I am an O’Brien. Supposedly my great grandparents lived in Dún Laoghaire. I’ve always wanted to go there and track down where exactly my family lived. I am on day 89/ lesson 89 In Duolingo learning “Irish” and it has proven to be the most difficult language to learn for me.
It’s not the easiest language to learn. But you are learning a very ancient language and a gateway to deeper Irish culture. Plus your friends and family will be impressed. 🤩 Good luck searching for your O’Brien family. Dún Laoghaire is a suburb of Dublin, so their ancestors may have come originally from a different part of Ireland. O’Brien is quite a common name in Ireland. It means that you are a descendant of Brian Boru - the Irish king who defeated the Vikings!
@@irishmatthew Thank you for this information. 🙏🏻 I won’t give up. One day I will find out where my family comes from and will speak with the people who live there now. I’m so thrilled for my upcoming adventures. I love your videos.. thanks again.
Conas atá tú? Is as Gearmáin mé. Táim ag foghlaim Gaeilge. I started learning Irish during confinement and I have not gotten very far yet but hopefully I will improve and then go on vacation in one of the areas you listed to see if someone understands me. Lovely channel, hope to see more :)
Go raibh maith agat a Carola 😀. That’s great you are learning Irish. It’s such a cool language. You are one of a very few people on the planet who can speak it 🤩 Meas mór! I hope you will get to visit Ireland and to practice your Irish ☘️
Hi Matthew, I went to An Ghaeltacht in Donegal as a child, our School sent us there for a week or 2 weeks, (can't remember that far back now) I loved it there, we had some wonderful times on that little Island..
@@irishmatthew I have no idea Mathew, all we knew it was as An Ghaeltacht....all the old ladies wore black shawls it would have been 1964/65 or it could have been earlier than that....Rolling Stones were singing I can't get No Satisfaction at the time haha! someone had a radio on speakers on the Island and it was blasting out that song, I just remembered Arranmore :)
My grandad spoke Irish but sadly I never heard him do so -- but he had a wonderful accent. He grew up on the coast in Kerry and Cork and his stories were of Valentia Island and Skibereen and other places around there. He lived most of his life in England.
Well done Pete. It’s not the easiest language to learn 🤓 The ultimate way is to spend time in the Gaeltacht immersed in the language. But that can be difficult to do. I find watching TG4 good and I also listen to Radio Na Gaeltacht.
Thanks Matthew, great video, I learned a lot in 4 minutes, fair play 👏 I’m hoping to visit every Gaeltacht area in 2021…but I haven’t spoken a word of Irish in over 30 years 😳 Any pointers or advice on where is best to start learning again/afresh? Thanks again
Maith thú agus go raibh maith agat. Duolingo is an easy way to start learning straight away. TG4 has great content and the Irish is relatively easy to understand. Radio na Life has relatively easy Irish as well. Radio na Gaeltachta is great, but can be difficult to understand if your irish is not good. There are a few pop up Gaeltachtai coming back now that covid has ended. I love this site as well - www.bitesize.irish/
Great videos. Greetings from Macedonia. What are the methods the English used to convert the Irish to speak English? It has made a big difference for sure in their lives. Macedonians in Aegean Macedonia were in the same situation with the Greeks, today only the old people speak Macedonian fluently there, the rest only greek.
For the most part, there was no intention by the English to make the Irish give up their language. It was mostly economical. The English crown always had a foothold in Ireland, in Dublin. But most of Ireland was still Gaelic and spoke Irish. That changed in 1601, when the old Gaelic order was defeated by the English. The upper class was replaced by English speakers and English culture. The legal, political and educational system became English speaking. Most of the people still spoke Irish, but it was the language of the poor and of the defeated. It gradually lost it’s prestige as a language. All this changed dramatically with the great famine (1845 to 1852). The famine devastated Irish speaking areas. The language of trade, commerce, the law and social advancement was English. So in one generation half of the country changed from speaking Irish to English. It was to give their children a chance to succeed and so that they would never have to endure what their parents endured (ie die of starvation). To answer your question - it was the fact that all the organs of state were through the medium of English - ie the legal system, the educational system, the political system etc. Also English was also the language of trade and the language of the world (and still is). It opens a lot of doors to be proficient in English. As far as I know, there are similar examples in other European countries - eg most young people in France, Germany and Italy now speak the same language. But 100 years ago, their dialects may have been totally different. A central authority brought about a ‘correct version’ of the language eg metropolitan French, High German, Tuscan Italian. I presume something similar happened in Greece in the 19th and 20th century.
The english banned Irish from public life ,so any thing got to do with the state was in English and it was also not in the schools and when they did let it in to the schools it was just as a token, the same is happening in the Republic of Ireland at the moment Irish is of no use in life or in work and is of limited use in education ,if you are interested in language revival study the revival of Hebrew in Israel all education was in Hebrew and all public life was in Hebrew and the language of home was mostly Yiddish the revival of Hebrew does not get the attention it deserves because of the history
Maith thú a mhac , níl leath a dóthain aird á dtabhairt ar na Gaeltachtaí.. 3:08 ní baileach , tá corr dhuine thart nach bhfuil an teanga sin ar eolas acu
Go raibh maith agat a bhainne. Ní raibh fhios agam go raibh daoine fós i gConamara nach labhraíonn Béarla. Is cuimhin liom a bheith ag obair mar dhochtúir i nGaillimh agus ag bualadh ar dhaoine scothaosta as Connemara a labhair Béarla maith comhrá, ach nuair a bhí siad tinn níor theastaigh uathu ach labhairt trí Ghaeilge (tuigim cén fáth)
Hahaha. I never noticed 😂 There is no official Gaeltacht in South Armagh. I don’t know why it is on the map. But I am sure that Irish would have been spoken there well into the 19th century.
@@irishmatthew there is a small Irish school in newry that used to be run by a caraher (a notable Republican family in south Armagh). I’m American but my grandparents hailed from south Armagh and I would go in the summers. My grandma who just passed two months ago taught me prayers she learned in Irish. I still hold those memories close to my heart and can say my summers spent there are some of my fondest memories. It’s such an overlooked part of Ireland and beautiful now especially with the towers and soldiers gone! Thanks for the video man! Cheers
@@shawnfinnegan64 Thanks Shaun. It is definitely a beautiful, overlooked part of the country. My granny was from just over the border from south Armagh. Sorry to hear about your granny. ‘’Keep the faith…’ as your president says 😀
The old district of Oriel (south Armagh, south Monaghan, north Louth) was the last major Irish speaking district in the eastern half of Ireland. The dialect they spoke was East Ulster Gaelic, which was once spoken from county Antrim to the Boyne in county Meath. That particular dialect is now extinct, but there is a recording in the RTE archives of a woman called Annie O’Hanlon speaking it in the 1960s. She came from outside Omeath in the Cooley mountains in Louth, close to the border with Armagh. She was the very last native Irish speaker in Oriel. Anybody who’s interested can just google it and listen and read the history of this once substantial Irish speaking district.
Something I realized. There’s probably loads of dialects like there is in the Netherlands. Once you kill a tongue in a village completely, it’s not coming back. So teaching ‘Irish’, will help nobody at all. Parents who still speak Irish natively have to raise their children on it, otherwise it dies.
Eolas iontach. Tá mé as Mhaigh Eo agus labhraíonn mé Gaedhilige (Na canúint i Mhaigh Eo Theas). Tá Tuair Mhic Éadaigh - Partraígh, an daingean is mó. Ach tá an canúint breactha dtimpeall i Mhaigh Eo Iarthar agus Theas mar'sin déanann muid rudaí difriúlchta. Is aoibhinn liom a laibhairt leis na muintir óna Gaeltachteanna timpeall na hÉireann. Tá dhá comharsana agam ó gConamara Thuaidh agus Spidéal agus tá na difríochtaí inár Gaeilge an-suimiúil, agus labhraíonn muid Gaeilge Connachtach
Go raibh maith agat a Dheagánaich. Tá sé sin ana suimiúil. Ní raibh a fhios agam faoi Tuair Mhic Éadaigh-Partraigh i Mhaigh Eo theas. Smaoiním i gcónaí ar Ghaeltacht Mhaigh Eo mar Acaill agus Béal an Mhuirthead. Táim fiosrach ar an gcaoi a litríonn tú Gaeilge - Gaeildhilige. An é seo mar a litrítear an Ghaeilge i Maigh Eo? Beagán cosúil le ‘gaelainn’ i gCiarraí.
@@irishmatthew Tá fáilte romhat. Sea, Dúiche Sheoighe ea thugtar air. Ach drochuair tá sé i mbaol 😔 Iorrais agus Acailla na Gaeltachteanna eile i Maigh Eo san Thuaidh. I Mhaigh Eo Theas litríonn muid Gaeilge - Gaeildhilige ach fuaimnítear sé an rud céanna. Litríonn siad Gaedhlage i hIrrois, ach tá na scoile a'marú an sean litriú
The West Belfast Gaeltacht - that is not a genuine Gaeltacht, mate. They are all native speakers of English speaking Irish with heavy, comically heavy, English accents and littering their Irish with mistakes. If you want to hear "dhá bhliain" pronounced as "gá bhliain", head for the Belfast Gaeltacht Quarter. If you want to hear "tá mé fear" instead of "is fear mé", go there also. It's about as genuine as people in Belfast setting up an Ancient Hittite-speaking area.
I don't understand how people can be such idiots. If you want to give feedback, at least be more polite. The internet is already full of idiots who do nothing but complain. My advice is that you make better videos than Matthew and stop just complaining about your ass sitting on the couch.
@@cacabulock Camilla, you were unable to deny the truth of what I said. A Gaeltacht formed from poor learners of the language, that is not a Gaeltacht. Ní Gaelainn mhaith a labharthar sa Cheathrú Gaeltacht Bhéal Féirste, is baolach - nílid siad ach ag imirt leis an dteangain.
Thank you for the comment Disappointed Englishman. I’ve never been to the west Belfast Gaeltacht, so I can’t comment on the standard of spoken Irish there. But you may well be right. However I do find the tone of your comment disparaging, especially giving the amount of trauma the community there has sustained in recent history.
Matthew why do you avoid explaining why there are so few places in Ireland that speak Irish? Its because the British beat it out of us. It was illegal to speak Irish.
This was a factor. Also poverty - to succeed in 19th and 20th century Ireland, you needed to speak English. Daniel O’Connell recognised this. And snobbery / racism from the ruling establishment class in London at the time. (This hasn’t died - just tune into some of the pronouncement from Boris Johnson, some in his cabinet and other prominent Brexiteers) The Gaelic revival of the late 19th century was a recognition that the language was dying and that an effort was needed to stop it from being lost entirely.
Sorry but that is not true and is just a very common myth. Speaking Irish was never illegal under the Penal Laws or any other statute. What is true is that the court system introduced procedural rules that prohibited use of Irish when presenting cases and in other legal contexts. But that didn’t mean that the language was illegal. The real reason for the language’s historic decline was that Irish people came to believe that it was economically advantageous to speak English. My own maternal grandmother was born in far West Cork shortly after the turn of the century. She was raised by her grandparents who were native speakers but they absolutely refused to speak Irish to her because of the stigma and the disadvantage they believed it would bring. Just to be clear, I’m not saying that the decline of Irish wasn’t a consequence of the British occupation. I’m just saying that the reasons were economic rather than legal.
Unfortunately, this is a lie. The British did NOT beat Irish out of a single person. Irish-speaking parents DID beat it out of their children. It was NEVER illegal to speak Irish in Ireland!
@@disappointedenglishman98 Irish parents refused to teach their children their native language because they were colonised and made to feel ashamed of their own language and culture. Just because it wasn't technically illegal doesn't mean that British colonialism isn't to blame.
@@patriciag6030 That is simply a lie.The reason why Irish people beat their children for speaking English was an awareness after the Famine that they couldn't carry on in poverty and squalor - and the economic opportunities were in the English-speaking cities such as Dublin and Cork. They beat their chlidren to help them, funnily enough.
Ireland is a sad example of how a native language can collapse and how people can adopt an invading language cy or in this case England for the Motherland.
![[ ออกกอง ] วัยหนุ่ม 2544 โลกหลังลูกกรง..ทัวร์กองถ่ายหนังใน "คุกของจริง" | JUSTดูIT.](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/vB--aOkZCpw/mqdefault.jpg)
As a Basque speaker person who has interest in Irish and Gaeltacht areas this video has been very interesting. Greetings from the Basque Country!
Thank you. The basque people are very close genetic relatives to the native Irish. We go all the way back to the Stone Age and before :-)
I am an O’Brien. Supposedly my great grandparents lived in Dún Laoghaire. I’ve always wanted to go there and track down where exactly my family lived. I am on day 89/ lesson 89 In Duolingo learning “Irish” and it has proven to be the most difficult language to learn for me.
It’s not the easiest language to learn. But you are learning a very ancient language and a gateway to deeper Irish culture. Plus your friends and family will be impressed. 🤩
Good luck searching for your O’Brien family. Dún Laoghaire is a suburb of Dublin, so their ancestors may have come originally from a different part of Ireland. O’Brien is quite a common name in Ireland. It means that you are a descendant of Brian Boru - the Irish king who defeated the Vikings!
@@irishmatthew Thank you for this information. 🙏🏻 I won’t give up. One day I will find out where my family comes from and will speak with the people who live there now. I’m so thrilled for my upcoming adventures. I love your videos.. thanks again.
I am an O’Brien. I’m about 80 lessons behind you. Keep up the good work! Persist!🎉
Conas atá tú? Is as Gearmáin mé. Táim ag foghlaim Gaeilge. I started learning Irish during confinement and I have not gotten very far yet but hopefully I will improve and then go on vacation in one of the areas you listed to see if someone understands me. Lovely channel, hope to see more :)
Go raibh maith agat a Carola 😀. That’s great you are learning Irish. It’s such a cool language. You are one of a very few people on the planet who can speak it 🤩 Meas mór! I hope you will get to visit Ireland and to practice your Irish ☘️
An-mhaith👍
Keep learning! I'm learning Irish too. It's difficult but I love it and the people I've met through it.
Maith thú, a Charóla! 👍 Is iontach an rud é go bhfuil ag foghlaim na Gaeilge thall sa Ghearmáin
Lean ar aghaidh leis.
parts of my family come from Armagh, I'd love to learn the language and experience Ireland some day
Nice. The Orchard County! I hope you get to visit us here in Ireland some time and get to learn a cúpla focal.
Thanks for posting . I missed that area last time I was in Ireland .
Next time Robert 😃
The scenery in the Gaeltacht areas is amazing.
Hi Matthew, I went to An Ghaeltacht in Donegal as a child, our School sent us there for a week or 2 weeks, (can't remember that far back now) I loved it there, we had some wonderful times on that little Island..
That’s fantastic Mary.
Which island were you on? Tory? Arranmore?
@@irishmatthew I have no idea Mathew, all we knew it was as An Ghaeltacht....all the old ladies wore black shawls it would have been 1964/65 or it could have been earlier than that....Rolling Stones were singing I can't get No Satisfaction at the time haha! someone had a radio on speakers on the Island and it was blasting out that song, I just remembered Arranmore :)
@mary maclaughlan hahaha. Great memories. Rocking Arranmore with the stones 😎
@@irishmatthew That's about the height of it Matthew Haha!
My grandad spoke Irish but sadly I never heard him do so -- but he had a wonderful accent. He grew up on the coast in Kerry and Cork and his stories were of Valentia Island and Skibereen and other places around there. He lived most of his life in England.
He sounds like he was a wonderful man.
Thank you for the videos. I would like to learn Irish very much.
Thanks Paula. It is becoming really popular to learn. There is something like a million people learning it on Duolingo.
@@irishmatthew Good , I am glad people are doingthat so that we don't lose it!
Very interesting
Thank you Odette
@@irishmatthewMy grandfather came from Mullingar then over to Liverpool and I am in the Caribbean, Irish are everywhere!
GRMA! Tá me ag foghlaim Gaeilge anois agus tá súil agam dul go dti an Ghaeltacht! ☘
Maith thú a a phongop. Is iontach é sin.
I've got a 137 day streak going on Duolingo trying to learn the language - but it doesn't come easy to me.
Well done Pete. It’s not the easiest language to learn 🤓
The ultimate way is to spend time in the Gaeltacht immersed in the language. But that can be difficult to do.
I find watching TG4 good and I also listen to Radio Na Gaeltacht.
I am a McCormick Very proud of my Irish heritage. I study and speak the language everyday! Munster!!! Erin go Braugh!!!!!
That’s fantastic Alex. Well done. What do you use to study?
Thanks Matthew, great video, I learned a lot in 4 minutes, fair play 👏
I’m hoping to visit every Gaeltacht area in 2021…but I haven’t spoken a word of Irish in over 30 years 😳 Any pointers or advice on where is best to start learning again/afresh? Thanks again
Maith thú agus go raibh maith agat. Duolingo is an easy way to start learning straight away. TG4 has great content and the Irish is relatively easy to understand. Radio na Life has relatively easy Irish as well. Radio na Gaeltachta is great, but can be difficult to understand if your irish is not good. There are a few pop up Gaeltachtai coming back now that covid has ended. I love this site as well - www.bitesize.irish/
So it's one year since you posted ,so how is your Irish now
How would you recommend going about learning irish/the different dialects? I'm on duolingo but I'm not sure thats the best option out there
Great videos. Greetings from Macedonia. What are the methods the English used to convert the Irish to speak English? It has made a big difference for sure in their lives. Macedonians in Aegean Macedonia were in the same situation with the Greeks, today only the old people speak Macedonian fluently there, the rest only greek.
For the most part, there was no intention by the English to make the Irish give up their language. It was mostly economical.
The English crown always had a foothold in Ireland, in Dublin. But most of Ireland was still Gaelic and spoke Irish. That changed in 1601, when the old Gaelic order was defeated by the English. The upper class was replaced by English speakers and English culture. The legal, political and educational system became English speaking. Most of the people still spoke Irish, but it was the language of the poor and of the defeated. It gradually lost it’s prestige as a language.
All this changed dramatically with the great famine (1845 to 1852). The famine devastated Irish speaking areas. The language of trade, commerce, the law and social advancement was English. So in one generation half of the country changed from speaking Irish to English. It was to give their children a chance to succeed and so that they would never have to endure what their parents endured (ie die of starvation).
To answer your question - it was the fact that all the organs of state were through the medium of English - ie the legal system, the educational system, the political system etc. Also English was also the language of trade and the language of the world (and still is). It opens a lot of doors to be proficient in English.
As far as I know, there are similar examples in other European countries - eg most young people in France, Germany and Italy now speak the same language. But 100 years ago, their dialects may have been totally different. A central authority brought about a ‘correct version’ of the language eg metropolitan French, High German, Tuscan Italian. I presume something similar happened in Greece in the 19th and 20th century.
The english banned Irish from public life ,so any thing got to do with the state was in English and it was also not in the schools and when they did let it in to the schools it was just as a token, the same is happening in the Republic of Ireland at the moment Irish is of no use in life or in work and is of limited use in education ,if you are interested in language revival study the revival of Hebrew in Israel all education was in Hebrew and all public life was in Hebrew and the language of home was mostly Yiddish the revival of Hebrew does not get the attention it deserves because of the history
Maith thú a mhac , níl leath a dóthain aird á dtabhairt ar na Gaeltachtaí..
3:08 ní baileach , tá corr dhuine thart nach bhfuil an teanga sin ar eolas acu
Go raibh maith agat a bhainne.
Ní raibh fhios agam go raibh daoine fós i gConamara nach labhraíonn Béarla. Is cuimhin liom a bheith ag obair mar dhochtúir i nGaillimh agus ag bualadh ar dhaoine scothaosta as Connemara a labhair Béarla maith comhrá, ach nuair a bhí siad tinn níor theastaigh uathu ach labhairt trí Ghaeilge (tuigim cén fáth)
I like how you had south Armagh on the map! 😂 cmon Armagh!
Hahaha. I never noticed 😂 There is no official Gaeltacht in South Armagh. I don’t know why it is on the map. But I am sure that Irish would have been spoken there well into the 19th century.
@@irishmatthew there is a small Irish school in newry that used to be run by a caraher (a notable Republican family in south Armagh). I’m American but my grandparents hailed from south Armagh and I would go in the summers. My grandma who just passed two months ago taught me prayers she learned in Irish. I still hold those memories close to my heart and can say my summers spent there are some of my fondest memories. It’s such an overlooked part of Ireland and beautiful now especially with the towers and soldiers gone! Thanks for the video man! Cheers
@@shawnfinnegan64 Thanks Shaun. It is definitely a beautiful, overlooked part of the country. My granny was from just over the border from south Armagh. Sorry to hear about your granny. ‘’Keep the faith…’ as your president says 😀
The old district of Oriel (south Armagh, south Monaghan, north Louth) was the last major Irish speaking district in the eastern half of Ireland. The dialect they spoke was East Ulster Gaelic, which was once spoken from county Antrim to the Boyne in county Meath.
That particular dialect is now extinct, but there is a recording in the RTE archives of a woman called Annie O’Hanlon speaking it in the 1960s. She came from outside Omeath in the Cooley mountains in Louth, close to the border with Armagh. She was the very last native Irish speaker in Oriel. Anybody who’s interested can just google it and listen and read the history of this once substantial Irish speaking district.
Ah Ghaeilge abú!
🙂
GRMA
I visited my Ó Cinnéide family in an Gráige, (Baile an Fheirtéaraigh), Contae Chiarraí over three Summers in the 70s and 90s.
Don’t forget west belfast.
Go raibh maith agat a Genevieve. I think I mentioned it. But I’ve never been there. It’s on my list of places to visit.
Canedys and Cooks idk 🤷🏼
County Mayo i’m from ty 23 & Me
?
Something I realized. There’s probably loads of dialects like there is in the Netherlands.
Once you kill a tongue in a village completely, it’s not coming back.
So teaching ‘Irish’, will help nobody at all. Parents who still speak Irish natively have to raise their children on it, otherwise it dies.
Eolas iontach. Tá mé as Mhaigh Eo agus labhraíonn mé Gaedhilige (Na canúint i Mhaigh Eo Theas). Tá Tuair Mhic Éadaigh - Partraígh, an daingean is mó. Ach tá an canúint breactha dtimpeall i Mhaigh Eo Iarthar agus Theas mar'sin déanann muid rudaí difriúlchta. Is aoibhinn liom a laibhairt leis na muintir óna Gaeltachteanna timpeall na hÉireann. Tá dhá comharsana agam ó gConamara Thuaidh agus Spidéal agus tá na difríochtaí inár Gaeilge an-suimiúil, agus labhraíonn muid Gaeilge Connachtach
Go raibh maith agat a Dheagánaich. Tá sé sin ana suimiúil. Ní raibh a fhios agam faoi Tuair Mhic Éadaigh-Partraigh i Mhaigh Eo theas.
Smaoiním i gcónaí ar Ghaeltacht Mhaigh Eo mar Acaill agus Béal an Mhuirthead.
Táim fiosrach ar an gcaoi a litríonn tú Gaeilge - Gaeildhilige. An é seo mar a litrítear an Ghaeilge i Maigh Eo? Beagán cosúil le ‘gaelainn’ i gCiarraí.
@@irishmatthew Tá fáilte romhat. Sea, Dúiche Sheoighe ea thugtar air. Ach drochuair tá sé i mbaol 😔 Iorrais agus Acailla na Gaeltachteanna eile i Maigh Eo san Thuaidh.
I Mhaigh Eo Theas litríonn muid Gaeilge - Gaeildhilige ach fuaimnítear sé an rud céanna. Litríonn siad Gaedhlage i hIrrois, ach tá na scoile a'marú an sean litriú
@@deaganachomarunacathasaigh4344Na bi Ag caint, since 26 it's official, they have been trying to eradicate the Gaelic
Go raibh maith!😅
The West Belfast Gaeltacht - that is not a genuine Gaeltacht, mate. They are all native speakers of English speaking Irish with heavy, comically heavy, English accents and littering their Irish with mistakes. If you want to hear "dhá bhliain" pronounced as "gá bhliain", head for the Belfast Gaeltacht Quarter. If you want to hear "tá mé fear" instead of "is fear mé", go there also. It's about as genuine as people in Belfast setting up an Ancient Hittite-speaking area.
I don't understand how people can be such idiots. If you want to give feedback, at least be more polite. The internet is already full of idiots who do nothing but complain. My advice is that you make better videos than Matthew and stop just complaining about your ass sitting on the couch.
@@cacabulock Camilla, you were unable to deny the truth of what I said. A Gaeltacht formed from poor learners of the language, that is not a Gaeltacht. Ní Gaelainn mhaith a labharthar sa Cheathrú Gaeltacht Bhéal Féirste, is baolach - nílid siad ach ag imirt leis an dteangain.
What is your problem? Go fix what to do in your useless life!
@@cacabulock Camilla, you are unable even to argue properly. Mo thrua do cheann!
Thank you for the comment Disappointed Englishman. I’ve never been to the west Belfast Gaeltacht, so I can’t comment on the standard of spoken Irish there. But you may well be right. However I do find the tone of your comment disparaging, especially giving the amount of trauma the community there has sustained in recent history.
Matthew why do you avoid explaining why there are so few places in Ireland that speak Irish? Its because the British beat it out of us. It was illegal to speak Irish.
This was a factor. Also poverty - to succeed in 19th and 20th century Ireland, you needed to speak English. Daniel O’Connell recognised this.
And snobbery / racism from the ruling establishment class in London at the time. (This hasn’t died - just tune into some of the pronouncement from Boris Johnson, some in his cabinet and other prominent Brexiteers)
The Gaelic revival of the late 19th century was a recognition that the language was dying and that an effort was needed to stop it from being lost entirely.
Sorry but that is not true and is just a very common myth. Speaking Irish was never illegal under the Penal Laws or any other statute. What is true is that the court system introduced procedural rules that prohibited use of Irish when presenting cases and in other legal contexts. But that didn’t mean that the language was illegal. The real reason for the language’s historic decline was that Irish people came to believe that it was economically advantageous to speak English. My own maternal grandmother was born in far West Cork shortly after the turn of the century. She was raised by her grandparents who were native speakers but they absolutely refused to speak Irish to her because of the stigma and the disadvantage they believed it would bring. Just to be clear, I’m not saying that the decline of Irish wasn’t a consequence of the British occupation. I’m just saying that the reasons were economic rather than legal.
Unfortunately, this is a lie. The British did NOT beat Irish out of a single person. Irish-speaking parents DID beat it out of their children. It was NEVER illegal to speak Irish in Ireland!
@@disappointedenglishman98 Irish parents refused to teach their children their native language because they were colonised and made to feel ashamed of their own language and culture. Just because it wasn't technically illegal doesn't mean that British colonialism isn't to blame.
@@patriciag6030 That is simply a lie.The reason why Irish people beat their children for speaking English was an awareness after the Famine that they couldn't carry on in poverty and squalor - and the economic opportunities were in the English-speaking cities such as Dublin and Cork. They beat their chlidren to help them, funnily enough.
Ireland is a sad example of how a native language can collapse and how people can adopt an invading language cy or in this case England for the Motherland.
Yes, it is sad. The language has nearly died, but there is a revival of sorts and I think Irish is going to get a lot stronger in the coming decades.