Gaelic Athletic Association
The Gaelic Athletic Association is an organisation which is mostly focussed on promoting gaelic games: that is,
Irish sports, such as
hurling and
camogie,
Gaelic football and
handball, and
rounders. The organisation also promotes
Irish music and
dance, and the
Irish language as an integral part of its objectives. The organisation is based, both functionally and in terms of competition, on the traditional parishes and
counties of Ireland. It is the largest and most popular organisation in Ireland with some 800,000 members out of the island's 5 million people.
Encyclopedia
The
Gaelic Athletic Association is an organisation which is mostly focussed on promoting
gaelic games: that is,
Irish sports, such as
hurling and
camogie,
Gaelic football and
handball, and
rounders. The organisation also promotes
Irish music and
dance, and the
Irish language as an integral part of its objectives. The organisation is based, both functionally and in terms of competition, on the traditional parishes and
counties of Ireland. It is the largest and most popular organisation in Ireland with some 800,000 members out of the island's 5 million people.
Foundation of the GAA
The man directly involved in the founding of the GAA was a
Clareman named
Michael Cusack. Born in 1847 Cusack went on to pursue a career as a teacher at Blackrock College, in
Dublin. In 1877 he set up his own cramming school, the Civil Service Academy, to prepare students for examinations into the British Civil Service. "Cusack's Academy" as it was known and its pupils did extremely well with the result that the numbers attending it soared. Pupils at the Academy were encouraged to get involved in all forms of physical exercise and, as a language enthusiast, Cusack was troubled by falling standards in specifically Irish games.
To remedy this situation and to re-establish hurling as the national pastime, Cusack met with several other enthuasiasts, most Maurice Davin and the Gaelic Athletic Association was established on Saturday, November 1 1884 in Hayes' Hotel,
Thurles, County Tipperary. The initial plan was to ressurect the ancient Tailteann Games and establish an independent Irish organisation for promoting athletics, but hurling and gaelic football eventually predominated. Archbishop Croke of Cashel and
Michael Davitt were two of the organisations patrons.
Aims of the GAA
- To foster and promote the native Irish pastimes.
- To open athletics to all social classes.
- To aid in the establishment of hurling and football clubs which would organise matches between counties.
The GAA in the twentieth century
Up to the twentieth century most of the members were farm labourers, small farmers, barmen or shop assistants. But from 1900 onwards a new type of individual — those who were now being influenced by the Celtic Revival — joined the movement. They tended to be middle-class Roman Catholic clerks, school teachers and civil servants. In 1922 it passed over the job of promoting athletics to the National Athletic and Cycling Association.
The achievements of the GAA
- The ancient game of hurling was saved from extinction and both it and Gaelic football were standardised, albeit that both standardised games, but in particular Gaelic Football, bore little resemblance to the original sports.
- It provided an all-Ireland structure in which people could participate, both on a sporting and on an organisational level. In the absence of an Irish parliament it was the first democratically run all-island structure and proved the training ground for many future Irish political leaders.
- Along with the Gaelic League and the Irish Literary Revival, it provided a mechanism for the creation of a sense of Irish identity.
- In its structures it created a structure of national and communal loyalty, an achievement given that the various elements owed their origins from a variety of sources: Catholicism , British law , and Irish history . Its achievement in popularising counties was particularly marked. It made the counties seem a natural sense of local definition. . The overwhelming power of "the county" remains embodied in the existence of one county team for Dublin, even though in terms of population it could sustain a number of teams. Similarly local counties with a history of no success whatsoever in the championships retain their county teams rather than merge with far more successful neighbouring counties.
Accusations of sectarianism
The perception of the GAA in unionist circles in
Northern Ireland made its members and clubhouses targets for loyalist terrorists during
the Troubles. A number of GAA supporters were killed and clubhouses damaged.
This is because the association is sometimes portrayed as a sectarian organisation by those who contend that its establishment was based on political nationalism/republicanism and structures of the
Catholic Church. The latter accusation comes from the GAA's use of the Catholic parish as a means of dividing the country up into administrative units. However, the association also uses the original British county system to demarcate the next level up in the hierarchy, and the ancient provinces as the next level above that. The original intention was to have a wide distribution of clubs across the country, and ensuring that there was at least one club in every parish was the best way to achieve this.
The GAA would argue that it has always promoted Irish rather than Catholic identity, and has had members of minority religions playing an active role from its inception up to the present day. The GAA constitution forbids sectarianism, and
Charles Stuart Parnell was one of its early patrons.
Initially, members were prohibited from playing "foreign" sports, and up until recently, such sports were officially barred from using GAA grounds. In practice, however, the ban was applied only to
soccer and
rugby union. Since the 1960s, GAA has allowed its flagship stadium,
Croke Park, to be used for
International rules football — a compromise between Gaelic football and
Australian rules football — in matches between Ireland and
Australia. In the 1980s, Croke Park was the venue for an
American football game between
Notre Dame and
Navy.
A ban on members of the
British army and the
Royal Ulster Constabulary from playing Gaelic games was lifted on 17 November 2001 after the creation of the new
Police Service of Northern Ireland and after much lobbying from the more conciliatory wing of the association.
On 16 April 2005 the GAA's congress voted to suspend its Rule 42 ban on "foreign games" to enable the Football Association of Ireland and the
Irish Rugby Football Union to play their international fixures at Croke Park while the
Lansdowne Road stadium is being rebuilt. It has now been agreed by the Central Council that the first soccer and rugby union games in Croke Park can take place in early 2007. The first such fixture will be Ireland's home match of the Six Nations Rugby Union Championship against France.
In 2006, controversy arose over the use of Casement Park GAA stadium in County Antrim for a republican rally commemorating the
1981 Irish hunger strike which was addressed by
Gerry Adams and other prominent
Sinn Féin speakers. The GAA Central Council in Dublin said that the rally was a breach of the organization's rules forbidding political events; however the
Antrim county board ignored this ruling and the rally went ahead.
Democratic Unionist Party MP Gregory Campbell accused the GAA of attempting to politicize sport. The organizers of the rally denied this, saying that the rally was not organized by any political party.
The GAA today
The GAA is the largest amateur sports association in Ireland. The GAA has more than 3,000 member clubs and runs about 500 grounds throughout Ireland.
GAA internationals
Strictly speaking, the GAA doesn't hold true internationals, however, hurlers play an annual fixture against a national
Shinty team from
Scotland. Also — as mentioned above — the Ireland international rules football team, drawn from the ranks of Gaelic footballers, has an annual test series against the Australian team, which is drawn from the
Australian Football League. The venue alternates between Ireland and Australia.
The GAA across Ireland and the World
The Dublin County Board of the Gaelic Athletic Association [i] or
Dublin GAA is one of the 32 county...
- Higher Education GAA i.e. University, Colleges and Third-Level GAA.
- The GAA in Britain
- The GAA in Europe
- The GAA in the United States
- The GAA in Canada
GAA grounds
Main article: The GAA has many high quality grounds in Ireland and beyond, with
Croke Park being the showpiece.
See also
Bibliography
- The GAA: A History by Marcus de Burca, Gill & MacMillan, 1984 & 2000, ISBN 0-7171-3109-2
- Illustrated History of the GAA, by Eoghan Corry, Gill & MacMillan, 2005, ISBN 0-7171-3951-4
- The GAA Book of Lists, by Eoghan Corry, Hodder Headline, 2005, ISBN 0-340-89695-7
- The Gaelic Athletic Association And Irish Nationalist Politics 1884-1924 by W F Mandle . 240pp ISBN 0-7470-2200-3
- Michael Cusack and The GAA by Marcus De Burca, Anvil, 1989, 192pp, ISBN 0-947962-49-2
- Micheal Ciosog by Liam P O Cathnia, Clochomhar Tta, 1982.
- Croke Of Cashel by Mark Tierney, Gill And MacMillan, 1976.
- Maurice Davin First President Of The GAA by Seamus O'Riain, Geography Publications, 1994, ISBN 0-906602-25-4
- Croke Park by Tim Carey, Collins Press, 2004, ISBN 1-903464-54-4
- God and the Referee: Unforgettable GAA Quotations, by Eoghan Corry, Hodder Headline, 2005, ISBN 0-340-83976-7
- History of Hurling, by Seamus King, Gill & MacMillan, 2005, ISBN 0-7171-3938-7
- Sceal Na hIomana by Liam P O Cathnia, Clochomhar Tta, 1980.
- Caman, 2000 Years Of Irish Hurling by Art O Maolfabhail, 1973.
- Gaelic Football, by Jack Mahon, Gill & MacMillan, 2002 & 2006, ISBN 0-7171-4038-5
- Bairi Cos In Eirinn by Liam P O Cathnia, Clochomhar Tta, 1984.
References
External links
- by The Irish News
- - analysis, discussion forums, satire and humour on GAA topics.
