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Irish professor seeks Bostonians who grew up here hearing or speaking Gaelic
By adamg on Wed, 11/14/2018 - 9:45am
Séamus Dillon, a professor at Waterford Institute of Technology is trying to create an repository of experiences of Gaelic speakers in the US, and so has a request:
Do you remember Irish (Gaelic) being spoken when you were younger? Did you hear it in your local area? Do you speak Irish now? A researcher from Ireland is collecting stories and memories of Irish language usage in America and if you have such stories or memories you can email him at [email protected]. He is very keen to hear your stories, memories and/or questions so feel free to email him
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Comments
Did you hear it in your local area? Do you speak Irish now?
No, most wouldn't teach their kids/grand kids because they viewed it as useless and more so because of the way the Irish were treated locally in Boston. But hey White Privilege.
I'll forward his email to my father but i already know his response. Pog mo thoin!
Greenhills
Sit there. Buy people some coffee and the information will flow.
There was Irish spoken in some houses in Dorchester and Milton in the 70's and 80's from the generation that came over 1955-1965. We used to tell each other to shut the door to the classroom in first grade in Irish sometimes, though my parents took Irish in school, their home life was in Ireland was done in English.
This generation is now old (and dying off), but there are plenty still around that came from Connemara, rural Kerry, and other areas of the west around. Get some grad students out to Adams Corner post haste, it's better than email.
...Boherbee, Co. Kerry?
...Boherbee, Co. Kerry?
Please go away
Why are you chronically and constantly pontificating on matters related to Dot as if we care because you once lived here but escaped to the Irish Riviera once Dot turned brown. Fuck you and your phony liberal voice echoing from your lilly white south suburban enclave.
Born and raised Dot Rat. Proud of my roots. Didn’t abandoned my home town with excuses of being priced out or wanting a better life for my kids - better life meaning less blacks, Jews, gays, immigrants, homeless, or any other less than desirables. Yet you think Dot roots give your tired Hingham, Weymouth, Marshfield asses reason enough to lecture the real urbanites. No cred for OFD. SLID (Still Living In Dorchester) are the real troopers. Can’t you please stop your blather and send your letters to the editor of the Patriot Ledger and leave us to our business? City folk have work to do.
I seem to recall from some
I seem to recall from some family members a loosely organized group of Mayo people in Boston and Worcester. Might be worth tracking them down.
In the 90's I volunteered
In the 90's I volunteered with the Irish Cultural Centre to help with citizenship signups, when the # of Morrison visas increased. I remember a mother, in her mid-30s who had a baby in her arms and an older kid playing translator for her. It blew my mind, This was all in Dorchester.
Bostún
In Cape Breton dialect of S.Gaelic, Boston is Baile nam Beans, Beantown. It is noted that many fluent Gaels who went to work in Boston came back with only the English language and English attitudes to boot, shaming the locals who maintained the language and being one of the reasons for its decline.
I remember a Full English
I remember a Full English speaking migrant talking about not getting to learn Gaelic at his school back in Ireland. His sister gently reminded him that he had the choice of French, Latin and Irish,
as first language, and that he chose Latin.
He's currently living not so badly in Acton.
My whole family except the
My whole family except the American born and raised speak it. It is not dead or dying, it is alive and well in Ireland in the West. I have relatives in their 20's who speak it as a native langiage. They have soap operas in it in Connamarra. It is modern, and a a part of their identity. Nobody in Europe gives up one language to speak another, that thought stems from colonialism and American WASP B.S.