Gaelic Athletic Association

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The Gaelic Athletic Association (GAA) (Irish: Cumann Lúthchleas Gael) is an organisation which is mostly focused on promoting Gaelic games - traditional Irish sports, mainly hurling and Gaelic football. The organisation also promotes handball, rounders, Irish music, dance, and the Irish language. It is the largest and most popular organization in Ireland with some 800,000 members out of the island's population of almost 6 million.

Gaelic football and hurling are the main and most popular activities promoted by the organisation, and the most popular sports in the country.

The women's version of these games, Ladies' Gaelic football and Camogie, are organised by the independent but very closely linked associations of Ladies' Gaelic Football Association and Camogie Association of Ireland respectively.

Evolution of the Gaelic Athletic Association

Foundation and aims

The GAA was founded by Michael Cusack from County Clare. Pupils at the Academy he founded were encouraged to get involved in all forms of physical exercise. Cusack, a native Irish speaker, was troubled by declining participation in specifically Irish games.

To remedy this situation and to re-establish hurling as the national pastime, Cusack met with several other enthusiasts, most notably Maurice Davin and the Gaelic Athletic Association was established on Saturday, November 1 1884 in Hayes' Hotel, Thurles, County Tipperary. The seven founder members were Michael Cusack, Maurice Davin (who presided) John Wyse Power, John McKay, J. K. Bracken, Joseph O'Ryan and Thomas St. George McCarthy. Also admitted later by Cusack to have been present was Frank Moloney of Nenagh, while the following six names were published as having attended by the more detailed press reports of the time: William Foley, - Dwyer, - Culhane, William Delehunty, John Butler and William Cantwell. All these were from Thurles except Foley, who was from Carrick-on-Suir, like Davin. Of note, given later controversies about playing of 'foreign games' and the later banning of members of the British armed forces and police from joining, was that Thomas St. George Mc Carthy, a native of Bansha village, County Tipperary, was a capped rugby international player, having played for Ireland against Wales in 1883 and was also a District Inspector of the Royal Irish Constabulary (RIC). Also J.K. Bracken was the father of Brendan Bracken who was a member of the British cabinet during World War II.

The initial plan was to resurrect the ancient Tailteann Games and establish an independent Irish organisation for promoting athletics, but hurling and Gaelic football eventually predominated. The following goals were set out:

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.

The association's aim today is to be

The Gaelic Athletic Association in the twentieth century

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 individual — those who were now being influenced by the Celtic Revival (started in 1893) — joined the movement.

In 1918 the GAA was banned by the British government, but the games were still played in defiance of the ban. In 1922 it passed over the job of promoting athletics to the National Athletic and Cycling Association.

In 1984 the GAA celebrated its 100th year in existence. This anniversary was celebrated by the GAA with numerous events throughout the country and the All-Ireland Senior Hurling Championship final was moved to Semple Stadium in Thurles to honour the town in which the GAA was founded.

Modern challenges

Ireland has changed rapidly since the mid 1990s. EU enlargement, combined with the Celtic Tiger economy, has led to a large influx of foreign nationals from the EU's new member states in Eastern Europe. This means that a large proportion of the country's population is now outside the traditional native-born family structure through with the GAA was passed from generation to generation. This presents a challenge to an organisation that was previously not geared towards marketing itself to people who have not heard of it or its games, and instead relied on people being brought up playing hurling and Gaelic football often following their parents' example.The GAA has launched a number of projects to attract non traditional members such as consulting with the Australian Football League and running leagues aimed at non nationals While changing demographic in Ireland with more people living in city's is proving a challenge to the GAA

Also, maintaining the GAA's activities in the overseas units presents a challenge with the number of Irish emergrating oversea in decline , despite the large Irish diaspora, Gaelic games remain fairly unknown outside of the Irish expatriate community. Initiatives such as full-time development officers and high-profile competitions such as the Continental Youth Championship are helping to bring the games to non-Irish people everywhere. While British GAA is promoting Gaelic games to British youth.

Structure

The GAA is a democratic association consisting of various boards, councils, and committees organised in a structured hierarchy, and the world headquarters are at Croke Park. All of the association's activities are governed by a book called the Official Guide. Each County Board may have its own by-laws, none of which may conflict with the Official Guide. Each Divisional Board may have its own regulations, none of which may duplicate or contradict the Official Guide or county by-laws.

Annual Congress
President
Central Council
Provincial councils
County Board

Divisional Board (in larger counties)
Sport specific board (in some counties)

Club Committee

All of these bodies are elected on a democratic basis and staffed by volunteers.

Cultural activities

Through a division of the association known as Scór, the GAA promotes that actively pursues Irish cultural activities, and runs competitions in music, singing, dancing and storytelling.

Rule 4 of the association states:

The Association shall actively support the Irish language, traditional Irish dancing, music, song, and other aspects of Irish culture. It shall foster an awareness and love of the national ideals in the people of Ireland, and assist in promoting a community spirit through its clubs.|

The group was formally founded in 1969, and is promoted through various GAA clubs throughout Ireland (as well as some clubs outside of Ireland).

Achievements

The GAA has grown to become the largest and most popular organisation in Ireland with some 800,000 members out of the island's 6 million people.

It saved the ancient game of hurling from extinction. Both it and Gaelic football were standardised. This standardisation helped to spur the growth of the modern games since they were now being organised on a structured basis.

The GAA is the largest amateur sports association in Ireland. It has more than 2,500 member clubs and runs about 500 grounds throughout the country. The Gaelic games of hurling and football are also the most popular spectator sports in Ireland; 1,962,769 people attended GAA games in 2003.

Thanks to the success of a policy of having at least one club in every parish, clubs are evenly distributed throughout the country in both urban and rural areas, and the organisation's reach is therefore considerable. This huge presence means that the GAA has become a major player in the sporting and cultural life of Ireland. The association is recognised as a major generator of social capital thanks to its promotion of healthy pastimes, volunteering, and community involvement.

The GAA also provided an all-Ireland structure in which people could participate, both on a sporting and on an organisational level. This has helped to entrench a sense of local identity. For example, the county identities that have been fostered by over a century of local rivalries in the provincial championships are so prominent in society that many people feel emotionally attached to their county.Indeed, the GAA still adheres to the original British-devised county system that no longer coincides with that used by local government, and yet it is the GAA county boundaries that people most identify with.

In the GAA's structures (parish, county, province and national) it created a conduit for national and communal loyalty, an achievement given that the various elements owed their origins to 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 traditional Irish counties were largely a creation of British law such as County Londonderry (or County Derry, is it is referred to by the GAA), and some owed their origins to ancient Irish regions such as County Tyrone. An attempt in recent years to create North Dublin and South Dublin teams was never implemented. Counties with a history of no success whatsoever in the championships retain their county teams rather than merge with far more successful neighbouring counties.

Criticism

Accusation of exclusivity

The perception of the GAA in unionist circles in Northern Ireland made its members and clubhouses targets for loyalist paramilitaries during the Troubles. A number of GAA supporters were killed and clubhouses damaged.

The GAA would argue that it has always promoted Irish rather than Catholic identity, although its administrative units are based on Roman Catholic parishes and has had members of minority religions playing an active role from its inception up to the present day which included Jack Boothman who was president of the organisation in the 1990's. In Northern Ireland, however, Gaelic sports are virtually exclusively played by Roman Catholics. The GAA Official Guide forbids sectarianism.

In 2007 Fermanagh player Darren Graham, who represented the county at both Gaelic football and hurling, temporarily left the sport. Graham had received sectarian abuse from some fans, due to being a Protestant. However he received support from both his Lisnaskea team mates and the GAA board, who stated "Abuse of any players, officials or referees is not acceptable and all official reports of it will be dealt with seriously.

Bans on other sports & Rule 42

Until 1971 members were prohibited by Rule 42 (Rule 44 in the 2007 rulebook) from playing non-GAA sports or even attending those sports events as spectators, and up until recently, such sports were officially barred from using GAA grounds. In particular, sports with a British origin, except for golf, were commonly referred to formerly as garrison games. On 16 April 2005 the GAA's congress voted to temporarily relax its Rule 42 requirement that GAA-owned premesis are used by the GAA only, in respect of Croke Park, to enable the Football Association of Ireland and the Irish Rugby Football Union to play their international fixtures in Ireland while the Lansdowne Road stadium is being rebuilt. The GAA's governing Central Council agreed that the first soccer and rugby union games in Croke Park could take place in early 2007. The first such fixture was Ireland's home match of the Six Nations Rugby Union Championship against France which was won by France 20-17.

Naming of competitions, grounds and clubs after nationalists

There are some GAA competitions, grounds and clubs named after Irish national heroes. For example Casement Park in Belfast is named after Sir Roger Casement, a member of the Irish Republican Brotherhood. The trophy for the main all-Ireland Gaelic football competition is the Sam Maguire Cup, named for Sam Maguire, who, although a member of the Church of Ireland was an officer in the Irish Republican Army. An other example is Kevin Lynch's Hurling Club which is affiliated with the Derry County Board and is named in honour of Kevin Lynch, a member of the Irish National Liberation Army (INLA) , who died on hunger strike in 1981. The GAA prohibits clubs being named after people who are still alive.

Competitions

Domestic

The GAA organises competitive games in both codes and at all levels from youth all the way up to adult senior. The highest level of competitions in the GAA are the inter-county All-Ireland Championships where the 32 counties of Ireland Compete to win the Provincial championships, All-Ireland Senior Football Championship and All-Ireland Senior Hurling Championship. Before 1892, the winning club in each county championship contested the All-Ireland championship representing their county. In 1892, Congress granted permission for the winning club in each county championship to use players from other clubs in the county. The Inter County scene of today was thus created.

Internationals

The GAA does not hold internationals played according to the rules of either Gaelic football or hurling, however compromise rules have been reached.

Hurlers play an annual fixture against a national Shinty team from Scotland.

International Rules Football matches have taken place between an Irish national team drawn from the ranks of Gaelic footballers, against an Australian national team drawn from the Australian Football League. The venue alternates between Ireland and Australia. As of December 9, 2006 the International series between Australia and Ireland has been called off due to excessive violence in past matches.

Grounds

Main Article:List of GAA Stadiums by Capacity

The GAA has many stadiums in Ireland and beyond such as Gaelic Park used by New York GAA. Every county, and nearly all clubs, have a GAA ground on which to play their home games, with varying capacities and utilities.

The hierarchical structure of the GAA is applied to the used of grounds. Clubs with play at their own ground for the early rounds of the club championship while the latter rounds from quarter-finals too finals are usually held at the county ground.This is the ground where the Inter county games take place or the County Board are based. In practice a team like Gweedore GAA will play most of its games at Páirc Mhic Eiteagáin if they reach the final of the club championship, the game will be played in MacCumhail Park.

The provincial championship finals are usually played at the same venue every year, however, this trend has been called into question somewhat in Ulster, when in 2004 and 2005, the Ulster Football Finals were played in Croke Park, due to the fact that the anticipated attendance was likely to far exceed the capacity of St. Tiernach's Park, Clones.

Croke Park is the GAA's flagship venue, known colloquially as Croker or Headquarters, owing to the fact that the venue doubles as the GAA's base. With a capacity of 82,500, it ranks among the top 5 stadiums in Europe by capacity, having undergone extensive renovations for most of the 1990s and early 21st century. Every September, Croke Park hosts the All-Ireland Hurling and Football Finals, as the conclusion to the summer championship.

The next three biggest grounds are all in Munster - Semple Stadium in Thurles, Co. Tipperary with a capacity of 53,000, the Gaelic Grounds in Limerick which holds 50,000 and FitzGerald Stadium in Killarney, Co. Kerry which can accommodate 43,000.

Other notable grounds include:

Pearse Stadium in Galway, which has hosted International rules football series games;
Páirc Uí Chaoimh in Cork is where some Munster Finals are also held;
Páirc Uí Rinn, also in Cork, a former League of Ireland soccer ground.
St. Jarlath's Park, (known as Tuam Stadium) in Galway host to the most Connacht Finals.

Bibliography

The GAA: A History by Marcus de Burca, Gill & MacMillan, 1984 & 2000, ISBN 0-7171-3109-2
Illustrated History of the GAA, by Eoghan Corry, Gill & MacMillan, 2005, ISBN 0-7171-3951-4
The GAA Book of Lists, by Eoghan Corry, Hodder Headline, 2005, ISBN 0-340-89695-7
The Gaelic Athletic Association And Irish Nationalist Politics 1884-1924 by W F Mandle (Gill & MacMillan and Christopher Helm 1987). 240pp ISBN 0-7470-2200-3
Michael Cusack and The GAA by Marcus De Burca, Anvil, 1989, 192pp, ISBN 0-947962-49-2
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 0-906602-25-4
Croke Park by Tim Carey, Collins Press, 2004, ISBN 1-903464-54-4
God and the Referee: Unforgettable GAA Quotations, by Eoghan Corry, Hodder Headline, 2005, ISBN 0-340-83976-7
History of Hurling, by Seamus King, Gill & MacMillan, 2005, ISBN 0-7171-3938-7
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 0-7171-4038-5
Bairi Cos In Eirinn by Liam P O Cathnia, Clochomhar Tta, 1984.
Legends of the Ash, by Brendan Fullam, Wolfhound Press, 1998, ISBN 0-86327-667-9

References

External links

GAA official website
An Fear Rua: The GAA Unplugged! - analysis, discussion forums, satire and humour on GAA topics.
Hogan Stand
Radio Beo - Live commentary from club games, on the Internet.