Currently reading: Cornish road signs to be bilingual

New signs to be printed in English and Cornish

Cornish road signs could soon be printed in both English and Cornish as part of a bid to promote the region's traditional language.

Cornwall Council will adopt a new Cornish Language policy, which will demand that street signs are written in both languages.

The changes will only apply to new or replacement signs.

Around 300 people are believed to be fluent in Cornish, while a few thousand can recognise a few words.

However, councillor Dick Cole said the decision could boost the Cornish economy.

"Cornwall's uniqueness is its Celtic heritage and we have to promote that to attract more overseas visitors," he said.

The decision has not been given a universal welcome, though.

Councillor Morwenna Williams said: 'This will not be welcomed in my part of the county. Some people in Cornwall will find this ridiculous and unnecessary.'

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ThwartedEfforts 18 November 2009

Re: Cornish road signs to be bilingual

Wheatcroft wrote:
quite disgusting how my Cornishness is being disrespected by a handful of people here. Some of you must live dull lives

Oh the irony.

All this talk of "disrespect" means it's taken just two messages for you to play the victim card - the one you'd left poking out from between the lines of your original post. A clear case of minorityitis: take three days bed rest and then get out more.

Anyone fancy translating all the pub signs in Somerset into West Saxon? Thought not.

tannedbaldhead 18 November 2009

Re: Cornish road signs to be bilingual

beachland2 wrote:
I'm Cornish and don't want the silly language to be kept alive for the purposes of tourism of money.

If you were presenting an argument stating this move would not be of any benefit to Cornwell then fair enough. If, as your statement suggests, you are against it even if Cornwall benifits from increased tourist income then you are a fool. If by having a separate identity Cornish Tourism achieves higher incomes then why make such a fuss? Only an idiot would argue against a positive outcome from a cost/benifit analysis.

zthomasz 18 November 2009

Re: Cornish road signs to be bilingual

Wheatcroft wrote:
Its quite obvious most of you cannot read or understand basic english!! It won't cost tax payers in cornwall or the UK a penny more.

Yes it will because we will have to pay for the translators.

Wheatcroft wrote:
Secondly I'm finding it quite disgusting how my Cornishness is being disrespected by a handful of people here. Some of you must live dull lives if you cannot grasp we all have a rich cultural heritage wherever we live in Britain.

We don 't have cornishness. I don't speak cornish and neither does anybody else, except for 300 fruitcakes. Cornwall is already heavily subsidised by the rest of the UK, much more so than the north of england, scotland, wales and northern ireland. So it will be people outside of cornwall that end up paying for it.

More people from cornwall speak french than cornish. I'll accept cornish roadsigns when we have french, german, spanish portuguese and arabic roadsigns.

Identity politics have been responsible for alot of evil in the world and I find it very worrying that some people are still feeding it.