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From Special Irish Fest Linguistics Correspondent Sarah Walsh

Irish Tongues Are Wagging in U.S. Classrooms

DUBLIN — For generations, Irish schoolchildren have grown up despising Gaelic, this country's native language and a mandatory subject from kindergarten through high school. But these days the language, which most people here simply call "Irish," is experiencing something of a renaissance.

Irish-language schools and an Irish-language television station are booming in popularity, despite Gaelic's seemingly unpronounceable strings of consonants. And now the language's supporters, who have long bemoaned the impending death of the ancient tongue, have set their sights overseas.

The government department responsible for promoting the language began a fund last year that will dole out grants, of up to $36,000, to help international colleges establish programs teach Gaelic. This fall, the local branch of the Fulbright program will, for the first time, send native-speaking teaching assistants to American universities.

"Their immediate response was: 'Yes, yes, yes! We can't get enough teachers!' " said Carmel Coyle, director of the Irish Fulbright Commission.

Four assistants are going to colleges with Irish studies programs — New York University, Boston College, Notre Dame and the University of St. Thomas in Houston.

In some ways, Ireland is catching up. Of the 51 universities outside Ireland that teach Irish, 29 are in the United States. The Fulbright program has sponsored foreign language teaching assistants to work and study at American universities since 1968. Those modest one-year fellowships have generally gone to teachers of perennially popular languages, like Spanish and French, and more recently are going to languages like Arabic, Hindi, Turkish and Urdu.

Tír gan teanga, tír gan anam. Slán go fóill.