Culchie

Last updated

Culchie is a term in Hiberno-English for someone from rural Ireland. The term usually has a pejorative meaning directed by urban Irish against rural Irish, but since the late 20th century, the term has also been reclaimed by some who are proud of their rural or small-town origin. In Dublin, the term culchie is often used to describe someone from outside County Dublin. In Belfast, Northern Ireland, the term is used to refer to persons from outside of the city proper but not necessarily outside the Greater Belfast area.[ citation needed ] The etymology of the term is unclear.

Contents

Possible derivations

The term is defined in the Oxford English Dictionary as "one who lives in, or comes from, a rural area; a (simple) countryman (or woman), a provincial, a rustic". It is sometimes said to be a word derived from the remote town of Kiltimagh, County Mayo. [1] A further explanation is that the word derives from the word "agriculture", highlighting the agricultural/industrial divide between rural and urban populations. [2]

It may be derived from an Irish-language term cúl an tí, meaning 'back of the house'. [2] It was, and still is to a certain extent, common practice in rural areas to enter a neighbour's house through the back door, to avoid tracking dirt through the house and to visit in the kitchen, rather than the front, which was used for more formal visits. Thus the term cúl an tí or culchie referred to such rural peoples used to such practices. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, many city dwellers from Dublin tenements worked as domestic servants in the homes of wealthier people. The servants were not permitted to enter the house through the front door but had to use the back door or servants' entrance. It became common practice in Dublin to use culchie in a derogatory manner. Over time, as the numbers of servants dwindled through the 20th century, the term was retained in everyday use.[ citation needed ]

The word culchie may instead be derived from the Irish word coillte, 'woods, forests'. It was used by townspeople, mainly in the western counties of Mayo and Galway, as a condescending or pejorative reference to people from rural areas. In the mid-1960s it was adopted as a common term in Dublin, as a counter to the country people's use of the word jackeen for a Dublin person. The culchie spelling is common in the English-language media, based on their understanding of phonetics and the word's derivation. It is also sometime spelled cultchie, indicative of its more likely derivation from cúl an tí.[ citation needed ]

Culchie is also an Irish term for a simple, impromptu bed, chiefly consisting of planks, hastily slung between the tapered end of an inglenook fireplace and the nearest wall of a farmhouse kitchen. A culchie might be offered to anyone who asked for a bed for the night, who was not known to the family (rather like letting someone sleep in the barn). So, this could have become a derogatory term for traveling rural labourers and hence just country folk. However, originally it was just an example of common hospitality as often formerly offered to travellers and those in need.[ citation needed ]

Some Dublin GAA fans call supporters of any of the other county teams from Ireland culchies; fans from counties in Northern Ireland are called nordies. Dublin's fans are sometimes called jackeens. David McWilliams coined the term dulchies to describe Dubliners who decide to live in the provinces of Leinster (outside Dublin City, or County Dublin) or Ulster. This subgroup of people often live in urban areas such as Navan, Kells and Naas. The term is also frequently used to refer to Dubliners that live in rural parts of county Dublin.

The comedian Pat Shortt has made a successful living out of a culchie-themed act. He has his own television series, Killinaskully , based on a theme of a culchie in a village in rural Munster.

Television presenter Dáithí Ó Sé has been said by humourist George Byrne of The Herald to have a style interpreted as anywhere from "edgy" to "a big lump of culchie cliché". [3]

Culch.ie is an Irish pop-culture blog with a name derived from the term (.ie is the country code top-level domain name for Ireland). The site still exists but is no longer active.

Dundalk folk-punk singer Jinx Lennon included a song on his 2020 album "Border Schizo FFFolk Songs For The Fuc**d" named "Be Proud" in which he lists reasons for people to be proud of their hometown, including the lyrics "Be proud of your big, thick country accent - it's an addition not a subtraction". [4]

Culchie Festival

The Culchie Festival started in 1989 in Clonbur, County Galway and ran until 2012. The festival took place in many towns and villages throughout Ireland in its search to find an exemplary culchie or "village character" – a local (perhaps even parochial) personality with the ability to entertain at will and excel at various stereotypically rural tasks.

The festival was held in late October each year after regional heats held throughout Ireland and overseas Irish communities to select contestants. The final consists of various challenges, such as tractor racing, nappy changing, sandwich making, potato picking, knitting, and karaoke. [5] The 2008 winner was Adrian McCabe from Ballyjamesduff, County Cavan, where the next Culchie Festival was hosted, 23–25 October 2009.

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Hiberno-English</span> English dialects native to Ireland

Hiberno-English or Irish English (IrE), also formerly sometimes called Anglo-Irish, is the set of English dialects native to the island of Ireland, including both the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland.

This glossary of names for the British include nicknames and terms, including affectionate ones, neutral ones, and derogatory ones to describe British people, Irish People and more specifically English, Welsh, Scottish and Northern Irish people. Many of these terms may vary between offensive, derogatory, neutral and affectionate depending on a complex combination of tone, facial expression, context, usage, speaker and shared past history.

Teuchter is a Lowland Scots word sometimes used to offensively describe a Scottish Highlander, in particular a Gaelic-speaking Highlander. It is offensive, equivalent to other cultural epithets used by more powerful groups to describe people they have oppressed, but is often seen as amusing by the speaker. The term is contemptuous, essentially describing someone seen to be uncouth and rural.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Wanker</span> Insult

Wanker is slang for "one who wanks (masturbates)", but is most often used as a general insult. It is a pejorative term of English origin common in Britain and other parts of the English-speaking world, including Ireland, Australia and New Zealand. It is synonymous with the insult tosser.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">West Brit</span> Pejorative term for an Irish person who admires British customs

West Brit, an abbreviation of West Briton, is a derogatory term for an Irish person who is perceived as Anglophilic in matters of culture or politics. West Britain is a description of Ireland emphasising it as subject to British influence.

Craic or crack is a term for news, gossip, fun, entertainment, and enjoyable conversation, particularly prominent in Ireland. It is often used with the definite article – the craic – as in the expression "What's the craic?", meaning "How are you?" or "What's happening?". The Scots and English crack was borrowed into Irish as craic in the mid-20th century and the Irish spelling was then reborrowed into English. Under both spellings, the term has become popular and significant in Ireland.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Kiltimagh</span> Town in County Mayo, Ireland

Kiltimagh is a town in County Mayo in Ireland. As of the 2016 census, the town had a population of 1,069 people. Although there is no river going through the town, three rivers flow around the town: the Glore River, Yellow River and Pollagh River. The town centre sits at the crest of a hill surrounding The High Fort in Fortlands and built out linearly on the main road from there.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Yokel</span> Stock character; unsophisticated country person

Yokel is one of several derogatory terms referring to the stereotype of unsophisticated country people. The term is of uncertain etymology and is only attested from the early 19th century on.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Oxmantown</span> Historical suburb of Dublin, Ireland

Oxmantown was a suburb on the opposite bank of the Liffey from Dublin, in what is now the city's Northside. It was founded in the 12th century by Hiberno-Norse Dubliners or "Ostmen" who either migrated voluntarily or were expelled from inside of the city walls of Dublin after the Anglo-Norman invasion and the 1171 beheading of Hasculf, the last Hiberno-Norse King of Dublin by the invading army. The settlement was originally known as Ostmanby or Ostmantown. The settlement was bounded on the east by the lands of St Mary's Abbey and on the west by Oxmantown Green, an extensive common that in time was curtailed to form Smithfield Market. Oxmantown lay within the parish of St Michan's, which was the only church on the Northside until the parishes of St Mary's and St Paul's were formed in 1697 to cater to the district's burgeoning population.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Republic of Ireland–United Kingdom border</span> International border

The Republic of Ireland–United Kingdom border, sometimes referred to as the Irish border or British–Irish border, runs for 499 km (310 mi) from Lough Foyle in the north-west of Ireland to Carlingford Lough in the north-east, separating the Republic of Ireland from Northern Ireland.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Norse–Gaels</span> Extinct people of mixed Gaelic and Norse heritage

The Norse–Gaels were a people of mixed Gaelic and Norse ancestry and culture. They emerged in the Viking Age, when Vikings who settled in Ireland and in Scotland became Gaelicised and intermarried with Gaels. The Norse–Gaels dominated much of the Irish Sea and Scottish Sea regions from the 9th to 12th centuries. They founded the Kingdom of the Isles, the Kingdom of Dublin, the Lordship of Galloway, and briefly ruled the Kingdom of York. The most powerful Norse–Gaelic dynasty were the Uí Ímair or House of Ivar.

A seanchaí is a traditional Gaelic storyteller or historian. In Scottish Gaelic the word is seanchaidh. The word is often anglicised as shanachie.

Terence Dolan was an Irish lexicographer and radio personality. He was professor of Old and Middle English in the School of English and Drama at University College Dublin. He acted as the School's Research Co-ordinator, and was the director of the Hiberno-English Archive website. He appeared weekly on Seán Moncrieff's radio show (Mondays) on Newstalk 106. Podcasts of his appearances are available from Newstalk's website.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Reappropriation</span> Valuing a formerly pejorative term in esteem

In linguistics, reappropriation, reclamation, or resignification is the cultural process by which a group reclaims words or artifacts that were previously used in a way disparaging of that group. It is a specific form of a semantic change. Linguistic reclamation can have wider implications in the fields of discourse and has been described in terms of personal or sociopolitical empowerment.

Jackeen is a pejorative term for someone from Dublin, Ireland. The Oxford English Dictionary defines it as a "contemptuous designation for a self-assertive worthless fellow", citing the earliest documented use from the year 1840.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cracker (term)</span> Racial epithet towards white people

Cracker, sometimes cracka or white cracker, is a racial epithet directed towards white people, used especially with regard to poor rural whites in the Southern United States. Although commonly a pejorative, it is also used in a neutral context, particularly in reference to a native of Florida or Georgia.

A pejorative word, phrase, slur, or derogatory term is a word or grammatical form expressing a negative or a disrespectful connotation, a low opinion, or a lack of respect toward someone or something. It is also used to express criticism, hostility, or disregard. Sometimes, a term is regarded as pejorative in some social or ethnic groups but not in others or may be originally pejorative but later adopt a non-pejorative sense in some or all contexts.

Shoneenism is a pejorative term, used in Ireland from at least the 18th century, to describe Irish people who are viewed as adhering to Anglophile snobbery. Some late 19th and early 20th century Irish nationalist writers, like D. P. Moran (1869–1936), used the term shoneen, alongside the term West Brit, to characterize those who displayed snobbery, admiration for England or mimicked the English nobility. A stereotypical shoneen also reputedly shows corresponding disdain for Irish nationalism and the decolonisation of Irish culture, such as the Irish language and Irish traditional music.

Homelessness in Ireland is an evolving social issue. During the 19th century, homelessness was a pervasive impact of the Great Famine (1845–1852). During the 20th century, homelessness in Ireland was associated with older males who may have had addiction or alcoholism issues. However, since the 1990s and into the 21st century, it has been recognised that the homeless population includes increasing numbers of women and children. Commentators have attributed the ongoing events to the post-2008 Irish economic downturn and 'subsequent fiscal adjustments', and the parallel impacts of reduced familial incomes, mortgage arrears and rental increases which followed impacts to housing supply.

References

Definitions found at Irish Slang

  1. "culchie". Oxford English Dictionary . Oxford: Oxford University Press. 1993.
  2. 1 2 Dolan, Terence Patrick (2006). A Dictionary of Hiberno-English. Cork: Gill & Macmillan. p. 70. ISBN   9780717140398.
  3. Byrne, George (10 December 2011). "Smell". The Herald . Retrieved 11 December 2017.
  4. Clayton-Lea, Tony (2020-04-03). "Jinx Lennon: Border Schizo Fffolk Songs for the Fuc**d review – Best work yet from a contrary artist". The Irish Times . Retrieved 2022-09-20.
  5. "Culchie Festival bids to break motorbike record". BreakingNews.ie. Retrieved 2008-12-10.