lamarca; thanks for all those observations and anecdotes; it is helping me see the seissues more clearly from your perspective and I am now recognizing some of these experiences as my own, too! I am doing all this in the spirit of debate, etc. too so I was not thinking of this as a judgemental thing, just trying to figure what people mean when they say things, etc.

Greg:

I am friends with a Cornish scholar at Harvard and he has learned to speak it from native speakers in Cornwall. I realize in many case they may be mere revivers of the language as opposed to having been raised speaking it, but they are native speakers nonetheless. But to say it has not been spoken in 200 years is to ignore the contemporary linguists and scholars who are trying to revive it. I have learned songs from him (including one which is said to be very old) and I am guessing his pronunciation is correct since he has studied Cornish and I have not, but I guess I could be wrong since I do not know how the "correct" pronunciation sounds, not having studied it myself. However, I have studied Irish, Welsh and Gaelic, and one gets a feel for these Celtic languages after a while, so based on what I have read and heard, it sounds right enough to me. As for Cornish songs, there are a number of them in Peter Kennedy's big book of traditional songs...

Dan, thanks for your comments! I think everyone is thrilled to have you contribute to this thread!