Blasket Islands

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Blasket Islands
Native name: Na Blascaodaí
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Blasket Islands as seen from Dunmore Head
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Geography
Location Atlantic Ocean
Total islands 6
Major islands
Country
County Kerry
Demographics
Population 0 (as of 2011)

The Blasket Islands (Na Blascaodaí in Irish - etymology uncertain: it may come from the Norse word "brasker", meaning "a dangerous place") are a group of islands off the west coast of Ireland, forming part of County Kerry.

Geography

The six principal islands of the Blaskets are:

History

File:Blasket Harbour.jpg
The boat landing on the mainland near Dunquin, from where boats leave for the islands

They were inhabited until 1953 by a completely Irish-speaking population, and today are part of the Gaeltacht. The inhabitants were forcefully evacuated by the government to the mainland on 17 November 1953.[1][why?] Many[quantify] of the descendants currently[when?] live in Springfield, Massachusetts,[2][not in citation given] and some former residents still live on the Dingle Peninsula, within sight of their former home.

The islanders were the subject of much anthropological and linguistic study around the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th centuries particularly from writers and linguists such as Robin Flower, George Derwent Thomson and Kenneth H. Jackson. Thanks to their encouragement and that of others, a number of books were written by islanders that record much of the islands' traditions and way of life. These include An tOileánach (The Islandman) by Tomás Ó Criomhthain, Peig by Peig Sayers and Fiche Blian ag Fás (Twenty Years A-Growing) by Muiris Ó Súilleabháin.

The Blasket Islands have been called Next Parish America,[1] based on the erroneous idea that the next parish west of the islands would be the United States. The actual next parish west of the Blasket Island would be located in Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada.

File:Blasketislands.jpg
Panorama of the Blasket Islands against the afternoon sun

References

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 Stagles, Joan and Ray, The Blasket Islands: Next Parish America. Dublin: O'Brien Press, 1980 (new edn. 1998).
  2. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.

External links

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