Reasons to Learn Irish

1. It's the National Language of Ireland: Irish is the first official language of the Republic of Ireland and has recently gained official recognition in the six counties of Northern Ireland under the Good Friday Agreement.
2. Cultural Identity of the Irish people: The most important distinguishing characteristics of a culture are usually contained within its language. Irish thus plays a paramount role in the Irish national cultural identity and is priceless repository of all that is truly Irish.
3. Dramatic Increase in the number of Irish speakers: The1996 census of Ireland showed that 1,095,830 people, 32% of the Irish adults, claimed to be able to speak Irish. No official count exists of how many people outside Ireland can speak Irish, but estimates range as high as 2 to 3 million.
4. The New Irish Renaissance: Irish is currently going through a major renaissance and more people are able to speak and write Irish today than have been able to for over 150 years. More books, newspapers and magazines have been published in Irish in the past century than in the entire history of the language.
5. Valuable heritage for up to 70 million people from the Irish Diaspora: Official estimates indicate that there are more than 70 million people of Irish descent around the world. In the 1990 US census, 40 million people described themselves as Irish. Irish is a valuable cultural link in the shared history of all these groups.
6. Irish literature, folklore and proverbs: Irish is the only language north of the Alps to have any extensive surviving ancient and medieval literature and as such it is studied at all major universities through out Europe and even as far off as North America and Australia. Ireland has the world's largest collection of folklore and proverbs of which the vast majority is only available in Irish.
7. Ireland's need to maintain its identity in the EU: Ireland's recent entry into the EU has highlighted Ireland's need to maintain its unique identity through its language. Irish is becoming more and more a part of the Irish national identity as well as gaining increasing popularity with both Irish and non-Irish abroad.