A challange for UCDUCCTCDNUIGUUQUBULUMDCU!

In this blog last month I lamented the lack of knowledge of Irish literature among those Irish people who are unable to read it (in many cases after 11 years of study). In that article I mentioned in passing the remarks of a former Professor of Irish in Cork University, Alan Titley.

He has written (as he does almost every week) an article in the Irish Times (Irish) praising the decision of Education Minister Joe McHugh to continue the provision of history as a subject in our schools. This was despite the strong recommendations to the contrary including from the NCAA.

There was a paragraph in his article which struck me forcefully.

"Tá scoláireacht/aí dochtúireachta á dtairiscint ag Ollscoil Áth na Bó (nó Oxford duitse) ar son staidéir a dhéanamh ar stair na hÉireann san 18ú haois. Só bhfat? arsa tusa. Is í an mhórdhifríocht ná gur scoláireacht í ina gcaithfear leas a bhaint as na foinsí Gaeilge - na mílte díobh - d’fhonn na hoibre a dhéanamh. Is cuma nó réabhlóid sa staireolaíocht an méid seo féin.

Tá nach mór dochreidte gur scríobhadh stair na hÉireann tar éis turnamh na meánaoiseanna gan beann ar bith ar theanga na ndaoine a raibh an stair á scríobh fúthu..."

(There is a scholorship/docturship being offered by Oxford University for study on Irish history in the 18th century. What's unusual about that you might say. Of great interest is the fact that this study must use the resources available in Irish - thousands of them - in order to complete this work. This could be regarded as a revolution in its own right.

It is almost incredible that the history of Ireland after the collapse of the middle ages without the slightest reference to the language of the people about whom this history was been written...)

In fact this is perhaps the basis of the name I have given this blog - The Hidden Ireland. It is the name of a seminal work by another scholar of the School of Munster*, Daniel Corkery.

Of course, as Titley point out, there are historians who mine this rich resource like Vincent Morley, Néill Uí Chiosáin, Ghearóid Uí Thuathaigh, Bhreandáin Uí Bhuachalla and others but how many are blind to it's wealth. However how strange it is that the history of Ireland often is in fact the history of the English government of Ireland.

He wonders "Cad ina thaobh nár smaoinigh ollscoil éigin abhus ar bheart chomh réabhlóideach, chomh coimeádach, chomh soiléir, chomh lom, chomh nach mór meabhairphléascach sin, nárbh fholáir do staraithe na bunfhoinsí a léamh?"
(Why did no university here think of a plan so revolutionary, so conservative, so clear, so obvious, so mindbloggingly explosive as to suggest that historian read the basic sources!)

He asks is an of the Irish educational institutions ready to take up the challange.

What about it UCDUCCTCDNUIGUUQUBULUMDCU?

Translations are entirely my own and I have take a little liberty to get the message across and thus loose the author's pithy and imaginative delivery found in the original.

* Ionad Bairre Sgoil na Mumhan - Motto of UCC

The fado & Protestant culture

There's an interesting article in today's (17 Aug 2010) Irish Times by Torlach Mac Con Midhe, Idir an Fado agus an cultúr Protastúnach (Irish) {Trans: Between the Fado and the Protestant culture}

An article by Alan Titley in the same paper started him thinking back to his youth when he travelled to Canada to study. Strangly enough his memory is not so much meeting and interacting with North Americans but with meeting those from South America, refugees from the fall of Allende in Chile, or from the "dirty war" in Argentina as well as Mexican, Venuzuelans, Columbians and Peruvians.

He found that these people enriched his experience far more than the dour North Americans. They were full of fun and energy. They were singing, dancing, eating, drinking, laughing (though the story at home was often tragic) and they played football. He found he could mix with them and that they respected him. He was able to sing "Ar an loing seo Phaidí Loingsigh" and recite "Tháinig long ó Valparaiso!" with out self consciousness. He could participate. He was welcomed.

One of the Argentinian girls, Rita, said to him, "You know, we have no friends among the Canadians! The only English-speaking friends we have are the Irish!" He notes that he had the same problem himself. There was no life or vigour to be found except in these exuberent Latins.

He reflects that in the recent past Irish emigrants have departed for the most part to the English speaking dominions and former colonies. However prior to that they went to the countries of Southern Europe. Though we are an Atlantic people rather than a Mediterranean, although we share that with the Portuguese, we have a "Catholic" tradition in common.

He muses that the empires sent colonists to their territories, and they either decimated the original populace leaving the descendants of the colonists in power. However in Ireland something else happened. The empire made colonists of the native people. They were gifted with the language and culture of the British. They were colonists in their own land. But at the same time it is impossible to deny that there are still "native traits" to be found in these colonists. For this reason they are a split, divided people in themselves.

He quotes Faust “Zwei Seelen wohnen, ach! in meiner Brust,” (Alas, Two souls reside in my breast!). We have the soul of the colonist and that of the Gael in our breast and they do not sit well with each other.

He concludes with a stark question. "I believe that this is sometimes realised by the Irish language community (lucht na Gaeilge) but I wonder is it appreciated by the English speakers!"
By the way the Fado, in the article title, is a type of music from Portugal, learned, understood and appreciated by the author, not a million miles away from our own Sean-Nós styles. (see pic)