The Revival Of The Irish Language Revival In Irish Case Study
.2. The Revival of the Irish Language
The Gaelic League was founded in the year 1893, a cultural movement whose aim was to promote and maintain the Irish language. By that time, Irish had become a minority language, spoken by no more than 15.2 per cent of the population of the whole of Ireland, or 19.2 per cent of the population of the area which was later to secede from the United Kingdom to become the Irish Free State. In 1911, those figures had declined to 13.3 per cent and 17.6 per cent respectively (Ó Murchú, 2012). The League idealized the idea of the Irish language revival. It made some successful changes but mainly in the education sector, whereas in other domains it did not have much effect (McArthur, 2005).
The year 1922 marks the establishment of the Free Irish State, from which Northern Ireland was excluded (Hickey, 2007: 421). There have been attempts made by the government between 1922 and 1960 to promote and reestablish the Irish language in order to make it the dominant language …show more content…
Irish classes became compulsory and the students had to pass Irish in order to get their Secondary school certificate (McArthur, 2005). In addition, financial inducements were used to promote the teaching of other subjects through Irish. It was decided in 1921 that the aim of the syllabus in schools would be the advancement of the policy of restoration of the Irish language. As already said, the government saw the education system as the key element in the revival of Irish. It was believed that an Irish speaking Ireland would soon emerge. But the problem was that the restoration of the language was the concern only of the education system, without other domains participating or making any changes (Ó Laoire, 2008: 204). In order to achieve their aims, the government protected the Irish language by declaring it the national language and an official language in the Constitution in 1937 (Walsh, 2011:
The Gaelic League was founded in the year 1893, a cultural movement whose aim was to promote and maintain the Irish language. By that time, Irish had become a minority language, spoken by no more than 15.2 per cent of the population of the whole of Ireland, or 19.2 per cent of the population of the area which was later to secede from the United Kingdom to become the Irish Free State. In 1911, those figures had declined to 13.3 per cent and 17.6 per cent respectively (Ó Murchú, 2012). The League idealized the idea of the Irish language revival. It made some successful changes but mainly in the education sector, whereas in other domains it did not have much effect (McArthur, 2005).
The year 1922 marks the establishment of the Free Irish State, from which Northern Ireland was excluded (Hickey, 2007: 421). There have been attempts made by the government between 1922 and 1960 to promote and reestablish the Irish language in order to make it the dominant language …show more content…
Irish classes became compulsory and the students had to pass Irish in order to get their Secondary school certificate (McArthur, 2005). In addition, financial inducements were used to promote the teaching of other subjects through Irish. It was decided in 1921 that the aim of the syllabus in schools would be the advancement of the policy of restoration of the Irish language. As already said, the government saw the education system as the key element in the revival of Irish. It was believed that an Irish speaking Ireland would soon emerge. But the problem was that the restoration of the language was the concern only of the education system, without other domains participating or making any changes (Ó Laoire, 2008: 204). In order to achieve their aims, the government protected the Irish language by declaring it the national language and an official language in the Constitution in 1937 (Walsh, 2011: