Antipathy, paradox and disconnect in the Irish state’s legal relationship with the Irish language

Positioned within the context of ongoing debate on reform of the Official Languages Act 2003, this article critically examines the Irish state’s legal position regarding the Irish language. Revealing antipathy, paradox and disconnect, both in a historical and contemporary context, the article argues for a reconceptualised debate about the role of law in the protection and promotion of the Irish language. Notwithstanding a complex post-colonial language history and austerity grounded arguments that language rights and language legislative provisions are resource intensive, the article argues that the legal approach to the Irish language should be underpinned by a substantive and more purposive conception of equality. There is, in Ireland, an antipathy to view language from the perspective of substantive equality. This antipathy has, in turn, hindered the development of an appropriate institutional infrastructure and legacy within which core provisions of the Official Languages Act 2003 could, and can, be effectively fulfilled.