In his address at a reception in Buenos Aires for Argentina's 500,000-strong Irish community on Saturday, Irish President Michael D Higgins focused on the contributions the Irish had made in creating modern Argentina.
The country has the largest Irish diaspora in the non-English speaking world. Entire villages from the Midlands in Ireland moved to Argentina in the 19th century fleeing famine and oppression.
The community has the longest continuously published Irish newspaper outside Ireland, the Southern Cross, first published in 1875.
Higgins praised the bonds between Ireland and Argentina, joking that "bonds in not a word used lightly any more in Ireland." He also received warm applause for the parts of his speech delivered in Spanish to the largely bilingual audience.
Higgins delivered a speech earlier in the National Academy of Medicine on Ireland's relationship with the country who received an estimated 50,000 Irish emigrants in the second half of the 19th century.
He presented the coach of Argentina’s national rugby team, Santiago Phelan, whose family originated in Co. Wexford, with a Certificate of Irish Heritage.
He also attended a ceremony in Buenos Aires' Plaza Irlanda in honor of William Brown, the man from Mayo who founded the Argentine navy.
While the Irish community sustained its identity in Argentina by marrying other Irish, after five generations the diaspora is well integrated into Argentinian society, said Lyda O'Farrell, who attended the reception.
“My grandmother asked me why I was marrying a heathen when I told her I was engaged to an Argentinian,” remembers Mrs O’Farrell, whose family originally came from Wexford and Limerick.
“The community is fading away,” says Juan Clancy, whose great-grandfather arrived in 1844 from Wexford. “The president’s visit gets us together, but the modern way of life is diluting the old communities here in Argentina. It is not just happening to us but the German and British communities as well."
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Switch to the desktop site to post a comment.Smyrnian | Oct 17, 2012, 09:33 PM EDT
Curitiba - you make an excellent and thoughtful point. thank you. got me thinking about what you said.
Curitiba | Oct 17, 2012, 11:43 AM EDT
Tayandcake: Yes, but that is only one way of building an empire. That way is expensive, costs lives and because of the amount of force required to maintain it, doomed to failure. Ireland's empire is not one of governments and border and armies and civil servants based in various outposts. Ireland'e empire is its people. Wherever there are Irish people, that is Ireland. Camden Town in the 1960's WAS Ireland. They don't say New York was Irish for nothing. And of course Buenos Aires Is Irish, for as long as the Irish people there regard themselves as such. Ireland is nothing special in this empire:it just happens to be where the greatest concentration of Irish people live.
curtisjohnson | Oct 16, 2012, 09:13 PM EDT
"(Remember the Malvinas War? G.B. calls them the Falkland Islands )" Yes, the Malvinas are one in a long line of examples of british global larceny. Britain is more of a crime syndicate than a nation.
TayandCake | Oct 16, 2012, 08:59 PM EDT
Curitiba, Liams right, those Europe countries took things by force. Gun beats spears it seems. Irelands idea of a Empire is to built a pub in an area and have lock ins.
Curitiba | Oct 16, 2012, 04:34 PM EDT
Well, I'm glad the Argentinian Irish are taking a bit of interest in the Anglophone Irish Diaspora. I had a friend from Wales who could speak Welsh and he went to Chubut province to that town where the speak Welsh, Y Wladfa. He could speak no Castellano, and they no English, so they communicated in Welsh. A pity the Irish language has not been disseminated amongst the Diaspora in the same way. That would be a proper cultural experience, people from two different Irish communities in communicating in Irish because neither of you know each other's first language.
ancavker | Oct 16, 2012, 03:16 PM EDT
Curitiba: I don't know, but close enough!!
Curitiba | Oct 16, 2012, 03:04 PM EDT
ancavker: Plastico Patrico's hahahahahahaha!Good one. Is that grammatically correct in Castellano though?
Curitiba | Oct 16, 2012, 03:01 PM EDT
Liam3494: No, but we did!
Smyrnian | Oct 16, 2012, 12:44 PM EDT
Ancavkar - they probably never heard of them.
ancavker | Oct 16, 2012, 10:31 AM EDT
curitiba: I wonder what some of the Irish in Ireland would call the Irish in Argentina Plastico Patrico's
seanomelb | Oct 15, 2012, 05:21 PM EDT
Los Isla Malvinas Argentine.
Smyrnian | Oct 15, 2012, 04:13 PM EDT
I have had the pleasure of visiting several S. American countries and meeting our wonderful Irish cousins there. Truly terrific people and a great experience!!
WoundedKnee | Oct 15, 2012, 03:42 PM EDT
hybernia: Her "looks" that you find attractive are the product of plastic surgery. As they say in Argentina, she is "operada".
hybernia | Oct 15, 2012, 01:14 PM EDT
The Argentine president Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner is rather beautiful isn't she.
nicgearailt | Oct 15, 2012, 12:31 PM EDT
sounds like a nice place to visit...The President of Ireland makes us proud...a true scholar..
cillowen | Oct 15, 2012, 10:44 AM EDT
as is right and proper to honor those who fought for worthy causes.
Liam3494 | Oct 15, 2012, 09:18 AM EDT
Curitiba... As a first generation Irish in Argentina, we're doing OK thanks. It was an honour to meet the President and his wife last week, and the last thing we Irish want is to be thought of as a colonial empire. We didn't miss out on anything, thank you very much.
Curitiba | Oct 15, 2012, 09:12 AM EDT
How would it be if Ireland had its own colony in South America, a place where Irish culture and language is maintained and reinvigorated by immigration from Ireland and the rest of the Diaspora nations. Britain, France, Spain and Portugal got their own nations in the Americas, where you see a mirror image of the source culture in Europe. Ireland missed out and now the Irish community (and others) are subject to the subtle assimilation policies of the government of Argentina. It was lucky to have survived as long as it did, given that there has been no mass immigration of Irish people since the 1800's. Perhaps a new wave of Irish immigration to Argentina would save the Irish community there from complete assimilation.
kubs | Oct 15, 2012, 09:11 AM EDT
Another common bond between the two countries is the bond that the Crown forces attempted ( & continue ) to place on both of these sovereign nations. (Remember the Malvinas War? G.B. calls them the Falkland Islands )