nua-shaoghal na Gàidhlig

(this is purely from my experience as a lay-person, there are much more qualified people out there who will be able to say more about this than me I suggest you listen to them)

Celtic soup - Does this person refer to all Celtic cultures and history as a monolith? Do they provide Gaelic prayers for Welsh deities for example? Do they say things like "Ancient Celts believed xyz" only for you to find out that they meant Medieval Christian Ireland?

If prayers/hymns etc are being provided, is it just the English translation or do they show the original text too? Is there any use of relevant Celtic languages at all?

If only the English translation of a text is given, have the translators provided interpretation notes and sources? Do they reference other interpretations of lines with ambiguous meaning?

Is use of Celtic languages accurate? If they're talking about Celtic terminology and it's spelled incorrectly or there are grammar errors, I personally would doubt the thoroughness of their research

Are they overly concerned with "Celtic blood" and DNA? This one is less about information sources and more for vetting people arriving in Celtic spaces, but still worth mentioning. Celtic identity is primarily defined by the languages and the cultures which go with them. Obsession with blood percentages is a good sign you're dealing with a white supremacist

- is the source comfortable with ambiguity? There are many aspects of Celtic cultures (especially when you go farther back) that we are not certain about; a good scholarly source will typically address ambiguities in the materials and others' interpretations of them

Petition to Add Gaelic and Scots language support to Steam

Operation Pinkeye creator Cobra! has launched a petition asking Valve to include Gaelic and Scots as listable languages on Steam.

Steam currently doesn’t recognize Gaelic or Scots as language options that games can be written in. A gamedev in Scotland is working on a game which features both. They’ve started a petition asking for Valve to recognize and provide support for both languages. Both languages are recognized minority languages in Scotland (official status). Please consider signing and sharing!

It’s currently impossible indicate that a game is written in Gaelic or Scots on Steam. That’s what indie developer and language enthusiast Cobra! of Stormplay Games discovered when they tried to submit Operation: Pinkeye, their multilingual “flingback” FPS to the platform.

As we learned when we spoke to them earlier this year, Cobra!’s driving force as a developer is to promote Scots and Gaelic games – something that’s pretty difficult to do when the biggest storefront in the business doesn’t support either language.

After contacting Valve, Cobra! was told that the company has “no plans” to add Gaelic or Scots as recognised languages at this time. Well, let’s give them some plans!

Help Cobra! out by signing their petition to add Scots and Gaelic as supported languages on Steam. And who knows, maybe it could help open the door for greater minority language support in games across the board?

“…supporting both languages is a central point to my game, and the Steam listing lacking both on it’s listing is going to undermine this cause.

We’re simply asking for Valve to add the option to add Scots and Gaelic as languages a seller can select as supported by their game, so speakers of said languages know what game supports their language(s) on the platform.”

–  COBRA! OF STORMPLAY GAMES

for names, though I think it’s a bit different? there are some names where it sounds mostly fine to me (Dòmhnallan, Annag — although the former kind of sounds to me like a different name altogether; the latter, too, a little bit, tbh), but others where it sounds totally wrong (Murchadhan???). I don’t think I could put a rule to it. there are also a few names with common diminutives (Donaidh for Donnchadh, e.g.).

My language is not immediately associated with me. The fact that I am a fluent Gaelic speaker has often left confusion lingering in the air. They were not the first people to look perplexed as to how I can speak Gaelic ‘so well’. We spoke for some time together and our encounter was lovely as they wished me luck in my London adventure.

It also reminded me of the apparent duplicity my identity presents to others. It reminded me of the times where I have been excluded from conversation with other Gaelic speakers; that somehow my Gaelic connection was not the same as theirs, that perhaps I wasn’t authentic enough. It reminded me that though we were part of the same culture, it appeared that I wasn’t.

I was born and brought up in Glasgow and I have no direct ties to A’ Ghàidhealtachd . My ancestry lies in Ireland and Nigeria. I attended a Gaelic speaking school from the ages of four to seventeen which provided an excellent education and understanding of Gaelic culture. It is a rich culture which not only possesses a beautiful language, but a wonderful history of folklore and traditional music. However it is also a culture which deeply advocates patriotism that is often tinged with anti-English sentiments, which has the dangerous potential to breed prejudice and separatist attitudes. Through this learned patriotism I internalised notions of what it means to be a Gael, to speak the language, and what it means to be Scottish. I never saw any reflections myself within these set values. Perhaps it is wrong to call it ‘my language,’ as its culture doesn’t immediately represent or include me.

Is there something going on in the Gaeltacht that I don’t know about? Are the local Gaels stockpiling weapons and ammo in bunkers? Is GME running summer insurrectionist training camps? Are there plans to plant bombs south of the border?

Because so far as I know, all anybody wants from Scottish nationalism is the right not to be under a government that is constantly elected by the English via their overwhelming numerical superiority, and which consistently fails to reflect the values Scottish people vote for, like staying in the E.U. and maintaining Scotland’s commitment to taking in refugees and immigrants. 

Exactly which of those values can’t she see herself reflected in?

And she speaks English as well, the language of those who colonized half the known world (we helped them, yes, haven’t forgotten). English, French and Spanish together have imposed themselves on how much of the world? And are spoken by how many white people in Europe and the Americas? With Britain (ie England) in We-don’t-want-no-more-refugees-and-immigrants (see also Brexit) mode and America currently melting down and riding the slippery slope to failed democracy and either a white-supremacist lite rebellion or 4 more years of pandering to it’s base, does she truly feel comfortable with the current English-speaking values? Cause I don’t. Yet here I am, speaking English. Is it my ethnic language? No…well, sort of but people would think I was taking the piss if I started speaking Scots.It’s “my language” because I grew up speaking it and I’m fluent. End of story.

I would truly love to know what, exactly, Gaels have been saying to her to make her so uncomfortable with their value system. Not a vague reference to a “dangerous nationalism that breeds prejudice”. Because when I bitch about why I don’t go to shul anymore I’ve got the specifics.

 5+ years worth of ruined kiddush lunches arguing with Islamophobes telling me “All Muslims are violent” and “the Koran says such and such” which it never does because OP has never read anything but the Fox News translation, while I own 4 bloody translations of the Qur’an including the one most praised by the Salafis (Wahhabis) and can struggle through the Arabic at a snail’s pace if it has transliterated text beside it.

because the Jewish love of learning and respect for tradition has deteriorated into an aggressive appreciation for loud, boorish ignorance and racialism

Because they invite in racist Right-wing nutbars like Pamela Geller to talk in one synagogue and racist Left-wing nutbars like Al Sharpton into another. Is there a fucking shortage of intelligent people to invite to events? Do we not have any black Jews of our own to speak to us on racism? Apparently organized Jewry thinks so.(There are black Jews but their anti-racism might make us uncomfortable and we’d rather do like all the other liberals and point fingers at the white goyim’s dirty laundry than pull up our sleeves and wash our own)

Because they’ve got so cozy with Evangelicals and can’t see how its destroying Judaism not just politically but religiously, cause I’ve had Jews sending me shit from John Hagee about blood moons like we dunked him and gave him a s’micha (rabbinic ordination).

Because my shul puts up posters showing the rabbi four rabbis ago walking arm in arm with MLK but people are too good damn busy admiring the wilted lettuce they didn’t finish to say a word while I’m getting mobbed and bullied by four middle-aged men at kiddish and we’re just all pretending that Jews in Israel didn’t take their lawnchairs and coolers out to watch and cheer while Palestinians were getting bombed 

the Israeli parliament turning into the Zionist Brownshirts Ball but don’t let’s talk about it lest it be a shanda fur die Goyim.

because the current rabbi is all about the pride flag and BLM but doesn’t have shit to say about Israel’s plan to annex the West Bank while the other nations are sick with covid

When there’s Gaels sitting on the Cheviot Hills cheering at all the English Covid deaths over their Irn-Brus, I will take seriously this woman’s intimations of a dangerous Scottish supremacy breeding in the Gaeltachd. This woman does not know from dangerous nationalism. 

I take crap, as a convert. I don’t “look Jewish”. I don’t have a Jewish name.

When I would get to shul late helpful strangers would always tell me what page we were on, and show me where we were on it….on the English half of the page. And do you know what I’d say. I’d say, “Tov me’od” (thank you very much) and “Shabbat shalom” and then watch their eyes go like saucers when I’d find the corresponding spot on the Hebrew side and follow along. In fairness, like 90% of non-Orthodox Jews, they probably couldn’t read the Hebrew side themselves but I get the same thing at the Orthodox shul where they can read it. People ask your family name all the time to try to figure out if you’re “the real deal” (a born Jew). And people message you on J-date and then ghost when they figure out you’re a convert..You’re surrounded by Ashkenazim who think theirs is the only “right” way to be Jewish when you can never ever be an Ashkenazi. Not even if the dunked you in a mikvah of Manischewitz.And you’re not a Sephardi, or a Mizrachi or any other kind of Jew. You just float around in Jewish ethnic limbo. 

But none of those things were the reason I don’t go to shul anymore. I left because I have a serious ETHICAL problem with the politics of organized Judaism, not a vague suspicion of zionism (as opposed to Zionism which I do have very specific issues with). I could’ve walked away completely, instead I went out looking and found myself some Jews who feel the same way I do to hang with. 

I’m sure there are any number of “city Gaels” who haven’t had anyone to converse with since leaving GME, or proficient adult learners, who would be absolutely delighted to have someone fluent to talk to. They probably wouldn’t all be white, either. There’s a very nice half-black man who had a Gaelic-speaking mother complaining about Gaelic racism online right now and his whole family is fluent. If she looked him up she wouldn’t even have to be stuck in the Gaelic equivalent of converts’ corner with the learners.

Seriously, has this women made the slightest effort to find anyone, or is she just throwing the towel in and sulking about the fact that the ethically Scottish Gaeltachd Gaels are snobby? ‘Cause lots of them are snotty to the white learners without a recent connection, too. Honest to god, the fluent people who ignore proficient learners and resent being stuck amongst them socially, why does it never occur to them that they SHARE the same prejudice they’re complaining about in others….that Gaels who learnt at the knee are the only “real” Gaels and the only ones worth socializing with?

when she discusses “values”, I take her to mean the ways “traditional” Gaelic culture is associated with — for example — crofting, a deep heritage connection to somewhere in the Highlands or Islands, strong Christianity, a sense of (valid!) grievance against the English that (not valid!) all too often elides Scots’ (in general) and Gaels’ (in particular) involvement in slavery and colonial exploitation. all of this is intertwined in complex ways with common romantic images of Gaels-as-Highlanders, which are still in various ways influential in Gaelic spaces — we might think of the controversy at the Mòd a few years ago when Na Seudan Ùr were told one of their (frankly still very trad in style) arrangements sounded like “lounge bar jazz” (we may note in passing that jazz originated in Black communities in the US); the president of the Mòd said that “the competitions concentrate on celebrating the traditional values of the language, and that is something we are very proud of”. there’s that word: values.

the emphasis in conversations around Gaelic and in Gaelic spaces on these things — “tradition” and “values” — plays out in ways that don’t impact me as a white person,* but even for me as a white learner with no direct connection to the language I can see just the tip of the iceberg every time someone asks me if I’m of Scottish ancestry (or sometimes more specifically if I have family ties to Cape Breton) when they find out I’m a learner. they’re looking for an explanation, an ethnic connection, because — consciously or not — the language continues to be associated more or less exclusively with white people from the Highlands and Islands and their direct descendants, even if those descendants have moved elsewhere.

the tension Ezeji and other non-white Gaelic speakers are bringing to the fore is between the claim that is staked broadly today for Gaelic as a civic** language, a community open to anyone willing to learn, and the fact that, nonetheless, the Gaelic community is built around the presumption of whiteness (and, within whiteness, of ethnic connection to “the Gaelic world”), such that the existence of non-white Gaelic-speakers represents a deviation from the norm. Sofia Samatar (not a Gaelic speaker) has written eloquently about what she calls “skin feeling”, the ways that Black people are perceived first and foremost as Black, and only secondarily (or — as we are regularly reminded — not at all) as people. what Ezeji is describing is the constant little reminders that her Blackness is automatically marked in Gaelic spaces, that she is perceived first and foremost as someone who doesn’t fit (or belong) in Gaelic spaces. racism in Gaelic spaces doesn’t necessarily look like racial slurs (although it may); instead it may look like the constant presumption of whiteness, the surprise at encountering deviations from whiteness, the unpreparedness of GME programs to support non-white students, everything that adds up to: you shouldn’t be here.

British society at large is profoundly racist; Ezeji and others are drawing attention to the particular ways that ideas about “Gaelicness” and “the Gaelic community” are built around whiteness, just as ideas about “Britishness” and “the British community” (or even, still, “Scottishness” and “the Scottish community”) are built around whiteness. even the most well-meaning white Gaelic-speakers (and numerically the overwhelming majority of Gaelic-speakers are white) has grown up surrounded by and embedded in this racist society, and while the racial element of Scottishness has been the object of critical analysis for some time now, the racial element of Gaelicness has been significantly less interrogated (primarily in the context of the diaspora).

as far as the suggestion that she just needs to look harder to find Gaelic-speaking friends, that doesn’t address the systemic issues at play here, or the demographic differences. there are communities and social networks of anti-Zionist Jews; there are no pre-existing communities of non-white Gaelic speakers, and to insist that they need to just make their own is to absolve the white Gaelic world of the responsibility to change, to address the effects of race and racism in Gaelic spaces.

if that sounds to you like “Project Fear”, I’m not sure what to tell you.

I would also, finally, suggest that, even in jest, even with the knowledge that the Wee Ginger Dug is a persona and not a real dog, to say that a Black person writing about her experiences should have a (metaphorical) dog sicced on her is, at the very least, in very poor taste.

* they do, however, impact me as a gay person — but that’s a conversation for another time.

Be mindful of the content you’re putting on your social media accounts. Stop retweeting/reposting violent images and videos of black people dying. Know that content like this, even with trigger warnings included, can be very emotionally disturbing/distressing and yes, even traumatic, for black people navigating the internet right now.

Report any images and videos you see where protestors’ faces are visible/unblurred, particularly in content surrounding the lootings. Don’t retweet or repost these images and videos. This can be a death sentence. 

DONATE, PARTICULARLY TO MINNESOTA-BASED BLACK YOUTH MOVEMENTS / MUTUAL AID FUNDS WHO ARE DOING WORK ON THE GROUND. FOLLOW/BOOST IF YOU CAN’T.

• The Minnesota Freedom Fund, a mutual aid group fighting back against the unjust MN bail system, is taking donations. (Twitter)

• The Black Visions Collective, a Minnesota-based freedom fighter organization creating campaigns for justice, is taking donations. (Twitter)

• Reclaim the Block, a coalition to demand that Minneapolis divest from policing, is taking donations. (Twitter)

• Crowdfunding for black trans people in need thread. 

ATLANTA

LOUISVILLE

HOUSTON

BROOKLYN

Direct Venmo to @pgh-freedomfund to help post bail for protesters arrested tonight as quickly as possible.

Indianapolis Bail Fund