Clare Island may become ‘testing ground’ for Irish language

Islanders embrace Feighan’s Gaeltacht idea

Clare Island may become ‘testing ground’ for Irish language


Áine Ryan

A CENTURY ago Clare Island proved to be the perfect laboratory for the groundbreaking Clare Island Survey, led by famous naturalist Robert Lloyd Praeger.
Now Fine Gael’s shadow spokesman on the Gaeltacht Affairs, Frank Feighan has suggested the island becomes a testing ground for the reintroduction of the Irish language. Ironically around the time (1909-1911) that Praeger and his army of botanists and archaeologists, marine biologists and etymologists were examining the flora and fauna, culture and heritage of the island, the native tongue was no longer spoken by the majority of islanders.
However, present day postmaster, Padraic O’Malley recalls a pithy observation made by his late uncle Mikey James Moran about his mother, who came from a north Mayo Gaeltacht and taught lace-making and crocheting on the island during the early decades of the last century. “Occasionally another woman from the island who was also a native speaker would come to visit my grandmother and they would chat and converse away with each other. But if the children came within listening distance they were shooed away lest they pick up the Irish. My uncle believed their logic was that Irish would be no use to them when they were forced to emigrate to the UK or the United States,” O’Malley recalls.
“Of course, the government would have to develop a realistic and achievable proposal to carry out such an ambitious project. It would have to be about speaking the language. After all I went to school and was taught Irish for 14 years and still left without being able to speak Irish,” says Padraic O’Malley. “It wouldn’t take a huge shift to transform the national school into a Gaelscoil. And we’re always looking to increase the population, so scholarships could be offered to families who want to resettle here and learn Irish.”
Frank Feighan argues we need to think outside the box if the 20-year Strategy for the Irish Language to increase the number of speakers from 87,000 to 250,000 is to be successful. He said after his recent visit to the island – which during summer months has a population of up to 160 – that he was struck by how suitable it was for a pilot project on the Irish language, since it is situated between the gaeltacht areas of Achill island and Connemara.
Part-time island resident and Professor of Education at the University of Gavle in Sweden, Dr Peter Gill agrees with  Feighan. He refers to the Royal Irish Academy’s New Survey of Clare Island, launched by Charles Haughey in 1991.
Dr Gill says: “In the new survey, it is remarkable that more Irish placenames of the fields and rocks, coves and crannies were recorded than in the original [carried out by Eoin MacNeill, Michael McDowell’s grandfather].
“Under the surface of the visible culture is the invisible one. This has been clearly shown recently with the resurgence of traditional music and seanós dancing and singing on the island. For a myriad of reasons, the island is a perfect laboratory to reintroduce the language. The parameters of the project can be easily defined and its progress monitored,” Peter Gill argues.
He has recorded some of these lyrical placenames in a bilingual love poem, he often recites at island gatherings: “So I despaired of winning your heart and put mine idir a dhΡ cliath/ But you went and stole it that day from CreagΡn Léim an Mhadaí (the field of the jumping dog).”  
The higgledy-piggledy Rundale or ClachΡn farming system of the densely populated pre-famine Clare Island – when the population surged to over 1600 – contributed to the colourful patchwork pastiche of placenames.
According to the principal of St Patrick’s National School, Mary McCabe, Irish words still pepper the everyday dialect. Children are still called gasúrs and the side roads are bóithríns. Or when the dog is ordered to direct the hens out of the newly sown potato patch, the owner will shout a menacing : ‘cearc, cearc, cearc’ and if the mutt’s excited enthusiasm leads to feathers flying, the order becomes a scolding ‘a’mhadaigh, a’mhadaigh, a’mhadaigh’, pronounced “waddy, waddy waddy’.
“I think Frank Feighan’s proposal is a great idea. An island is probably the best place to carry out such a pilot study since the people are in touch with their heritage and culture and effectively the native language is the missing link in this,” Mary McCabe observes.
“Over the years our school has promoted a strong Irish cultural ethos and we now have a St Patrick’s National School céilí band. Children from the age of  six and seven upwards play fiddles, accordions, banjos and concertinas. They often join in sessions with the older island musicians.
“The school is the obvious place to implement this and like gaelscoils throughout the country the adults would learn from the children. Of course there would have to be a programme of formal classes for adults as well.”
For  secondary school student, GrΡinne O’Malley (18) fluency in Irish would mean more points in the Leaving Cert.
“Since Irish is compulsory for the Leaving Cert it would be great to be fluent and pick up all those extra points.”