Irish language in Northern Ireland

The Irish language (also known as Irish Gaelic) (Irish: Gaeilge) is a recognised minority language in Northern Ireland. The dialect spoken there is known as Ulster Irish. Protection for the Irish language in Northern Ireland stems largely from the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages.

According to the 2011 UK Census, in Northern Ireland 184,898 (10.65%) claim to have some knowledge of Irish, of whom 104,943 (6.05%) can speak the language to varying degrees. Some 4,130 people (0.2%) use Irish as their main home language.

As in other parts of Celtic Europe, Irish was the main language in the region of present-day Northern Ireland for most of its recorded history. The historic influence of the Irish language in Northern Ireland can be seen in many place names, for example the name of Belfast first appears in the year 668, and the Lagan even earlier. The Plantation of Ulster led to a decline in Gaelic culture, of which Irish was part – while some Scottish settlers were Gaelic speakers, English was made widespread by the plantation. Despite the plantation Gaelic continued to be spoken in non-planted areas until the mass migration in the 19th century caused by economic factors (see below for further).

Intellectuals in Belfast took an antiquarian interest in Irish-language culture towards the end of the 18th century, and an Irish-language magazine Bolg an tSolair was published in 1795. The Ulster Gaelic Society was founded in 1830. Attitudes among the Presbyterian middle class, however, tended to change in the second half of the 19th century as the Gaelic Revival became associated with Irish nationalism. A branch of the Gaelic League was founded in Belfast in 1895 with a non-sectarian and widely-based membership, but the decline in Irish as a first language continued.

Irish was in sharp decline throughout the whole of Ireland from the mid-1800s. From the late 1600s and early 1700s, the Church of Ireland made some attempts to revive the declining Gaelic language. The church printed Bibles and Prayer Books in Gaelic, and some churches, and some Protestant clergymen like William King of Dublin, held services in the language. However, the English language had been the language of learning and the Roman Catholic Church continued to use Latin and English in its services. English was the language of the industrial east of the island, and Gaelic started to become confined to the more rural west.

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