Editing Ireland (section)

==Demographics==
{{Main|Irish people|Demographics of the Republic of Ireland|Demographics of Northern Ireland}}
[[File:Catholicism in Ireland.png|thumb|upright=1|Proportion of respondents to the Ireland census 2011 or the Northern Ireland census 2011 who stated they were Catholic. Areas in which Catholics are in the majority are blue. Areas in which Catholics are in a minority are red.]]
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{{bar percent|[[Roman Catholicism]]|purple|71.2}}
{{bar percent|[[Protestantism]]|blue|20.9}}
{{bar percent|[[Irreligion|No Religion]]|yellow|7.5}}
{{bar percent|Other|black|0.4}}
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The population of Ireland is just over 7 million, of which approximately 5.1 million reside in the Republic of Ireland and 1.9 million reside in Northern Ireland.<ref name="2022population"/>

People have lived in Ireland for over 9,000 years. Early historical and genealogical records note the existence of major groups such as the {{lang|ga|[[Cruthin]]}}, {{lang|ga|[[Corcu Loígde]]}}, {{lang|ga|[[Dál Riata]]}}, {{lang|ga|[[Dáirine]]}}, {{lang|ga|[[Deirgtine]]}}, {{lang|ga|[[Delbhna]]}}, {{lang|ga|[[Érainn]]}}, {{lang|ga|[[Laigin]]}}, {{lang|ga|[[Ulaid]]}}. Later major groups included the {{lang|ga|[[Connachta]]}}, {{lang|ga|[[Ciannachta]]}}, {{lang|ga|[[Eóganachta]]}}. Smaller groups included the {{lang|ga|aithechthúatha}} (see {{lang|ga|[[Attacotti]]}}), {{lang|ga|[[Cálraighe]]}}, {{lang|ga|[[Cíarraige]]}}, {{lang|ga|[[Conmaicne]]}}, {{lang|ga|[[Dartraighe]]}}, {{lang|ga|[[Déisi]]}}, {{lang|ga|[[Éile]]}}, {{lang|ga|[[Fir Bolg]]}}, {{lang|ga|[[Fortuatha]]}}, {{lang|ga|[[Gailenga]]}}, {{lang|ga|[[Gamanraige]]}}, {{lang|ga|[[Mairtine]]}}, {{lang|ga|[[Múscraige]]}}, {{lang|ga|[[Partraige]]}}, {{lang|ga|[[Soghain]]}}, {{lang|ga|[[Uaithni]]}}, {{lang|ga|[[Uí Maine]]}}, {{lang|ga|[[Uí Liatháin]]}}. Many survived into late medieval times, others vanished as they became politically unimportant. Over the past 1,200 years, [[Vikings]], [[Normans]], [[Welsh people|Welsh]], [[Flemings]], [[Scottish people|Scots]], English, [[African diaspora|Africans]] and Eastern Europeans have all added to the population and have had significant influences on Irish culture.

The population of Ireland rose rapidly from the 16th century until the mid-19th century, interrupted briefly by the [[Irish Famine (1740–41)|Famine of 1740–41]], which killed roughly two-fifths of the island's population. The population rebounded and multiplied over the next century, but the Great Famine of the 1840s caused one million deaths and forced over one million more to emigrate in its immediate wake. Over the following century, the population was reduced by over half, at a time when the general trend in European countries was for populations to rise by an average of three-fold.

Ireland's largest religious group is Christianity. The largest denomination is [[Roman Catholicism]], representing over 73% of the island (and about 87% of the Republic of Ireland). Most of the rest of the population adhere to one of the various [[Protestant]] denominations (about 48% of Northern Ireland).<ref name="niprotestants">{{Cite news |last=McKittrick |first=David |title=Census Reveals Northern Ireland's Protestant Population is at Record Low |work=[[The Independent]] |date=19 December 2002 |url= https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/census-reveals-northern-irelands-protestant-population-is-at-record-low-611500.html |access-date=30 December 2009 |location=London |url-status=dead |archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20110624101635/http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/census-reveals-northern-irelands-protestant-population-is-at-record-low-611500.html |archive-date=24 June 2011}}</ref> The largest is the [[Anglicanism|Anglican]] [[Church of Ireland]]. The [[Islam in Ireland|Muslim community]] is growing in Ireland, mostly through increased immigration, with a 50% increase in the republic between the 2006 and 2011 census.<ref>{{cite web |last=Counihan |first=Patrick |title=Divorce rates soar in Ireland as population continues to expand |publisher=Irish Central |date=30 March 2012 |url=http://www.irishcentral.com/news/divorce-rates-soar-in-ireland-as-population-continues-to-expand-145121415-237438531 |access-date=7 June 2014 |archive-date=19 September 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160919225802/http://www.irishcentral.com/news/divorce-rates-soar-in-ireland-as-population-continues-to-expand-145121415-237438531 |url-status=live }}</ref> The island has a small [[History of the Jews in Ireland|Jewish community]]. About 4% of the Republic's population and about 14% of the Northern Ireland population<ref name="niprotestants" /> describe themselves as of no religion. In a 2010 survey conducted on behalf of the [[Irish Times]],<!-- Republic of Ireland only? --> 32% of respondents said they went to a religious service more than once per week.

===Divisions and settlements===
{{Further|Provinces of Ireland|Counties of Ireland|City status in Ireland}}
{{Provinces of Ireland-200px wide}}
Traditionally, Ireland is subdivided into [[Provinces of Ireland|four provinces]]: [[Connacht]] (west), [[Leinster]] (east), [[Munster]] (south), and [[Ulster]] (north). In a system that developed between the 13th and 17th centuries,<ref>{{Cite book |last=Crawford |first=John |title=Anglicizing the Government of Ireland: The Irish Privy Council and the Expansion of Tudor Rule 1556–1578 |publisher=Irish Academic Press |date=1993 |isbn=978-0-7165-2498-4}}</ref> Ireland has [[Counties of Ireland|32 traditional counties]]. Twenty-six of these counties are in the Republic of Ireland, and [[Counties of Northern Ireland|six are in Northern Ireland]]. The six counties that constitute Northern Ireland are all in the province of Ulster (which has nine counties in total). As such, ''Ulster'' is often used as a synonym for Northern Ireland, although the two are not coterminous. In the Republic of Ireland, counties form the basis of the system of local government. Counties [[County Dublin|Dublin]], [[County Cork|Cork]], [[County Limerick|Limerick]], [[County Galway|Galway]], [[County Waterford|Waterford]] and [[County Tipperary|Tipperary]] have been broken up into smaller administrative areas. However, they are still treated as counties for cultural and some official purposes, for example, postal addresses and by the [[Ordnance Survey Ireland]]. Counties in Northern Ireland are [[Local government in Northern Ireland|no longer used]] for local governmental purposes,<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.gazetteer.co.uk/section1.htm |title=The Gazetteer of British Place Names: Main features of the Gazetteer |website=Gazetteer of British Place Names |publisher=Association of British Counties |access-date=23 January 2010 |archive-date=11 January 2010 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100111105121/http://www.gazetteer.co.uk/section1.htm |url-status=live }}</ref> but, as in the Republic, their traditional boundaries are still used for informal purposes such as sports leagues and in cultural or tourism contexts.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.discovernorthernireland.com/destinationNI/ |title=NI by County |website=Discover Northern Ireland |publisher=Northern Ireland Tourist Board |access-date=15 October 2010 |archive-date=23 October 2010 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20101023160757/http://www.discovernorthernireland.com/destinationNI/ |url-status=live }}</ref>

City status in Ireland is decided by [[legislation|legislative]] or [[royal charter]]. Dublin, with over one million residents in the [[Greater Dublin Area]], is the largest city on the island. Belfast, with 579,726 residents, is the largest city in Northern Ireland. City status does not directly equate with population size. For example, [[Armagh]], with 14,590 is the seat of the Church of Ireland and the [[Roman Catholic]] [[Primate of All Ireland]] and was re-granted [[City status in the United Kingdom#Northern Ireland|city status]] by Queen [[Elizabeth II]] in 1994 (having lost that status in [[Municipal Corporations (Ireland) Act 1840|local government reforms of 1840]]). In the Republic of Ireland, [[Kilkenny]], the seat of the [[Butler dynasty]], while no longer a city for administrative purposes (since the 2001 [[Local Government Act 2001|Local Government Act]]), is entitled by law to continue to use the description.

{| class="table" style="text-align:center; margin-right:10px; font-size:90%"
|-
! colspan=6 style="background:#f5f5f5; font-size:130%; padding:0.3em" |[[List of settlements on the island of Ireland by population|Cities and towns by population]]<ref name="CSO data">{{cite web |title=Population |url=https://data.cso.ie/ |website=Central Statistics Office |access-date=2 August 2023 |archive-date=25 August 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210825074214/https://data.cso.ie/ |url-status=live }}</ref><ref name="2021 populations">{{cite web |title=Settlement 2015 |url=https://build.nisra.gov.uk/en/custom/viewdata?d=PEOPLE&v=SETTLEMENT15&~SETTLEMENT15=N11000151+N11000243+N11000438+N11000447+N11000218+N11000564+N11000559+N11000099+N11000040+N11000537+N11000153 |website=NISRA |access-date=17 August 2023 |archive-date=20 August 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230820072644/https://build.nisra.gov.uk/en/custom/viewdata?d=PEOPLE&v=SETTLEMENT15&~SETTLEMENT15=N11000151+N11000243+N11000438+N11000447+N11000218+N11000564+N11000559+N11000099+N11000040+N11000537+N11000153 |url-status=live }}</ref>
|- style=vertical-align:top
! rowspan=21|[[File:Dublin liffey.JPG|frameless|upright=0.7]]<br />[[Dublin]]<br /><br />[[File:Belfast City Hall 2.jpg|frameless|upright=0.7]]<br />[[Belfast]]<br />
! style="background:#f5f5f5; text-align:center"| #
! style="background:#f5f5f5; text-align:left"| Settlement
! style="background:#f5f5f5; text-align:center"| City<br />Popu&shy;lation 
! style="background:#f5f5f5; text-align:center"| Urban<br />popu&shy;lation
! style="background:#f5f5f5; text-align:center"| Metro<br />popu&shy;lation
! rowspan=21|[[File:Halla na Cathrach i gCorcaigh.jpg|frameless|upright=0.7]]<br />[[Cork (city)|Cork]]<br /><br />[[File:Thomond Bridge and River Shannon, Limerick - geograph.org.uk - 5141684.jpg|frameless|upright=0.7]]<br />[[Limerick, Ireland|Limerick]]<br />
|-
| 1 ||style=text-align:left |'''[[Dublin]]'''|| 592,713|| 1,263,219 || 1,458,154
|-
| 2 ||style=text-align:left |'''[[Belfast]]'''|| 293,298|| || 639,000
|-
| 3 ||style=text-align:left |'''[[Cork (city)|Cork]]'''|| 222,333|| || 305,222
|-
| 4 ||style=text-align:left |'''[[Limerick]]'''|| 102,287|| || 
|-
| 5 ||style=text-align:left |'''[[Galway]]'''|| 85,910 || ||
|-
| 6 ||style=text-align:left |'''[[Derry]]'''|| 85,279 || ||
|-
| 7 ||style=text-align:left |'''[[Craigavon, County Armagh|Greater Craigavon]]'''|| 72,301 || ||
|-
| 8 ||style=text-align:left |'''[[Newtownabbey]]'''{{efn|name=BelfastMetro|Part of [[Belfast metropolitan area]]}}|| 67,599 
|| ||
|-
| 9 ||style=text-align:left |'''[[Bangor, County Down|Bangor]]'''{{efn|name=BelfastMetro}}|| 64,596|| ||
|-
| 10 ||style=text-align:left |'''[[Waterford]]'''|| 60,079|| ||
|-
|}

{{Further|List of metropolitan areas in Ireland}}

===Migration===
The population of Ireland collapsed dramatically during the second half of the 19th century. A population of over eight million in 1841 was reduced to slightly over four million by 1921. In part, the fall in population was caused by death from the Great Famine of 1845 to 1852, which took roughly one million lives. The remaining decline of around three million was due to the entrenched culture of emigration caused by the dire economic state of the country, lasting until the late 20th century.

Emigration from Ireland in the 19th century contributed to the populations of England, the United States, Canada and Australia, in all of which a large [[Irish diaspora]] lives. {{As of|2006}}, 4.3 million Canadians, or 14% of the population, were of Irish descent,<ref>"[http://www12.statcan.ca/census-recensement/2006/dp-pd/hlt/97-562/pages/page.cfm?Lang=E&Geo=PR&Code=01&Table=2&Data=Count&StartRec=1&Sort=3&Display=All&CSDFilter=5000 Ethnic origins, 2006 counts, for Canada, provinces and territories – 20% sample data] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160818195955/http://www12.statcan.ca/census-recensement/2006/dp-pd/hlt/97-562/pages/page.cfm?Lang=E&Geo=PR&Code=01&Table=2&Data=Count&StartRec=1&Sort=3&Display=All&CSDFilter=5000 |date=18 August 2016 }}". Statistics Canada.</ref> while around one-third of the Australian population had an element of Irish descent.<ref name="SMH Irish">{{cite news |last1=McDonald |first1=Ronan |title=Has Australia forgotten its Irish past? |url=https://www.smh.com.au/opinion/has-australia-forgotten-its-irish-past-20150316-1lzw3a.html |access-date=31 January 2019 |work=The Sydney Morning Herald |date=16 March 2015 |archive-date=31 January 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190131145440/https://www.smh.com.au/opinion/has-australia-forgotten-its-irish-past-20150316-1lzw3a.html |url-status=live }}</ref> {{As of|2013}}, there were 40 million Irish-Americans<ref>"Rank of States for Selected Ancestry Groups with 100,000 or more persons: 1980" (PDF). United States Census Bureau. Retrieved 30 November 2012.</ref> and 33 million Americans who claimed Irish ancestry.<ref>{{cite news |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2013/03/17/the-irish-american-population-is-seven-times-larger-than-ireland/ |title=The Irish-American population is seven times larger than Ireland |last=Kliff |first=Sarah |date=17 March 2013 |newspaper=[[The Washington Post]] |access-date=6 August 2014 |archive-date=13 April 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160413104911/https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2013/03/17/the-irish-american-population-is-seven-times-larger-than-ireland/ |url-status=live }}</ref>

With growing prosperity since the last decade of the 20th century, Ireland became a destination for immigrants. Since the European Union expanded to include Poland in 2004, [[Polish people]] have comprised the largest number of immigrants (over 150,000)<ref>{{Cite news |last=Sullivan |first=Kevin |author-link=Kevin Sullivan (journalist) |title=Hustling to Find Classrooms For All in a Diverse Ireland |newspaper=[[The Washington Post]] |date=24 October 2007 |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/23/AR2007102302162_pf.html |access-date=9 November 2008 |archive-date=29 June 2011 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110629055902/http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/23/AR2007102302162_pf.html |url-status=live }}</ref> from Central Europe. There has also been significant immigration from Lithuania, Czech Republic and Latvia.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Tovey |first1=Hilary |last2=Share |first2=Perry |title=A Sociology of Ireland |publisher=Gill & Macmillan |date=2003 |location=Dublin |page=156 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=EU4NqA7RIHUC&pg=PA156 |isbn=978-0-7171-3501-1 |access-date=9 September 2011 |archive-date=29 September 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130929051512/http://books.google.com/books?id=EU4NqA7RIHUC&pg=PA156 |url-status=live }}</ref>

[[Demographics of the Republic of Ireland#Immigration|The Republic of Ireland in particular]] has seen large-scale immigration, with 420,000 foreign nationals as of 2006, about 10% of the population.<ref name=autogenerated1>{{cite news |last=Seaver |first=Michael |title=Ireland Steps Up as Immigration Leader |work=[[The Christian Science Monitor]] |date=5 September 2007 |url=http://www.csmonitor.com/2007/0905/p06s02-woeu.html |access-date=30 December 2009 |archive-date=8 March 2009 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090308112358/http://www.csmonitor.com/2007/0905/p06s02-woeu.html |url-status=live }}</ref> Nearly a quarter of births (24 percent) in 2009 were to mothers born outside of Ireland.<ref>{{cite news |title=24% of boom births to 'new Irish' |work=[[Irish Examiner]] |date=28 June 2011 |url=http://www.irishexaminer.com/breakingnews/ireland/24-of-boom-births-to-new-irish-510651.html |access-date=9 December 2012 |archive-date=23 June 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130623040313/http://www.irishexaminer.com/breakingnews/ireland/24-of-boom-births-to-new-irish-510651.html |url-status=live }}</ref> Up to 50,000 eastern and central European migrant workers left Ireland in response to the Irish financial crisis.<ref name="affluenceends">{{cite news |last=Henry |first=McDonald |title=Ireland's Age of Affluence Comes to an End |work=The Guardian |date=5 April 2009 |url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/2009/apr/05/ireland-economy-vat-unemployment |access-date=30 December 2009 |location=London |archive-date=6 September 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130906100249/http://www.theguardian.com/world/2009/apr/05/ireland-economy-vat-unemployment |url-status=live }}</ref>

===Languages===
{{main|Languages of Ireland}}
[[File:Irish speakers in 2011.png|thumb|upright=1.15|Proportion of respondents who said they could speak Irish in the Ireland census in 2011 or the Northern Ireland census in 2011]]
The two official languages of the Republic of Ireland are Irish and English. Each language has produced noteworthy literature. Irish, though now only the language of a minority, was the vernacular of the Irish people for thousands of years and was possibly introduced during the [[Iron Age]]. It began to be written down after Christianisation in the 5th century and spread to Scotland and the Isle of Man, where it evolved into the [[Scottish Gaelic]] and [[Manx Language|Manx]] languages, respectively.

The Irish language has a vast treasury of written texts from many centuries and is divided by linguists into [[Old Irish]] from the 6th to 10th century, [[Middle Irish]] from the 10th to 13th century, Early Modern Irish until the 17th century, and the Modern Irish spoken today. It remained the dominant language of Ireland for most of those periods, having influences from [[Latin Language|Latin]], [[Old Norse]], [[Anglo-Norman language|French]] and English. It declined under British rule but remained the majority tongue until the early 19th century, and since then has been a minority language.

The [[Gaelic Revival]] of the late 19th and early 20th centuries had a long-term influence. Irish is taught in mainstream Irish schools as a compulsory subject, but teaching methods have been criticised for their ineffectiveness, with most students showing little evidence of fluency even after 14 years of instruction.<ref>{{cite news |url=http://universitytimes.ie/?p=1707 |title=Head-to-Head: The Irish Language Debate |work=UniversityTimes.ie |date=21 February 2011 |access-date=31 March 2015 |archive-date=2 April 2015 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150402150444/http://www.universitytimes.ie/?p=1707 |url-status=live }}</ref>

There is now a growing population of urban Irish speakers in both the Republic and Northern Ireland, especially in Dublin<ref name="schism">{{cite news|last=Ó Broin|first=Brian|date=16 January 2010|title=Schism fears for Gaeilgeoirí|url=https://www.irishtimes.com/life-and-style/people/schism-fears-for-gaeilgeoir%C3%AD-1.1269494|newspaper=[[The Irish Times]]|access-date=16 February 2018|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180216211616/https://www.irishtimes.com/life-and-style/people/schism-fears-for-gaeilgeoir%C3%AD-1.1269494|archive-date=16 February 2018|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>John Walsh; Bernadette OʼRourke; Hugh Rowland, ''[https://www.forasnagaeilge.ie/wp-content/uploads/2015/10/New-speakers-of-Irish-report.pdf Research Report on New Speakers of Irish]'' {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210308094820/https://www.forasnagaeilge.ie/wp-content/uploads/2015/10/New-speakers-of-Irish-report.pdf |date=8 March 2021 }}</ref> and Belfast,<ref>{{cite news |last=McKinney |first=Seamus |title=Belfast Gaeltacht inspired Irish speakers all over North |work=Northern Ireland News |publisher=[[Irish News]] |date=16 May 2020 |url=https://www.irishnews.com/news/northernirelandnews/2020/05/16/news/belfast-gaeltacht-inspired-irish-speakers-all-over-north-1940540/ |access-date=7 May 2023 |archive-date=21 June 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230621180615/https://www.irishnews.com/news/northernirelandnews/2020/05/16/news/belfast-gaeltacht-inspired-irish-speakers-all-over-north-1940540/ |url-status=live }}</ref> with the children of such Irish speakers sometimes attending Irish-medium schools ({{lang|ga|[[Gaelscoil]] or Gaelscoileanna}}). It has been argued that they tend to be more highly educated than monolingual English speakers.<ref name="cso.ie">{{cite web |url=http://www.cso.ie/en/media/csoie/census/documents/census2011profile9/Profile,9,What,we,know,Press,Statement.pdf |title=Press Statement: Census 2011 Results |website=CSO.ie |publisher=Central Statistics Office |date=22 November 2012 |location=Dublin |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160328211550/http://www.cso.ie/en/media/csoie/census/documents/census2011profile9/Profile,9,What,we,know,Press,Statement.pdf |archive-date=28 March 2016 |url-status=dead |access-date=6 October 2017 }}</ref> Recent research suggests that urban Irish is developing in a direction of its own, both in pronunciation and grammar.<ref name="irishtimes.com">{{cite news |first=Brian |last=Ó Broin |title=Schism fears for Gaeilgeoirí |url=http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/weekend/2010/0116/1224262447899.html |newspaper=[[The Irish Times]] |access-date=31 March 2015 |archive-date=21 October 2012 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121021041737/http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/weekend/2010/0116/1224262447899.html |url-status=live }}</ref>

Traditional rural Irish-speaking areas, known collectively as the {{lang|ga|[[Gaeltacht]]}}, are in linguistic decline. The main {{lang|ga|Gaeltacht}} areas are in the west, south-west and north-west, in Galway, Mayo, Donegal, western Cork and Kerry with smaller {{lang|ga|Gaeltacht}} areas near [[Dungarvan]] in Waterford and in Meath.<ref>{{cite web |title=Where are Ireland's Gaeltacht areas? |website=FAQ |publisher={{lang|ga|[[Údarás na Gaeltachta]]}} |date=2015 |url=http://www.udaras.ie/en/faoin-laithrean-seo/ceisteanna-coitianta |access-date=9 September 2015 |archive-date=7 September 2015 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150907174242/http://www.udaras.ie/en/faoin-laithrean-seo/ceisteanna-coitianta/ |url-status=live }}</ref>

[[Hiberno-English|English in Ireland]] was first introduced during the Norman invasion. It was spoken by a few peasants and merchants brought over from England and was largely replaced by Irish before the Tudor conquest of Ireland. It was introduced as the official language during the Tudor and Cromwellian conquests. The Ulster plantations gave it a permanent foothold in Ulster, and it remained the official and upper-class language elsewhere, the Irish-speaking chieftains and nobility having been deposed. Language shift during the 19th century replaced Irish with English as the first language for a vast majority of the population.<ref>{{cite book |last=Spolsky |first=Bernard |title=Language policy |publisher=Cambridge University Press |date=2004 |page=191 |isbn=978-0-521-01175-4}}</ref>

Fewer than 2% of the population of the Republic of Ireland today speak Irish on a daily basis, and under 10% regularly, outside of the education system<ref>{{cite web |title=Table 15: Irish speakers aged 3 years and over in each Province, County and City, classified by frequency of speaking Irish, 2006 |website=Census 2006 |volume=9 – Irish Language |publisher=Central Statistics Office |url=http://beyond2020.cso.ie/Census/TableViewer/tableView.aspx?ReportId=75639 |access-date=9 November 2008 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090227165829/http://beyond2020.cso.ie/Census/TableViewer/tableView.aspx?ReportId=75639 |archive-date=27 February 2009 }}</ref> and 38% of those over 15 years are classified as "Irish speakers". In Northern Ireland, English is the de facto official language, but official recognition is afforded to Irish, including specific protective measures under Part III of the [[European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages]]. A lesser status (including recognition under Part II of the Charter) is given to [[Ulster Scots dialects]], which are spoken by roughly 2% of Northern Ireland residents, and also spoken by some in the Republic of Ireland.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.ark.ac.uk/nilt/1999/Community_Relations/USPKULST.html |title=Northern Ireland Life and Times Survey, 1999 |publisher=Access Research Knowledge Northern Ireland (Queen's University Belfast / Ulster University) |date=9 May 2003 |access-date=20 October 2013 |archive-date=8 January 2011 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110108123922/http://www.ark.ac.uk/nilt/1999/Community_Relations/USPKULST.html |url-status=live }}</ref> Since the 1960s with the increase in immigration, many more languages have been introduced, particularly deriving from Asia and Eastern Europe.

Also native to Ireland are [[Shelta language|Shelta]], the language of the nomadic [[Irish Travellers]],<ref name=McArthur>{{cite book|editor-last=McArthur |editor-first=Tom |title=The Oxford Companion to the English Language |publisher=Oxford University Press |date=1992 |isbn=978-0-19-214183-5 |url=https://archive.org/details/oxfordcompaniont00mcar }}</ref> [[Irish Sign Language]], and [[Northern Ireland Sign Language]].