Irish people are too apathetic about the anglicisation of their surnames

38 comments

1. Speak for yourself. Neither my name nor my language define who I am, or what my culture is.

2. It’s fairly low down on my list of priorities if I am to be honest. But you can always change yours back to the original version fairly easily if you want to preserve it.

   You reminded me about this actually. My Irish teachers always insisted on translating my surnames into Irish, despite the fact that both surnames are French. No meaning in Irish!

3. OK then.

4. Use your Irish Surname, next time you renew your passport change the name there, and go by your Irish Surname.

5. Change your own back. I did.

6. > and I explained that it had no meaning in English, but that it was phonetically transcribed from an Irish name that sounds only vaguely similar

   Do you go by the Irish version now?

7. I don’t even know if my surname is Anglicized or actually the original English since my great grandfather was an orangeman.

   I don’t really care either lol

8. Many of the surnames translations to Irish are brutal

   Is there any directory for our surnames as Gaeilge?

9. I sort of agree with you from a moral standpoint, but from a practical standpoint, I find using my anglicised name (both first and last name) makes life an awful lot easier when travelling abroad etc

10. Hills I’m not going to die on for 800 please Alex

11. I’m not apathetic, I just don’t care about it.

12. OP’s original family name translates as ‘too much time on his hands’

13. My surname translates as “speckled one”, now really, what do l derive from that as an individual, that my Irish ancestors were freckle-faced?

14. You can check out some common and obscure Irish names and their English versions [here](https://www.na-ring-gael.com)

15. Seriously OP, ignore 90% of the comments here – groany shites.

    I think it’s great that you’re thinking about this and reflecting on our history and the loss of our language and culture. I’ve started slowly using the Irish spelling of my first name informally. It feels good.

    Reminds me of the line from ‘Thousands are Sailing’ that always gives me goosebumps – ‘and I didn’t even get so far that they could change my name’.

    Tír gan teanga is tír gan anam.

16. So do I use the original Norman of my name then or the makey uppy Irish version?

17. I changed mine back. My parents thought it was a bit strange, but I speak Irish and all my children go to a local Gaelscoil. My surname never really sat well with me until I changed it. I changed it when I was renewing my passport. All my children have the Irish version on their birth cert.

18. I didn’t know we could change our names. Will be looking into it.

19. English people can’t even pronounce the anglicised version of my surname (which really bothers me) so I’m starting to phase in the Irish version at work (in England). Id rather hear people struggle with that than assume they know how to pronounce the English version and get it totally wrong. I think it is important that we reclaim our language, and I wish I’d had more exposure to it growing up. 

20. Eh, on the one hand I like the idea of changing it back, but I’ve lived in England for the last 20 years and thinking about having to spell it out constantly doesn’t really appeal.

    I might still do it thinking about it mind. Could be interesting.

21. It is deeply sad. I changed my name, and use an Irish-language one. I encourage thinking about your own and what you’d like to do.

    The part of the successful destruction of our culture that stands out to me is how little is known about our clothing. There are a few descriptions of details — a yellow dye we were famous for, we know a garment called a great coat existed — a few things like this.

    But these garments died out after woodcuts, after the Guttenburg press — they were entirely erased.

    It’s actually kind of mind blowing how successful that erasure was, when you consider how many “folk costumes”/ancestral garments did survive empires and colonization.

22. This got me thinking, and I’m pretty sure this will be an unpopular opinion.

    But there are somethings I just don’t care about but in certain circles when you tell people you don’t care about it, they use it to attack your Irishness or patriotism.

    I don’t care about GAA. Some people will act like not liking GAA is failing at your civic duty to support Irish culture.

    I don’t like people referring to the British Isles, but I don’t get in a tizzy or overtly angry when I do hear that phrase. If I mention this, people will look at you like you just sang a verse of God Save The King with a tear in your eye.

    Irish language is grand. I like it existing. Not too bothered about it being compulsory at school. I think there are better ways to inspire revival. I also feel like there are a lot of people who have very strong opinions of the language staying compulsory that can’t speak a word of it but would never consider doing an adult class. They want it to be someone elses problem to solve.

    And this. Really can’t be arsed that I have an Irish name but it’s anglicized. It would be weird if people started calling me a different name. I don’t think I could answer to anything else. Maybe to gobshite, arsehole and other names I will probably be called for admitting this. But it’s the only name I’ve had. I don’t want to change it.

23. I’d add to this that we are very complacent about translations of place names.

    It’s an interesting thing to know whether a place is named after a geographic feature, a prominent person or family, or something else.

    However many of our placenames, like our surnames are just “heres how it sounds in this other language”, which is much less interesting , doesn’t add anything new… Just removes or deletes and potentially leaves you disconnected from your world/heritage.

    And ultimately your name is, your name, nobody should be forcing a translation onto you.

24. The Irish version of my name arrived in the area shortly before the Vikings; we know my family were using an anglicised version in 1802 but not when they started. It’s not a happy chapter of our history and none of the harm can be undone by any of us, we just have to decide how to move forward with what survived and developed since then.

    Just personally, the anglicised version is the form that’s ‘my’ name – it’s what connects me to my immediate forebears, and that resonates with me more than links into the deeper past. But I think it’s important to remember where it came from and how we got here.

25. I’m bengali Indian and the English were at it for our surnames as well I guess. We sort of kept both – you write the bengali spelling and pronunciation when you write it in bengali and the english one when writing in english. But since education and my work are purely in english, I almost never have used the bengali version of my surname. Which is a shame, when I think of it.

    (My surname means ‘lion’ in bengali – means nothing in english just a close approximation that I guess my great great grandfather thought everyone would be able to write and pronounce).

26. The variations in Irish names tells a rich and interesting story and I wouldn’t be in favour of forcing people to “normalise” their names. Totally on board for people using whatever form they want though!

27. I need to change back to Cú Chulainn

28. I would like to change my last name to its form as gaeilge, but I’m waiting until I have become more fluent in gaeilge before I do. I just think it’s a bit hollow to use the Irish version if I don’t have a good enough grasp of the Irish language first.

29. It’s mad to me that we didn’t just all do this post independence.

30. Much of that doesnt bother me. What does though is the issue that others take with my name.
    “Whats that in English?” as a response to hearing your name gets grating after a while. I understand that it is curiosity in most cases, but many times, at work etc, the same people with continue an English version of my name, which I never use.

    The state drag their heels too, especially when it comes to the síneadh fada. Which just isn’t good enough. Get unicode and get over it.

31. I’m currently a bit more concerned about the anglicisation of our terrorists

    /s

32. Britain had their turn. It’s the EU’s turn now.

33. I’m not too bothered. We are (I think) unique in Europe in having two legitimate names that can be used for official correspondence.

    I prefer my English language name as a. it’s the one I’ve been called all my life, and b. it’s way shorter than the Irish equivalent.

    I have known to freak out some folks by stating “John is ainm dom” when meeting them for the first time as gaeilge. However, I refer you to point a. above. My name is not Seán (or even Eoin).

34. Grandfather changed it back, and i religiously stick to it.

    The name means from the bright headed

35. My biggest issue is the O’ which most websites don’t accept so I’ve dropped using the apostrophe altogether except on my signature.

36. Surname used to begin with just Mc over the course of 5ish years entirely switched to Mac which is Irish for “Son of *insert name*”

37. I disagree. Different languages have different spelling and pronunciation rules. When people migrate from one language region to another, they usually have to adapt their name for the locals to pronounce it. EG if I go to Japan my surname Quigley becomes Kwiguri spelled in Katakana.

    I think it’s fine to use the Irish version in Ireland, but going into rest of the world and expecting people to be aware of the obscure and counter intuitive spelling rules of the Irish language just makes you difficult. 

    Imagine if you were meeting a Chinese guy and he expected you to be able to read his name written in Chinese characters. You’re essentially asking for the same thing. 

38. That’s what more than 800 years of ruling does to a mf.

    As someone who is not Irish but visited Ireland many times all over the island and fell in love with the country, as well as its history, it is outrageous to me that there is not a stronger effort to revive Gaelic back than just learning a bit in school to never use again.