Language Maintenance and Language Shift as Strategies of Social Reproduction

Abstract

Abstract This chapter presents a study of the social pattern of Irish/English bilingualism in the area of the southwestern peninsula of An Daingean which is officially defined as an Irish-speaking or Gaeltacht area. (The boundaries of this Gaeltacht area have, in fact, been revised on a number of occasions since 1926. The study area corresponds to the Gaeltacht as defined in the most recent boundary revision in 1974, although in the course of the analysis note is also taken of the earlier designations.) The study focuses on the extent to which Irish is used in the home and the community and the social, spatial, and temporal variations in these patterns. Other language-related variables-ability to speak Irish, attitudes towards Irish and towards state policies for Irish-are also considered, but their inclusion here is primarily to assist in understanding the incidence and extent of social use of Irish in the study area. The analytical model stresses the importance for the maintenance of Irish of the territorial organization of the local community and the relationship of this to the wider national and international economy. The ‘territorial organization’ of communities refers to the daily patterns of social interaction as members of the community move between home, work-place, school, shop, church, and other services, and also the more extensive movements of people and capital, including all forms of migration and tourism. These patterns of interaction are, of course, subject to change as the area responds to the opportunities and pressures of its external environment. From the viewpoint of language maintenance a crucial question concerns the way socio-economic changes affect social network boundaries, or in more formal sociological terms, the degree to which Irish-speaking networks are open or closed. Depending on the relative number and social characteristics of the participants entering or leaving social networks, these processes have a cumulative effect on language patterns.