Gaelic Athletic Association

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Image:Gaelic Athletic Association.png The Gaelic Athletic Association (The GAA) (Irish: Cumann Lúthchleas Gael) is an organisation which is mostly focussed on promoting 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.Template:Ref

1 Foundation of the GAA
2 Aims of the GAA
3 The GAA in the twentieth century
4 The achievements of the GAA
5 Accusations of sectarianism
6 The GAA today
7 GAA internationals
8 The GAA across Ireland and the World
9 Major GAA grounds
10 References
11 See also
12 Bibliography
13 External links
- 13.1 GAA abroad

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Foundation of the GAA

Image:GAA Corporate Logo.png Template:See 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 and the Gaelic Athletic Association was established on Saturday, November 1, 1884 in Hayes's Hotel, Thurles, County Tipperary.

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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.

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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 person — those who were now being influenced by the Gaelic League (1893) — joined the movement. They tended to be clerks, school teachers or civil servants. In 1922 it passed over the job of promoting athletics to the National Athletic and Cycling Association.

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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. (Gaelic Football borrowed heavily from aspects of rugby and soccer in terms of rules and structures.)
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 (parish, county, province and national) 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 (the parishes), British law (the counties), and Irish history (the provinces and the nation). Its achievement in popularising counties was particularly marked. It made the counties seem a natural sense of local definition. (The modern Irish counties were largely a creation of British law — albeit that some owed their origins to ancient Irish counties — and in many senses had not been accepted as communal units with popular loyalty until the appearance of county teams). 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. (An attempt in recent years to create North Dublin and South Dublin teams was never implemented.) 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.

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Accusations of sectarianism

The GAA is sometimes accused of being a sectarian organisation, almost always by unionist politicians in Northern Ireland. They contend that its establishment was based on political nationalism and republicanism and the Catholic Church. 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. 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 — in matches between Ireland and Australia. And in the 1980s, Croke Park was the venue for an American football game between Notre Dame and Navy.

A ban (Rule 21) 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. Only one of the six counties where it would apply (County Down) voted for its removal. The nationalism of the GAA made its members and clubhouses particular targets for loyalist terrorists during the Troubles and up to the present-day.

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 Roadstadium is being rebuilt. Delegates from five of the six counties of Northern Ireland strongly opposed the change, as well as those from County Cork but they were outvoted by delegates from the rest of the country. 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.

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The GAA today

The GAA is the largest amateur sports association in Ireland and possibly in the WorldTemplate:Fact. The GAA has more than 3,000 member clubs and runs about 500 grounds throughout Ireland.

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GAA internationals

Strictly speaking, the GAA doesn't hold true internationals, however, hurlers play an annual fixture against a national Shinty team from Scotland, and — as mentioned above — Gaelic footballers also have a test series against the Australian national teams drawn from the Australian Football League annually, under compromise rules. The venue alternates between Ireland and Australia.

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The GAA across Ireland and the World

Image:Countieshf.GIF

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Major GAA grounds

The GAA has many high quality grounds in Ireland and beyond with Croke Park being the show peace Other GAA Grounds can be found here

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References

Template:Note Go Ireland

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Bibliography

The GAA: A History by Marcus de Burca, Gill & MacMillan, 1984 & 2000, ISBN 0717131092
Illustrated History of the GAA, by Eoghan Corry, Gill & MacMillan, 2005, ISBN 0717139514
The GAA Book of Lists, by Eoghan Corry, Hodder Headline, 2005, ISBN 0340896957
The Gaelic Athletic Association And Irish Nationalist Politics 1884-1924 by W F Mandle (Gill & MacMillan and Christopher Helm 1987). 240pp ISBN 0747022003
Michael Cusack and The GAA by Marcus De Burca, Anvil, 1989, 192pp, ISBN 0947962492
Micheal Ciosog by Liam P O Cathnia, Clochomhar Tta, 1982.
Croke Of Cashel by Mark Tierney, Gill And MacMillan, 1976.
Maurice Davin (1842-1927) First President Of The GAA by Seamus O'Riain, Geography Publications, 1994, ISBN 0906602254
Croke Park by Tim Carey, Collins Press, 2004, ISBN 1903464544
God and the Referee: Unforgettable GAA Quotations, by Eoghan Corry, Hodder Headline, 2005, ISBN 0340839767
History of Hurling, by Seamus King, Gill & MacMillan, 2005, ISBN 0717139387
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 0717140385
Bairi Cos In Eirinn by Liam P O Cathnia, Clochomhar Tta, 1984.