A 99% of the monolingual men and women answered that the only speak
English. This shows that English predominates more than Welsh, although all
people interviewed live in Wales. As a result, English is the most spoken
language in Wales, therefore, Welsh is not the first language in Wales.
As far as the
difference between monolingual men and women is concerned, it must be pointed
out that only two women between 0-25 use Welsh as their first language. The
rest of the people speak English. It is also important to emphasize that this
figure is due to the easy access that they have had to Welsh at school. Young
people have had a bigger chance to learn Welsh than adult people thanks to
schools, as sum years ago the prohibition of Welsh was still present. This also
influences in the result. And it is quite obvious that they are not completely
monolingual because the interview given was written in English. Thus they are
monolingual when they use a language, but they are bilingual indeed. Since both
women were perfectly able to understand the interview and communicate with us
in English.
In both graphics it is shown that the biggest group of age that speaks most English is the one between 0-25 years, this is owing to the Welsh society’s approach to the English culture and language.
After doing the survey, it can be seen that in
South-Wales there aren’t many bilinguals. In the interval from 0 to 25 there
are 42 people who are bilingual, that is 26% of the total surveyees of this
age-range. In the following age-range (26-45), which represents the 31%, there
are 21 people. In the next age-range from 45 to 66 there are 16 people, which
is the 38%. And finally, only 5 people from the age-range who are 66 and over
can speak both languages, this is the 23%.
If we pay attention to the numbers of
bilinguals we can see that the oldest age-range is the smallest because, until
the 30s-40s, Welsh was forbidden. When we look into the other results, we can
see that the group 46-66 has increased compared to the oldest group but from
here to the youngest group there is a decrease. That is because since 1980
Welsh is a compulsory subject at school. So, people study the language but in
the society they don’t use it.
Men from 0 to 25 years are bilingual in these situations: seven of them are bilingual only at home, five at work, three in other situations and seven at all situations.
Men from 26 to 45 years are bilingual in these situations: four can speak both languages at home, four at work or school, eight in other situations and only four men are bilingual in all situations. One man from the age range 46-65 is bilingual at home and two in other; there is anyone who uses Welsh at work and three of them are bilingual in all situations. Men from 66 and over use both languages in these situations: one is bilingual at home and one in other situations, but any is bilingual at work and in all situations. In general there are more bilingual men in the age range 0-25 because they learn it at school. There aren’t as bilingual as the youngest age range because they didn’t learnt it.
When we look
into the graphic we can see that women from 0 to 25 are bilingual in these
situations:
Eleven of them
are bilingual at home, twelve at school or work, nine in other situations and
six in every situation. Women from 26 to
45 use English and Welsh in the following situations: Four women are
bilingual at home, three at school or work, three in other situations and two
of them in all situations. In the range age
from 46 to 65 there are four women that are bilingual at home, four more in the
school or work, three in other situations and four of them in the whole
situations. At last, in the
range age from 66 and over there is one woman bilingual at home, one at other
situations and three at all situations. As we can see,
there isn’t any woman who uses Welsh at school. That is because in those period
Welsh was forbidden.
On the other
hand we can say that the youngest group is the largest and especially at
school. The reason of that is because nowadays Welsh is a compulsory subject at
school.
GENERAL RESULTS OF THE SURVEYS
After doing the surveys we have seen that there are more people who speak only English than the people who speak English and Welsh. In the results of our surveys we have seen that out of 118 men there are 82 that speak English and only 36 that speak both languages (English and Welsh). On the other hand, with regards to the woman, we can see that at of 130 women, 82 speak English and only 48 speak both languages.
If we compare the women and the men that only speak English and the women and the men that speak both languages we can see that there are more men who speak both languages (52.9%)than women (47.1%).If we look at the women and the men who only speak English we can see that are most the women who only speak English(51.8%) than the men (48.2%).
In this chart we can see that 84 people who are a 28% of the total are bilingual and 214 people who are the remaining 72% are monolingual (in English). In other words, this means that a little bit more of a quarter of the population speak and use Welsh.
*Notice that all monolingual speakers are English-speaking and not
Welsh-speaking. Only 3 people claimed to be Welsh-monolingual-speakers. That
is, however, doubtful since all of them where able to understand us and answer
to our survey which was written in English! In any case, the population claims
to be only Welsh-speaking would represent only 1% of all the surveyess.
In this chart we can see the percentage of people sorted (who are monolingual or bilingual) by age. Between 0-25 years old a 74% are monolingual and the remaining 26% bilingual. Between 26-45 years old a 69% are monolingual and the remaining 31% are bilingual. Between 46-65 years old a 62% are monolingual and the remaining 38% are bilingual. Finally, a 77% of the people who are more than 66 years old are monolingual and the remaining, 23% are bilingual.
In all cases we can see that are more the people who are monolingual than the people who are bilingual. In the case of the people who are between 46 and 65 years old we can see that the percentage of the people who is bilingual is quite more elevated than the other ages.
CONTRASTIVE ANALYSIS:
As far as monolinguals are concerned, there are huge differences when we compare the use of English- Welsh and Spanish-Catalan in these countries because Welsh speakers are nearly very few, whereas Catalan speakers are more abundant.
The use of Catalan among elderly people is higher than Welsh because, some years before, when there was the prohibition of both languages, Catalan people did not stop speaking Catalan language, whereas in Wales, the language started to disappear progressively.
It can be clearly seen that Welsh and Catalan are the least used languages in Wales and Catalonia respectively. This is due to the prohibition of both languages and the obligation to learn Spanish and English some years ago. However, the two languages are used more and more in public life in order to try not to lose them. But these two campaigns aren’t obtaining the same results. While in Wales, Welsh language seems to be improving and more children and young people can speak English and Welsh; in Catalonia, the figures reflect the descent of Catalan use among young people. Though nowadays, Catalan is more used than Welsh, in some years’ time, Welsh use will have probably gone up and Catalan use will have decreased.
Therefore, observing the graphics, Catalan may come to the same situation as Welsh. They can easily disappear unless both governments keep on promoting the use of these two languages.
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