Although the two official languages adopted by the Ireland state are both English and Irish, there are many languages and dialects used in Ireland, as Ulster Scots dialect, Gaelic, Irish Gaelic, Gaeilge… Some of these terms are related to the Celtic language of Ireland.
So what is the difference between Irish and Gaelic language and how these languages impact the English of Ireland? Watch this video by the Bitesize Irish Gaelic Chanel on YouTube to learn more about that.
Irish has been spoken in Ireland for over 2.000 years. The 2006 Census for the Irish state reports that 1.6 million of the total of 4 million can speak Irish and then 80.000 speak the language on a daily basis. While it may be a minority language, the constitution of Ireland affords Irish special status as a national and official language. This long history can be learned by watching this brief documentary about the history of Irish.
But only a minority have some ability to use Irish, and it is the first language just for a small percentage of the population. English has been the predominant first language, displacing Irish. For the Republic of Ireland, both languages have official status, with Irish being the national and first official language.
So is the Irish language important? For the Irish which is more important, the Irish language or English? In this video, they asked people if they think that the Irish language is important and required if they knew how to answer it in Irish. They show us how the use of the Irish language has been saw as a way to be proud of their own culture and history but hardly used as a principal language on a daily basis.
References:
D. Ó Corrain, ‘A future for Irish placenames’, in: A. Ó Maolfabhail, The placenames of Ireland in the third millennium, Ordnance Survey for the Place names Commission, Dublin (1992), p. 44.
Census 2006; see table O on page 26 Archived 25 March 2009 at the Wayback Machine. https://web.archive.org/web/20090325005303/http://www.cso.ie/census/documents/Final%20Principal%20Demographic%20Results%202006.pdf
Languages Across Europe
http://www.bbc.co.uk/languages/european_languages/countries/ireland.shtml
Irish Languages Resource Center
English Varieties in Australia, USA and Britain 