Current Distribution in Scotland
The 2001 UK Census showed a total of 58,652 Gaelic speakers in Scotland (1.2% of population over three years old). Compared to the 1991 Census, there has been a diminution of approximately 7,300 people (11% of the total), meaning that Gaelic decline (language shift) in Scotland is continuing, albeit at a far slower rate.
Considering the data related to Civil Parishes (which permit a continuous study of Gaelic status since the 19th century), two new circumstances have taken place, which are related to this decline:
- No parish in Scotland has a proportion of Gaelic speakers greater than 75% any more (the highest value corresponds to Barvas, Lewis and Harris, with 74.7%).
- No parish in Mainland Scotland has a proportion of Gaelic speakers greater than 25% any more (the highest value corresponds to Lochalsh, Highland, with 20.1%).
The main stronghold of the language continues to be the Outer Hebrides (Na h-Eileanan Siar), where the overall proportion of speakers remains at 61.1% and all parishes return values over 50%. The Parish of Kilmuir in Northern Skye is also over this threshold of 50%.
Outside of the Outer Hebrides the only areas with significant percentages of Gaelic speakers are the islands of Tiree (with 47.8%), Skye (with 36.8%), Raasay (with 36.1%) and Lismore (with 28.8%) in the Inner Hebrides. Regardless of this, the weight of Gaelic in Scotland is now much reduced. From a total of almost 900 Civil Parishes in Scotland:
- 9 of them have a proportion of Gaelic speakers greater than 50%.
- 20 of them have a proportion of Gaelic speakers greater than 25%.
- 39 of them have a proportion of Gaelic speakers greater than 10%.
Outside the main Gaelic-speaking areas a relatively high proportion of Gaelic-speaking people are, in effect, socially isolated from other Gaelic-speakers and as a result they have few opportunities to use the language. As with most Celtic languages, complete monolingualism is virtually non-existent except among native-speaking children under school age in traditional Gàidhealtachd regions.
In 2010, the census of pupils in Scotland showed that 606 pupils in publicly-funded schools had Gaelic as the main language at home.
Read more about this topic: Scottish Gaelic
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