Planting a tree: The role of formal and non -formal educational programs in the revival of Scottish Gaelic

The borders of the Scots-Gaelic world have shrunk before the continually erosive power of the "killer language" English. The Gaelic language now faces the possibility of "language death." With a movement that has gathered force since the recent opening of the Scottish Parliament (for the first time in nearly 400 years), Scottish Gaels have begun to build an educational system to revive and maintain Scottish Gaelic. Several organizations contribute to the governance of Gaelic education, with the Bord na Gaidhlig seeming to be taking the lead as an advisory, if not a supervisory, body. As part of a worldwide trend in minority language education, the rationale for saving threatened languages from extinction stretches beyond the linguistic boundaries of Scottish Gaelic. Heritage language education is supported by five arguments: the world is currently experiencing a great "die off" of languages which would result in a great loss to humankind because each language constitutes a storehouse of both objective knowledge, and coincident with the Whorfian hypothesis of language relativity, every language expresses a unique worldview, the loss of which would amount to an inestimable loss to world culture; language provides the holders of a particular language-culture with a source of ethnic and cultural identity; language groups, no less than racial or ethnic groups, possess the right of self-continuation; and each language constitutes a heritage to its particular language-culture that should be retained for future generations. The history of language revival efforts holds significant models for any contemporary effort. The Scottish-Gaelic efforts include formal child-centered Gaelic-medium immersion primary schools and high schools and nursery schools and non-formal play groups. Educational programs to educate adults encompass some formal educational venues such as that of the Gaelic college Sabhal Mor Ostaig, and non-formal adult education forums which often take the form of immersion classes. As well, cultural activities often have a language-education counterpart, just as very often, language education venues often have cultural or artistic features. Additionally, as the Gaelic-language education movement strives to resuscitate a moribund community, using educational institutions as a primary tool, it takes on political implications for minority rights.