.
- Learn Welsh (.cymru) have a free online course. (Doesn’t render fantastically on mobile.)
- Teach Yourself Welsh. (£3.99 on Kindle!)
- Glossika. (It’s free for Welsh!)
And, uh, I’ll be back tomorrow with how I got on!