Written by John Walsh, Fiontar, DCU, Cois Life. Reviewed by Paul Keenan

"If it could be brought home to the parents that their children stand to gain something by their speaking Irish to them you might have a remedy. As it is they are opposed to Irish ... " (Aodh de Paor, muinteoir, Acaill, Co Mhaigh Eo, 1925).

"If it could be brought home to the parents that their children stand to gain something by their speaking Irish to them you might have a remedy. As it is they are opposed to Irish ... " (Aodh de Paor, muinteoir, Acaill, Co Mhaigh Eo, 1925)

The 1926 Gaeltacht Commission, set up by the Free State Government undertook the task of compiling the attitudes of people in Irish-speaking regions of the State, as expressed above, and defining the boundaries of Irish-speaking districts in the first years after British rule. Comprehensive surveys into the public's capacity in Irish were conducted and an economic analysis of the Gaeltacht was also carried out. The report dealt with the geographical concentration of Irish speakers in the country and expressed concern at the demise of Gaeltacht areas such as in east Sligo, south Kilkenny, southwest Cork and much of Mayo.

Now, with the publication of a contemporary report into the state of the nation's Gaeltacht areas, John Walsh presents us with a record of that earlier Commission. In Díchoimisiúnú Teanga: Coimisiún na Gaeltachta 1926, he teases out the findings of the '26 group, and the public opinions contained in the final report that become the essence of his book.

All credit is due to the writer in seeing his material not as source material for an academic treatise, but, untouched, as a powerful oral record of a real culture both in time and place. Díchoimisiúnú Teanga presents the voices of those interviewed in their everyday language.

The effect is one of 'hearing' original voices and 'real-time' considerations on the survival of the Irish language, emigration, education, administration and economy, unfiltered through a 2002 boom-time lense.

It should be stressed here that Díchoimisiúnú Teanga is bilingual, reflecting the original transcripts from the '26 report, providing the social historian with an invaluable document, and not one requiring a high level of Irish. The transcripts were compiled from 26 meetings organised nationwide with over 100 Irish speakers interviewed.

Coinciding with the 2000 Government Gaeltacht investigation, Díchoimisiúnú Teanga is a timely reminder for those concerned with the current state of the Gaeltacht of Irish language issues still to be addressed over 75 years after the original Coimisiún na Gaeltachta. As proof of this, challenge yourself to place the following quote on the lips of a speaker in 1926 or 2000, and decry its validity across two centuries.

"We are not dealing with a language spoken over a wide area but rather with the ruins of a language. We compare our work with the archaeologist's task of reconstructing an old building from a heap of stones, lying here and there in the place where the original building stood." Díchoimisiúnú Teanga can be ordered through the publisher's website: http://www.coislife.ie/eng_academic.htm