Irish Centre of Pittsburgh

09/18/2026

Saturday night Seisún 9/19/26 at Pittsburgh Airport Hyatt Hotel on Stage 4 at the Pittsburgh Feis 7-9pm. Hosted by feis musicians Mike Shaffer and Dave Yates. Park in hotel lot and bring your parking ticket inside for validation.

09/12/2026

Irish Dance Adjudicator’s 9/11 experience as she escaped the World Trade Center

A woman has described the moment her "guardian angel" carried her to safety as she escaped the World Trade Center in the 9/11 attacks.

09/12/2026

09/06/2026

IRELAND 🇮🇪

The first Catholic school named after Saint Carlos Acutis will be named in Donegal this week

Scoil Náisiúnta Gort a' Choirce will now include Naomh Carlo Acutis in its name

08/28/2026

Oh, we are seated!

‘Derry Girls’ creator Lisa McGee will be releasing a new mockumentary Netflix series set in the world of competitive Irish dancing.

The new six-part series is called ‘Jig’ (sound familiar?) and will begin shooting in Northern Ireland next year.

According to early reports, ‘Jig’ will centre on best friends Cara and Fletcher from the struggling Sweeney School of Dance in Derry, who take on their seemingly unbeatable rivals in Florida.

The show will follow both schools in the lead-up to the World Championships.

Will you be tuning in? ☘️

📸: Wikimedia Creative Commons

08/26/2026

Here is a little slip that quietly makes a lot of Irish people wince. That ancient language of Ireland? It is not really called Gaelic. In Ireland, they call it Irish. ☘️ Irish, not Gaelic.

This one causes a surprising amount of gentle confusion, and it is worth clearing up. Many people, especially abroad, refer to the native language of Ireland as Gaelic. But in Ireland itself, that is not what people call it. The language is called Irish, or by its own name, Gaeilge. Ask an Irish person if they speak Gaelic, and you may well get a small, patient correction. So where does the mix-up come from? The word Gaelic is not wrong exactly, but it is imprecise. Gaelic properly refers to a whole family of related languages, the Goidelic or Gaelic languages, which includes not just Irish but also Scottish Gaelic and Manx. And confusingly, when people say Gaelic on its own, it very often refers specifically to Scottish Gaelic, which is a distinct, though related, language of its own. So to call the Irish language simply Gaelic can muddle it with its Scottish cousin, and blur the fact that Irish is its own proud, ancient and distinct tongue. In Ireland, the official name of the language in English is Irish. In the language itself, it is Gaeilge. It is one of the oldest written languages in Europe, with a literature stretching back well over a thousand years, and it is very much its own thing. So while nobody will mind too much, if you want to get it just right, and win a warm nod from an Irish speaker, call it Irish.

Its own proud, ancient tongue. 💚 A small but meaningful point of Irish pride, that the native language of Ireland is properly called Irish, or Gaeilge, not simply Gaelic, an ancient and distinct tongue all its own, deserving of its own true name.

08/09/2026

07/15/2026

This is devastating and it was caused by human activity. It was completely avoidable. Thanks to the wonderful Park Staff and Fire Crews for battling this fire.

Thanks to the early notification by the public and swift action from emergency services and NPWS staff and contractors, yesterday's wildfire in Killarney National Park was brought under control swiftly. It highlights the importance of being both vigilant and responsible when enjoying the outdoors during the current heatwave. Barbecues are strictly prohibited within the National Park. Littering can also cause fires, so please make sure not to leave glass or plastic bottles behind. If you witness any camp fires or barbecues, please make people aware of the regulations and dangers or contact the National Park Ranger Base from 9am to 5pm or the Gardai. Be part of the solution- not the problem.

07/15/2026

Calling Comhaltas members

We are looking for volunteer assistants for Scoil Éigse this year in Belfast (3rd - 7th August).

This is a great opportunity to shadow amazing tutors. You need to be over 18 to volunteer. Please follow the QR code to sign up.

06/20/2026

🌿 They are marching for a language that was nearly killed three times — by colonisation, by famine, and by the indifference of the independent Irish state that was supposed to save it. They are marching because something that was nearly lost is not quite lost, and they intend to keep it that way.

The modern Irish language revival is one of the most complex and contested cultural projects in contemporary Irish life, and one of the most quietly remarkable. The language that the Famine reduced to the survival of coastal communities in the west, that the National School system systematically suppressed for over a century, that emigration drained of its youngest and most energetic speakers generation after generation, is today spoken by hundreds of thousands of people who chose it — who went looking for it, learned it as adults, sent their children to Irish-medium schools, built Irish language radio and television stations and online communities, and refused to accept that the story was already over.

The Irish language revival has its critics, and their criticisms are not all without foundation. Compulsory Irish in schools has produced generations of students who associate the language with tedium and failure rather than with the living culture it carries. The gap between the Irish learned in classrooms and the Irish spoken natively in Gaeltacht communities has sometimes felt unbridgeable. The political and ideological freight loaded onto the language — its historical association with a specific version of Irish nationalist identity — has made some Irish people feel that engaging with it requires signing up for a politics they don't hold.

But something has shifted in the last decade. A new generation of Irish speakers has appeared who are younger, more urban, more digitally native, and less interested in the language as ideology than as culture — as music, as literature, as a different way of being Irish that doesn't require you to be a particular kind of Irish. TikTok accounts in Irish. Irish language podcasts. Irish rap music. Irish graphic novels. The language finding its way into contemporary life through the front door rather than the compulsory curriculum.

"Níl sé ró-dhéanach." It is not too late.

They are still marching. The language is still answering. 🍀