Áras na nGael has been at the heart of the Irish language in Galway City since 1935. Micheál Mac Aoidh is the new Development Officer for this building that once served as the city home of Lady Gregory’s family. Having spent much of his own youth involved in Irish events there, he wants to see the Áras restored as a vibrant centre for people interested in the language and culture. He tells CIARAN TIERNEY about his vision.

Not many people find themselves going on strike within just two months of taking up a new job, but that was the position Galway City native Micheál Mac Aoidh found himself in earlier this year when he stood on a picket line in the heart of the city.

Having only taken over as the Development Officer at Áras na nGael in December, standing with a placard outside the historic premises on Dominick Street on a cold February morning was not exactly how Micheál had envisaged settling into his new role.

But that strike also gave him a renewed sense of hope.

As the only current employee at the Dominick Street centre, he was delighted to be joined by Irish language enthusiasts from a variety of backgrounds, from the city and surrounding areas, on a day when up to 40 Irish language groups went on strike to highlight a dispute over funding cutbacks on both sides of the Irish border.

People were keen to show up to lend moral and physical support to Micheál and the board of Áras na nGael, the building which has been tasked with keeping the Irish language alive and providing a suitable location for activities in our native language in Galway City, since the 1930s.

The picket highlighted a crisis in funding at Foras na Gaeilge, the body charged with promoting the language throughout the island of Ireland, while providing a clear reminder at a local level that the building in which Micheál works badly needs a revamp.

Foras na Gaeilge, set up following the Good Friday Agreement, aims to promote Irish throughout the island and the one-day strike in late February was organised after the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) was accused of blocking or delaying increases in funding for centres such as Áras na nGael.

Having spent years working to promote the Irish language in both Galway City and the Donegal Gaeltacht, Micheál says he has been involved in the Irish language community all his life. He was brought up in an Irish-speaking household in Salthill and attended both Scoil Iognáid and Coláiste Iognáid (the Jes), where he was educated in Irish.

By the time he attended the University of Galway in the late 1980s, Micheál was a regular at Áras na nGael. He would attend music sessions in the pub on the premises – which is due to reopen at the end of this month – and took part in rehearsals there with an Irish language drama group called Na Fánaithe.

Micheál always had a great love for the place and saw huge potential in the building when he applied for the role of Development Officer late last year. Indeed, his late mother, Eithne Conway McGee, was one of the trustees of Áras na nGael when he was a youngster.

“I really got to know this place during my college years, when I used to attend Club Áras. There has always been a link between the pub here and third-level Irish language students or those involved in the Irish language at the University of Galway. I was involved in a drama group who were based here (na Fánaithe), so I have a big link with this place going way back,” he says.

“The club at the time would have had a lot of sean-nós music and Gaeltacht people mixing with city people. A lot of people from the Gaeltacht who lived in the city would come here to socialise. It was a very interesting place. A lot of foreign tourists would come here. You could meet people from the Basque Country here on a Saturday night. It was very multilingual.”

Pictured: Micheál Mac Aodha, Development Officer at Áras na nGael. ‘I want this to be the centre of Irish language culture, language, the arts, and a place to socialise.’