Awareness

What’s it like to attend a Scottish Gaelic milling frolic in Halifax, Nova Scotia? I’ll “waulk” you through it (pun intended) with videos and photos!

What does the remembrance poppy symbol have in common with the situation of Gaelic?

What’s the Scottish Gaelic translation for Wendy? Translating names can actually be complicated. Gaelic name translation raises larger issues about what can be translated, what could be translated but probably shouldn’t be, how we do translation, and why people want certain things translated. This post gives the history of the name Wendy that all the baby name books get wrong, and offers 6 different suggestions for translating Wendy into Gaelic.

Earlier this year, I helped to create and deliver a training session on Scottish Gaelic language & culture awareness for the Harbourside Area of the Nova Scotia Council of Girl Guides of Canada. This post gives a bit of the back story on that session, and makes our training materials available to readers as a free download. The materials include activities for children and fact sheets for adult leaders.

What is Gaelic? My regular blog readers already know, but it doesn’t hurt to keep putting the basic facts out there. Increasing positive awareness of Gaelic is an important part of language revitalization. This post provides four different basic answers to the question, “What is Gaelic?”

How I customized my Apple laptop computer with a decal showcasing themes from Scottish Gaelic language and culture. I wanted my laptop not only to look beautiful, but also to make Gaelic more visible in public. Art and design provide a small but enjoyable way to raise awareness about the continued existence and use of Gaelic in the 21st century.

May is Gaelic Awareness Month in Nova Scotia. In May 2013, Sgoil Ghàidhlig an Àrd-Bhaile, the Halifax Gaelic Society, worked together with the Halifax Public Libraries to plan a series of free public workshops on various aspects of Gaelic language and culture. Members of the Gaelic community in Halifax were asked to propose workshop presentations on topics with which they were familiar, and the various library branches selected ones to host and promote. I co-presented a workshop on Celtic Spirituality.

The month of May in Nova Scotia is Gaelic Awareness Month, or Mìos na Gàidhlig. For me, every day is Gaelic day, but if you speak Gaelic and live in Halifax, May is a busy month! In May 2013, the Lieutenant Governor of Nova Scotia, the viceregal representative in Nova Scotia of the Canadian monarch, Queen Elizabeth II, held a reception in honour of Mìos na Gàidhlig at his official residence, Government House in Halifax. Take a look inside Government House with me in this post, including some surprising Gaelic touches.