An Irish Poet Redefines Language Identity

Posted on April 15, 2026

By Emma Deshpande

And she asked me to recite the Heaney poem out loud,
—just so the rest of the class could understand
that they weren’t Irish poems,
—just to hear how he would’ve pronounced them.

In Laoighseach Ní Choistealbha’s poem “Another Shibboleth,” the speaker is requested, as the only student from the North of Ireland in her classroom, to recite lines by the Northern Irish poet Seamus Heaney, “just to hear how he would’ve pronounced them.” Written in Irish and translated into English by Ellen Corbett for Words Without Borders, “Another Shibboleth” takes a moment that many students can identify with—being singled out in class because their identity correlates with the lesson—and expands it into a fierce reflection on the complexities of Irish culture, geography, and language.

Meet Laoighseach Ní Choistealbha

Laoighseach Ní Choistealbha, the author of “Another Shibboleth,” did not grow up speaking Irish; she studied the language in school and now lives in the Conamara Gaeltacht, one of the protected regions for Irish speakers in Ireland. 

Hear Ní Choistealbha reflect on her process of writing in Irish when English is her first language, and learn about the history of Irish-speaking communities in the Laggan region of Donegal, where she was raised, in an audio essay recorded for the radio station RTÉ: 

I think of English as the hare in Aesop’s fable, ready to sprint ahead, full of bravado. It’s only when I avert my eyes and let English take a nap, just before the finish line, that I hear the patient pads of Irish coming around the bend of the poem, slowly, slowly.

Then, listen to Ní Choistealbha read her Irish poem “Aiteall” (The Break in the Rain). (English subtitles available.)

Irish Language and the Gaeltacht

Today, there are approximately 1.7 million Irish speakers in the Republic of Ireland. Learn more about the history of the language, then introduce students to the Gaeltacht (ghway-al-tohkt), a collective of regions in Ireland where Irish is the primary spoken language. These regions aim to preserve the language and its related culture.

Show students a short video to learn how to say “Conas atá tú?” (How are you?) in Irish. Ask them to practice this phrase in small groups, then discuss the experience. How does the spelling, or pronunciation, of this Irish phrase resemble any other languages the students might know? How is it unique? 

“Another Shibboleth” in the Classroom

Ní Choistealbha’s poem describes an incident where a student is asked to read a poem aloud because she has a Northern Irish accent. Begin a class discussion on the poem by analyzing the title, “Another Shibboleth.” Ask students if they’ve ever heard the word “shibboleth” before. A shibboleth is a distinctive use of language by a particular group; a professor at Rice University explains that a shibboleth can be a “linguistic password” used to “identify another person as a member, or a non-member, of a particular group.” After sharing this definition with your students, ask them to explain the shibboleth in the poem.

To help students understand the linguistic context for this poem, show them the range of accents across Ireland in this video.

Students can hear Ní Choistealbha’s accent in English in her reading of her audio essay “Cornmeal” on RTÉ. They can also hear her read this poem in the original Irish on Words Without Borders. For another example of a Northern Irish accent, students can listen to a recording of Seamus Heaney, the poet referenced in Ní Choistealbha’s poem, reading his poem “Oyster.” 

History Extension: County Donegal and Northern Ireland

Ní Choistealbha grew up in County Donegal. Though Donegal shares most of its land borders with Northern Ireland, it’s part of the Republic of Ireland. To learn more about the Northern Ireland–Republic of Ireland border, read overviews of the Irish war of independence, the partition of Ireland, and the establishment of the Republic of Ireland. 

Then, show students video footage from the 1960s of farming and daily life in the Laggan (lowlands or flatlands in Irish), which is the region where Ní Choistealbha grew up in Eastern Donegal.

Finally, share this travel essay in Condé Nast Traveler to discover more of Donegal’s history and culture, including its rich musical heritage. 

Potential Assignments for “Another Shibboleth”

• English/Language Arts: After discussing shibboleths in class, ask students to brainstorm examples of words or phrases that they associate with their hometowns or languages they speak at home, either because of regional pronunciation or regional slang. Ask them to choose 1–2 words from the list, then write a poem that incorporates these words.
• Bonus for advanced literature students: Assign students an essay comparing Ní Choistealbha’s poem with the full text of Heaney’s poem “The Ministry of Fear.” Both poems are set in school settings, where the teachers other Northern Irish accents (in Ní Choistealbha’s poem) or overtly discriminate against Northern Irish Catholics (in Heaney’s poem). How do the speakers of each poem put up with this treatment? How do they resist it?
• History/Social Studies: After discussing the partition of Ireland, students should analyze the question that the speaker in Ní Choistealbha’s poem must answer: “Are you from the North?” Ní Choistealbha lists culture, accents, and food as her speaker’s connections to the region of the North of Ireland, regardless of international borders. Ask students to relate the complex cultural and national identity of Donegal residents like Ní Choistealbha to experiences in other regions divided during colonial and postcolonial periods, such as the India–Pakistan border and borders throughout the continent of Africa. How do they define their own cultural and national identities?