AH Challenge: Gaelic-speaking Ireland

This is admittedly based on a thread that another poster started in a foolish and mildly offensive way, but the question is solid -- Why did Ireland end up with English as it's first language, well-meaning attempts to revive Gaelic notwithstanding?

Folks had already cited the fact that England is larger, more important, right next door, and actively occupying/settling the country for a good part of it's history, but I thought the same could be said for much of the Balkans, and Albanian seems to be doing okay these days. My best theory is that by the time Ireland broke off, English was already established as a global language of trade, and attempts to displace it with an obscure regional dialect were seen as a nuisance, national pride be damned.

In that case, it seems like one answer to the challenge could be for one of France's zany schemes to take Ireland to actually succeed -- an earlier Galic revival, perhaps one encouraged by the occup... er, "liberating" power, could stick. Alternately, we could reduce the dominance of Britain+America in global trade in the 20th century, though that might actually be harder than Napoleon having a good day.

Thoughts? Am I missing something obvious? Does this need a POD in 1600 to work?

I think that the main problem is that Ireland was a democracy and it was not able to impose Irish at a state administration level.

If Ireland became a dictatorship after independence it would be able to decree mandatory use of Irish and creat a standard literary language earlier.

Zajir said:

I think that the main problem is that Ireland was a democracy and it was not able to impose Irish at a state administration level.

If Ireland became a dictatorship after independence it would be able to decree mandatory use of Irish and creat a standard lterary language earlier.

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Hmm, maybe... but it's worth noting that the Irish Free state evidently did require proficiency in Irish at the civil service level from 1922-1974, and it didn't seem to help. Of course, being able to Stamp Out the Foul Tongue of the Oppressor at gunpoint would certainly help, but could such a dictatorship hold power, or is English so ingrained at this point that such measures would just end in counter-revolt?

Of course, we could have Irish independence in the 18th or 19th century (doesn't have to be by French invasion per se, though losing Ireland before 1900 probably requires Britain to lose a war with someone), followed by the Revolutionary Hero turning into the Protector of the Revolution, and that probably gets us there.

Not being occupied by England is key. The shorter that period is, the less the likelihood of Gaelic extinction.

I guess a question related to this thread is why do Wales & Brittany have so many native speakers of their variant forms of the Celtic language family & Ireland & Scotland so relatively few? Wales & Brittany historically have been under English & French cultural & political domination, respectively, much longer than Ireland & Scotland.

Even if there was never an attempt by England to settle or take over Ireland (which is rather unavoidable) English or another language (possibly French, given the Norman ruling class at the time) would almost inevitably displace Irish Gaelic in Ireland, at least among the ruling classes there. In fact it might actually be faster in a TL without England settlement/conquest because then the use of the language wouldn't be so politicised. The reason being that language is driven by trade, and Ireland is too poor and Irish Gaelic too unusual and distantly related a language for foreigners to bother learning it, the Irish would be learning English or French or another trade tongue instead. Irish Gaelic could still be the majority language used in the sticks, and then I suppose you could say eventual shifts of power towards the proletariat (i.e. cutting off heads of nobs) could lead to it becoming the official language (compare places like Hungary or Czechia for instance), but that's all I can think of offhand.

Thande said:

Even if there was never an attempt by England to settle or take over Ireland (which is rather unavoidable) English or another language (possibly French, given the Norman ruling class at the time) would almost inevitably displace Irish Gaelic in Ireland, at least among the ruling classes there. In fact it might actually be faster in a TL without England settlement/conquest because then the use of the language wouldn't be so politicised. The reason being that language is driven by trade, and Ireland is too poor and Irish Gaelic too unusual and distantly related a language for foreigners to bother learning it, the Irish would be learning English or French or another trade tongue instead.

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Point me to one of these so-called peaceful language shifts where a country in not dominated by a foreign political class or a foreign power.

I can't think of any. Finnish is still around, isn't it? Not going anywhere. Lithuanian and Latvian survived. Surely Lithuania isn't any richer than Ireland? Hungarian is doing fine.

Vietnamese and Korean never got overwhelmed by Mandarin, though equally large languages that ended up under direct Chinese rule are now on their way out. Tibetan stuck around, and Tibet is hugely poor, but now that China's there in force the writing's on the wall.

Trade => language shift is not a hypothesis that stands up to examination. Political power is far more important.

In Ireland's case you had a combination case of both being politically dominated AND subsumed in an English-oriented trade system. Take away one and Gaelic will still be around.

Occupuation seems easier to remove than trade links.

Herzen's love-child said:

I guess a question related to this thread is why do Wales & Brittany have so many native speakers of their variant forms of the Celtic language family & Ireland & Scotland so relatively few? Wales & Brittany historically have been under English & French cultural & political domination, respectively, much longer than Ireland & Scotland.

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Because Scotland and Ireland had native ruling classes who preferred to use a form of English, which was generally not the case in Brittany and Wales. And in Scotland this has pretty much always been the case, as long as there has been a recognisable Scotland, with Gaelic being associated with commoners and barbarian Highlanders. This is why there is a politicised debate now over whether Scots English is a separate language to English or just a dialect.

Ireland is a more complex case because much of the wars there can be summed up as "last century's set of English settlers vs. this century's set of English settlers" and there was acculturation going on: you can see this in language, you've got Yola, Irish-English from the 1200s, Fingalian, modern Irish-English, Ulster Scots (Irish-ised Scottish English), etc. It's been pointed out that, strictly speaking, most of the people Cromwell killed in Ireland were "English", it's just debated as to where the line blurs, i.e. at what point do the descendants of English settlers in Ireland become Irish. But the point is that the political identity of languages got blurred by these waves of settlement and how the languages interacted with each other: the modern use of Irish Gaelic is largely a deliberate revival on the part of the Irish Republic's government to distance the country from its past and try to establish a unique identity.

RGB said:

Point me to one of these so-called peaceful language shifts where a country in not dominated by a foreign political class or a foreign power.

I can't think of any. Finnish is still around, isn't it? Not going anywhere. Lithuanian and Latvian survived. Surely Lithuania isn't any richer than Ireland? Hungarian is doing fine.

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I don't think you're using the same definitions as me. All those examples you use are comparable to what I was talking about. I meant the ruling classes would stop using Irish Gaelic as their primary tongue of choice, so in order for Irish Gaelic to be the national language, that would require a shift in the balance of power later on, as indeed was the case in all those countries you mentioned.

Well laid out, Thande. Thanks!

Thande said:

I don't think you're using the same definitions as me. All those examples you use are comparable to what I was talking about. I meant the ruling classes would stop using Irish Gaelic as their primary tongue of choice, so in order for Irish Gaelic to be the national language, that would require a shift in the balance of power later on, as indeed was the case in all those countries you mentioned.

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Ruling classes can and do change their language more easily than the bulk of the populace as long as that populace has no mobility and little mandatory schooling. I'm not sure how it's entirely relevant.

But your Czech parallel is actually pretty good. It's basically the same as my Finnish parallel.

The Baltic state had a German speaking elite, Finland a Swedish speaking one, Ragusa a Italian speaking one. In all these states the local languages won out.

Wiki:

From the eighteenth century the language went into a decline, rapidly losing ground to English due in part to restrictions dictated by British rule – a conspicuous example of the process known by linguists as language shift.[20] In the mid-nineteenth century it lost a large portion of its speakers to death and emigration resulting from poverty, particularly in the wake of the Great Famine (1845–1849).

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So not sure if this 'it was naturally outcompeted by English' stuff has application.

Thande said:

Because Scotland and Ireland had native ruling classes who preferred to use a form of English, which was generally not the case in Brittany and Wales.

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French became Brittany's administrative language during the 13th Century, BEFORE the union with the Kingdom of France. And as a reminder, France replaced Latin with French in 1539 (Ordinance of Villers-Cotterêts). So Brittany was technically the first francophone country in the world...

The Irish can't speak their own language because they're too anglicised. They always thought that the anglosaxon way of life is the best model in the world.

Which ones of the 26 counties are you talking about? I have been to Eire several times and had nothing but a very warm welcome but I would not describe them as English Wannabes and I would VERY strongly suggest that no one else does either! Erse gets more and more common the further west you go and more and more spoken to the extent that if you go in a pub they will only speak English if you can't answer their welcome in Erse. So it is not a dying language but it would require a major change in the east of Ireland for it to become the dominant language.

Lindseyman said:

Which ones of the 26 counties are you talking about? I have been to Eire several times and had nothing but a very warm welcome but I would not describe them as English Wannabes and I would VERY strongly suggest that no one else does either! Erse gets more and more common the further west you go and more and more spoken to the extent that if you go in a pub they will only speak English if you can't answer their welcome in Erse. So it is not a dying language but it would require a major change in the east of Ireland for it to become the dominant language.

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I just know Dublin and honestly, I can't see the difference between this city and an English one. Everything is like in England. Is there evidence of possible "Stockholm" syndrom or something?

I agree with RGB and will say that language shift is always caused by occupation and settlement, never because of trade. I can't think of any counter-examples either. So just keep the English out. If there's English settlers have them come under the governance of Gaelic rulers and they should shift to Gaelic.

I have no clue about Irish history really but in regards to modern times, a lot of Irish people I've talked to seem to point blame at the educational system for the decline of the language. It's not the teaching medium but it's still a compulsory subject in school, so a lot of people grow to loath it. The few Gaeilgeoiri (Irish language speakers) I have met talk glowingly about private immersive schools, gaelscoileanna. Kids who go to immersive schools (Gaelscoileanna) where Gaeilge is the teaching medium don't have the importance of it shoved down their throats. It's taught in a more natural and engaging manner, so they enjoy learning and regularly using the language.

Perhaps early on in the Republic's history, encourage more of these private immersive institutions to be established. Should they become more popular and successful perhaps the government can be convinced to create a more public initiative.

Here's a documentary with an interesting perspective on Gaeilge and it's survival "An Féidir Linn?". Another thing to look at is the series "No Béarla" hosted by Mánchan Magan.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bPYdADwLYbQ&feature=youtube_gdata_player

If we're talking about times considerably far back, I don't know, kill all the Sasanach somehow. Don't import the potato or at least import more varieties of it for some genetic diversity.

Sucrose said:

I agree with RGB and will say that language shift is always caused by occupation and settlement, never because of trade. I can't think of any counter-examples either. So just keep the English out. If there's English settlers have them come under the governance of Gaelic rulers and they should shift to Gaelic.

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I also concur with RGB on this point; Korea is a particularly good example of this, as it happens. The international lingua franca for East Asia, and really, for that matter, large parts of the far East generally was Chinese, owing to China's cultural and economic dominance, but while knowledge of Chinese culture was essentially mandatory for the Korean, and to a slightly lesser extent, Japanese elites, it never came close to displacing the Korean and Japanese languages.

By contrast, where Chinese did displace local languages, there was a very long and consistent period of Chinese rule and settlement. The most obvious example of this is in Southern China, which until the Han Dynasty, was not Chinese at all, but over the course of a few hundred years, was totally Sincizied by a combination of Chinese immigration and settlement, and the displacement thereof of the local languages.

Mind, that's not to say that there weren't other reasons that Chinese displaced local languages. A major factor in it was that before the Chinese settlement, Southern China was extremely lightly populated, whereas Korea and Japan, leaving aside how they experienced no extensive Chinese settlement in their core regions, already had strongly entrenched native populations. However, I dunno how much this applies to Ireland; since the principal reason the above matters is that it leaves the region susceptible to large-scale immigration, which, AFAIK, was not a significant factor in the Anglicization of Ireland.

Fleetlord said:

Why did Ireland end up with English as it's first language, well-meaning attempts to revive Gaelic notwithstanding?

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The answer is simple, the English, and then the British actively sought to break the concept of the Irish national Identity, and sought to annihilate the language as they gradually expanded full control over the island. By the time Ireland achieved independence, Gaelic lacked any cultural significance beyond those who were romantic nationalists. Not that they didn't, and or haven't tried, to continue the language, but even in the Gaeltacht areas of the Republic, the people speak English very well. Television and Radio are eroding it.