Maybe your husband is right in a perverse sort of way, Lyndy-loo.

Minority languages only seem to do well when they become a rallying point. The use of Gaelic in Ireland is in serious decline in spite of all attempts to revive it. It is an official language and everyone learns it at school.

What's needed to get it going again is a bit of persecution. The only place where the language is doing well is west Belfast.

Basque and Catalan are also doing well. Franco banned them and encouraged migration of non-speakers from other regions. The Russians did the same thing in the Baltic states. Nowadays these places have become quite intolerant of Spanish and Russian speakers respectively.

Luxembourg offers a different example. The growing popularity of Luxembourgish among the locals parallels the increase in the number of foreigners living there (now up to around 40%), yet there is no anti-foreigner sentiment.