Scots Gaelic could die out within a decade, study finds

Language is used routinely only by a diminishing number of elderly islanders

A casual visitor to Scotland might assume that the Gaelic language is thriving, with every police car carrying the word poileas and every ambulance ambaileans. Yet in the few places where it is spoken, the language is in a profound, potentially terminal crisis.

Without radical action, Scots Gaelic will be dead within a decade, according to a study. The language is rarely spoken in the home, little used by teenagers, and used routinely only by a diminishing number of elderly Gaels dispersed across a few island communities in the Hebrides.