The language planning policy in Ireland and Irish-language books: A hundred year perspective

Abstract

An element of a nation’s state policy is to support the use of a particular language or languages while prohibiting the use of other languages or their varieties in certain situations – usually formal. This is in the realm of language planning of which there are two basic types. Corpus planning involves establishing a standard language and promoting it among the language users. Status planning supports the use of a particular language through granting it the status of official language or auxiliary language in a given state or region, most often in the spheres of education, administration, services and media. This article discusses the Irish-language book in the context of language planning in Ireland. Particular observations are made from a perspective of a hundred years after most of Ireland seceded from the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland to form an autonomous state (1922), which required the establishment of new national policies.