IRISH LANGUAGE:
A New View
of the Irish Language, edited by Caoifhionn Nic Phaidin and Sean O'
Cearnaigh, Cois Life Teo, 271pp, €20
THIS IS a book of 20 essays each
of which deals (in English) with an aspect of the Irish language in
a contemporary context. Each essay is of value and a number pose
particular challenges, writes
Proinsias O'Drisceoil.
Aidan Doyle's essay Modern Irish Scholarship at Home and Abroad defies its unpromising title by proposing a complete change in the way Irish is taught at university level. He advocates for Irish "the compilation of a language course such as is available for other foreign languages" and claims "it is hard to defend the policy of lecturing through the medium of Irish, considering the lack of teaching aids and books".
He acknowledges that to begin teaching through the medium of English would necessarily involve an abandonment of the Irish revival and what he sees as an attachment by academics to outmoded forms of romantic cultural nationalism. His argument follows the lines of the distinction between civic and ethnic nationalism and challenges the view that the importance of Irish derives from its status as a signifier of ethnic distinctiveness, the standard justification for state support.
He believes the ethnic emphasis has resulted in the exclusion of those not belonging to the dominant native tradition and in what one presumes is a reference to the recent celebration of the 300th anniversary of the foundation of St Anthony's College, Louvain, by the Franciscans, he notes that "while much research has been done on Catholic writings of the 17th century aimed at countering the effects of the Reformation, comparatively little has been written about the Protestant translations of the Bible and the Book of Common Prayer in the same period".
Doyle's argument is one which demands attention as the ethnic presumptions of cultural nationalism are undermined by mass-immigration. However, even Doyle fails to discuss the extent to which the entire state promotion of Irish has been reliant on partition. The un-noticed disappearance of Irish-speaking communities in the Sperrin Mountains and in the Glens of Antrim during the years of Stormont rule, the complete denial by Stormont of public rights to speakers of Irish and the current hostility among Unionists towards the idea of an Irish Language Act, all underline the fact that an Ireland which included a million Northern Protestants with full democratic entitlements would have been one where language policies would have had to be watered down in order to take their views and culture into account. For the many Irish language activists who desired a united Ireland, the granting of their wish would have proved to be the ultimate curse.
For sociologist Pádraig Ó Riagáin, (Irish Language Policy 1922-2007: Balancing Maintenance and Revival) "the Official Languages Act 2003 signals a false dawn or, maybe, a last hurrah". Based on a concept of individual rights rather than any idea of a general revival of the language, the Act will, he suspects, fall foul of the numerical and social weakness of Irish-speaking networks. Equally, however, the argument could be made that the degree of delay and frustration involved in any attempt to deal through Irish with state agencies acts as a deterrent, not least in Gaeltacht areas where a resigned acceptance that a state official is by definition a speaker of English is universal. Indeed it is difficult to see how a civil service and Garda force with nominal Irish language admission qualifications can operate the Act.
In a feisty and entertaining essay (Teaching and Learning Irish Today) Anna Ní Ghallachair, director of the Language Centre, National University of Ireland, Maynooth, argues that the literature component of Irish language courses at second level should be maintained and she draws attention to what she sees as the "disastrous consequences" which have followed the dropping of the compulsory literature component from second-level courses in European languages. Nor has this, she argues, increased the communicative competence of students.
Both Ní Ghallachair and John Harris (Irish in the Education System) contradict the widely-held view that large amounts of school time are devoted to the teaching of Irish. In a crowded curriculum the amount of time devoted to the subject in primary school is at most 2.5 hours per week for junior and senior infants and 3.5 hours for first to sixth classes. Some teachers, for reasons discussed sympathetically by Ní Ghallachair, hardly teach the subject at all. In secondary schools the requirements of the examination system make the enjoyable teaching of the language itself an indulgence which cannot be risked and the language skills of students remain static. The outcome is predictable.
Conchúir Ó Giollagáin and Seosamh Mac Donnachacha (The Gaeltacht Today) show the extent to which Gaeltacht areas are "in an advanced stage of language shift". As a consequence the immersion in a second language available to students of French, Spanish or German is far less available to learners of Irish. Their essay indicates how state policy might counteract the seeming inevitability of the Gaeltacht's demise but, as the use of English becomes embedded among the young in all Gaeltacht areas, it is difficult to be hopeful.
This is a stimulating, handsomely-produced book, essential reading for the politicians, teachers, state planners and officials who will ignore it.
...
Proinsias Ó Drisceoil is the author of Seán Ó Dálaigh: Éigse agus Iomarbhá (Cork University Press 2007)