For most people, St. Patrick’s Day means pints of Guinness and a splash of green. But beneath the shamrocks and the hangovers, something deeper is awakening. Gaeilge, the Irish language, is finding its voice again.
For too long, it’s been dismissed as a ‘dead’ language, abandoned like Latin or Old English. But that couldn’t be further from the truth. Irish isn’t dead—it was silenced and suppressed. But it’s never gone away. And now, it’s fighting its way back. This taps into something deeper: a cultural defiance, a refusal to let the language disappear.
Across Ireland and beyond, more and more people are learning Irish—not just out of curiosity, but out of a quiet sense of defiance. A need to reclaim what was almost lost.
The notion that Irish is a “dead language” is a dangerous myth. Irish didn’t simply fade away – it was actively suppressed. Under centuries of British colonial rule, speaking Irish wasn’t just discouraged—it was criminalised. Public use of Irish in Ireland was discouraged, as English was promoted as the language of governance, education, and prestige.
While teaching Irish in schools wasn’t formally banned, it was heavily marginalised, with English often enforced as the language of instruction. In many areas, speaking Irish was stigmatised, and Irish speakers were often made to feel inferior – or punished – for using their native language. By the late 19th century, fewer than 15% of people in Ireland were native Irish speakers. This decline wasn’t natural – it was a product of political and social forces that demanded assimilation.
This pattern of suppression wasn’t uniquely Irish. Scottish Gaelic and Welsh faced similar attacks. In Wales, children were punished for speaking their native tongue and forced to wear the infamous ‘Welsh Not’ as a mark of shame. While Welsh has experienced a strong revival – now spoken by over 20% of the population – Irish has struggled to recover. The language’s revival today isn’t just about reclaiming words, it is about resisting the forces that attempted to erase a crucial part of Irish identity.
So why is Irish seeing a resurgence now? It is about reasserting control over an identity that was nearly lost. Across Ireland and beyond, people are learning Irish as an act of resistance and reclamation. Language class numbers have been booming. In recent years, with organisations like Conradh na Gaeilge reporting record numbers of learners. Even in Gaeltacht areas, the heartlands of Irish speaking communities, there’s renewed interest, with more students enrolling in gaelscoileanna (Irish-language schools) than ever before. Groups like Kneecap are part of this shift, using their unapologetically political music to turn Irish into a cultural statement. Their fusion of Irish and English rap is helping popularise the language, transforming it into a symbol of resistance and pride. The fact that English remains part of the mix doesn’t weaken the resistance — it reflects the reality of a bilingual identity shaped by colonialism. Reclaiming Irish alongside English is itself an act of defiance, refusing to let the language disappear. From the classroom to the street, Irish is coming back — not just as a language, but as a tool for cultural empowerment.
Language is tied to identity. When a language is suppressed, what’s lost isn’t just words but history, memory, and belonging. For centuries, Irish was beaten out of the national psyche, and reclaiming it now means restoring a connection to a heritage that was suppressed for generations. Wales has shown what’s possible. Welsh is now embedded in daily life through education, media, and policy, proving that a minority language can thrive when supported at every level of society. The hope for Irish is similar: not just as a language of resistance, but as one that becomes fully normalised — spoken in homes, schools, and workplaces, not only in the classroom or as a symbol of defiance. Reclaiming Gaeilge isn’t about nostalgia, it’s about reversing centuries of cultural erasure and restoring a language to the fabric of everyday life. The true power lies in making it the norm again, in every space where Irish has been silenced for generations.
