Repression, Revolution and Revival: The Irish Language between 1800–2000
Before examining the current state of the Irish language and the present efforts to continue the languages revitalisation it is important to under the language’s history. Specifically, how Irish came to be a minority language and the revival efforts prior to and following independence in 1922.
Part One: The Decline of the Language and Early Revival Efforts (1800–1870)
The Irish language did not become a language on the margins of society overnight. It gradually lost its status and dominance over centuries and generations. From the Anglo-Norman invasion of 1169 AD that first introduced English to the island through to the Georgian era and the end of the 18th century, Irish was slowly replaced by English. By the advent of the 19th century, the island was under the control of a Protestant Anglo-Irish ruling class which were vehemently against anything Irish, particularly the language, and this strong abhorrence towards Irish would fuel the accelerated downfall of the language throughout the century to come.
The 19th century saw Ireland under the complete control of the British empire with the Act of Union (1801) and it was to be the most devastating period of decline for the Irish language, particularly between 1800–1870. The shift from Irish to English took place at a greater pace among the educated elites and middle- and upper-class Catholics, than was seen among the poorer classes of Anglo-Irish society. During the 19th century, few were learning Irish with many favouring English as there was a greater benefit in learning to read and write the language. This was a trend that began in the 18th century but accelerated in the 19th century, especially following the expansion of education. Free primary education was provided via the National Board of Education, which was established in 1831, and nearly half a million students were being educated by the schools by 1849.
The impact of these schools on the Irish language was wholly negative as English was the language of instruction and Irish was not on the syllabus. A common deterrent for pupils was the ‘tally stick’ (bata scóir). Each child had a tally stick upon which a notch was carved for every time they spoke Irish. At the end of the school day corporal punishment would be issued to the children who had notches on their tally stick. The impact the education system had in Irish’s decline is best summarised by then Chief Inspector for National Education, Patrick Keenan, who wrote “We are quietly but certainly destroying the national legend, the national music, and the national language of the country.” (Report of the Commissioners for National Education, 1855, as cited in Denvir, 2006). These schools were enthusiastically supported, and this enthusiasm was mirrored by the widespread desire among the Irish people to become part of the Anglophone world due to the opportunities it could grant them.
The Great Famine, or An Gorta Mór (The Great Hunger) as it is alternatively referred to, had a significant negative impact on the Irish language. The vast majority of those affected were those in the west and south of the island, which were majority Irish-speaking, poor communities. 800’000 people are estimated to have died, with an estimated one to one-and-a-half million emigrants leaving Ireland between 1845–1851. In the twenty years post-famine, another two million emigrants would flee her shores as well. The Great Famine further weakened Irish’s position among the poorer, Irish Catholic classes. Emigration became a permanent fixture of life in post-famine Ireland and as a result English was seen as an increasingly beneficial language to learn. By the end of An Gorta Mór, only 23 per cent of the population spoke Irish, and of those barely a third spoke Irish alone, and the language was no longer actively spoken by children in the vast majority of households. Perhaps the most damning evidence of Irish’s decline is in the 1891 census in which a mere 38’121 people marked themselves as monoglot speakers of the language.
Despite the hastening decline of Irish in the early and mid-19th century, there were still efforts to study the language and to keep it alive. This was primarily carried out by those in the Anglo-Irish upper classes via scholarly societies, as well as a minority of the clergy. Some of these efforts were primarily concerned with old Irish and most of this work was carried out by these antiquarian societies established between 1800–1850. Their work did raise awareness of the Irish language, as did that of people interested in the living language. Phillip Barron established a short-lived Irish-medium college in Waterford in 1835, and Archbishop McHale translated some of the Iliad and Moore’s melodies. Unfortunately, these efforts had little to no immediate impact as the common people were more interested in reading folk-tales than these more sophisticated literary works. What their work did achieve, however, was to lay the foundation for the later Gaelic revival efforts seen from 1870 onwards.
Part Two: Revival Efforts in the Home Rule Era (1870–1922)
There was a surge in advocacy and activism for a revival of Irish from 1870 to independence in 1922. This was set against a backdrop of the failed Fenian Rising (1867), increased efforts to obtain Irish Home Rule, and the Romantic literary revival. Combined, these increased the Irish people’s national confidence in taking charge of their own destiny, as well as national pride in their language.
As previously mentioned, while there were academic and antiquarian societies interested in preserving the Irish language, the Society for the Preservation of the Irish Language (SPIL) that was established in 1876 marked a change. This organisation represented more than the antiquarians and academics. Crucially, its primary concern was the living language’s preservation and revival, and it was more widely and positively received amongst the public. Their primary target was education, and alongside the Irish National Teachers’ Organization (INTO), they secured their first victory with the inclusion of Irish in the Intermediate Examination from 1878 onwards. This was followed a year later by the permission for primary schools to teach Irish as an optional subject outside school hours, which would later be permitted to be taught within school hours with the Revised Programme of Instruction for Primary Schools (1900).
The most prominent champions of the revival of the Irish language were the Gaelic League (Conradh na Gaeilge) established in 1893 by Eoin MacNeill. By 1904, the League would be an established force of contemporary Irish society. The Gaelic League was primarily focused on education as a means to reviving the language. It believed the SPIL and INTO had made compromises in achieving their aims. They were greatly concerned with getting Irish onto the syllabus in primary and post-primary education as they viewed more people speaking the language as the best way for it to survive. The Gaelic League was influential in securing the aforementioned 1900 Revised Programme of Instruction for Primary Schools. One of its other key achievements was the retention of Irish on the secondary school syllabus following the 1899 Vice-Regal Inquiry.
The Gaelic League made other notable contributions in the effort to revive and spread the Irish language. Aware that almost all of its adult members did not learn Irish at school, they established voluntary Irish classes at the local level. They also organised cultural events on a local and national level. The national Oireachtas festival, first held in 1897, was important in that it drew in participants and spectators from urban centres and rural areas alike and encouraged native speakers to partake. The Gaelic League played an important role in the publishing of Irish teaching aids and literature, and as a result inspired new writers. It was also responsible for the establishment of the Gaeltacht, areas in which Irish was the first language of its inhabitants.
The Gaelic League’s revival efforts have since been argued as more symbolic than effectual in many respects. Irish continued to be taught as a primary and post-primary school subject for any increasing number of children, although it rarely made it beyond the classroom. Education alone cannot contribute to a language’s revival. Emphasising the use of the language when engaging in cultural and sporting events can aid in reviving a language, however this was neglected with regard to Irish. As Aidan Doyle notes in his book A History of the Irish Language: From the Norman Invasion to Independence “one could use the Irish form of one’s name, or dance Irish jigs and reels, without having to speak a word of Irish in everyday life.” That the use of Irish was symbolic rather than it being necessitated is hardly surprising though. The language was in many respects “nothing more than an ornament”.
Part Three: From Independence to the Present (1922–2000)
Following independence in 1922, Irish was enshrined in the constitution as the ‘national language’, with English recognised as an official language. Efforts to revitalise the language fell into the hands of the government. The government and its successors made positive strides towards revitalising the language. The necessity of having Irish to enter the National University of Ireland, previously achieved by the Gaelic League in 1909, was maintained. Irish became a requirement to work in the civil service as well.
Although a title used prior to independence, the term Gaeltacht (pl. Gaeltachtaí) was officially adopted by the state from 1926 after the Coimisiún na Gaeltachta (Commission on the Gaeltacht) report. The Gaeltachtaí were differentiated between Fíor-Ghaeltacht (True Gaeltacht) where at least 80% of residents could speak Irish and the Breac-Ghaeltacht (Partial Gaeltacht) where 25% to 79% of residents spoke Irish. Residents of the Gaeltachtaí were seen as true native Irish speakers. Of course, it is not the case that only those who acquire Irish from growing up in the Gaeltacht are to be considered native speakers. There are plenty of people who grow up speaking Irish that has been passed down to them by non-Gaeltacht native speakers who themselves have excellent knowledge of Irish. That being said, the vast majority of native Irish speakers are those from and living in the Gaeltacht. In the present day, there are Gaeltachtaí in counties Donegal, Galway, Kerry, Cork, Mayo, Waterford and Meath.
Working with the INTO, the National Programme for Schools was produced in 1922 with the recommendation that Irish be taught to all children. They also encouraged schools to adopt Irish as the medium of instruction. One problem in achieving this was that few teachers had even a rudimentary knowledge of the language. In response, the government established teacher training programmes and summer courses and by 1926, over 50% of teachers had the necessary qualification. Irish became mandatory in primary and secondary education in the mid-1930s, and the number of Irish-medium schools increased during and beyond the decade. By the end of the 1940s, 12% of all national schools were Irish-medium schools, up from 4% in 1930. Irish in schools came under criticism in the 1940s, and lead to the INTO launching A Plan for Education (1947), which shifted the focus to developing students’ oral competencies.
Irish maintained its preferential and mandatory status throughout the 1950s and 1960s, but by the turn of the 1970s it became a contentious issue and began to lose its footing. The unfortunate truth was that it was fighting the third most widely spoken language world-wide, English, for popularity and relevance. Changes in the curriculum in the 1950s had emphasised the importance of students learning modern European languages at secondary level, such as French or German, and they became increasingly popular in the 1970s, making it harder for Irish to compete for relevance. Between 1960 and 1979, Irish-medium national schools dropped in number from 420 to 160, with a drop from 80 to 17 seen across the same timeframe in secondary schools. Following policy retreats, Irish was no longer a requirement to work in the civil service by 1974, and the year previous it was removed as a mandatory Leaving Certificate examination. Consequently, Irish’s position in the domains marked as most important to the language’s revitalisation (namely education and public administration) was being eroded.
Until this point, the Irish language was seen as a means of realising the national identity, but this shifted between the 1970s to the 1990s to viewing it as a matter of the rights of the language’s speakers. This focus was largely driven by activist groups in the Gaeltacht areas that had long since been largely ignored by successive governments. They successfully obtained an Irish-medium radio station in Raidió na Gaeltachta (1972) and in 1996 Teilifís na Gaeilge, an Irish-medium television station. Bord na Gaeilge was also created in 1978 to represent the Gaeltacht areas and seek economic investment and infrastructure improvements. The activism of the Gaeltacht areas and shift of focus on the Irish language to a matter of language speakers’ rights would lead to a ‘fresh dynamism’ at the turn of the 21st century.
As for the present legal and constitutional status of Irish, it is the first official language with English the recognised second official language as previously established (Government of Ireland, 2020). As such, the Department of Education and Skills and the Department of Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sport and Media, is committed to promoting the use and furthering the growth of Irish. The ‘Official Languages Act 2003’ (OLA) is among recent government actions to support these commitments. Further to the OLA, Irish has received official institutional recognition from the European Union since 2007 via the ‘European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages’. Official EU status means that the Irish and British governments must support the language, and that Irish people can work in EU offices using Irish.
The Irish language has had a long, turbulent history and has rebounded from the brink of an almost certain death to be a language that its nation is proud of. However, as I hope will become clear over the course of this endeavour, Irish remains some way from being a more established, regular fixture of daily life in the Republic of Ireland. Upcoming posts will first layout contemporary policies related to revitalising Irish, specifically the 20-Year Strategy for the Irish Language: 2010–2030, as well as examining the current state of the language by consulting the latest census and survey data.
If you are curious to read further into the history of the Irish language’s decline and subsequent revival as discussed in this post, the sources are listed below. If you are interested in reading my future posts about the issues facing the Irish language and the potential solutions for them, you can subscribe via my profile page.
Sources:
Andrews, J. (2012). Plantation Ireland: A Review of Settlement History. A History of Settlement in Ireland, 156–173.
Buachalla, S. Ó. (1984). Educational Policy and the Role of the Irish Language from 1831 to 1981. European Journal of Education, 19(1), 75–92.
Coakley, J. (2021). Geographical retreat and symbolic advance? Language policy in Ireland. Language Problems and Language Planning, 45(2), 239–260.
Darmody, M., & Daly, T. (2015). Attitudes Towards the Irish Language on The Island of Ireland. Forás Na Gaeilge.
Denvir, G. (2006). Literature in Irish, 1800–1890: From the Act of Union to the Gaelic League. In M. Kelleher, & P. O’Leary, The Cambridge History of Irish Literature (pp. 544–598). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Doyle, A. (2015). A History of the Irish Language: From the Norman Invasion to Independence. Oxford University Press.
Government of Ireland (2020), Bunreacht na hÉireann: Constitution of Ireland. Department of the Taoiseach. Accessed at: https://www.gov.ie/en/publication/d5bd8c-constitution-of-ireland/
Hickey, R. (2011). The Dialects of Irish: Study of a Changing Landscape. De Gruyter Mouton.
Hindley, R. (1990). The Death of the Irish Language: A Qualified Obituary. London/New York: Routledge.
Kinealy, C. (1994). This Great Calamity: The Irish Famine, 1845–52. Gill & MacMillan Ltd.
Mac Giolla Chríost, D. (2012). A question of national identity or minority rights? The changing status of the Irish language in Ireland since 1922. Nations and Nationalism, 18(3), 398–416.
Ní Bhrádaigh, E., McCarron, S., Walsh, J., & Duffy, P. (2007). Using GIS to map the evolution of the Gaeltacht. Irish Geography 40(1), 99–108.
Ó Buachalla, S. (1984). Educational Policy and the Role of the Irish Language from 1831 to 1981. European Journal of Education, 19(1), 75–92.
O’Donoghue, T., & O’Doherty, T. (2019). Irish Speakers and Schooling in the Gaeltacht, 1900 to the Present. Springer International Publisher.
Walsh, B. (2023). Schooling, the Gaelic League, and the Irish language revival in Ireland 1831–1922. Paedagogica Historica, 59(6), 1161–1177.
