Gaelic Athletic Association
:
GAA redirects here. For the
ice hockey and
box/
indoor lacrosse statistic, see
Goals against average.
 |
A stylised Celtic cross serves as the traditional logo of the GAA. |
The
Gaelic Athletic Association (The
GAA) (
Irish:
Cumann Lúthchleas Gael) is an organisation which is mostly focussed on promoting
gaelic games: that is,
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.
[Go Ireland]Foundation of the GAA
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. The initial plan was to ressurect the ancient
Tailteann Games and establish an independent Irish organisation for promoting athletics, but hurling and gaelic football eventually predominated.
# 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.
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.
# 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.
The perception of the GAA in unionist circles in
Northern Ireland made its members and clubhouses targets for
loyalist terrorists during
the Troubles. A number of GAA members were killed and clubhouses destroyed.
This is because the association is sometimes portrayed as a
sectarian organisation by those who contend that its establishment was based on political nationalism/republicanism and structures of the
Catholic Church. The latter accusation comes from the GAA's use of the Catholic parish as a means of dividing the country up into administrative units. However, the association also uses the original British county system to demarcate the next level up in the hierarchy, and the ancient provinces as the next level above that. The original intention was to have a wide distribution of clubs across the country, and ensuring that there was at least one club in every parish was the best way to achieve this.
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. The GAA is officially non-sectarian, and
Charles Stuart Parnell was one of its early patrons. Nonetheless, Unionists link it to
Irish nationalism and
Irish republicanism citing the affinity of many nationalists and most republicans for Gaelic sports and the naming of a small number of GAA pitches and clubs after prominent figures in the fight for Irish independence.
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 football — 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.
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 Road stadium is being rebuilt. 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.
The GAA is the largest amateur sports association in Ireland and possibly in the world. The GAA has more than 3,000 member clubs and runs about 500 grounds throughout Ireland.
Strictly speaking, the GAA doesn't hold true internationals, however, hurlers play an annual fixture against a national
Shinty team from
Scotland. Also — as mentioned above — the
Ireland international rules football team, drawn from the ranks of Gaelic footballers, has an annual test series against the
Australian team, which is drawn from the
Australian Football League. The venue alternates between Ireland and Australia.
*
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Higher Education GAA i.e. University, Colleges and Third-Level GAA.
Main article: Gaelic Sport Grounds
The GAA has many high quality grounds in Ireland and beyond, with
Croke Park being the showpiece.
*
Micheál Ã" Muircheartaigh*
GAA All Stars Awards*
Micheál Ã" Hehir*
The Sunday Game*
Up for the Match*
Top 20 GAA Moments*
Sport in Ireland*
Gaelic Athletic Association clubs* 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.
*
GAA official website*
Hogan Stand*
National GAA Results and Fixtures on Aertel*
Local GAA Results and Fixtures on Aertel*
GAA World by
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Index of GAA club sites*
GAA News Results and Fixtures from Sports.ie*
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