The GAA and revolutionary Irish politics in late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century Ireland

Abstract

The argument outlined in this article builds on the recent detailed historiography of the role of the Gaelic Athletic Association (GAA) around the turn of the twentieth century in Ireland. In the minds of some persuasive authors, the organization exercised an important supportive role in the expression of physical force Irish Republicanism and was therefore a not insignificant player in the activities of bodies expressly committed to this course of action. Yet others, such as the scholar William Murphy, have claimed this interpretation of the GAA's role is wholly overstated and instead it contained within its ranks members who, entirely coincidentally, were also involved in a range of similar entities at that time and were therefore committed to the cause of Irish sovereignty in a relatively benign form. In other words, the GAA offered a useful setting in which prominent Irish nationalists could hone their organizational skills rather than operating as a body that, in any coherent fashion, constituted an active agent in the promotion of an aggressive form of Irish nationalism during this period. By profiling the lived experiences of a select number of prominent GAA personalities, it is possible to illustrate this important distinction and establish the precise role of the association in those seminal decades either side of the turn of the twentieth century.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.