It is that time of year again and the swallows are preparing to leave or have already left. It is a melancholy prospect; so I do not say the swallows are about to depart for Africa because I want to; I merely observe that it is so.
In that same spirit I have remarked many times before on the futile attempts by various governments to revive the Irish language. Such observations have been normally met by the Gaeilgeoir lobby with accusations of West Brittery, of anti-nationalism, and even, from one ranting idiot, of racism. The actual reality of what is happening to the language is ignored. Instead, as well as abusing the messenger, pro-language activists speak of the plethora of Irish-language schools which are opening up everywhere.
Good. We had an Irish language group here in The Irish Times last year, run by enthusiastic fluent speakers. Initially, it got a warm response from staff members (though I confess I did not attend: any language which even contemplates making the plural of the word "bean" the wholly unrelated "mna" is not lightly going to succumb to my palsied attempts to master it). But as time went on, the pupils dropped away, and now the Irish course is well and truly no more.
All right, so all these language schools which are opening up everywhere are for children. I wish them well, truly; yet am quite confident that even in the medium term their efforts will come to little or nothing. The Irish language not merely will not be revived, but its decline will not be halted. Judge not by enthusiasts; judge not by the promises of professional Irish language promoters; judge not by the wise words of the political establishment which clings to ideal of a language reborn as did knights to the prospect of the Grail. Judge by children.
How many children in playgrounds in Gaeltacht schools find themselves speaking English? How many Gaeltacht areas are in reality Irish-speaking, the pretence being maintained even though children ceased to speak the language as a normal means of communication a generation ago? And what is happening today in primary schools which has caused such a catastrophic decline in interest and enthusiasm for the language?
The numbers achieving Grade C or higher in the Junior Cert at ordinary level has fallen by 10 percentage points in two years. Over the same period students attaining C or higher at foundation level dropped ever more, from over 62 per cent to under 50 per cent. The response of the Minister for Education, Micheal Martin, was to declare that it was essential "in the interests of maintaining the language as a living language that we ascertain the root causes of this decline".
Ah; so Irish is still a living language, is it? Is this why the Minister hardly ever addresses the Dail in Irish, though he is a fluent speaker - that the language is so alive that virtually no-one in the Dail can understand it? And even if he successfully ascertains the root causes in the decline of the language, does that mean he can arrest and reverse that decline? Equally, does it mean because I can work out what makes the swallows leave for Africa at this time of year, I can prevent them going?
In the history of the state, there has been no project to compare with the attempts to revive the language; the results have been a tragi-comedy. Even now, we refuse to recognise reality. Not merely do we not see that the emperor has no clothes, but we also insist he is speaking Irish. He is not. He cannot. He simply will not.
That is the sad and ineluctable truth about the language. The Irish people will not speak it; but our politicians have not yet the courage to admit that it is, to all extents and purposes, dead.
A language is not a living language because a few enthusiastic people gather in covens to mouth it to one another. A living language is what children shout, unbidden and unforced to one another in play. It is the natural form of communication which people prefer: and no amount of coercion can succeed in changing that reality.
We can dress that reality up as much as we like. We can bully and beat children to speak Irish, and they won't. We can throw money at the problem, as has happened with Teilifis de Lorean, which was named Teilifis na Gaeilge and is now named TG4, but it doesn't mean people will either speak Irish or watch the station. Then we can put Spanish football, the Dail Public Accounts Committee, American basketball and Aussie rules on the television channel, and declare it to be a triumph for Irish language broadcasting. It isn't. And we know it.
At this stage in our history, with tens of billions of pounds having been spent on promoting Irish, we might actually ask whether it is morally justifiable to force-feed Irish to workingclass children, when a terrifying proportion of them, perhaps 25 per cent, emerge from school functionally illiterate in English. As for Irish, they simply loathe it as simply a daily and unnecessary torture. Is it not time to end this mad experiment in compulsory linguistic engineering? In our hearts, we know it will only work on the day that the swallows stay because I command them to.