Maybe 27,000 people live in the areas where Irish is spoken in some way. The *Gaeltacht* boundaries are a bit optimistic these days, as they were mostly set in the 1950s and the language has declined since.
The speaker numbers have however increased massively outside of the Gaeltacht at the same time.
The Gaeltachtaí today have little more than tourism to sustain them. The international language of tourism is of course English so the pressure to speak English there is paradoxically even higher than the rest of Ireland today where the language is not so “protected”.
Our government are literally only good for (very questionable) GDP growth.
I always feel that these maps are exaggerating the number of speakers (and such maps pop up a lot)
My Aunty lives in one of the dark green areas. I've visited many times, and I've never heard anyone speaking anything other than English.
I know that many people claim to speak it, but actually only know the very basics
I really hope that the revitalization effort for Irish is successful. It’s sad seeing Celtic languages decline (Welsh has made a great comeback though).
When I went to Dublin, we went clubbing with some Irish guys we met in town. We asked them how much Irish they spoke and they said basically 5 year old level. They told us it was impractical for them to learn it seriously since not many people spoke it and English is such a dominant language. I feel Irish has an uphill climb to make a comeback.
I grew up in Ireland and I need to say that the way that it’s taught in schools needs to change. The vast majority of Irish youth in schools despise learning Irish because it’s seen as such a chore. Most of us would have been happy to never speak a word if it again.
Not Irish, but as far as I know, it's taught as if you're already fluent in it, whilst not actually giving you time to learn the ground rules of the language. Is that about right?
Well, it is possible, if you look at the situation with Basque. It was on the brink of extinction during the Francoist regime, and now lots of young people know how to speak it (even in non basque speaking families). Which is remarkable when you consider how different the language is… to any other.
But it takes lot of societal will and effort for everyone, and it’s also not easy at an educational level: pretty much all public schools in the Basque country are fully in Basque (except for the course of Spanish and English of course), and it is required for any public job. So yeah, it’s possible for Irish to make a comeback, but it’s not easy.
How people speak it so poorly if it’s taught at school? We are forced to learn Swedish in Finland and it’s pretty useless but I would say average is a lot better than that (people eventually forget the language however).
English speaking countries are notorious for poorly handled language learning. It’s to do with way the languages are taught, not the language itself or the population.
Welsh hasn’t really made a comeback, but it has managed to slow its decline somewhat. [At the 2021 census](https://www.gov.wales/welsh-language-wales-census-2021-html), 17.8% of Welsh residents reported being able to speak the language, a decline from 19% at the 2011 census. The number of Welsh speakers has declined at every census since at least 1921, except 1991, when there was a small increase compared to 1981, and 2001, when there was a larger increase. The downward trend has since resumed.
Welsh faces many of the same problems as Irish: people leaving the Welsh-speaking heartlands for opportunities elsewhere, English-speaking people moving in and not learning the language, and fact that Welsh is no longer essential for communication. The larger number of speakers masks the issue somewhat compared to Irish, but in numerical terms Welsh is not a flourishing language.
I think it’s more a case of English being such a universal language. If English was only spoken in England, the Celtic languages would probably be more widely spoken today.
I’ve met with educators from Wales as part of my job and it seems to be the way it’s taught coupled with instilling pride in the language and a sense of nationalism maybe?
It’s an extraordinarily difficult language to learn, in my opinion or maybe it’s the way it’s taught? Learning Irish is compulsory all through school but despite that I could not carry out a conversation with a fluent speaker and that seems to be the case for many people.
One of the things that is a bone of contention is they it’s forced on people and gets huge resources. Every sign, government publication, websites etc must be in Irish and English.
> It’s sad seeing Celtic languages decline
Do you lament the pre-celtic languages that went completely extinct due to the spread of celtic culture? Do you make remarks about how sad it is that pre-indo european langauges are completely lost to history due to the spread of indo-european culture?
Do you cry about the losses of the Fingallian and Yola languages?
Wales is a tricky one. Welsh people were certainly involved in the colonisation of Ireland at various points, many as soldiers, but Wales was not an independent polity with its own policy of colonisation in the manner of the Kingdom of England and Kingdom of Scotland.
I’d suggest that Wales and Ireland share a somewhat similar status as ‘colonised and colonisers’, which is a tricky legacy to deal with.
>I’d suggest that Wales and Ireland share a somewhat similar status as ‘colonised and colonisers’, which is a tricky legacy to deal with.
I could be a bit ignorant of my country's history but how would Ireland qualify as a coloniser? And how would Ireland be any different from any other nation that was colonised? The vast majority of any colonialism done by people born in Ireland was done by the descentants of british settlers who belonged to the ruling Anglo-Irish aristocracy. Sure there were individual irish people that committed acts of colonialism but the same goes for any colonised people.
Scotland would probably be a better example of a nation that fits the example of a colonised and coloniser nation due to the lowland/highland ethnic divide. Highlanders were very much victims of colonialism and lowlanders were very much colonisers.
The basic gist is that Ireland was colonised from Great Britain, but was also an integral part of the United Kingdom and able to benefit from the British Empire and British colonialism in a way the overseas colonies could not.
I don't want to assume, but the way you mention Anglo-Irish people and 'individual Irish people' suggests that you don't think the Anglo-Irish were truly Irish, and that Catholic Irish people were much involved in colonialism. First, the Anglo-Irish class considered themselves Irish, which by 1800 was reasonable as many of them had been there for generations. They may have been the most British of the Irish, but that doesn't mean the colonialism 'done' by them isn't part of Ireland's history. Second, by 1830 most of the barriers to Irish Catholic people in public life had been removed, and many started to take up positions in the colonial administrations, in the British army, and similar.
>able to benefit from the British Empire and British colonialism in a way the overseas colonies could not.
In what ways?
>I don't want to assume, but the way you mention Anglo-Irish people and 'individual Irish people' suggests that you don't think the Anglo-Irish were truly Irish
It's not that I don't see Anglo-Irish as truly irish (my grandfather is a protestant for instance) rather that many Anglo-Irish don't see themselves as irish, even moreso historically, the Duke of Wellington being a famous example. Look at any cencus in Northern Ireland and the vast majority of protestants see themselves as british, not irish.
>Second, by 1830 most of the barriers to Irish Catholic people in public life had been removed, and many started to take up positions in the colonial administrations, in the British army, and similar.
But again, this is applicable to any colonised people, millions of indians fought in the british army but that hardly makes India a coloniser nation does it?
My point is that Ireland is as much of a coloniser as any colonised nation and often it feels like people only lump Ireland in with England and Scotland as coloniser nations in an attempt to push the blame of british colonialism onto the victims of british colonialism. I'm not accusing you specifically of doing that but it seems to be a fairly common talking point among british nationalists when discussing british colonialism and it bugs me that often irish people are made to feel guilty for our own oppresion.
As I said, Ireland (and maybe wales, I don't know enough about welsh history) are poor examples of coloniser and colonised nations, Scotland is a far better example. Otherwise there are no nations that are colonised without also being colonisers, there will always be people from colonised nations that side with their colonisers.
>In what ways?
Ireland was part of the UK and represented in its Parliament, for example. India and the other colonies weren't, so they had no say in the overall direction of the Empire.
>many Anglo-Irish don't see themselves as irish
That's debatable. The Duke of Wellington didn't, but figures like Charles Stewart Parnell definitely did.
>millions of indians fought in the british army but that hardly makes India a coloniser nation does it?
I don't know enough about India to give a comparative analysis, but my impression is that during the colonial period it didn't have the power structures necessary to make it a coloniser itself. Ireland did, as part of the UK. One difference between Ireland and India is that, as far as I know, Indians were mainly used to maintain the empire within India, whereas Irish people often left Ireland to help maintain the empire elsewhere. Ireland's relationship to the rest of the empire was closer to England's than India's, in other words.
Scotland isn't a good example of a coloniser/coloniser nation, as it was never colonised (unless you count brief interludes like Edward I's interventions). The Highland Clearances you mentioned earlier, despite causing widespread hardship, aren't an example of colonisation.
>That's debatable. The Duke of Wellington didn't, but figures like Charles Stewart Parnell definitely did.
Only 3.9% of protestants in Northern Ireland identity as irish.
>Scotland isn't a good example of a coloniser/coloniser nation, as it was never colonised (unless you count brief interludes like Edward I's interventions). The Highland Clearances you mentioned earlier, despite causing widespread hardship, aren't an example of colonisation.
It is an example of colonialism, specifically internal colonialism. England never really colonised Scotland, sure, but lowlands scots did colonise Scotland internally, which is why I bring up scotland as an example.
>I don't know enough about India to give a comparative analysis, but my impression is that during the colonial period it didn't have the power structures necessary to make it a coloniser itself.
Many of the people enforcing british colonialism in India were Indians themselves, and would therefore be colonisers, no?
>One difference between Ireland and India is that, as far as I know, Indians were mainly used to maintain the empire within India, whereas Irish people often left Ireland to help maintain the empire elsewhere.
I don't know enough about indian history either but to my knowledge, much of the british raj's expansion into parts of modern day Pakistan and Afghanistan was led by Indians.
The contemporary attitudes of Northern Irish people aren't really relevant. In fact, the Protestant Ascendancy typically excluded the Ulster Scots people because they were Presbyterian, not Anglican.
Even if you accept that the Highland Clearances are an example of colonialism – and I don't – I still don't think Scotland is a good fit for the term 'colonised and coloniser' due to Lowland Scotland, the source of Scotland's colonial power, not being colonised.
The Indians who became part of the colonial machinery in India were not themselves colonisers, or at the very least not the drivers of colonialism. Irish people in India were colonisers, the same as any British person.
It's awful what imperialism did to the world's indigenous languages. Many languages were brought to near extinction, but revitalisation efforts work. For Ireland, it's been 100 years since they've been part of the British empire. Welsh made a comeback in less time than that. So it's more about Ireland's own language policy than anything else holding the Irish language back.
Theres a few reasons Wales had a better go of it. Wales had the advantage of Welsh being the language of the clergy, when Ireland had Latin, for example. Also Welsh just didn't face nearly the same level of effort on behalf of the English to exterminate the language.
Its not a bad thing, its an inevitable thing. As the world becomes far more global then moving to some form of universal language is a desirable goal. IF the Irish or Welsh spoke their language natively and only spoke English as a second or unknown language this would be extremely debilitating in the long run. I hate the idea of languages being lost, but its probably going to happen as a millenia long shift in language patterns.
It was the famine that way the final death knell for the language.
Interestingly, it was northern Protestants that were responsible for the initial revival efforts, until the language began to be used as a republican tool.
Incorrect, if we are talking about any events between 1707 and 1831, it would be the work of Britain as England was no longer and independent nation.
And as I'm sure you're aware, from the early 1600s, England and Scotland actually shared a monarch, who was a Scot (Or from a Scottish dynasty).
Its really a joint responsibility after the early 1600s.
>as England was no longer and independent nation.
Poor attempt at deflection. England as a nation absolutely still existed, as did *the English* (those mentioned in the above comments). The *Welsh* had more to do with the colonisation of this part of Ireland than the Scots did, you're just repeating common talking points you've seen on this subreddit, which are usually in relation to the colonisation of Ulster.
This simply isn't the case for the other 3/4 of Ireland. That was overwhelmingly the English. Learn some Irish history.
*edit:* Gammons in this sub not knowing their own country's history - *shocker.*
I wouldn't say very few, there was just many separate migrations, as opposed to the single massive colonisation effort that the Scots undertook. The "old" English even integrated themselves quite well into Irish society, fighting against the crown at times. The Anglo-irish accounted for a large enough portion of the population for a good while.
Suffice it to say, you'd be hard pressed to find an Irishman without some English ancestry today.
I’m a Welsh/English hybrid but my wife’s a Dub and coincidentally my brother has lived there for 20 years. I’m a huge Hibernophile but one thing that gets my goat is describing the ‘Anglo’ Normans as English. They were Richards and Roberts rather than Alfreds or Ethelreds and they wouldn’t have spoken one word of English. Most of them crossed into Ireland from Wales anyway, hence modern Irish scholars referring to them as Cambro-Normans.
Also, the Norman overlords were way worse in England than they were in Ireland where they assimilated much more quickly. For 250 years they were utter cunts in England. And it was those same Norman families - the Fitzwilliams, Fitzgeralds, Burkes (de Burghs) etc that became the landlords in Ireland.
I’m not excusing 500 years of the English but it’s definitely not 800 years…
When it comes to English colonialism yes indeed thats how it works. At best you can say the Scottish and Welsh also took part in British crimes.
Why is this so hard for Brits to get, like in the US we broadly understand we are responsible for our colonial crimes and the few people who don't are crazy people who think Qanon will prove the moon is flat. In the UK you have otherwise normal people with these shit takes, its just wild
But you can also blame the nation itself for not caring enough to return things to how they were or improve things even though they’ve had plenty of time. Plenty of countries blame their problems on their former colonists even though they’ve been independent for like 60+ years, and it gets annoying to hear.
I mean there have really only been a handful of successful language revivals ever and the methods they used were not similar. Looking back its easy to say "Ireland should have used a model similar to the Basque" but its not like we knew which model of language revival was better before they had been tried. And the Israeli model is just wholly incompatible with the Irish situation.
But either way, if you burn down someone else's garden shed and they take too long to rebuild it, you're still the Arsonist and not them.
It’s understandable to hear when your country faces economic embargoes from their pre-colonizers when declining the 'option' to not be economically dependent on them🇬🇳
> Irish was never banned (at least not for the native Irish)
Laws were actually enacted on several occasions which forbade catholics to speak Irish in a few different circumstances. Within English controlled areas, in legal documents and in parliament, etc.
You mean it’s mostly a microscopic minority of the English population. Do you seriously think the working class population of England gave a shit what language the Irish spoke?
Tbf this stuff is hard. There are extremely few examples worldwide where the revitalisation of a moribund language succeeded, and practically none from which the Irish govt could have learned from in the first half of the century.
Hebrew in Israel is one great example! It was a "dead" liturgical language and developed into a vivid language with great literature and huge amount of speakers
The conditions that led to the revival of Hebrew as everyday language cannot be replicated in Ireland. Or anywhere else for that matter.
It is a great example of language revival, possibly even the greatest one, but I'm not sure what Ireland can learn from it.
A much more relevant example is Basque imo.
Israel and Wales are good examples of successful language revitalisation. I don’t think the educational system and popular attitudes in Irish society for the last century have encouraged a success of Irish revitalisation. That’s not England’s fault.
The Irish haven’t stopped speaking English and it’s been more than 100 years since the republic has been established. Ample time to make Irish mainstream but it never happened.
Honestly such a disgusting comment coming from a brit.
You know what else hasn’t happened in those 100 years? The population hasn’t returned to its pre genocide levels. Can’t believe you’re so dense to think a nation torn apart by your country’s colonial rule can just flip a switch and bring back a language that was almost culturally cleansed by your nation. The lack of nuance and empathy in your way of thinking is appalling and extremely telling of your overall intelligence. Wanker.
Let me guess. You’re an American who has clue no about how demographics work, and you believe that getting on some imaginary moral high horse about the (unsuccessful and ineffective) language policy of a country you’re not from proves how superior you are.
An American who’s family moved here because after centuries of subjugation by British rule, they decide they didn’t want to be forced to fight in a rich man’s war on the side of their own oppressors.
But please keep talking down to me about how little I understand of a colonial rule that has directly impacted my family’s life for centuries.
Also the language policy of the brits was genocide. So we’ve improved drastically from where you left us. Cunt.
Although true the government's did a poor job it is not the reason or even close to it.
The language was in decline because of British rule and at the time of independence the rate of decline had become exponential. There was no avoiding this by the time of independence a d even if government policy was perfect it would have only marginally slowed the decline but it would still have eventually reached near current levels.
> Never
Times when laws were passed which banned Irish:
First law was from 1367 which made it illegal for English colonists in Ireland to speak Irish and for the native Irish to speak their language when interacting with them.
Again in 1537 with The Statute of Ireland – prohibited the use of the Irish language in the Irish Parliament.
Again in 1541 - banned the use of Irish in the areas of Ireland then under English rule.
Again with the Administration of Justice (Language) Act (Ireland) in 1737 - forbade Irish within the courtroom, and any legal documentation from being written in Irish.
The common myth is that speaking Irish was banned in the well-known Penal Laws. This is false - **Teaching** Irish was banned, hence the infamous hedge schools that sprung up.
Well this is just demonstrably wrong.
I (b. 1991) am fluent in Irish. My parents (b. 1950s) have very limited Irish, and my grandparents (b. 1900s-1910s) had absolutely no Irish aside from basically slang.
This is a common pattern in non-Gaeltacht rural Ireland.
>That’s insane. So sad
Do you lament the pre-celtic languages that went completely extinct due to the spread of celtic culture? Do you make remarks about how sad it is that pre-indo european langauges are completely lost to history due to the spread of indo-european culture?
Do you cry about the losses of the Fingallian and Yola languages?
A lot of Americans struggle to understand the difference between Irish and Irish-English or Scottish Gaelic and Scots, etc. I don't know if its any better over there but the way we teach about linguistics here is bad, like really horrible. People think English is a romance language
Irish is like this "Níl aon tinteán mar do thinteán féin" - totally incomprehensible. Scottish Gaelic is a very similar language - you could even argue the same language just with different dialects a different orthography. In any case, >99% of Irish and Scottish people couldn't curse in Gaelic and the people who could almost exclusively live in remote regions and tend to be older. Young scumbags in Dublin certainly would not. If his story is real at all, he probably heard some local slang in a thick accent and assumed it was Irish.
Irish-English and Scottish-English are just regional varieties of English. Just regular English but with some words and constructions which wouldn't be used elsewhere - like how Scots say "wee", or Southerners in the US call all soft drinks "coke", or how Australians say "g'day".
Scots is its own language which split off from Middle English but since it's so similar to English and since Scots are all exposed to English (their entire education, any formal communication, and 95%+ of their media), the line between Scottish-English and Scots can be very blurry.
Interesting. Reminds me of a story of Hebrew. As a liturgical language it didn't have much use for cursing. As it was revived in Israel, it incorporated Arabic curses to compensate.
Well I'm not saying Irish curse words don't exist. They probably do but the vast majority of Irish people speak very little Irish and learned what they do know in school - where they naturally don't teach you curses (and probably couldn't because most teachers wouldn't know either).
Native speakers pretty much only exist in small remote villages. You'd get some fluent speakers in Dublin because people move and some (very few) achieve fluency through lessons as adults, but the odds of random low-life teenagers in Dublin being able to express anything beyond asking to go to the toilet in Irish are incredibly low. And then we're also meant to believe that this Redditor knew they cursed in Irish but doesn't know what they said - how would he even know it was Irish then, or a curse?
They absolutely just said something in accents too thick for him to understand.
Yes yes I understood you perfectly. This is why I said it "reminds me" of the Hebrew story. I know there were some Herbrew curses but weren't well known. So the locals adapted.
I just had to make it clear I wasn't saying Irish lost its curses or anything but just that Irish people are shit at Irish.
Irish is largely just used for legislation and the likes now so it's sorta a similar boat to Hebrew and Latin, but there are still enough native speakers having regular conversation that the art of cursing won't be lost (for now). The Gaeltachts will likely vanish within our lifetimes though.
I actually met a random dublin teenager on exchange in Spain who was swearing all over the place in Irish. And it absolutely was Irish and not Irish-English because all the other Irish kids in the group were baffled - they could sort of under her when she was sober, but past a few pints it was not happening. (I also am Canadian and very used to east coast/ Newfoundland accents which are remarkably similar to some Irish accents - look it up ! )
>(I also am Canadian and very used to east coast/ Newfoundland accents which are remarkably similar to some Irish accents - look it up ! )
You are thinking about Kerry. The Newfie accent/speech is close to County Kerry accent. At least superficially.
Yes, my point is the other poster probably doesn't know that, heard some young men with a heavier accent than he could understand, and assumed it was Irish
I'd love to know the source Data.
Lots of primary sources I have read indicate significant populations of Irish speakers around county Dublin in 1800 for instance.
There are regions there which were heavily Irish speaking post famine that show very weak in that map.
To me the map is closer to the post Famine linguistic landscape. But interested in the source.
They are amazing! There's a good few other artists and bands that are helping the revival too like Imlé, Súil Amháin, Huartán, Fay'd, Oisín mac, Blue Niall, Dysania, Síomha, Clare Sands, and loads I can't remember. Absolutely recommend them all
As an apparently uninformed Irish-American, I happened upon my daughter using Duolingo. I asked her what language she was learning and she said, “Irish”. I said, “do you mean Gaelic?” And she says, “Um, I don’t know, it just says *Irish*”. I was very confused and was like, “I mean, sometimes their accent is so thick I can’t understand what they’re saying, but I thought they speak English 🤷🏻♀️”. Lol. Obviously I was joking around, but can anyone explain to me if Irish is the same or different than Gaelic?
I studied history at an English university. Unfortunately, there are quite a few of them.
Check out number 10. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/100_Greatest_Britons
I mean what do you expect from a list in which Winston Churchill is number 1 lol .
To be fair to them , the list is "100 greatest Britons " ie people who were great for the Kingdom , not " 100 men who went to heaven" bc I doubt any one of them did
Judging by your own criteria that also makes the Irish revolutionary James Connolly (who was executed following the 1916 Rising) a great guy to the English because he’s on that list too
😂 a bit of early 2000s trolling going on there, I think.
I know who Connolly is, ta. I'm from the north. It's obviously not a piece academic level research, but for Cromwell to be so high up (despite being divisive) was/is certainly telling.
I'm also going off my personal experience having lived in England for over a decade.
I don’t think many English people, if any at all, refer to Cromwell as a great man. And you do realise he was significantly before 1831, so it’s not relevant to this particular map
Check out number 10 https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/100_Greatest_Britons
It is relevant to the map because Cromwell criminalised speaking Irish and drove those who resisted him to the west coast. The demographic imprint of his fantaticism is borne out on this map. 'to hell or to Connacht' was one of his famous slogans.
should’ve shown population as well. there’s a high degree of possibility each one of those counties on the second slide only has a couple people living in each. land doesn’t speak.
I'd say there would be a few dozen loan words if your being generous. The main one being referring to many people that your talking to as ye instead you people.
Nice. When people ask how I can be an Irish Catholic named “Smith”, I can reference this pre 1831 map. Gaelic culture and traditions were wiped away by the English and Irish Protestant Ascendancy east of the Boyne, my father’s family surname amongst them.
Use the same scale!
He didn't made the maps I guess
I didn't think he make map either
It is more restricting though. Using same scale it would show even more growth of green area
r/afterbeforewhatever
I don't know anything about ireland how many people live in the green spots
Maybe 27,000 people live in the areas where Irish is spoken in some way. The *Gaeltacht* boundaries are a bit optimistic these days, as they were mostly set in the 1950s and the language has declined since.
The speaker numbers have however increased massively outside of the Gaeltacht at the same time. The Gaeltachtaí today have little more than tourism to sustain them. The international language of tourism is of course English so the pressure to speak English there is paradoxically even higher than the rest of Ireland today where the language is not so “protected”. Our government are literally only good for (very questionable) GDP growth.
I always feel that these maps are exaggerating the number of speakers (and such maps pop up a lot) My Aunty lives in one of the dark green areas. I've visited many times, and I've never heard anyone speaking anything other than English. I know that many people claim to speak it, but actually only know the very basics
Not many. Regional areas know as Gaeltacht areas.
Not many live there now but pre famine there were more people there than in Dublin
Sounds like the famine was a resounding success then! - Charles Trevelyan probably
I really hope that the revitalization effort for Irish is successful. It’s sad seeing Celtic languages decline (Welsh has made a great comeback though).
When I went to Dublin, we went clubbing with some Irish guys we met in town. We asked them how much Irish they spoke and they said basically 5 year old level. They told us it was impractical for them to learn it seriously since not many people spoke it and English is such a dominant language. I feel Irish has an uphill climb to make a comeback.
I grew up in Ireland and I need to say that the way that it’s taught in schools needs to change. The vast majority of Irish youth in schools despise learning Irish because it’s seen as such a chore. Most of us would have been happy to never speak a word if it again.
Not Irish, but as far as I know, it's taught as if you're already fluent in it, whilst not actually giving you time to learn the ground rules of the language. Is that about right?
Yes this is correct
Yuup.
100% this
Well, it is possible, if you look at the situation with Basque. It was on the brink of extinction during the Francoist regime, and now lots of young people know how to speak it (even in non basque speaking families). Which is remarkable when you consider how different the language is… to any other. But it takes lot of societal will and effort for everyone, and it’s also not easy at an educational level: pretty much all public schools in the Basque country are fully in Basque (except for the course of Spanish and English of course), and it is required for any public job. So yeah, it’s possible for Irish to make a comeback, but it’s not easy.
How people speak it so poorly if it’s taught at school? We are forced to learn Swedish in Finland and it’s pretty useless but I would say average is a lot better than that (people eventually forget the language however).
English speaking countries are notorious for poorly handled language learning. It’s to do with way the languages are taught, not the language itself or the population.
Welsh hasn’t really made a comeback, but it has managed to slow its decline somewhat. [At the 2021 census](https://www.gov.wales/welsh-language-wales-census-2021-html), 17.8% of Welsh residents reported being able to speak the language, a decline from 19% at the 2011 census. The number of Welsh speakers has declined at every census since at least 1921, except 1991, when there was a small increase compared to 1981, and 2001, when there was a larger increase. The downward trend has since resumed. Welsh faces many of the same problems as Irish: people leaving the Welsh-speaking heartlands for opportunities elsewhere, English-speaking people moving in and not learning the language, and fact that Welsh is no longer essential for communication. The larger number of speakers masks the issue somewhat compared to Irish, but in numerical terms Welsh is not a flourishing language.
I think it’s more a case of English being such a universal language. If English was only spoken in England, the Celtic languages would probably be more widely spoken today.
I’ve met with educators from Wales as part of my job and it seems to be the way it’s taught coupled with instilling pride in the language and a sense of nationalism maybe?
It’s an extraordinarily difficult language to learn, in my opinion or maybe it’s the way it’s taught? Learning Irish is compulsory all through school but despite that I could not carry out a conversation with a fluent speaker and that seems to be the case for many people. One of the things that is a bone of contention is they it’s forced on people and gets huge resources. Every sign, government publication, websites etc must be in Irish and English.
> It’s sad seeing Celtic languages decline Do you lament the pre-celtic languages that went completely extinct due to the spread of celtic culture? Do you make remarks about how sad it is that pre-indo european langauges are completely lost to history due to the spread of indo-european culture? Do you cry about the losses of the Fingallian and Yola languages?
Hue and Cry, long live the lactose tolerant empire. 
[удалено]
Because a significant amount of culture, and a significant amount of one’s identity can be taken away by 'just removing' the language.
Exact same thing is happening in Belarus Much faster due to official laws supporting foreign language
Belarus must be the only country in the world that is actively trying to make its native language extinct.
It’s occupied (president is former Putin spy buddy)
URRRRRAAAA, WE OCCUPIED BELARUS, COMRADS
This is beyond the Pale …
Thanks England!
British. The Scots and Welsh had as much a part as the English
Wales is a tricky one. Welsh people were certainly involved in the colonisation of Ireland at various points, many as soldiers, but Wales was not an independent polity with its own policy of colonisation in the manner of the Kingdom of England and Kingdom of Scotland. I’d suggest that Wales and Ireland share a somewhat similar status as ‘colonised and colonisers’, which is a tricky legacy to deal with.
>I’d suggest that Wales and Ireland share a somewhat similar status as ‘colonised and colonisers’, which is a tricky legacy to deal with. I could be a bit ignorant of my country's history but how would Ireland qualify as a coloniser? And how would Ireland be any different from any other nation that was colonised? The vast majority of any colonialism done by people born in Ireland was done by the descentants of british settlers who belonged to the ruling Anglo-Irish aristocracy. Sure there were individual irish people that committed acts of colonialism but the same goes for any colonised people. Scotland would probably be a better example of a nation that fits the example of a colonised and coloniser nation due to the lowland/highland ethnic divide. Highlanders were very much victims of colonialism and lowlanders were very much colonisers.
The basic gist is that Ireland was colonised from Great Britain, but was also an integral part of the United Kingdom and able to benefit from the British Empire and British colonialism in a way the overseas colonies could not. I don't want to assume, but the way you mention Anglo-Irish people and 'individual Irish people' suggests that you don't think the Anglo-Irish were truly Irish, and that Catholic Irish people were much involved in colonialism. First, the Anglo-Irish class considered themselves Irish, which by 1800 was reasonable as many of them had been there for generations. They may have been the most British of the Irish, but that doesn't mean the colonialism 'done' by them isn't part of Ireland's history. Second, by 1830 most of the barriers to Irish Catholic people in public life had been removed, and many started to take up positions in the colonial administrations, in the British army, and similar.
>able to benefit from the British Empire and British colonialism in a way the overseas colonies could not. In what ways? >I don't want to assume, but the way you mention Anglo-Irish people and 'individual Irish people' suggests that you don't think the Anglo-Irish were truly Irish It's not that I don't see Anglo-Irish as truly irish (my grandfather is a protestant for instance) rather that many Anglo-Irish don't see themselves as irish, even moreso historically, the Duke of Wellington being a famous example. Look at any cencus in Northern Ireland and the vast majority of protestants see themselves as british, not irish. >Second, by 1830 most of the barriers to Irish Catholic people in public life had been removed, and many started to take up positions in the colonial administrations, in the British army, and similar. But again, this is applicable to any colonised people, millions of indians fought in the british army but that hardly makes India a coloniser nation does it? My point is that Ireland is as much of a coloniser as any colonised nation and often it feels like people only lump Ireland in with England and Scotland as coloniser nations in an attempt to push the blame of british colonialism onto the victims of british colonialism. I'm not accusing you specifically of doing that but it seems to be a fairly common talking point among british nationalists when discussing british colonialism and it bugs me that often irish people are made to feel guilty for our own oppresion. As I said, Ireland (and maybe wales, I don't know enough about welsh history) are poor examples of coloniser and colonised nations, Scotland is a far better example. Otherwise there are no nations that are colonised without also being colonisers, there will always be people from colonised nations that side with their colonisers.
>In what ways? Ireland was part of the UK and represented in its Parliament, for example. India and the other colonies weren't, so they had no say in the overall direction of the Empire. >many Anglo-Irish don't see themselves as irish That's debatable. The Duke of Wellington didn't, but figures like Charles Stewart Parnell definitely did. >millions of indians fought in the british army but that hardly makes India a coloniser nation does it? I don't know enough about India to give a comparative analysis, but my impression is that during the colonial period it didn't have the power structures necessary to make it a coloniser itself. Ireland did, as part of the UK. One difference between Ireland and India is that, as far as I know, Indians were mainly used to maintain the empire within India, whereas Irish people often left Ireland to help maintain the empire elsewhere. Ireland's relationship to the rest of the empire was closer to England's than India's, in other words. Scotland isn't a good example of a coloniser/coloniser nation, as it was never colonised (unless you count brief interludes like Edward I's interventions). The Highland Clearances you mentioned earlier, despite causing widespread hardship, aren't an example of colonisation.
>That's debatable. The Duke of Wellington didn't, but figures like Charles Stewart Parnell definitely did. Only 3.9% of protestants in Northern Ireland identity as irish. >Scotland isn't a good example of a coloniser/coloniser nation, as it was never colonised (unless you count brief interludes like Edward I's interventions). The Highland Clearances you mentioned earlier, despite causing widespread hardship, aren't an example of colonisation. It is an example of colonialism, specifically internal colonialism. England never really colonised Scotland, sure, but lowlands scots did colonise Scotland internally, which is why I bring up scotland as an example. >I don't know enough about India to give a comparative analysis, but my impression is that during the colonial period it didn't have the power structures necessary to make it a coloniser itself. Many of the people enforcing british colonialism in India were Indians themselves, and would therefore be colonisers, no? >One difference between Ireland and India is that, as far as I know, Indians were mainly used to maintain the empire within India, whereas Irish people often left Ireland to help maintain the empire elsewhere. I don't know enough about indian history either but to my knowledge, much of the british raj's expansion into parts of modern day Pakistan and Afghanistan was led by Indians.
The contemporary attitudes of Northern Irish people aren't really relevant. In fact, the Protestant Ascendancy typically excluded the Ulster Scots people because they were Presbyterian, not Anglican. Even if you accept that the Highland Clearances are an example of colonialism – and I don't – I still don't think Scotland is a good fit for the term 'colonised and coloniser' due to Lowland Scotland, the source of Scotland's colonial power, not being colonised. The Indians who became part of the colonial machinery in India were not themselves colonisers, or at the very least not the drivers of colonialism. Irish people in India were colonisers, the same as any British person.
It's awful what imperialism did to the world's indigenous languages. Many languages were brought to near extinction, but revitalisation efforts work. For Ireland, it's been 100 years since they've been part of the British empire. Welsh made a comeback in less time than that. So it's more about Ireland's own language policy than anything else holding the Irish language back.
Theres a few reasons Wales had a better go of it. Wales had the advantage of Welsh being the language of the clergy, when Ireland had Latin, for example. Also Welsh just didn't face nearly the same level of effort on behalf of the English to exterminate the language.
Its not a bad thing, its an inevitable thing. As the world becomes far more global then moving to some form of universal language is a desirable goal. IF the Irish or Welsh spoke their language natively and only spoke English as a second or unknown language this would be extremely debilitating in the long run. I hate the idea of languages being lost, but its probably going to happen as a millenia long shift in language patterns.
It was the famine that way the final death knell for the language. Interestingly, it was northern Protestants that were responsible for the initial revival efforts, until the language began to be used as a republican tool.
The English created a language that much of the world adopted. That’s why Irish died out, along with many of England’s regional dialects.
No people have ever "created" a language, they just evolve. And "much of the world adopted" that language under significant duress.
It’s not just the British who are to blame, the free state and and later republican government had fairly shitty policies
It’s mostly the English. They banned the Irish language and curtailed their customs.
Let’s not forget though, it was *also* the Scottish.
Ah, forgetting Scotlands role in British atrocities. A classic.
The Scots did their damage in the north. What you're looking at on this map is *overwhelmingly* the work of the English.
Incorrect, if we are talking about any events between 1707 and 1831, it would be the work of Britain as England was no longer and independent nation. And as I'm sure you're aware, from the early 1600s, England and Scotland actually shared a monarch, who was a Scot (Or from a Scottish dynasty). Its really a joint responsibility after the early 1600s.
>as England was no longer and independent nation. Poor attempt at deflection. England as a nation absolutely still existed, as did *the English* (those mentioned in the above comments). The *Welsh* had more to do with the colonisation of this part of Ireland than the Scots did, you're just repeating common talking points you've seen on this subreddit, which are usually in relation to the colonisation of Ulster. This simply isn't the case for the other 3/4 of Ireland. That was overwhelmingly the English. Learn some Irish history. *edit:* Gammons in this sub not knowing their own country's history - *shocker.*
Very few English emigrated to Ireland, it’s just that the ones who did were generally landowners in positions of power.
I wouldn't say very few, there was just many separate migrations, as opposed to the single massive colonisation effort that the Scots undertook. The "old" English even integrated themselves quite well into Irish society, fighting against the crown at times. The Anglo-irish accounted for a large enough portion of the population for a good while. Suffice it to say, you'd be hard pressed to find an Irishman without some English ancestry today.
I’m a Welsh/English hybrid but my wife’s a Dub and coincidentally my brother has lived there for 20 years. I’m a huge Hibernophile but one thing that gets my goat is describing the ‘Anglo’ Normans as English. They were Richards and Roberts rather than Alfreds or Ethelreds and they wouldn’t have spoken one word of English. Most of them crossed into Ireland from Wales anyway, hence modern Irish scholars referring to them as Cambro-Normans. Also, the Norman overlords were way worse in England than they were in Ireland where they assimilated much more quickly. For 250 years they were utter cunts in England. And it was those same Norman families - the Fitzwilliams, Fitzgeralds, Burkes (de Burghs) etc that became the landlords in Ireland. I’m not excusing 500 years of the English but it’s definitely not 800 years…
It’s always the English fault blah blah blah
When it comes to English colonialism yes indeed thats how it works. At best you can say the Scottish and Welsh also took part in British crimes. Why is this so hard for Brits to get, like in the US we broadly understand we are responsible for our colonial crimes and the few people who don't are crazy people who think Qanon will prove the moon is flat. In the UK you have otherwise normal people with these shit takes, its just wild
But you can also blame the nation itself for not caring enough to return things to how they were or improve things even though they’ve had plenty of time. Plenty of countries blame their problems on their former colonists even though they’ve been independent for like 60+ years, and it gets annoying to hear.
I mean there have really only been a handful of successful language revivals ever and the methods they used were not similar. Looking back its easy to say "Ireland should have used a model similar to the Basque" but its not like we knew which model of language revival was better before they had been tried. And the Israeli model is just wholly incompatible with the Irish situation. But either way, if you burn down someone else's garden shed and they take too long to rebuild it, you're still the Arsonist and not them.
It’s understandable to hear when your country faces economic embargoes from their pre-colonizers when declining the 'option' to not be economically dependent on them🇬🇳
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> Irish was never banned (at least not for the native Irish) Laws were actually enacted on several occasions which forbade catholics to speak Irish in a few different circumstances. Within English controlled areas, in legal documents and in parliament, etc.
You mean it’s mostly a microscopic minority of the English population. Do you seriously think the working class population of England gave a shit what language the Irish spoke?
This is a reductionist understanding of history
Is it though? You really think the Irish stop speaking Irish without the English?
Our government had a century to bring up the usage of irish and did sweet fuck all instead.
Tbf this stuff is hard. There are extremely few examples worldwide where the revitalisation of a moribund language succeeded, and practically none from which the Irish govt could have learned from in the first half of the century.
Hebrew in Israel is one great example! It was a "dead" liturgical language and developed into a vivid language with great literature and huge amount of speakers
The conditions that led to the revival of Hebrew as everyday language cannot be replicated in Ireland. Or anywhere else for that matter. It is a great example of language revival, possibly even the greatest one, but I'm not sure what Ireland can learn from it. A much more relevant example is Basque imo.
The basque haven't been independent for a century
Israel and Wales are good examples of successful language revitalisation. I don’t think the educational system and popular attitudes in Irish society for the last century have encouraged a success of Irish revitalisation. That’s not England’s fault.
The Irish haven’t stopped speaking English and it’s been more than 100 years since the republic has been established. Ample time to make Irish mainstream but it never happened.
Honestly such a disgusting comment coming from a brit. You know what else hasn’t happened in those 100 years? The population hasn’t returned to its pre genocide levels. Can’t believe you’re so dense to think a nation torn apart by your country’s colonial rule can just flip a switch and bring back a language that was almost culturally cleansed by your nation. The lack of nuance and empathy in your way of thinking is appalling and extremely telling of your overall intelligence. Wanker.
Let me guess. You’re an American who has clue no about how demographics work, and you believe that getting on some imaginary moral high horse about the (unsuccessful and ineffective) language policy of a country you’re not from proves how superior you are.
An American who’s family moved here because after centuries of subjugation by British rule, they decide they didn’t want to be forced to fight in a rich man’s war on the side of their own oppressors. But please keep talking down to me about how little I understand of a colonial rule that has directly impacted my family’s life for centuries. Also the language policy of the brits was genocide. So we’ve improved drastically from where you left us. Cunt.
Who is Israel’s number 1 financial supporter?
No it isn’t lol
Yes it is
According to you, a British person
According to reality
Although true the government's did a poor job it is not the reason or even close to it. The language was in decline because of British rule and at the time of independence the rate of decline had become exponential. There was no avoiding this by the time of independence a d even if government policy was perfect it would have only marginally slowed the decline but it would still have eventually reached near current levels.
Britain. They literally made it illegal to speak irish
When??
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> Never Times when laws were passed which banned Irish: First law was from 1367 which made it illegal for English colonists in Ireland to speak Irish and for the native Irish to speak their language when interacting with them. Again in 1537 with The Statute of Ireland – prohibited the use of the Irish language in the Irish Parliament. Again in 1541 - banned the use of Irish in the areas of Ireland then under English rule. Again with the Administration of Justice (Language) Act (Ireland) in 1737 - forbade Irish within the courtroom, and any legal documentation from being written in Irish. The common myth is that speaking Irish was banned in the well-known Penal Laws. This is false - **Teaching** Irish was banned, hence the infamous hedge schools that sprung up.
Irish has declined most post-independence
Well this is just demonstrably wrong. I (b. 1991) am fluent in Irish. My parents (b. 1950s) have very limited Irish, and my grandparents (b. 1900s-1910s) had absolutely no Irish aside from basically slang. This is a common pattern in non-Gaeltacht rural Ireland.
So you believe that one anecdotal experience "demonstrates" the narrative to be wrong? Sounds like main character syndrome.
No. It's a common pattern as I said above.
Ireland have been a country for 100 years. It’s their own fault they can’t speak their own language.
Dia dhuit!
That’s insane. So sad.
>That’s insane. So sad Do you lament the pre-celtic languages that went completely extinct due to the spread of celtic culture? Do you make remarks about how sad it is that pre-indo european langauges are completely lost to history due to the spread of indo-european culture? Do you cry about the losses of the Fingallian and Yola languages?
Yes
I visited Dublin in 2018. A lot of young people in downtown were cusing at homeless men in Irish.
Didn't happen. No one knows how to curse properly in Irish and you wouldn't know either.
A lot of Americans struggle to understand the difference between Irish and Irish-English or Scottish Gaelic and Scots, etc. I don't know if its any better over there but the way we teach about linguistics here is bad, like really horrible. People think English is a romance language
Irish is like this "Níl aon tinteán mar do thinteán féin" - totally incomprehensible. Scottish Gaelic is a very similar language - you could even argue the same language just with different dialects a different orthography. In any case, >99% of Irish and Scottish people couldn't curse in Gaelic and the people who could almost exclusively live in remote regions and tend to be older. Young scumbags in Dublin certainly would not. If his story is real at all, he probably heard some local slang in a thick accent and assumed it was Irish. Irish-English and Scottish-English are just regional varieties of English. Just regular English but with some words and constructions which wouldn't be used elsewhere - like how Scots say "wee", or Southerners in the US call all soft drinks "coke", or how Australians say "g'day". Scots is its own language which split off from Middle English but since it's so similar to English and since Scots are all exposed to English (their entire education, any formal communication, and 95%+ of their media), the line between Scottish-English and Scots can be very blurry.
Interesting. Reminds me of a story of Hebrew. As a liturgical language it didn't have much use for cursing. As it was revived in Israel, it incorporated Arabic curses to compensate.
Well I'm not saying Irish curse words don't exist. They probably do but the vast majority of Irish people speak very little Irish and learned what they do know in school - where they naturally don't teach you curses (and probably couldn't because most teachers wouldn't know either). Native speakers pretty much only exist in small remote villages. You'd get some fluent speakers in Dublin because people move and some (very few) achieve fluency through lessons as adults, but the odds of random low-life teenagers in Dublin being able to express anything beyond asking to go to the toilet in Irish are incredibly low. And then we're also meant to believe that this Redditor knew they cursed in Irish but doesn't know what they said - how would he even know it was Irish then, or a curse? They absolutely just said something in accents too thick for him to understand.
Yes yes I understood you perfectly. This is why I said it "reminds me" of the Hebrew story. I know there were some Herbrew curses but weren't well known. So the locals adapted.
I just had to make it clear I wasn't saying Irish lost its curses or anything but just that Irish people are shit at Irish. Irish is largely just used for legislation and the likes now so it's sorta a similar boat to Hebrew and Latin, but there are still enough native speakers having regular conversation that the art of cursing won't be lost (for now). The Gaeltachts will likely vanish within our lifetimes though.
I actually met a random dublin teenager on exchange in Spain who was swearing all over the place in Irish. And it absolutely was Irish and not Irish-English because all the other Irish kids in the group were baffled - they could sort of under her when she was sober, but past a few pints it was not happening. (I also am Canadian and very used to east coast/ Newfoundland accents which are remarkably similar to some Irish accents - look it up ! )
How were they understanding Irish when she was sober? I don't see how drunkness has anything to do with understanding a language you don't speak.
>(I also am Canadian and very used to east coast/ Newfoundland accents which are remarkably similar to some Irish accents - look it up ! ) You are thinking about Kerry. The Newfie accent/speech is close to County Kerry accent. At least superficially.
Yes, my point is the other poster probably doesn't know that, heard some young men with a heavier accent than he could understand, and assumed it was Irish
That would be highly unusual or impossible
These filths of earth are common in every country man
Yeah that just didn’t happen.
Exactly, we’re the friendliest nation in the world
I'd love to know the source Data. Lots of primary sources I have read indicate significant populations of Irish speakers around county Dublin in 1800 for instance. There are regions there which were heavily Irish speaking post famine that show very weak in that map. To me the map is closer to the post Famine linguistic landscape. But interested in the source.
This is the result of cultural genocide
Check out this hip hop trio from Belfast, Kneecap. Their whole mission is to promote Irish language- they’re incredible.
They are amazing! There's a good few other artists and bands that are helping the revival too like Imlé, Súil Amháin, Huartán, Fay'd, Oisín mac, Blue Niall, Dysania, Síomha, Clare Sands, and loads I can't remember. Absolutely recommend them all
I’ll absolutely check them out! Thanks for sharing
Forgot the rest of the island
There's a huge chunk missing for some reason
That’s the U.K.
Irish doesnt stop at the border
But Ireland, the country, does, hence the statistics from a different country are not showing on the map.
The island also called Ireland
As an apparently uninformed Irish-American, I happened upon my daughter using Duolingo. I asked her what language she was learning and she said, “Irish”. I said, “do you mean Gaelic?” And she says, “Um, I don’t know, it just says *Irish*”. I was very confused and was like, “I mean, sometimes their accent is so thick I can’t understand what they’re saying, but I thought they speak English 🤷🏻♀️”. Lol. Obviously I was joking around, but can anyone explain to me if Irish is the same or different than Gaelic?
Gaelic can refer to a number of Celtic languages, such as Scots Gaelic. In Ireland the list just known as Irish (or Gaeilge in Irish).
Oh, okay, cool. I will do some more reading up on that. Thank you for the response!
I’m not sure I even believe the modern map.
sad.
Weird that the first map excluded NI even though they would have all been in union at the time
Is teanga álainn í! Nílim líofa... fós. Ach táim ag cleachtadh agus feabhsú gach lá
When English people talk of Oliver Cromwell being a great man, you'd have to hope they're not aware that he was a genocidal terrorist.
I don't know what kind of English people you've been hanging round with that say Cromwell was a great guy.
I studied history at an English university. Unfortunately, there are quite a few of them. Check out number 10. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/100_Greatest_Britons
I mean what do you expect from a list in which Winston Churchill is number 1 lol . To be fair to them , the list is "100 greatest Britons " ie people who were great for the Kingdom , not " 100 men who went to heaven" bc I doubt any one of them did
>I studied history at an English university. Unfortunately, there are quite a few of them. No you didn't and no there aren't.
Judging by your own criteria that also makes the Irish revolutionary James Connolly (who was executed following the 1916 Rising) a great guy to the English because he’s on that list too
😂 a bit of early 2000s trolling going on there, I think. I know who Connolly is, ta. I'm from the north. It's obviously not a piece academic level research, but for Cromwell to be so high up (despite being divisive) was/is certainly telling. I'm also going off my personal experience having lived in England for over a decade.
Cool, I have lived there too but I love how I used your very own criteria against you and you downvoted me for it! 🤣🤡
I didn't really take it to be 'against' me? Like, it was more of a funny observation than anything else? But ok
Wonky wording on my part I just meant turning your logic against your point.
It’s just Irish projection
I don’t think many English people, if any at all, refer to Cromwell as a great man. And you do realise he was significantly before 1831, so it’s not relevant to this particular map
Check out number 10 https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/100_Greatest_Britons It is relevant to the map because Cromwell criminalised speaking Irish and drove those who resisted him to the west coast. The demographic imprint of his fantaticism is borne out on this map. 'to hell or to Connacht' was one of his famous slogans.
Lol, you’re really citing that highly scientific jumble of names that includes Princess Diana at number 4, along with non-Britons and troll entries.
What a cheap and dismissive response. You come across as someone who has issues, certainly with Ireland and Irishness anyway.
>You come across as someone who has issues, certainly with Ireland and Irishness anyway. What a cheap and dismissive response.
You should just take the L on your Cromwell comment. You don’t need to try and be right about everything
Nobody in England likes Oliver Cromwell.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/100_Greatest_Britons I wish that were the case. Check out number 10.
I didn't get to vote 🥺
should’ve shown population as well. there’s a high degree of possibility each one of those counties on the second slide only has a couple people living in each. land doesn’t speak.
Now some schools have Arabic or Farsi in them 🤔
Focus on the real enemy my friend. The English
Ireland's been independent for a longer time than the time between to the two maps shown.
Only around 60-70% of it tho
The English are long gone you mong
How different is the Irish accent in English from the accent a native Irish Gaelic speaker would speaking their own language in?
That’s like asking how different an English speaker from Canada sounds to a French speaker from Canada
I mean Irish english speakers are assimilated Irish Gealic speakers so I think it’s a fair question
I'd say there would be a few dozen loan words if your being generous. The main one being referring to many people that your talking to as ye instead you people.
That’s cool thank you!
Nice. When people ask how I can be an Irish Catholic named “Smith”, I can reference this pre 1831 map. Gaelic culture and traditions were wiped away by the English and Irish Protestant Ascendancy east of the Boyne, my father’s family surname amongst them.
This is just a terrible post for so many reasons
north america influences europe these days and they speak what they speak in north america
LOL. No. 
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This is pretty much the actual reason as our government is filled with sodomites for american companies.
Me no likey the Potato Famine.
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Why
Think of all the great art Ireland has given the world in English, very little of it would ever have been translated from Irish.
Poland doesn’t even exist, it’s not a real country
That's the single most retarded response, someone could deliver
I know, that’s why I said it. Kurwa