From a quote in an article by the Huffington Post examining the institutionalised discrimination faced by Irish-speaking citizens and communities in Ireland, which I featured last week:

“In February 2014, at an Irish language rights march and protest in Dublin, Brenda Ní Ghairbhí, a manager at Seachtain na Gaeilge (Irish Language Week), remembers a speech given by a woman who was raising all of her children with Irish. As this woman shared her experience of visiting a doctor’s office, she became very emotional, recalling how her children could not communicate with their doctor because he had no Irish and they had no English. Experiences like these illustrate just some of the frustration and marginalization that can exist when proper services are not provided for those in the minority.”

Now take this report by the Irish Medical Times:

“The Department of Health has just seven staff, or almost 2 per cent of the total number of employees, who are capable of carrying out their duties through both the Irish and English languages.

“My Department is committed to ensuring that customers who wish to conduct their business through Irish can be facilitated to the greatest extent possible,” Minister for Health Dr Leo Varadkar said in the Dáil.”

It would be even more instructive to discover just how many of the 65,000 employees in the national Health Service Executive are fluent in our national language (and that excludes another 40,000 sub-contracted staff). Anglophone supremacists casually justify their bigotry by claiming that “no one speaks Irish anyway” while simultaneously ensuring that those who actually do speak it are denied the right to do so in the key areas that matter: employment, education, welfare and health. It becomes, as intended, a self-fulfilling statement. Or to quote:

“The argument about a doctor being unable to treat a small boy because his parents did not teach him English is completely bogus. Our local vet can treat my dog who can only bark.”

Which reminds one of the long, Medieval roots of anti-Irish racism on this island nation – even as embraced and practised by self-hating Irish people:

“…it is no more a sin to kill an Irishman than a dog or any other brute”

Knockhouse ringfort and archaeological complex, Waterford (Íomhá: Thru My Eyes by Jamie)

One of the more remarkable phenomena of modern Ireland has been the slow deculturation of the Irish people, a process ongoing since the 1970s (though initiating much further back than that). Of course all nations go through a crucible of continuous change and development, and it would be problematic for things to be otherwise. However some changes are less beneficial than others. While one can over-romanticise the past it is notable that a casual hostility to a distinctly indigenous sense of Irishness now manifests itself not just in a militant contempt for our national language but also for the physical symbols of the ancestral generations who once spoke it. It’s as if the structures of earth and stone that survive into the present day are as much a threat to some new – yet decades old – sense of Anglo-American Irishness as the native speech whose names they often bear.

One can hardly imagine that the destruction wrought in the historically precious lands around Teamhair na Rí, Tara of the Kings, would have been possible before the hedonistic watershed of the so-called Celtic Tiger. No government of the right or centre-left would have permitted or sought such a thing, no matter the dubious socio-economic arguments – or suspect financial inducements. Again, that is not to claim the existence of some sort of lost Golden Age of cultural patronage under administrations of any political background, either national or local. The records from the gaining of independence in the 1920s are replete with the misdeeds of Irish politicians and public servants in relation to historic monuments and sites of significance across our island nation. However there were lines that were never crossed – and the driving of a landscape-scouring motorway through Ireland’s equivalent of the “Valley of the Kings” was one such line. Having been transgressed it seems that some are determined that we should never go back.

So take this report from The Journal:

“LOCAL HISTORIANS HAVE hit out at plans to demolish a Waterford ring fort that dates back over 5,000 years.

US firm West Pharmaceutical Services began building a manufacturing plant on the Knockhouse site earlier this week.

The tri-vallate ring fort will be cleared during the second phase of the development, which the company says will deliver about 150 new jobs once the factory is opened in 2018.

While company-funded archaeologists will record and preserve any valuable artefacts found on the site, the rocks supporting the ancient monument will be levelled to make way for the new plant.

As construction on the land gets underway, local historians have established a new Facebook page to raise awareness of its archaeological importance.

“It’s an incredible site,” local historian Chewie Cusack told TheJournal.ie. “Only about 3% of Ireland’s ring forts are tri-vallate, which makes this place quite unique. It should be protected or at least left as a green area during construction.”

Cusack said he was disappointed that Waterford City and County Council, which approved the multi-million euro development, had allowed “commercial interests” to override concerns about the site’s preservation.”

The importance of the Knockhouse ringfort to the archaeological record of the south-east cannot be emphasised enough. As well as the remains of its relatively unique arrangement of earthen embankments and their related excavation ditches, the site also contains three well-preserved examples of souterrains or underground chambers and tunnels. Furthermore early excavations both here and in the surrounding area indicate that Knockhouse lies within a complex of antiquities dating back to the Neolithic, a span of some 5000 years. Its destruction after centuries of existence to make way for a chronologically fleeting modern industrial building would be a criminal act of wanton vandalism.

However should we be surprised by such cultural crimes in a country led by intellectual barbarians, indifferent ethnocidists obsessively pursuing a facile vision of modernity? From the Irish Times:

“Comments made by Taoiseach Enda Kenny in a radio documentary in which he disputed the decline of Irish as a spoken language in the Gaeltacht and outlined his reasons for appointing the current Minister for the Gaeltacht have been criticised by language rights group Conradh na Gaeilge.

During Documentary on One: Fine Gaeilgeoir, broadcast on Saturday afternoon about the controversial appointment of Donegal TD Joe McHugh as Minister for the Gaeltacht in July 2014 and his subsequent efforts to learn Irish, Mr Kenny said the use of the language was “actually increasing”.

“The figures would show that it is actually increasing – by a small percentage – but increasing,” Mr Kenny said.

“It is clear that the Taoiseach is mistaken if he thinks that the number of Irish speakers in the Gaeltacht is growing, even minimally – the bulk of research and linguistic studies contradict such a statement,” Conradh na Gaeilge president Cóilín Ó Cearbhaill said

Alluding to amajor reportpublished in May that warned that Irish is unlikely to be the majority spoken language in Gaeltacht areas in ten years time unless drastic action is taken, Mr Ó Cearbhaill said there was “no question” about the reduction in the number of Irish speakers in the Gaeltacht.

Mr Kenny also drew criticism for a comment about Gaeltacht areas in which he said: “While there may be pressures on the language you can’t have a sort of an exclusive reservation here – it’s a free country”.

Mr Ó Cearbhaill said Gaeltacht communities are “seeking support” from the Government to address the issues facing them to “ensure the continuation of the Irish language as the language of use in the Gaeltacht today and in to the future.”

Mr Kenny, who was criticised in July 2014 for his appointment of a non-Irish speaker to the position of Minister for the Gaeltacht, said in the documentary that Joe McHugh’s appointment was partly due to geographical concerns that Donegal should be represented in Government and also for the fact that he had “been around for a while.”

Appointed to government, made a cabinet minister tasked with supporting Ireland’s native language, and the communities and citizens who speak it or wish to speak it, simply on the basis that he had been hanging around the corridors of power for a while and needed some crumb of recognition? Pathetic cronyism and patronage, with tens of thousands of men, women and children – and a language dating back millennia – made to suffer the consequences of it.

Tá An Réabhlóid Ag Teacht!

In today’s Irish Times newspaper Seaghán Mac an tSionnaigh reviews the latest in a wave of books from a new generation of writers and historians challenging the inferior position of Ireland’s indigenous language, and the conventional narratives which have shaped our understanding of the suppression – and extermination – of those who speak it:

“In The Broken Harp, Identity and Language in Modern Ireland, biologist and author Tomás Mac Síomóin presents the decline of the Irish language as one of the most insidious outcomes of the multi-faceted colonisation of the Irish people from the 16th century through to the present day.

Rather than appealing to the Romantic rhetoric of the failed Gaelic revival period, or to the naive optimism of modern-day “official Gaeldom”, Mac Síomóin presents a convincing case relying on consistent reference to the fates of other postcolonial nations, to modern postcolonial theory from intellectuals such as Albert Memmi, Frantz Fanon, and N’gugi wa Thiongo, as well as to his own background in biology which allows him to describe with some authority the residual effects of post-colonial trauma…

Irish history is not presently a compulsory secondary school subject, as Mac Síomóin notes, but when it is chosen, its narrative is entirely purged of reference to what constituted a veritable cultural genocide in Ireland. As such, Mac Síomóin’s first chapter sets about establishing the nature of the historical relationship between the Irish people and their ancestral language. He does not, however, pursue the jaded cliche of blaming England outright for Ireland’s cultural ills. Rather, he advocates an understanding of Irish history as involving three distinct agents of colonisation, a distinction reflected in the chronological arrangement of The Broken Harp’s central three chapters whose overall narrative may be summarised in the following manner: a process initiated by the Tudors was perpetuated by the Irish Catholic Church who, moving to occupy a power vaccum created by the end of the Irish War of Independence, served to consolidate the English-imposed status quo.

The particular psychological profile of the Irish as a people who for generations had suffered genocide, famine, and sexual crime as consequences of the first two waves of colonisation is said to have engendered a catastrophic vulnerability to the third and present wave of colonisation; that of Anglocentric neo-liberal globalisation, a pet peeve of Mac Síomóin’s.

[Mac Síomóin] …associates a variety of malign symptoms with the colonial condition afflicting Ireland, sensationally terming it “Super Colonised Irish Syndrome”.

In a situation he feels is reminiscent of Stockholm Syndrome, Mac Síomóin diagnoses Ireland with a general infatuation with and assimilation to the cultural norms of other Anglophone cultures to the detriment of its own…

That Ireland submits all to easily to the cultures of its anglophone counterparts is shown by Mac Síomóin to be in keeping with the Sapir-Whorf hypthosis which maintains that the loss of a language entails the loss of a world-view tailored to the centuries of experience shared by those who spoke the language. Adopting the language of the coloniser exposes the colonised subject to a world-view in which he is a mere subaltern partner. On the willingness of colonised peoples to internalise unflattering colonial conceptions of themselves, Mac Síomóin places Albert Memmi’s remarks in the context of Ireland’s consequent inability to assert itself internationally…

In response to claims made in his presence that the loss of the Irish language was a necessary consequence of societal modernisation, and that the revival of Irish on economic grounds makes no sense, I feel Mac Síomóin has omitted a very effective rhetorical question; to what extent is post-Gaelic Ireland, having embraced Anglicisation, more societally modern and more economically stable than a similar-sized country such as Denmark whose mere three million inhabitants have yet to abandon Danish? To no extent at all, I dare to wager.

Mac Síomóin suggests that a resuscitation of the Irish language cannot be achieved without first mentally decolonising the nation, echoing Frantz Fanon’s call to discover that the coloniser’s conception of the colonised was nothing but a “hoax” which nonetheless needs to be demolished after colonisation ever before the considerable psychological effects of colonisation can be reversed. Mac Síomóin thus laments the common conception of Irish speakers in popular speech as “eccentrics” or “fanatics”, whose rights, accorded to them by the EU, if not by common sense itself, are consistently denied to them by Irish governments.”

Most of the arguments and points above are ones that readers of An Sionnach Fionn will be readily familiar with, and the full article makes many more. As I have said previously, one cannot understand modern Ireland without understanding the colonial forces, by invaders or appeasers, which have created it. In terms of our culture and society we continue to live in a Medieval English colony, a psychological Pale of hearts and minds.

The Economic and Social Research Institute, the well-known independent think-tank, has released a new, one hundred page study titled, “Attitudes towards the Irish Language on the Island of Ireland, August 2015”, edited by Dr. Merike Darmody of the ESRI and Tania Daly of Amárach Research. The document outlines the current status of our indigenous language and its speakers both nationally across Ireland and regionally in the north-east of the country. So far the results seem to have taken more than a few right-wing Anglophone commentators by surprise, with some already contesting their veracity. The analysis shows that 57% of respondents in the 26 Counties have either basic or advanced fluency in Irish, with 13% speaking it weekly and 33% less regularly than that. In contrast 17% in the 6 Counties displayed basic or advanced fluency in Irish, with 2% speaking it weekly and 12% less than that. In both cases language use was dominated by younger participants though 67% of all those surveyed in the 26 Cos. and 45% in the 6 Cos. stated that they had positive feelings towards the Irish language.

One interesting set of statistics thrown up by the research found that 33% of adult respondents in the 26 Cos. and 31% in the 6 Cos. had at least one friend who speaks Irish outside the home. A further 38% of adults nationally had ‘friends who are bringing up their children through Irish at home or who use a lot of Irish with their children’, which is only slightly higher than the regional figure of 31% for the north-east. The survey also found that 37% of respondents in the 26 Cos. and 29% in the 6 Cos. believed that neither the national government in Dublin or the regional administration in Belfast were doing enough to service the needs of the language and its speakers. In contrast 31% and 24% respectively felt they were doing enough.

On the question of Ireland remaining a bilingual island nation with English as the principal speech 43% on a national level and 34% on a regional level were in favour. 26% nationally and 38%  regionally believed that the language should be disregarded. Sadly only 6% in the 26 Cos. and 5% in the 6 Cos. believed that Irish should be restored as the principal or sole language of the country. Which shows how far the language’s status has slipped over the last several decades and how little has been done to promote this solution to our linguistic travails.

You can read the full document here and the questionnaire used here.

Over the last several months a number of people from Ireland and the Irish diaspora have been barred from the American social networking platform, Facebook, because it refuses to recognise the legitimacy (or existence?) of names in the Irish language. Yes, I know, it sounds bizarre, particularly as Facebook’s European HQ is based in Dublin, but in several recent cases the company’s online administrators have insisted that some indigenous Irish names are not real names, and demanded that their holders anglicise or “translate” their names into ersatz English forms. From a report by the Irish Times:

“Facebook users who choose to use their Irish language names on the social networking site are to hold a protest next month at the company’s Dublin headquarters over its contentious user identification policy.

The so-called ‘real-name’ policy requires users to prove their identity using either one form of official Government identification such as a birth certificate, a driver’s licence or else two matching non-government forms of identification.

A spokesperson for Misneach, the Irish-language activist group behind the protest, said the policy affects many of those who choose to use their names in Irish later in life but who do not have official documentation to prove the authenticity of their names.

Irish news website tuairisc.ie reported in July that Laoiseach Ní Choisdealbha, an Irish language officer at NUI Galway, had her account suspended by the company over the use of her name in Irish.

The account was subsequently restored but only under the English language version of Ms Ní Choisdealbha’s name.

The ‘real-name’ policy has been opposed in the US and elsewhere by a coalition of LGBTQ people, Native Americans and survivors of domestic violence.

The #MyNameIs campaign has been advocating for the reform of the policy.

The protest takes place at 2pm on October 7th at the company’s Grand Canal HQ.”

This frankly ridiculous form of linguistic colonialism has also effected Scottish-speaking Facebook users in Scotland. The protest in October is being organised by Misneach, an Irish rights grouping, which you can see more of in the video below. They can be followed on Facebook, Twitter, Google+ or via their blog. Twitter user Misneach Nua Eabhrac has also done an excellent job of keeping others informed of the twists and turns in this issue. I will update ASF with news on the demonstration nearer the time. Beir bua!

The Language Commissioner, Rónán Ó Domhnaill, has offered a carefully worded response to an article published in last week’s Irish Examiner by the eco-conservative journalist Victoria White. Through her newspaper column White derided the legislative basis for language rights in Ireland while extolling the lyrical, airy-fairy, oh-so-gossamer nature of our indigenous tongue, one that has no place as the living language of several hundred thousand citizens in a modern post-industrial society (or some such nonsense). From Monday’s newspaper:

“IN last Thursday’s Irish Examiner, Victoria White advanced the sensationalist theory that the Official Languages Act (2003) is “killing off what’s left of the Irish language”.

The fact of the matter is that the recent controversy about the validity of drink-driving convictions has absolutely nothing to do with the Official Languages Act.

Firstly, people are charged for traffic offences under the Road Traffic Act, not the Official Languages Act. Secondly, the fact that the legislation which stated that breath test results be furnished in both official languages was ignored is not the fault of the Irish language, or language legislation designed to protect the rights of Irish language speakers, but rather an example of the State deciding one thing in legislation and subsequently failing to fulfil what was a fairly simple procedural duty.

While many of us might find it comforting to imagine, as Ms White does, that ‘only love’ will save the Irish language, all evidence and research points to the fact that effective language legislation is also crucial to the survival of minority languages.

Likewise, we are told matter-of-factly about the “idiocy of attempting to revive the Irish language by an act of parliament”, despite the historical and contemporary evidence from across the globe that suggests that acts of parliament, while never the sole determinant in the fate of a language, are often important in deciding whether languages survive or not.

There is also a question of language rights, two words which Ms White feels necessary to place in quotation marks. Many regard the right to speak a language as a human right, but she seems to hold the reductive view that understanding English renders the very notion of linguistic rights redundant.

The Taliban reference is an obvious, tiresome, and disrespectful slur, but we might also wonder as to who these “guardians” of language rights are. Is Ms White referring to the thousands of Irish speakers, from the Gaeltacht and elsewhere, who took to the streets of Dublin last year on ‘Lá Mór na Gaeilge’ to demand the same language rights? Or to the many parents who demand services in their native language for the child they are raising, against the odds, in Irish?

For many people, the Irish language is more than a ‘bird dialect’ or even a beautiful historical anachronism. It is a living language spoken by a significant minority who deserve to be treated with respect rather than to be patronised with spurious arguments based on factual inaccuracies.”

In other words, stop drinking the supremacist Kool-Aid.

[With thanks to the many folk on ASF, email and Twitter who alerted me to the article by An Coimisinéir Teanga]

The majority of the population of the island of Ireland can only be Irish when the minority of the population who do not regard themselves as Irish are ready to permit it. That seems to be the message of journalist Malachi O’Doherty in the unionist-leaning Belfast Telegraph newspaper, as he comments on the attempts by Newry, Mourne and Down Council to meet demands for dual language signage in their local government area. In the columnist’s opinion bilingual signs displaying a recognition of the indigenous language of this nation are “…just a bit of English and a bit of gobbledygook” that in other geographical circumstances, such as in the capital city of Dublin, would be both “quaint” and “charming“. However relocated to the UK-administrated north-east of the country such physical manifestations of Irishness simply become part of an alleged “culture war” being waged against Britain’s continued legacy-colony on the island.

Of course readers in the United States will be more familiar with the concept of a “culture war” as imagined by right-wing nationalists and media-folk in their republic, where it is claimed to be:

“…a conflict between those values considered traditionalist or conservative and those considered progressive or liberal. It originated in the 1920s when urban and rural American values came into clear conflict. This followed several decades of immigration to the States by people whom earlier European immigrants considered “alien”. “

In the context of Ireland the leaders of unionism, and their apologists, believe a war is being waged against their supremacist sense of “Britishness” in the north-east and it is one in which Irish-speaking citizens and communities are being forcefully labelled as “alien” in their own country. Those ideologues and political mavericks who rally to defend the rump British colony on the island see it as their duty to pillory, suppress and extinguish An Ghaelige wherever it appears because their paranoia renders it – and all that it apparently represents – into some sort of existential threat to their way of life. In that sense they are no different from their fellow-travellers in Fox News who provide the fuel which drives animosity towards Native American, Latino-American or Afro-American communities or the arch-manipulators of the al-Ḥayāt Media Centre who supply the psychological ammunition that arms the fanatics of the Islamic State.

A more honest summation of some unionist opinions of Irish-speakers in Ireland would run:

“When the Gaeltacht sends its people, they’re not sending their best. They’re not sending you. They’re not sending you. They’re sending people that have lots of problems, and they’re bringing those problems with us. They’re bringing guns. They’re bringing terror. They’re terrorists. And some, I assume, are good people.

We’re building a wall. And it’s going to be a great wall. And, by the way, the Free State will pay for it. It’s going to a great wall, because I know how to build. And it’s not going to cost nearly as much as what they’re saying for a crummy wall.

We’re going to do a wall; we’re going to have a big, fat beautiful door on the wall; we’re going to have people come in, but they’re going to come in speaking English!”

Unfortunately there is no lack of Seoníní willing to lend respectability to such prejudices.

In response to some comments yesterday I thought this business report from the BBC on the preference-through-necessity in Irish medium schools for technology-based education tools, including etexts and ebooks, might be of some interest:

“Technology and education have a long, complicated and sometimes exaggerated relationship.

Digital technology is associated with the classroom of the future. And if you throw iPads into the mix, you’re even more likely to hear the language of an over-optimistic tomorrow.

So you might not expect to find tablet computers being deployed to defend a language first written down 1,700 years ago when “writing on a tablet” would have meant carving on a stone.

But in an innovative blend of ancient and modern, online technology is being used to keep alive teaching in the Irish language.

And Apple, the Californian technology giant, is using this schools project in the west of Ireland as a signpost for a much more ambitious, global application of iPads in education.

The problem that it’s trying to solve is how to provide a full range of textbooks and teaching materials for a small, specialist, under-served area of education.

The number of schools in Ireland teaching through the Irish language has grown sharply in recent years, after near extinction in the early 1970s. But in total there are still fewer than 250 primary and secondary schools.

“It doesn’t make sense for publishers to put money into translating text books from English,” says Sean O’Gradaigh, lecturer in the school of education at the National University of Ireland, Galway.

It means there is demand from Irish language schools, but not enough resources to breathe life into the teaching.

Mr O’Gradaigh’s response has been to use tablet computers – in this case iPads – to produce digital textbooks that can be downloaded and shared by Irish language schools.

Irish language schools are big users of technology, says Mr O’Gradaigh. In about three-quarters of secondary schools, all the teaching staff will have their own iPad. In one in five schools, every pupil will have their own.

Mr O’Gradaigh says this reflects two sides of Irish language schools. They use iPads to get access to the digital resources. But also, because Irish language schools tend to appeal to middle-class families, the schools and their families can afford the expense.

The big picture here is that schools and academics have become the authors and publishers of their own specialist textbooks. And because it is online and digital, it can be replicated and shared immediately.”

An alternative view on the Irish language and Irish-speakers in modern Ireland from the viewpoint of a member of the British Unionist minority in the north-east of the country, albeit an unusually sympathetic and supportive one. Journalist and academic Ian Malcolm writing for the Belfast Telegraph:

“On Remembrance Sunday I wore my poppy and my fáinne side by side. And I wore them both with equal pride. One demonstrates my love of Irish and the other the importance of remembering those who died in conflicts so that I could have the right to speak my language.

I’m Protestant, unionist and British and proud of all those things. But I’m also very proud to be an Irish speaker, and have been for 20 years. Speaking Irish has not turned me into a Catholic, nationalist or republican.

I’m not someone whose recently taken an interest in Irish, because it’s becoming “trendy”, or “fashionable”. In a way, I’ve been a speaker all my life, but started to learn “for real” at a time when it was still seen as a slightly dodgy thing to do.

There is no cultural, historical, or other reason why Protestants and unionists should not speak Irish. Indeed, for centuries they did.

Even as English was displacing Irish as the language of the people all over Ireland, many Protestants held on dearly to something they cherished.

Conversely, leading Catholics and the Church were often to blame for accelerating the decline and Daniel O’Connell (the champion of Catholic emancipation) urged his followers to abandon Irish.

There is, however, an underlying and unsettling refrain which suggests that unionists and Protestants are possibly disloyal or even untrustworthy if they speak Irish.

Not true – I have never voted for a party without a “U” somewhere in its title. And why should I? Being an Irish speaker should not change one’s beliefs or core values.

But things are changing. There’s less of that negativity and Protestants no longer have to “sneak off” to a Catholic area to learn Irish. The vibrant Skainos centre in east Belfast – where I have spoken often – shows that we are moving forward.

I myself run the Hidden Ulster course at Stranmillis, where people from both communities are learning about the language.

I explain our shared Gaelic heritage, tracing the history from the Celts (who were neither Protestant nor Catholic) to the present day.

When Irish was first spoken on these islands there were no nationalists and republicans, or unionists and loyalists.

What really interests my students is what I call “living Irish” – that’s the language that’s around us all in our everyday lives.

It’s unusual for me to trouble the page in English now. I became a journalist on leaving school, but after many years of hacking decided to do a degree in Irish at Queen’s, before going on to do a PhD in sociolinguistics.

And I’d have done none of that had it not been for Irish, the language I love. No one in my working-class family had even dreamt of university until I went to QUB, after tutoring myself for two A-Levels in the space of six weeks.

Now, virtually everything I do involves Irish in some way. I still write, but most of what I write is in Irish – even cheques. The language is something that has changed my life in many ways, but it has not changed those core values.

As a Protestant – and unionist – I see no contradiction in also being an Irish speaker. After all, I’ve “worn the T-shirt” and, literally, written the book.”

On a side-note one should mention the Ultach Trust, a non-profit organisation that has done more than any other to facilitate an interest in the Irish language by northern Unionists and/or Protestants. In a recent cost-saving measure the government of Ireland shamefully withdrew state-funding from the Ultach and other some other groups, in the process effectively destroying one of the corner-stones of cross-community Irish language teaching and activism in the north-east of the country. It is simply incomprehensible that any rational government policy directed towards reconciliation on our island nation could be enhanced by denying Unionists access to Irish in a politically neutral environment. But then the Dublin establishment is as committed to that national objective as it is to the Irish language itself.

Slugger O’Toole examines the current efforts to persuade Unionist political leaders to end their blockade of Irish language rights at the regional assembly in Stormont and features a Facebook posting by Linda Ervine, someone who has been transformed by the news media into the public face of politically non-aligned Irish-speakers:

“This Tuesday 2nd December at 11 am on the steps of Parliament Buildings I will be presenting a letter to representatives of the main parties. The letter calls for fair treatment and respect for the Irish language. It outlines the disappointment and anger caused by divisive and insulting comments about the language and calls for the introduction of an Irish Language Act.

Our current political system lacks integrity and many display a moral cowardice. That is why I have taken this step. I pray that my message will not be distorted and will be received gracefully.”

Meanwhile some more evidence of the benefits of bilingualism for the human condition – and brain.

Defenders and apologists for the British colonial state in the north-east of Ireland claim that the artificial entity is now a Western-style democracy, regardless of its gerrymandered and totalitarian past. That may be so but the democratic culture found in “Northern Ireland” frequently reminds one more of North Korea than it does of the European Union or United States. From the BBC:

“A judge has thrown out a legal bid to overturn a council block on putting bilingual signs on a Belfast street.

He dismissed all grounds of challenge to the denial of street signs in English and Irish at Ballymurphy Drive.

He rejected claims it was unreasonable to have a policy requiring a two-thirds majority of households to declare in favour of a second street name.

He said it was particularly important in Northern Ireland to have convincing evidence in favour of change.

“In those circumstances it cannot be unreasonable to require clear and convincing evidence on the part of those who occupy the street that they want an additional street name plate in another language apart from English.”

Lawyers for Ballymurphy Drive resident Eileen Reid said the refusal was unlawful and in breach of an obligation to promote Irish.

Out of 92 eligible residents on the street canvassed by Belfast City Council, 52 confirmed they wanted Irish signs, with only one opposed.

But because the other 39 did not respond to the survey the two-thirds requirement was not met.

The judge said he was not concerned with the merits of whether there should be an Irish sign at Ballymurphy Drive.

He was only examining whether the council’s process was lawful, he said.

Rejecting all other arguments in the judicial review challenge, he described the contention that non-voters should not have been taken into account as “fundamentally flawed”.

He added: “Those who did not return their surveys can have been in no doubt as to the consequences of their inaction.””

So 57% of eligible voters took part in a ballot that returned a 98% Yes vote in favour of bilingual street signs. However because 43% of eligible voters failed to take part in the plebiscite the result is considered invalid. This despite the fact that those who failed to vote or who voted No only formed 44% of the total electorate while those who voted Yes formed 56%. That is not democracy or anything close to it. It is the same old British and Unionist electoral sleight-of-hand that has characterized Britain’s claimed authority in Ireland for the past century and more. Though this time with an added touch of judicial mind-reading thrown in for good measure.

Peace process? Yeah right, sing me another hallelujah chorus from that increasingly tattered hymn-sheet. As has been cynically remarked before, what’s the real difference between civil rights for Irish Nationalists and civil rights for Irish-speakers? About two tonnes of Semtex…

Meanwhile Seán Tadhg Ó Gairbhí offers this summation in the Irish Times:

“You know it has been a pretty grim year for the Irish language when it fell to Gregory Campbell to provide the light relief.

Reviews of the MP’s “curry my yoghurt, can coca coalyer” routine were mixed, with many failing to acknowledge the comic genius involved in parodying both the Irish language and the stereotype of the humourless DUP man in one yoghurt-based gag.

Down South on Lá Mór na Gaeilge, thousands of Irish speakers were “dearg le fearg” as they marched in support of the first ever Coimisinéir Teanga’s decision to resign in protest at Government failures to support the language.

An Taoiseach Enda Kenny responded by appointing a self-professed non-Irish speaker as Minister of State for the Gaeltacht.

The new minister, Joe McHugh, began his tenure by inviting the people of Ireland to go “on a journey” with him as he tried to learn the language.

As someone who is essentially learning a language at the behest of his boss, it would be churlish to begrudge Mr McHugh the simple pleasures that are enjoyed by learners of languages the world over.

…but we should also spare a thought for those who have already been on this journey and are, therefore, excluded from sharing in his excitement.

Take, for example, the people of the Gaeltacht who were once considered so important that they merited a senior Irish-speaking Minister all of their own.

Then again the leaders of the 1916 Rising were once held to be so important that they were routinely included in any narrative of the 1916 Rising.

There was also much dismay at the Department of Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht’s admission that Google Translate had been used to provide the Irish language text for Ireland.ie.

The 1916 video did, however, get one thing right.

In using as its soundtrack a toothsome pop song in Irish to add a little ‘native’ flavour to proceedings, the much maligned video captured perfectly the prevailing view of the language as pleasant background noise, an innocuous pursuit best left to the enthusiast.

A Millward Brown/Tuairisc.ie opinion poll published in October showed that a large majority of the population believe that the State should do more to support the Irish language.

Unfortunately, this particular strain of enthusiasm for Irish among the public is never regarded by policy makers as evidence of a possible mandate to radically change their approach to preserving the language.

Instead the State continues to relinquish its responsibility for ensuring that Irish survives as the language of the home and the community in those areas where it is still spoken by a majority.

…risible reforms proposed for the Civil Service fail even to guarantee public services in Irish to Irish-speaking communities.

Everywhere you look, the State is turning its back on its role in the safe-guarding of Irish for future generations, so much so that a few Irish speakers have called for a referendum on the language’s constitutional status.

Has it really come to this?

The broadcaster Dara Ó Cinnéide tells a story about a question he was asked a number of years ago in a shop located less than an hour’s drive from his home in the Corca Dhuibhne Gaeltacht.

The former Kerry footballer was conversing in Irish with a colleague when the shopkeeper interrupted them. “Tell me, are there many more of ye back there?” she asked.

There’s still a few, but they’d be forgiven if their enthusiasm is waning.”

However there is some good news from the Limerick Leader, albeit with a caveat:

“THE Irish language looks set to get parity on new road signs in Limerick following a motion by councillor Séighin Ó Ceallaigh.

The Sinn Fein city east councillor had a notice of motion passed at the last full meeting calling on the council to introduce a bye-law to have the Irish language and English language names spelt in the same font size on name plates, directional signs, and name plates. He wants to see a Gaelic-style font used in order to differentiate between Irish and English names.

It was unanimously passed by councillors…

“I am delighted that the Council has passed this motion and that we are taking a step in the right direction by promoting language equality. I was never happy with the state of signs in Limerick or throughout the State, where Irish was in a much smaller font, or not on the signs at all. From now on every permanent, non traffic sign erected throughout Limerick will have both languages in equal size,” he said.

Cllr Ó Ceallaigh feels having the Irish translation written in a Gaelic script style would be more appropriate than it being written in italics, as it is now.

“This style will really complement the Irish name, and remind us of our wonderful language, history and culture. It’s quite necessary I believe to have the Gaelic style, as it is our own native style of writing, which I use,” he said.

There will be no full-scale replacement of signage, with only new signs having the script.”

While I favour Gaelic typefaces myself and would be happy to see their full restoration I cannot help but wonder if their tokenistic use will do more harm than good? Councillor Ó Ceallaigh is absolutely correct that placing Irish language texts on public signs in smaller, italic fonts is reprehensible and indicates more than anything else that the language is somehow “foreign”, unlike the equivalent English or anglicised versions. However clear and legible modern Irish texts for road signs would seem to be more desirable in the short to medium term, with Irish language place-names given greater prominence than their would-be English replacements.

Of course the real aim should be the dropping of the bastardised anglicisations and makey-uppy English translations of original Irish names in the first place. However that is another day’s work.

A couple of Irish-related tech stories, one good and one bad (or at least highly suspect). Firstly from the Irish Times:

“Users of Google’s email client, Gmail, can now use the service in Irish following an extensive translation project undertaken by localisation teams and volunteer translators across the world.

Familiar Gmail terms such as Inbox, Starred and Sent Mail will appear as Bosca Isteach, Le Réiltín and Seolta once a small change is made to the user settings.

Comedian and presenter Hector Ó hEochagáin showed students from Pobalscoil Ghaoth Dobhair, Coláiste Íosagáin, Gaelcholáiste an Phiarsaigh and Mount Temple how to switch their Gmail settings to Gaeilge at an event at The Foundry, Google’s innovation centre in Dublin on Thursday.

The project came about after Professor Kevin Scannell of the University of St Louis, Missouri, contacted Google with the idea of translating the email client currently used by over 425 million users across the world.

Over 60,000 terms and messages were translated into Irish by a team of eight translators bringing to 72 the number of supported languages in Gmail.

Google staff based in Dublin, Zurich and at the company’s Mountain View base in California spent the last two months testing the newly localised version before going live with Gmail as Gaeilge.

Laura Brassil, who works with the localisation team in Dublin, said she hoped the tool would be used by people regardless of their knowledge of Irish.

Not only did the project make Gmail available in Irish but it also played its part in updating a database of languages used by other companies to inform their own software applications.

The Common Locale Data Repository (CLDR) is a collaborative database used to adapt software to the conventions of different languages by software giants including Apple, IBM and Microsoft as well as Google.

“Google updated the Irish data in CLDR which will improve Irish across the internet. English is very dominant but as more languages are coming online it is getting easier to use the Internet in different languages,” Ms Brassil said.

“I have great hope for it myself. I used to have very good Irish but I haven’t spoken it much since school so this has brought Irish back to me ‘tá sé ag teacht ar ais chugam,’ she added.

Several translators who worked on the project including Cormac Breathnach, Ciarán Ó Bréartún, Micheál Ó Meachair and Eoin Ó Murchú were present along with several members of the Google team.

John Lunney, Gmail engineer and member of a group of Irish speakers at Google said: “The idea is the most important thing. It is very good for people who are fluent but it especially good for those who do not have fluent Irish but who want to get back in touch with it again.”

In contrast the Irish Independent presents an unapologetically negative-spin on the Irish language with the bizarre claim that:

“One third of parents believe coding skills are more important than Irish, according to the results of a survey from UPC.

The results also showed that one in five believed it to be ‘more important’ than maths while they listed coding skills as being on a level par with mainstream subjects such as business, geography, music, history, art, Irish, science, languages, maths and English.

Today Microsoft is hosting an Hour of Code event in Government buildings which is being  hosted by Deputy Eoghan Murphy – the event, run by Code.org, will be open to everyone working in Government buildings.”

All of which is worryingly vague. A quick internet research reveals that the original survey from UPC Ireland was released way back in early October as part of a PR campaign to promote its CoderDojo partnership, via Breaking News:

“In the research, carried out among 1,000 people (adults) by Amarach Research, two-thirds of respondents said that learning computer code is equally as important as learning mainstream subjects including Business, Geography, Music, History, Art, Irish, Science, Languages, Maths and English.”

So perhaps that Irish Independent newspaper headline should have read:

“One third of parents believe coding skills are more important than Business, Geography, Music, History, Art, Irish, Science, Languages, Maths and English, according to the results of a survey from UPC.”

So to Concubhar Ó Liatháin writing on Slugger O’Toole on the ongoing struggle by Irish-speaking citizens in the north-east of Ireland to attain equal rights with their English-speaking contemporaries:

“I was up in Stormont yesterday – Cnoc an Anfa is the Irish for Stormont – and it certainly lived up to its name.  It was bitterly cold, so cold I could feel my fingers begin to detach themselves from my body as I clutched my ‘Acht Gaeilge’ placard at the bottom of the steps of that grandiose building.

There were around a hundred of us participating in an anti-racism, pro-diversity demonstration, called to demand an Irish Language Act to protect the north’s Irish speakers…”

Perhaps we need a similar rally outside Independent House?

A new website to strengthen ties between Gaelic-speaking communities in Ireland and Scotland, as well as encouraging cultural tourism by non-Gaels, has been launched in Inverness. From the Scotsman newspaper:

“TurasG will build on the links between the Scottish Gaidhealtachd and Ireland’s Gaeltacht.

World-renowned singer Julie Fowlis, fresh from the Scottish Music Awards, where she became the first Gaelic artist to be recognised alongside stars such as Annie Lennox, Paulo Nutini and Simple Minds, unveiled the new website at the HighlandLife Archive Centre in Inverness.

TurasG is an initiative of the European Union funded CeangalG project which has been working since last year to enhance business components to the cultural links already in existence between the Gaelic speakers of Scotland and their Irish Gaeilge-speaking counterparts.

The aim of TurasG is to inform the visitor to Scotland’s Gaidhealtachd or Ireland’s Gaeltacht of the opportunities available to explore the unrivalled heritage and culture of their destination.

The site is organised into different themes with features on life by the sea, life on the land, history, religion, the natural world, music and the arts and the visitor will be able to get information, view films, listen to music, poetry and commentary and see photographs of the various landmarks and sites of interest.

Inverness Provost Alex Graham welcomed the opportunity for the city to host the launch of TurasG, saying the website was a fine example of new technology promoting historic cultures.

He added: “Our Gaelic culture is important to us in Inverness and the Highlands, as is tourism which forms one of the biggest parts of our local economy.

“TurasG will bring these together in an effective and practical way, allowing visitors to explore and enjoy the culture of Scotland’s Gàidhealtacdh and Ireland’s Gaeltacht to the increased benefit of both.”

Visit Scotland Islands Manager Alan MacKenzie strongly backed the launch of TurasG.

He said: “I am delighted to support the establishment of this cultural tourism website, which should further enhance the Gaelic links between Scotland and Ireland.”

CeangalG is funded under the EU Interreg IVA programme and operates under the remit of the Special European Programmes Body.

Headed by Scottish Gaelic college, Sabhal Mòr Ostaig, it includes as main partners Údarás na Gaeltachta from the Republic of ireland and Belfast based Cultúrlann McAdam Ó Fiaich.”

The TurasG website is here, and it expands on the work of the inter-governmental Colm Cille project which promotes links between indigenous speakers in Ireland and Scotland. Meanwhile some welcome news from the third and smallest Gaelic nation, via Isle of Man Today:

“A leading linguist has hailed the ‘heroic’ efforts to save the Manx language and described the Isle of Man as a role model for the preservation of languages across the world.

Visiting the island last week while filming a documentary about the revitalisation of Manx Gaelic, Dr David Harrison heaped praise on the community effort that brought the language back from the verge of extinction.

He told the Examiner: ‘I think the people here know it, but they don’t have the distance to realise just how remarkable it is.

‘They’re very modest about what they’ve accomplished here with the language. But on a global scale it’s astonishing.’

An assistant professor at the elite Swarthmore College in Pennsylvania, Dr Harrison has spent 20 years studying languages in hundreds of different communities around the globe.

He said: ‘I had no inkling of what to expect from the contemporary Manx community and I’ve been amazed at the dynamism, the passion for the language and how it’s put out through all available channels, including social media.

‘It’s great that the Government, and the whole community here, have been so supportive of the language…’

The Manx language was infamously declared extinct by UNESCO in 2009, a decision that was reversed after protests from the Manx speaking community. Dr Harrison is convinced that the decision was in error.

He said: ‘That was a typical case of where a language is prematurely declared extinct, but what often happens is that other speakers have made themselves invisible because they didn’t want to advertise themselves.

‘In fact several speakers have told me that Manx was their first language growing up, and they didn’t learn English until they were seven or eight years old. That means there are native speakers, even if they didn’t choose to label themselves as such.’

His interviews have also uncovered stories of how the language came close to being lost between generations. He said: ‘Someone told me today that his grandmother was a fluent speaker of Manx but he never knew it because, if she had spoken Manx as a child, the other children would throw stones at her.

‘In those circumstances you can imagine that her decision to abandon Manx was not a free choice, and it deprived her of part of her identity, her history and her connection to the place she belonged.

…Language revitalisation has become a global movement now. A lot of communities have decided that they’re not going to be coerced or shamed into discarding their heritage’.”

As Sinn Féin accuses the lacklustre Fine Gael-Labour Party coalition of abandoning key government demands during the recent talks between Ireland, Britain and regional parties in the north-east of the country, the BBC takes a look at one of the touchstone issues for northern nationalists and many others on this island nation: the Irish language.

“…why is the Irish language such a divisive issue between the largest power-sharing partners and the latest touchstone in Northern Ireland’s culture war?

This year’s nursery class at Beann Mhadagáin primary school in west Belfast contains some of the 5,000 or so children in Northern Ireland now educated entirely in Irish.

But in another part of Belfast, evening classes are under way. Not far from Stormont, locals are learning Irish in east Belfast.

An upsurge in numbers of Protestants learning Irish would not be surprising to students of history.

At the turn of the last century, Irish, although in decline, was seen as a language for all.

Partition prompted nationalists in Northern Ireland to embrace the language in greater numbers, according to the historian Diarmaid Ferriter.

“They felt completely abandoned by their southern counterparts, and in that sense there was more at stake for them when it came to the language,” he says.

The survival of the Irish language in west Belfast owes a lot to a pioneering project in the 1960s when a group of families decided to make the Shaw’s Road area into a Gaeltacht, an Irish speaking area.

A second wave of Northern Ireland’s lrish language revival movement occurred on another site – the Maze Prison.

As the campaign for political prisoner status escalated in the 1980s, learning the Irish language – in what became known colloquially as the Jailtacht – became a way for prisoners to set themselves apart from the prison officers.

Feargal MacIonnrachtaigh, whose father was interned in 1973, says republican prisoners would use the language as a means of both communication and resistance.

“People were inspired by this idea that you could reclaim your identity and you could go through a process of ‘reconquest’ in terms of the language,” he says.

Robin Stewart is a former loyalist paramilitary who is learning the language in east Belfast.

“Learning Irish isn’t going to make me a republican – in fact what it does is strengthen my own identity and lets me challenge republicans and their version of what Gaelic and Irish history is,” he says.

The classes he attends are run by Linda Ervine, a sister-in-law of the late Progressive Unionist Party leader, David Ervine.

The DUP’s Gregory Campbell remains unapologetic about remarks he made last month about the use of the language in the assembly by some Sinn Féin MLAs.

“I am offended each time, every single day that they abuse the Irish language,” he says.

Sinn Fein MLA Máirtín Ó Muilleoir, who is a prominent Irish language advocate, says: “It is deeply saddening that we have somebody who wants to use the Irish language as a stick with which to beat people.”

An Irish language act, aimed at helping to support and protect the language, could create an entitlement to use Irish in interactions with government bodies and a number of other services.

However, the actual proposals are not yet available and the minister responsible, Sinn Féin’s Carál Ní Chúilín, told Spotlight that she would bring an Irish language bill before the assembly in the New Year.

The issue is also one of the outstanding matters in the current round of talks.

In Northern Ireland less than 4% of the population is fluent, although over 10% say they have some ability in Irish.”

Meanwhile the determination of some British Unionist politicians to suppress and eliminate the indigenous language and culture of Ireland continues apace. There’s never a day off in the prosecution of ethnocide. From the Ulster Herald:

“A FRESH political row has broken out locally over the Irish language after the new Fermanagh and Omagh District Council approved a bilingual approach to branding.

The agreement reached last week by the shadow council will see the new supercouncil embrace both Irish and English on letterheads, signage and on vehicles such as bin lorries.

The proposal was backed by both Sinn Féin, the SDLP and independent councillor Bernice Swift (23-12), much to the ire of unionist members, who had backed a trilingual policy embracing Ulster Scots.

During the meeting, Sinn Féin stated that the party’s preferred position was using the Irish language only on signage, with agreeing to the inclusion of English as a compromise.

However Mid Tyrone Sinn Féin councillor Barry McNally said the party had received a significant lobby from a number of groups and individuals who wish to see the promotion of the Irish Language in the area.

“We felt that, in line with the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages (ECRML), this could be achieved and was certainly something we would support.”

Cllr McNally said part three of the ECRML included the Irish language, and called for ‘detailed undertakings to support and promote languages’.

“By adopting this bilingual policy we as a council have embraced this fully,” said the councillor.”

In more positive news we have this (sometimes over-mystical) story from North America via Mint Press News:

“With their roots stretching back to a land oppressed by colonization, many Irish in North America are finding more in common with the native people of the continent as they work to breathe new life into the language of their homeland.

“Something extremely valuable was taken away from my family in a violent manner. If I don’t try to reclaim it, then it wasn’t very valuable to begin with,” said Dr. Aralt Mac Giolla Chainnigh, an astrophysicist at the Royal Military College of Canada and founder of the Permanent North American Gaeltacht, where the Irish language is spoken throughout the community and Irish traditions and culture are preserved.

Feeling that something was missing from his life, Mac Giolla Chainnigh began studying the language of his heritage about 25 years ago. He started out by buying a book and a tape, and he said it then became obvious that he needed to converse with fluent speakers.

“It ties together history and identification with ancestors,” he said. “There isn’t a more authentic identification than language. It embodies worldview and philosophy.”

Spearheaded by Mac Giolla Chainnigh, the network of Irish-speaking people purchased the 60-acre parcel of land in southeastern Ontario in September 2006, hoping to eventually establish a teaching center and residences there. Founded in 1826, the town of Tamworth was originally settled by Irish immigrants during the famine.

The Gaeltacht Cheanada (Canada’s Gaeltacht) opened on June 16, 2007. The opening ceremony was marked by speeches by Declan Kelly, then-Irish ambassador to Canada, representatives of Irish language education in North America and Ireland, and Éamon Ó Cuív, then-minister for Community, Rural and Gaeltacht Affairs in Ireland.

Other speakers included representatives of Tyendinaga’s Mohawk language program and Comhaltas Ceóltoirí Éireann, a global group that promotes traditional Irish music.

Visitors and participants come from as far as Texas, New Jersey, California and British Columbia. They speak of ancestors who couldn’t bring with them the landscape of their homeland or many of their relatives, but they could keep their language and bring their music that carried remembrance of the sea and winds.

“They abandoned language and tradition to blend in, and learned English because survival depended on acquiring English,” said MacGiolla Chainnigh. “But pride in being Irish remained.”

He said the Gaeltacht language teachers meet with language groups among native peoples, who are also working toward revitalizing their languages and trying to pass them on to their children.

First Nations in Canada experienced the same assaults of forced boarding schools, which had been established by the government and run by missionaries, as the Native Americans and the children in Ireland.

“Students say they see a culture that belongs to them and they have a chance to take hold of it,” said Traolach O’Riordain, director of Irish Studies at the University of Montana. “They say, ‘We are Irish, we have a sense of being Irish, we feel there’s a language that isn’t being passed down to us.'”

Then-President of Ireland Mary McAleese visited with a $43,000 check from the Irish government to help launch the program in 2006. More than 400 college students and about 20 high school students are currently studying Irish language, history, culture, literature, dance or drama through the university.

In December 2006 the Irish government passed a 20-year strategy to help Ireland become fully bilingual, encouraging use of language in everyday life and in government meetings.

That same year, the Fulbright Commission in Dublin began supporting Irish language learning and teaching in the U.S. It was also designated as the coordinating body for Irish language learning in the U.S. by Ireland’s Department of Arts, Heritage and Gaeltacht.

According to U.S. Census data, there are 39.6 million Americans who report tracing their ancestry to Ireland — almost seven times the entire 6.3 million population of Ireland.

Emma Loughney, administration officer of the Fulbright Commission in Dublin, Ireland, said the commission’s research identifies just over 50 third-level institutions and about 90 community-based groups that offer Irish language classes in the U.S.

“In addition to funding Fulbright Awards, the Commission funds 10 universities and several community groups,” Loughney said. “And to date, six U.S. students have received the U.S. Fulbright Award to post-graduate students fluent in Irish to complete a Master’s degree at an Irish university.”

Loughney said about 1,200 students were enrolled in Irish language classes in the U.S. during the 2013-2014 academic year through the Fulbright, up from 900 in the previous academic year. Participating U.S. institutions include University of Notre Dame, University of St. Thomas, University of Montana, Villanova, University of Connecticut, Catholic University, Elm’s College, University of Montana, Drew University, and New York University.

This year, 61 U.S. citizens from across the country were awarded grants to study Irish in Ireland’s Gaeltachtaí, including 41 undergraduates, postgraduates and professionals, and — for the first time ever — 20 secondary school students.

“The Gaeltacht Summer Awards scheme offers U.S. citizens an unparalleled immersion experience in Ireland,” said Loughney.”

Twenty-eight years ago officials from the government of Ireland tasked with managing Dublin’s interests in the north-east of the country asked their British counterparts to address the long-standing need for full equality between Irish- and English-speakers in the UK-administrated region. From the BBC:

“The efforts of the Irish Government under the Anglo-Irish Agreement to achieve greater recognition for the Irish language in Northern Ireland is detailed in previously confidential state papers newly released in Belfast.

In January 1986, the Irish government presented its views on “The Irish Language in Northern Ireland”.

The four-page typescript argued that “the Irish language is central to the identity and tradition of Irish nationalists”.

The paper called for “speedy action” in four specific areas: place names; the use of Irish in official business; an Irish language question in the 1991 Northern Ireland census and support for Irish language publications and events.

In particular, it raised the 1941 Stormont Local Government Act, which allowed for street names in English only.

The paper stated: “Quite apart from the rights involved, the fact is that most of the place names in NI… are Irish in their linguistic origin.”

On the use of Irish in official business, the document argued the treatment of Irish as a foreign language in Northern Ireland was “resented by nationalists and created opportunities for subversive organisations to appropriate the Irish language – the final symbol of nationality”.

The then Secretary of State Tom King had accepted the right of local residents to decide on bilingual street names.

However, it would be “inappropriate to grant Irish the parity of esteem which the Welsh enjoyed…””

That was in 1986. In 2014 all of the Irish parties to the recent Stormont House negotiations capitulated once again to the ideological racism of their British Unionist opponents and cast aside any hopes of legislation putting the Irish and English languages on an equal footing in the north-eastern corner of our island nation. Despite very public promises and pledges, and bellicose talk of breaking “the bastards”, Irish rights were sacrificed for dubious short-term gains by Sinn Féin, the SDLP and Fine Gael – Labour coalition government.

Which makes one wonder what on earth needs to be done if decades of diplomacy, politics, campaigning, legal challenges and outright pleading has achieved virtually nothing in terms of Irish rights in the dysfunctional legacy-colony of “Northern Ireland”? Which of course is what progressive Republicans and Nationalists were pondering way back in 1969 in terms of civil rights then.

Is it just me or have you noticed that racists and homophobes tend to share the same political and ideological fixations? I mean, you rarely find a racist who is not a homophobe, or a homophobe who is not a racist. It seems that prejudicial views attract bigots like excrement attracts flies. The flies aren’t terribly concerned about the specific origin or composition of the bodily waste they are attracted to and neither are the bigots. It is just enough that the prejudice exists and they must be a part of it. Talking of which here is Jim Allister, leader of the TUV (the ultra British and Unionist party in the north-east of the country), bewailing the public funding of organisations from within the Irish-speaking and Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender communities, as reported by the Newsletter:

“TUV leader Jim Allister has claimed that almost £3 million has been “squandered on many undeserving projects” by the Department of Social Development (DSD).

Mr Allister made the claim as he published the response to a series of Assembly Questions he had posed to the department, asking for details of spending from the Neighbourhood Renewal Fund under DUP ministers since 2011.

…in another question tabled on December 3 and answered on December 19, he asked the DSD minister to detail “how much funding has been supplied by his department to lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) groups since May 2011”.

The answers received revealed that amongst the spend: £1,064,546.17 was spent on GAA clubs, with £273,000 spent on one club alone in Strabane, Strabane Sigerson’s Club; £1,134,100.33 was spent on Irish language groups; £138,997.78 was spent on a republican ex-prisoners group, Tar Anall; £83,176.18 was spent on the Bloody Sunday Trust; £259,087.93 was spent on Carrick Hill Residents Association; and £231,681.00 was spent on LGBT projects, including £170,000 to support the Strabane & Lifford LGBT group alone, and annual subventions to Belfast Pride.

Mr Allister said: “With so many areas needing real help to tackle deprivation, I am angered to find so much money, supposedly for tackling disadvantage, is being squandered on such irrelevant projects.

“This extravagant feting of GAA clubs, Irish language groups, ex-prisoners’ groups and LGBT campaigners is all the more surprising considering it is happening under DUP ministers at DSD.

It seems the Sinn Féin wish list is not as disdained as some would like to pretend.”

One can only imagine the horror the average TUV member would experience if he or she ever met a hurley-playing, Irish-speaking gay man. It would probably require several days of self-flagellation, human sacrifices and fervent praying to a wrathful Old Testament god for the wretched TUVer to purify himself after an encounter with a minion of the Gaylick Satan. Such is the legacy of colonial racism and intolerance that several centuries of British occupation have bequeathed to our island nation.

Meanwhile, mention a Gael and who shall appear but the Irish Independent’s very own pipsqueak-demagogue, Ian O’Doherty, with his latest sermon from the mount:

“…it was interesting to see that the Department of Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht issued a report this week which, quelle surprise, called for more money to be flushed down the endless toilet that is the Irish language industry. The cause for concern is the fact that, apparently, only 2pc of Irish civil servants can speak Irish “to the required level”.

So, with dreary inevitability, we were told that we need an “even more radical and systematic overhaul to ensure the State could deliver on Irish citizens’ rights”.

The apparent crisis caused by the lack of fluent Irish speakers in the civil service is a result of the farcical 2001 Supreme Court decision which decreed that anyone who wanted to conduct official business as Gaeilge should be facilitated. That, in itself, is a classic example of Irish illogic. Sure, people might like to think that we are a bilingual country and the aspirational notion of everyone being able to switch effortlessly from English to Irish and back again is something which appeals to some, if not necessarily all, of the population. The problem is that all of the population, regardless of their opinion on the matter, will now be expected to fund more expensive language training courses for civil servants, simply to cater for cranks who could, but won’t, speak English.”

Imagine that, Irish people in Ireland wanting to speak Irish? Next thing you know Danish  people in Denmark will want to speak Danish or German people in Germany will want to speak German. And we all know that the citizens of those nations have high levels of English language fluency so those who decline to use the Queen’s speech must also be “cranks”.

“The exact figures for Government spending on Irish are as mysterious as those dreaded Irish noun declensions we had to learn in school, but most sources accept that it is somewhere in the figure of a billion euro a year. A billion euro, there or thereabouts, to keep a dying language on artificial life support is not just intellectually counter-intuitive, it’s morally bankrupt.”

Actually it averages around 100 million euros per annum, which is somewhat less than a billion euros – or even thereabouts.

“It was interesting to note that the same day this report came out, there was another Government press release trumpeting the fact that we spent €600m on foreign aid in 2014. Combine the two and that’s roughly €1.5bn of our money that this Government just splashed against the wall for absolutely no benefit.”

Irish-speaking men, women and children, and impoverished foreign men, women and children? Surely these two categories of recidivist are the twin evils threatening the prosperity of modern Ireland. However, despite his hatred of all things native the Keeper of the Anglophone Flame on the island-that-is-not-West-Britain cannot help but admit that:

“More people have developed an interest in Irish as a result of TG4 – the most innovative TV station in this country – than they ever did from their time at school.

After all, TG4 manages to present the language as a living, breathing, vibrant and sexy beast.”

The most “innovative TV station” in the country, Ian? But you have scolded us week after week with the admonishment that Irish is a “dead language” spoken by no one. So how can it have a television station? Is it staffed by the living dead? And watched by them too? For what have we also learned this week but that (Hibernophone) TG4 surpassed (Anglophone) RTÉ 2 in the audience ratings for New Years Day, making it the third most-watched TV channel in Ireland, just behind (Anglophone) TV3, and well ahead of (Anglophone) television channels like UTV and Channel 4.

Then again, who ever said bigotry and prejudice needed to be based on sense or logic?

[ASF: With thanks to @MisneachNYC]

In 1981 the “reverend” Ian Paisley MP MEP, founder and chief of the Free Presbyterian Church of Ulster, the Democratic Unionist Party and several quasi-terrorist groupings (notably the Ulster Resistance), issued an infamous response to a speech by the Fianna Fáil leader Charles Haughey where he claimed on behalf of the British Unionist minority in Ireland that:

“Our ancestors cut a civilisation out of the bogs and meadows of this country while Mr Haughey’s ancestors were wearing pig skins and living in caves …”

Despite the passage of nearly forty years this partisan understanding of the colonisation of our island nation by armed settlers and “planters” from Britain remains central to the ideology of political Unionism. The violent displacement of native Irish communities went hand-in-hand with the suppression of our language and culture, these things being regarded as the foremost impediments to the establishment of what we might now term a “British state for a British people” on the island of Ireland (to rework that old phrase). Through the historic mechanisms of invasion, occupation and annexation a shared sense of an indigenous Irish identity amongst the country’s inhabitants was slowly eroded or replaced. As many scholars have subsequently observed, Ireland’s fate under the Elizabethans and Cromwellians was a mere precursor for what would later befall the peoples of North America during the era of European expansion; an expansion that of course featured many prominent “Scots-Irish”, the immediate descendants of those who brought renewed “troubles” to Ireland in the 16th and 17th centuries.

It is in this context of past struggles that we should view Unionist opposition to the establishment of legal equality between the two majority cultures in the north-east of the country, Irish Nationalist and British Unionist, represented most obviously by the Irish and English languages. Such obstructionism is simply the continuation of that ancient Anglo-British “culture war” which disfigured Ireland for so long and which was latterly fuelled by notions of racial superiority. Notions that the rest of Europe rejected in the aftermath of WWII and the defeat of Nazism, including most of the people on the island of Britain (bar the Far Right fringe of the BNP, EDL, National Front and UKIP; where of course many Unionist pols find a ready audience for their special pleading). Indeed similar supremacist thinking shapes the world-view of those who use violence against satirists and journalists because those individuals refuse to accept the cultural restrictions demanded by their attackers.

From the Newsletter:

“A consultation on a draft Irish language act has been branded a waste of time and money by former culture minister Nelson McCausland.

DUP MLA Mr McCausland said the announcement of the process, due to begin next month, is designed to “distract from Sinn Fein’s failure” to progress the issue.

His party colleague Gregory Campbell has already stated he would treat the demand for such legislation as no more than toilet paper.

The current culture minister, Caral Ni Chuilin, hopes to enshrine official protection for Irish speakers in law.

Mr McCausland said: “At a time when there are many pressing issues and challenges facing her department, the culture minister has announced that she intends to waste time, money and effort consulting on something she knows will not happen.

The chair of the Assembly’s culture, arts and leisure committee added: “The SDLP have been keen to embarrass Sinn Fein over recent days about their failure to secure any progress towards an act, and it would seem that the minister’s announcement is some crude attempt to give the impression that something can be achieved, when both she and her party are well aware that her chance of success is zero.””

Chance of equality? Zero.

However, lest we believe that our nation as a whole is free of the poisonous legacy of colonial-era racism, think again. It can manifest itself in many ways. From the Herald:

“A GOVERNMENT department is advising its staff not to use a fada in the spelling of their names, despite being a huge supporter of the Irish language.

The Department of Education sent an email recommending that its staff refrain from including the accent in the spelling of their name, as its finance systems will not recognise the accent and, therefore, employees risk delayed wage payments.

The email, sent last month by the department’s assistant finance principal asked finance system users not to include the sine fada when using the service.

A source told the Herald that there is anger among some staff within the department regarding the instruction to drop the fada and that several are threatening to make a complaint to the Irish Language Commissioner.”

In fact government departments in Ireland have been discouraging the use of the síneadh fada for decades, an essential element in most Irish words and terms. The last big scandal arising from this latent discrimination concerned obstacles being placed in the way of children with Irish names being registered by the Department of Social Welfare. We were promised technological and procedural reform then. Instead it seems that we are still waiting for some Irish-born men, women and children not to be regarded as “foreigners” in their own country.

How do you eliminate institutional discrimination against a minority community when public servants from an apathetic majority community dominate nearly all government departments and services? By ensuring that those who are discriminated against are allocated fair representation within those departments and services. From a report by the Journal:

“A REPORT COMMISSIONED by the Joint Committee on Environment, Culture and the Gaeltacht has recommended, amongst other things, that at least 10% of public workers in each department of government should be proficient in the Irish language.

The report on the Official Languages Bill 2014 was announced yesterday on Raidió na Gaeltachta by Senator Labhrás Ó Murchú, a vice chairman of the 20-Year Strategy for the Irish Language 2010-2030.

Other recommendations made within the report include that the visibility of Irish on both official online resources and social media be greatly increased, and that all official documents should be published bilingually in a single document.

Contrary to popular perception, the total number of people who can speak Irish in this country has increased slightly in recent years, with a 7% increase in number of speakers between the two most recent censuses in 2006 and 2011.

Speaking to TheJournal.ie, General Secretary of Conradh na Gaeilge Julian de Spáinn thinks the 10% figure is very achievable, but doesn’t think the report goes far enough in other ways.

“…really all you’re talking about is having 30% of new hires to public service as being proficient.  It’s not that much to ask, they’re already being taught the language in school, this would simply be making good on that investment.

The PSNI took a very similar approach when it came to balancing out the ratio of Catholics to Protestants in the police service, so I see no reason why the same principle can’t be applied here.””

Meanwhile the updated legislation includes some surprising proposals; surprising because one cannot believe that such rules need to be enacted in the first place, especially after ninety odd years of an independent Irish nation:

“Head 9 New Section: Irish names and postal addresses

Provide for:

The use by persons of the Irish language or English language version, whichever they so wish, of their names and addresses when communicating with public bodies.

Explanatory note

The purpose of this Head is to allow people to use either the Irish or English versions of their names and addresses when communicating with public bodies. The underlying principle is that those wishing to use the Irish versions of their names should be treated no less favourably by public bodies than those wishing to use the English versions.

The proposal is also intended to address the difficulties which can be encountered by people whose names are in Irish when their personal details are being inputted into information technology (IT) systems used by public bodies. This can manifest itself, for example, in the form of the síneadh fada being omitted or not being accommodated as a recognised character in IT systems.

The inclusion of this provision has potential practical implications in areas such as IT and other business systems used in the public sector and will, therefore, require a lead-in time prior to its implementation in order to allow public bodies to amend their systems. As a result, it is proposed to enable the Minister to implement this provision on a phased basis on a date or dates to be prescribed by regulation. The aim of this approach is to allow the Minister to add to the list of bodies to which this provision applies as their business systems are adjusted to accommodate it. On a practical level, public bodies will be
informed of this new requirement under the Act on an administrative basis and asked to provide a timescale within which they agree to make appropriate adjustments to their systems.”

Yes, that’s right. In 2015 it requires Irish laws to permit Irish citizens to use Irish names with the Irish government in the Irish state.

As a an Israeli-American friend remarked to me on this matter: that is seriously fucked up.

The anglophone supremacists who influence so much of Ireland’s ideologically incestuous news media insist that Irish is a “dead language”. No one, they confidently assert, speaks, reads or writes in the indigenous speech of this island nation (or if they do so, it is simply out of an attachment to some sort of linguistic revanchism. Which leaves one wondering if such men and women are living, dead, or somewhere in-between?). However it seems that someone forgot to inform the students at Trinity College Dublin of this decades-old mantra from the press group-think (for the usual suspects have been claiming the same state of affairs since the 1970s). From a lengthy report by University Times:

“This evening saw the second annual “Toghchánaíocht” (Hustings) organised by An Cumann Gaelach and TCDSU. The event offers candidates in The Leadership Race a chance to speak about how they will offer support to the Irish language over the course of their term in office. Each candidate was given two minutes to speak, in Irish or in English, about their policies. Reachtaire of An Cumann Gaelach, Fionn Ó Deá, then posed a question to the candidates, each was then given time to answer before the floor was opened to questions from the audience. The main theme was the improvement of relations between An Cumann Gaelach and the SU.”

And my god, there is just paragraphs an’ paragraphs of young people from across Ireland and overseas making speeches in Irish and English on the issue of linguistic rights and education. None of whom look particularly zombie-like. Strange that…

For the last three years I have argued that when it comes to the linguistic and cultural rights of the Irish-speaking minority on this island nation the present Fine Gael-Labour coalition is one of the most antipathetic governments to have taken power since the achievement of independence in the 1920s. Few other administrations have displayed such open contempt for what is still the national and first official language of the state, presiding over a series of  iniquitous actions against Irish-speaking citizens without precedent in the modern era. Or at least since the overthrow of the one-party Unionist regime in the old Stormont Parliament. Whether it is undermining the status of the Irish language in our education system or attacking the provision of bilingual services to the general public no government in recent memory has acted with such collective aggressiveness as has the Anglophone axis of Fine Gael and Labour. Rather than tackling the decades-old culture of institutional discrimination against Irish-speakers within the state (and judiciary) the FG and Labour leaders, Kenny and Burton, and Gilmore before her, have surrendered to the latent bigotry, appeasing the self-interests of the Hibernophobic lobby behind the false flags of austerity or “reform”.

From the Irish Times:

“Preparations for the much-criticised official launch of the 1916 commemoration programme in November were rushed, and were undertaken under considerable time pressure, internal correspondence in the Department of Arts has disclosed.

In addition, a note from the office of Minister for Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht Heather Humphreys the weekend before the launch requested the Irish language be relegated to nearer the bottom of the list of principal themes and issues of the commemorations.

The Government had earlier been accused of downgrading the status of Irish with the appointment of two non-Irish speaking Ministers to the Department which has responsibility for Irish language and Gaeltacht affairs.

The official video for the launch ‘Ireland Inspires’ was widely criticised for making no reference to the Rising other than a fleeting image of the proclamation at the beginning. Professor Diarmuid Ferriter, a member of the Government’s advisory committee on centenary commemorations described it at the time as “embarrassing unhistoric sh**”.

The Department of Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht also admitted that the Irish version of the programme on the 1916 website, Ireland.ie, came from Google Translate. The translation described as “gibberish” was quickly removed and replaced by the correct version.

In a flurry of correspondence between the Departments of An Taoiseach and the Arts that week, there were further refinements of the programme that would be announced.

Later that day a final revised document of the main themes was circulated. It had eight headings, including Remembering the Past, Relatives, Commemorative Stamps, Culture Programmes, Irish Language, Our Young People, Community and Diaspora. A further heading, Reconciliation, was added the following day.

In a note responding to the draft plan, the media adviser to Ms Humphreys wrote: “In the second document I think the stamps should come further down (perhaps last). I would also be inclined to put the Irish language further down the list.”

In the event, Irish was relegated by only one position and featured prominently in the launch material.”

The insurrection of 1916 was as much a Gaelic rising as a Republican one. The indigenous language and culture of Ireland was central to the political philosophies of the revolutionaries who took to the streets and roads of Dublin, Meath, Wexford and Galway. In this matter at least the 1916 revolution is very much unfinished business…

A new all-Ireland poll has found that majorities both nationally and regionally support the provision of public services in the Irish language. From the Irish Examiner:

“A survey of over 1,000 adults over the age of 15 in the Republic and over 1,000 adults over 16 in the north conducted on behalf of Conradh na Gaeilge by Millward Brown has revealed that a majority of citizens, in both jurisdictions, believe that services provided by the state should the available through Irish for those who choose to use them.

In the south, 70% of the population believe services in Irish should be provided with only 13% opposed, while in the north 54% are in favour of services in Irish with only 26% opposed.

Millward Brown also looked at people’s confidence in understanding Irish (8% in the North compared to 35% in the south) and speaking Irish (5% in the north compared to 26% in the south). 44% percent of those surveyed in the south would like to have the opportunity to learn or to learn more Irish, while almost one third of the population in the north are interested in doing so.”

Tuairisc examines the survey in detail, including the high levels of support for bilingual services amongst 15-17 year olds (80% in favour). Opposition or indifference to language equality on a national level was found to be strongest in the over 45s and in the Dublin region, while in the north-east a majority of “Protestants” were also sceptical.