Publisher's Synopsis
This is the fifth volume in a pioneering series of authoritative studies on the social history of the Welsh language. It contains twenty-two chapters, all written by acknowledged experts in the field, dealing with the status of the Welsh language in a wide range of social domains, including agriculture and industry, education, religion, politics, law and culture. Although bureaucrats, Celtophobes and some of the upwardly mobile Welsh-speaking bourgeoisie were reluctant to promote the interests of the native tongue, these clearly exerted enormous potential for Welsh to become, both numerically and socially, a powerful influence in several contested domains.;The series 'A Social History of the Welsh Language', the fruits of the second major research project of the Centre for Advanced Welsh and Celtic Studies of the University of Wales, will interest and intrigue the general public as well as specialists in the field and help readers to familiarise themselves with the history of a language which, over the centuries, has been an integral part of the everyday life of the Welsh people and their sense of nationhood.
