Census language questions

:slight_smile: Well, the trouble is, Iā€™m not sure what they are trying to find out in the census.
It is not clear, to me at least, from the questions we have seen.

For example, Iā€™d have thought it would be very useful or at least interesting for the government / the authorities to know what proportion of people have Welsh as a first language, or who have English as a first language, but are also fluent in Welsh, or have some other language as a first language (immigrants from outside Britain, for example).

@sarapeacock I think I was trying to suggest a wording that was as neutral as possible in its expectations, and would result in as much information as possible coming back.

Whereas the existing wording seems to be fairly restrictive in its expectations and seems to give minimal information (as far as Ianguage is concerned). :slight_smile: (But as I say, itā€™s not clear (to me) what they are really trying to find out in those census questions. The other surveys are interesting, but the census is a unique opportunity to find out maximum information about the population (which is why it can seem a bit obtrusive), and for obvious reasons, itā€™'s not done too often.

In that Stats Wales link you posted, it says ā€œThe Census is the key source of information about the number of people who can speak Welsh.ā€. ~I presume that the The Annual Population Survey and similar surveys are only done on a proportion of the population, and stastistical techniques are used to estimate the results for the whole population.

(I notice these official bodies donā€™t seem to talk about ā€œfirst language Welsh speakersā€ (or native speakers) - perhaps it is not regarded as politically correct(!). However, I suppose ā€œlearnt to speak Welsh at home as a young childā€ means the same thing).

I presume that the The Annual Population Survey and similar surveys are only done on a proportion of the population, and stastistical techniques are used to estimate the results for the whole population.

That was my presumption also.

(I notice these official bodies donā€™t seem to talk about ā€œfirst language Welsh speakersā€ (or native speakers) - perhaps it is not regarded as politically correct(!). However, I suppose ā€œlearnt to speak Welsh at home as a young childā€ means the same thing).

I think if you try to find this out youā€™re going to get into similar problems as when trying to find out who speaks Welsh ā€˜fluentlyā€™ (which they do try to find out - itā€™s a bit of a minefield, though). How do you determine ā€˜first languageā€™ when a child is brought up with two languages? If a child speaks English at home until the age of 3 but then goes into a Welsh nursery and from there into Welsh education, they donā€™t have Welsh as their ā€˜first languageā€™, but will their Welsh be different from someone who learnt it before the age of 3?

I can see that wanting to determine transmission rates in the family is an important aspect, but again I think there is academic work being done on that particular aspect.

I did exactly that! I was at University in Wales when there was a census and hadnā€™t at the time learnt any Welsh and was sharing a house with about 9 other students and we had about 10 forms delivered to the house half in English and half in Welsh, but only one Welsh speaker lived there, we obviously could have requested more English forms but it was easier just to fill in the ones we had, the Welsh speaker made sure we filled it in right but it was fairly obvious which question was which by looking at the English version which had identical layout.

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Difficult. Someone might say, truthfully, "ā€œWelsh is the first language I ever spokeā€. But suppose the family moved to England - or anywhere else, and stopped speaking Welsh? Or suppose you spent very early years with Welsh Nain and the rest of your life with parents in English? I spoke German at 3-4 at the POW Camp and forgot it all when we left there because nobody spoke it with me!!