By Siobhan Clarke
On the quiet street that hosts the light rail track from Central through Surry Hills stands one of Sydney’s hidden gems, the Scoil na Gaeilge, or Irish Language School.
Established in 2007, the school welcomes all ages on a Monday night to preserve and celebrate the Irish language and culture.
Seán McLoughlin, president of Scoil na Gaeilge, has noticed a growing sentiment and popularity for people to learn the language, a language which grew close to extinction during the 19th and 20th Centuries.
“In the past two years, our numbers have mushroomed,” McLoughlin said. “When I first started three years ago, we would have had about 20 to 30 people on a Monday night, now for the past year and a half we’ve had 70 to 80.”
The Irish language was banned under British occupation for 600 years. The 1937 Constitution of Ireland established the Irish language as the national and first official language of the state, and it was only in 2022 that Irish language gained full status as an official and working language of the European Union.
“There is now a plethora of excellent resources for learning the Irish language and a plethora of media, articles, songs, plays, stories available at the click of a mouse,” McLoughlin said.
Gaeilge has now become a large part of public life with popular music groups such as Fontaines D.C. and Kneecap incorporating the Irish language into their songs, boosting interest in learning the language.
“I try to include a song in every lesson; I think a song is a wonderful nugget of language,” said McLoughlin. “You’ve got grammar, you’ve got vocabulary, you’ve got language in use, you’ve got rhythm, and you’ve got the music of the language all in your head.”
Today the numbers for how many speak the language in Ireland are debated with statistics placing 72,000 in daily use, but 1.8 million claiming that they have some ability to speak it.
The Scoil na Gaeilge is internationally boosting these numbers, with roughly 2000 people across Australia speaking the language at home.
The language continues to grow globally giving hope to the Irish community.
“My favourite proverb for the past three years has been ‘Beatha teanga í a labhairt’ which means the life of a language is to speak it,” said McLoughlin.
Featured image: Seán McLoughlin teaching a class through song. Photo: Siobhan Clarke
