Cynhadledd y Blaid - NEGES DDWY-IEITHOG!!!

BILINGUAL POSTING - SCROLL DOWN TO READ THE SECTION WRITTEN IN THE LANGUAGE OF BABYLON

Fe fum i lawr yng nghynhadledd Plaid Cymru dydd Gwener diwethaf, yn bennaf er mwyn cymeryd rhan mewn trafodaeth ar flogiau gwleidyddol yng Nghymru. Y panelwyr eraill oedd John Dixon, Chanticleer, Heledd Fychan, a seren y sioe, Iain Dale - gyda Bethan Jenkins AC yn cadeirio. Er bod 5 o'r 6 oedd ar y panel yn siaradwyr Cymraeg, ac er bod gwasanaeth cyfieithu ar y pryd yn cael ei ddarparu, cafodd y rhan fwyaf o'r drafodaeth ei chynnal drwy gyfrwng y Saesneg. Siaradodd Heledd Fychan yn bennaf (80%) drwy gyfrwng y Gymraeg, ac fe lynnais i at y Gymraeg tan y cwestiwn olaf un - a hynny oherwydd bod y cyfieithydd wedi mynd i baratoi at sesiwn arall.
Yn ystod y drafodaeth, fe gododd y cwestiwn o flogio yn ddwy-ieithog. Fi yw'r unig un sydd yn blogio yn y Gymraeg yn unig, a hynny oherwydd fy mod i'n teimlo cyfrifoldeb gwleidyddol i wneud hynny (er dwi'n cydymdeimlo gyda sefyllfa Heledd Fychan a John Dixon, sydd yn ymgeiswyr seneddol, ac felly yn gorfod cyrraedd pob un o'u hetholwyr). Fe ddisgrifiais fy hun - gyda fy nhafod yn fy moch - fel "cenedlaetholwr diwylliannol, hen fasiwn a chul", a dwi'n cydnabod yn agored mod i'n cael anhawster gyda'r cysyniad o ddwy-ieithrwydd. Ond fe ddywedodd Iain Dale ei fod wedi mynd i edrych ar flogiau ei gyd-banelwyr i gyd cyn dydd gwener, ac ei fod yn siomedig nad oedd wedi gallu deall fy negeseuon i. Felly, yn arbennig ar gyfer Iain, dyma neges ddwy-ieithog.

I enjoyed myself at the Spring Conference last Friday, and I thought that the panel on blogging was very enjoyable - certainly more fun than the sessions on Local Government and the EU that I attended. And the question about bi-lingual blogging has impelled me to write this - my first, and probably only - English language posting on the blog.
During the panel discussion, I described myself as a narrow-minded and old-fashioned cultural nationalist. Whilst this was slightly tongue-in-cheek, there is an element of truth in what I said. I am a member of Plaid Cymru for one reason above all others - to work towards the survival of this small and fragile language that I speak with my parents, my partner, and my children. This doesn't mean that I am a one-note politician; far from it - I have views on every political matter under the sun. But while I believe, for instance, in saving the whales or protecting civil liberties, I also realise that there are a lot of people out there who are already fighting for these causes. Welsh speakers are a minority group within a tiny region of a global power. My personal feeling is that if I don't put the language at the top of my political agenda, then who will?
Which brings us to bi-lingualism. Since devolution, there has developed a cosy political consensus around the language. The narrative from the Assembly since 2001 (the last census) goes like this - the number of people speaking Welsh has risen for the first time in 50 years, therefore everything is fine.
The problem with this outlook is that by focusing on the net increase in Welsh speakers, we take a simplistic, reductionist view of the situation. What has actually happened is that the proportion of Welsh speakers living in the traditional Welsh-language communities (Gwynedd, Anglesey, Sir Gaerfyrddin, Ceredigion, parts of Denbighshire, Conwy and Pembroke) has declined in the period 1991 - 2001, but that more young children have been taught the language in the traditionally English-speaking areas of the South-East.
So, while there has been an overall rise in the number of Welsh speakers, there has been a decline in the numbers where it really matters. We know from any number of studies that for a language to survive, it needs to be spoken as a community language. The numbers who have learnt Welsh in the past 10 to 20 years are primarily children, who are learning to speak Welsh as a second language. Some of these children will adopt Welsh as a commonly used language in adulthood - as a first language in some cases - and a minority of them will pass it on to their own children. But for the majority of them, Welsh will remain a second language for the remainder of their lives.
Which brings me to my trenchant position on bi-lingualism. Bi-lingualism, as a policy principle, best serves those Welsh speakers who live outside the traditional Welsh-speaking areas. But it does not serve the interests of those people who are already livung their lives primarily through the medium of Welsh. In many communities, the rhetoric of bi-lingualism serves to undermine Welsh. In the same way as it elevates Welsh in Cardiff or Caerffili, it elevates English in Caernarfon or Tregaron.
I firmly believe that bi-lingualism should be the norm for most of Wales. But I also believe that if the Welsh language is to have any hope of survival, then we need to accept that there are places and situations that should be allowed to opt-out of bi-lingualism; places where Welsh is given primacy over English. Some of these spaces, we can carve out for ourselves, which is why I try and use Welsh wherever it is possible, including this blog (and certainly when addressing the Plaid Cymru conference). But in other areas, we need a government policy that recognises the differing linguistic needs of different communites. This is an unpopular position, within Plaid Cymru as much as any other party, but I think that it is the only way that we can ensure the language's survival.