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Language and Identity – Ireland and Northern-Ireland

Language and Identity – Ireland and Northern-Ireland. CULTURE AND LITERATURE BŐDY EDIT 2013/2014. Preliminary information – historical bg. 1800: Act of Union (Union of Great Britain and the Irish Kingdom) and its consequences

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Language and Identity – Ireland and Northern-Ireland

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  1. Language and Identity – Ireland and Northern-Ireland CULTURE AND LITERATURE BŐDY EDIT 2013/2014

  2. Preliminary information – historical bg. • 1800: Act of Union (Union of Great Britain and the Irish Kingdom) and its consequences • 1845-1848: potato blight, starvation, emigration → drastic decrease in population • Late 19th century: fight for Home Rule (Charles Stuart Parnell) • 1916: Easter: Easter Rising

  3. Historical bg. • 1919-1921: Civil War, Irish Free State in 1922 (1937: renamed itself as Ireland and declared itself republic in 1949) • Northern-Ireland: 1922-1972: - limited independence, - Protestant, Unionist government in Belfast. - 1972: direct British rule. - 1986: Anglo-Irish Agreement, - 1998: Belfast Agreement: more freedom, cooperation bw. London and Belfast.

  4. Relevant issues concerning culture • Language: as a consequence of British colonization the Irish (Gaelic) language virtually disappears in the 18-19th centuries • Efforts to revive Gaelic Irish • Literature: revival in the 18-19th c.: romantic tendencies → • Claim for a national culture including literature. • Turn of the 19-20th centuries: Irish Renaissance, especially in drama-writing and staging.

  5. Language and identity in the 20th century and contemporary dramas • Late 19th century: independence movements and cultural ones are intertwined. • Cultural renaissance • In play-writing: to write Irish national plays – mostly in English, sometimes in Irish. • Organising figures: W. B. Yeats and his circle, especially Lady Augusta Gregory. • 1904: foundation of the Abbey Theatre

  6. Language • The dilemma whether to write in English or Irish • In most cases: compromises • Common aim: an understandable language evokingthe impression of hearing or reading the plays in Gaelic Irish. • Earlier solutions (Abbey-writers): - Lady Gregory: English + Kiltartan dialect - John Millington Synge: a very complex dialect - English and dialects from Wicklow, Kerry and Galway. - John O’Casey: Dublin dialect of poor classes + Gaelic words

  7. Language • Contemporary literature: in general the same method: to mix English with a Gaelic dialect. - Brendan Behan and Hugh Leonard: Dublin dialect (like O’Casey) - George Fitzmaurice and John B. Keane: Kerry dialect - Brian Friel: Derry dialect

  8. Irish English (Hiberno-English) language today • Is gradually losing its Gaelic heritage and is becoming similar to standard English → • Bigger challenge for the authors • Strange phenomena: eg. the work of Eugene Watters / Eoghan O’Tuairisc as a symbol of the language dilemma.

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