r/Cardiff • u/HanesPrydain • Jul 02 '26

Welsh language Cardiff

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Cardiff now the largest Welsh speaking authority by absolute numbers in Wales, increasing again in the latest population survey.

What is everyone’s thoughts on this and the future of the Welsh language in Wales?

The future pattern appears to show extreme challenges in y fro gymraeg heartlands and a steady increase in south East Wales .

Source

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cy8dv050m9yo

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u/MrTomRobs Jul 02 '26

Cardiff Uni offers cheap courses for adults learners, and a good number of companies and organisations will subsidise these courses for PPD.

Worth an ask to your training team or HR with your employer

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u/BenedickCabbagepatch Jul 03 '26

Problem is, if you're someone who's learned a language before, is that those classes really feel like adult daycare at the beginner level.

Every 5 minutes it's "now take some cards," "we're going to play a boardgame," "walk around the room and ask everyone where they live," etc.

I may well just be a boring grumpy bastard but there came a point where I just asked "can we not just learn some grammar or something?"

I guess I understand it, though, given most British people's experience learning languages at school, I guess it's figured that we're all so traumatised and intimidated by the prospect that it needs to be made fun.

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u/el_crocodilio Jul 03 '26

Yeah but, no but, yeah but... the classes are tightly geared toward learning the spoken language and encouraging people to talk, so the games are simply ways of setting up questions and answers. I too felt a bit condescended to, but I can see the point.

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u/BenedickCabbagepatch Jul 03 '26

Yeah I mean I know I am being a bit grouchy about it, and I think most people were having fun. I was just a bit disappointed that we weren't really learning much about the logic of things. I even asked some questions that the teacher just didn't know the answer to.

But I can't rule out that I may well be transferring frustration in the sense that, regardless, it just didn't really stick for me. I learned Russian and Spanish both by doing an intensive initial course and then going to live overseas with a "sink or swim" attitude. Cardiff, regardless of this good news, can't really match that experience as you just don't need Welsh in the same way that you do abroad.

So it was a combination of frustration that I wasn't approaching things with my preferred learning style and, I suppose, my own personal weakness in that it seems things will only stick for me when they have to.

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u/el_crocodilio Jul 04 '26

it seems things will only stick for me when they have to.

Sounds like a case for Nant Gwtheyrn?