5 - Ireland: Tempered Acceptance

Summary

By contrast to Scotland and Wales, Ireland should be more fertile ground for the promotion of new speaker interests. This is because Ireland is an independent state and as Irish is the first language according to the constitution, it has been used within the education system for far longer than has Welsh or Gaelic. Moreover, the statutory education system features the teaching of Irish as a core subject which has created a social mass of 1,761,420 people – 39.8 per cent of the population – who can speak Irish, according to the 2016 Census. The overwhelming majority of these would be learners and a significant proportion would be assumed to be new speakers. However, the 2016 Census shows that, of these, only 73,803 – 4.2 per cent of the population – used Irish daily outside of the education system. Special attention is given to the role of government departments, Foras na Gaeilge and An Chomhairle um Oideachas Gaeltachta agus Gaelscolaiohta in promoting Irish and responding to the needs of new speakers.