# Scots, Irish, St.Patrick **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [March 16, 2004, 7:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scots-irish-st-patrick/234692 "2004-03-16T19:44:28Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Declan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ecae2f/32.png) [@Declan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Declan)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2004, 8:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scots-irish-st-patrick/234692/21 "2004-03-17T08:50:19Z")
> [@ruadh](#): > > **Um, a Canadian passport should be enough to get you into Ireland. The birth certificate on its own will do you no good whatsoever.** > > If I had a Canadian passport , this would not be a conversational item. My british passport expired some time ago, and did not have the time or money to get it replaced. > > A Canadian passport requires something like 90 days to process I believe and its one of the smallest passports , thickness wise with fewer pages to stamp , than a normal passport. > > **[continuing hijack]BTW, none of this “Éire or NI” stuff please. Éire is simply the Irish word for Ireland. If you wouldn’t say “Ireland or NI” (and why would you?) there’s no reason to say “Éire or NI”.[/hijack]** Sorry , gotta disagree. For the purposes of this conversation , the two mentioned are separate political groups ,with Eire being the republic and NI being a British possession at the moment ,which means two separate foreign offices with their own rules. Correct me if thats wrong. Declan ---
**Author:** ![ruadh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/d2c977/32.png) [@ruadh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ruadh)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2004, 8:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scots-irish-st-patrick/234692/22 "2004-03-17T08:59:51Z")
> [@Declan](#): > > If I had a Canadian passport , this would not be a conversational item. My british passport expired some time ago, and did not have the time or money to get it replaced. > > A Canadian passport requires something like 90 days to process I believe and its one of the smallest passports , thickness wise with fewer pages to stamp , than a normal passport. Well, you need a passport from _some_ country anyway. How else are you going to get on the plane? > [@](#): > > Sorry , gotta disagree. For the purposes of this conversation , the two mentioned are separate political groups ,with Eire being the republic and NI being a British possession at the moment ,which means two separate foreign offices with their own rules. > > Correct me if thats wrong. I’m not disagreeing that they’re separate politically. “Ireland” has two meanings - the 26-county state and the 32-county island. “Éire” has the same two meanings. The only difference between them is that the former is the English term and the latter is the Irish term. There is no reason to use the latter term unless you’re speaking in Irish. If you need to distinguish between the two states, it makes no more sense to say “Éire and NI” than it does to say “Ireland and NI”. The most widely preferred way to distinguish them would be “RoI and NI”. ---
**Author:** ![UDS](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ecae2f/32.png) [@UDS](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UDS)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2004, 9:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scots-irish-st-patrick/234692/23 "2004-03-17T09:22:34Z")
> [@Declan](#): > > [Highjack of a highjack]Irish dopers , whats need to gain entry into Eire or NI papers wise if I want to come over with out a passport. As I was born in Belfast , would just the birth certificate do ?[/Highjack of a highjack] Producing the birth certificate does not, of itself, establish that you are an Irish citizen, for two reasons. First, you may be in the small class of people who, because of birth in Ireland, are entitled to become Irish citizens rather than being Irish citizens automatically (e.g. the children of accredited diplomats, persons who have previously made a declaration of alienage to renounce citizenship). Secondly, and more substantially, the birth certificate you flourish so confidently may not, in fact, be yours; a birth certificate is not an identity document. Even if you have some other identification (e.g. a driver’s licence) which has your photograph and shows you have the same name as is on the birth certificate, that could be a coincidence. Or you could have changed your name to coincide with the name on the birth certicate, and then applied for a licence. There are procedures in place for ensuring that the people who get passports are who they say they are. Sure, they’re not perfect, but they are mutually recognised internationally. There is no such convention with respect to drivers licences, birth certicates and the like. So the immigration officer will expect a passport. Truth is, if you get as far as landing in Ireland you \might\ succeed in talking your way in. Are you elderly and extremely respectable parents waiting for you just outside the landing area? This helps. Have you a pronounced Irish accent? Do you “look Irish”? This helps too. You might get in. But you might not. And, as **ruadh** points out, without a passport the airline is likely to refuse to carry you. Especially nowadays. So you’ll never get as far as the immigration officer. Hey, if you can afford a transatlantic airfare you can afford to pay for a passport. Oh, and what **ruadh** says about the name of the country is quite correct. It may seem picky, but if you do talk your way onto the plane and past the immigration officer, you should know that the locals will bristle at your usage. ---
**Author:** ![GorillaMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/50afbb/32.png) [@GorillaMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GorillaMan)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2004, 9:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scots-irish-st-patrick/234692/24 "2004-03-17T09:28:23Z")
> [@ruadh](#): > > Well, that’s redundant. If you have an Irish born grandparent, you have an Irish citizen parent. Because the child of the Irish born grandparent would automatically be an Irish citizen. Not necessarily true. Myself as an example again - if I have a child, they can claim Irish citizenship, _but only because I had done so_. If I had stuck with plain old British, they would have no claim. AFAIK, these rules were made to stop thousands of claims by Americans with only tenuous links to Ireland. ---
**Author:** ![ruadh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/d2c977/32.png) [@ruadh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ruadh)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2004, 10:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scots-irish-st-patrick/234692/25 "2004-03-17T10:35:56Z")
> [@](#): > > you may be in the small class of people who, because of birth in Ireland, are entitled to become Irish citizens rather than being Irish citizens automatically (e.g. the children of accredited diplomats, persons who have previously made a declaration of alienage to renounce citizenship). Just to be complete here, there is another category of persons born in Ireland who are not automatically Irish citizens. If you’re born in Ireland to non-citizen parents, and you qualify for the citizenship of another country, you are _entitled to declare yourself_ an Irish citizen; however, if you choose not to do so, Ireland will not claim you as a citizen. The reason for this is the revision to Articles 2 and 3 of the Irish Constitution. As **UDS** will know (but others may not), under the 1998 agreement the Irish state agreed to give up its constitutional claim to Northern Ireland but, in order to reassure northern nationalists that they were not being abandoned, the new text of the Constitution stated that “It is the entitlement and birthright of every person born in the island of Ireland… to be part of the Irish nation”. In this way, northern nationalists who _want_ to be Irish citizens are able to be, while northern unionists who _don’t_ want to be Irish citizens do not have Irish citizenship forced upon them. As a practical matter the same would apply to the child of any foreign national parents who is entitled to his or her parents’ citizenship. Finally, I’ll note that the Irish Government announced last week that it plans to hold a referendum to make another change to the Constitution, to deny entitlement to citizenship to the children of noncitizens who have been resident in Ireland for less than three years. ---
**Author:** ![ruadh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/d2c977/32.png) [@ruadh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ruadh)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2004, 10:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scots-irish-st-patrick/234692/26 "2004-03-17T10:41:28Z")
> [@GorillaMan](#): > > Not necessarily true. Myself as an example again - if I have a child, they can claim Irish citizenship, _but only because I had done so_. If I had stuck with plain old British, they would have no claim. No, you’ve missed the point. You didn’t have a choice in claiming Irish citizenship - as far as the Irish government is concerned, because your mother is an Irish citizen, _so are you_. From your same link: “If either of your parents was an Irish citizen at the time of your birth, you _are_ an Irish citizen” (emphasis added). You can choose whether or not to exercise this citizenship, of course, but that doesn’t impact on the Irish government’s view of you - nor on your children’s right to claim citizenship. ---
**Author:** ![ruadh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/d2c977/32.png) [@ruadh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ruadh)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2004, 10:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scots-irish-st-patrick/234692/27 "2004-03-17T10:56:31Z")
Oh, and as far as trying to keep Americans with a tenuous Irish connection from claiming citizenship, check out the website of the [Irish embassy in Washington](http://www.irelandemb.org/fbr.html) with its full and complete details on how an American with an Irish grandparent can apply. ---
**Author:** ![Futile\_Gesture](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/f05b48/32.png) [@Futile\_Gesture](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Futile_Gesture)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2004, 10:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scots-irish-st-patrick/234692/28 "2004-03-17T10:59:50Z")
> [@pravnik](#): > > What, you can’t be both? An Irish man and woman give birth to a child in the U.S., and the child can’t call himself Irish? A Latino born here can’t validly call himself a Mexican? It depends where the child is brought up and lives. If an ‘Scotch-Irish’ is to all intents and purposes identical to an American except for what they do today (St Patrick’s day), then ‘Scotch-Irish’ isn’t much of an national or cultural identity. What do those who not American and are ‘Scotch-Irish’ all year round do? Which is why I said that there was no longer any such thing. Sorry people, but if you are born and raised in America then you are American. You don’t get to co-opt other nationalities as a one-day party piece, there’s a bit more to it than that. This is very different from celibrating your _heritage_. Even if the idea of what Irish culture is seems to have lost track somewhere amongst the leprechauns and green Guinness. ---
**Author:** ![Dogface](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/9d8465/32.png) [@Dogface](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dogface)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2004, 12:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scots-irish-st-patrick/234692/29 "2004-03-17T12:58:18Z")
> [@ruadh](#): > > “Scotch-Irish” is an Americanism, used to refer to the 18th and 19th century immigrants to America who hailed from (what is now called) Northern Ireland and were Protestants of Scottish ancestry. The term has no currency on this side of the pond. And thus aren’t actually Irish at all. ---
**Author:** ![ruadh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/d2c977/32.png) [@ruadh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ruadh)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2004, 1:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scots-irish-st-patrick/234692/30 "2004-03-17T13:00:31Z")
They were born in Ireland, that makes them Irish AFAIC. How they chose to see themselves is another matter, of course. ---
**Author:** ![dylan\_73](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ecccb3/32.png) [@dylan\_73](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dylan_73)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2004, 3:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scots-irish-st-patrick/234692/31 "2004-03-17T15:27:09Z")
I’m Scottish, and today (St Patrick’s) is my birthday. Had to mention it somewhere… 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![gluteus\_maximus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/f17d59/32.png) [@gluteus\_maximus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gluteus_maximus)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2004, 4:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scots-irish-st-patrick/234692/32 "2004-03-17T16:51:21Z")
So, what’s with the Scottish Highlander bagpipes and Tartan kilts in the St. Patrick’s Day parade in NYC? I mean, I get the Irish tweed-wearin’ folk with their Irish setters… ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2004, 6:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scots-irish-st-patrick/234692/33 "2004-03-17T18:59:55Z")
The bagpipe is a traditional Irish instrument as well as a traditional Scottish one. There’s some dispute over who had it first, but a similar instrument was being played in the Middle East before it ever showed up on the Isles, so it’s probably moot. The Irish version of the instrument is slightly different, and it is, in fact, the Scottish version that you usually see and hear in St. Paddy’s parades. This is just because the Scottish type is generally preferred by Americans, and it’s considered close enough. As for tartans, I think (but I’m not certain) that tartans in general are Celtic, not specifically Scottish. Certainly, kilts were traditionally worn on both sides of the Irish Sea. ---
**Author:** ![Declan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ecae2f/32.png) [@Declan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Declan)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2004, 7:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scots-irish-st-patrick/234692/34 "2004-03-17T19:18:49Z")
> [@UDS](#): > > Producing the birth certificate does not, of itself, establish that you are an Irish citizen, for two reasons. > > First, you may be in the small class of people who, because of birth in Ireland, are entitled to become Irish citizens rather than being Irish citizens automatically (e.g. the children of accredited diplomats, persons who have previously made a declaration of alienage to renounce citizenship). No , I am a dual or tri national , never figured that one out ,but Canadian requirements don’t demand I renounce Irish citizenship , so to make it simple , I am dual national. > [@](#): > > Secondly, and more substantially, the birth certificate you flourish so confidently may not, in fact, be yours; a birth certificate is not an identity document. **Even if you have some other identification (e.g. a driver’s licence) which has your photograph and shows you have the same name as is on the birth certificate, that could be a coincidence.** Or you could have changed your name to coincide with the name on the birth certicate, and then applied for a licence. Unfortuneatly yeah , I got the same thing coming into canadian customs , it only proves your licensed to drive in Ontario , yeah whatever lady(not you) , its kinda funny that way , part of the confusion regarding passports , was that I knew I needed one for entry into a foreign country , and as a convience into the States , but not for the birth country. > [@](#): > > Truth is, if you get as far as landing in Ireland you \might\ succeed in talking your way in. Are you elderly and extremely respectable parents waiting for you just outside the landing area? This helps. Have you a pronounced Irish accent? Do you “look Irish”? This helps too. You might get in. But you might not. And, as **ruadh** points out, without a passport the airline is likely to refuse to carry you. Especially nowadays. So you’ll never get as far as the immigration officer. No , I am 39 and am more likely to get asked what state I am from , rather than what country , and have heard various mumbles under the breath about being another gringo 🙂 As for the airline refusing entry , thats a new one for me. Like I said , I thought it had to do with foreign countrys. > [@](#): > > Hey, if you can afford a transatlantic airfare you can afford to pay for a passport. True , probably in a couple of weeks I will apply for the Canadian passport Oh, and what **ruadh** says about the name of the country is quite correct. It may seem picky, but if you do talk your way onto the plane and past the immigration officer, you should know that the locals will bristle at your usage. [/QUOTE] Not the way I grew up here , when we emigrated here in 70 , the Irish of that generation had specific slang and sayings and a general way of talking, that happened to be one of them. But differnet times Declan ---
**Author:** ![pravnik](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/8edcca/32.png) [@pravnik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pravnik)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2004, 8:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scots-irish-st-patrick/234692/35 "2004-03-17T20:14:03Z")
> [@Futile Gesture](#): > > It depends where the child is brought up and lives. > > If an ‘Scotch-Irish’ is to all intents and purposes identical to an American except for what they do today (St Patrick’s day), then ‘Scotch-Irish’ isn’t much of an national or cultural identity. What do those who not American and are ‘Scotch-Irish’ all year round do? > > Which is why I said that there was no longer any such thing. Sorry people, but if you are born and raised in America then you are American. You don’t get to co-opt other nationalities as a one-day party piece, there’s a bit more to it than that. > > This is very different from celibrating your _heritage_. Even if the idea of what Irish culture is seems to have lost track somewhere amongst the leprechauns and green Guinness. Who said anything about nationality? I’m talking about cultural identity. No American traveling abroad would say “I’m Irish” if asked their nationality; that would be inane. I’m talking about identification with the place that the person’s family immigrated from, and the culture that they brought with them. For example, cities like Giddings and Fredericksburg in Texas were settled by German immigrants and retained a strong German identification long after those immigrants had passed away. In my maternal grandmother’s day, most residents spoke German and English fairly equally, and a bit of a creole of both. A skunk, native to Texas but not Germany, was “ein stinkatzen.” My great uncles had to enlist in the Navy and fight in the Pacific theater in WWII due to German last names and German accents in their voices, despite having been born and raised in America and never having even set foot in Germany. These cultural identities can still be quite strong today. A German girlfriend of mine in law school who was traveling through Giddings was let out of a speeding ticket by a state trooper named Shultz with a German Flag on his lapel. Strong Irish American communities still exist in major cities like Chicago; right now probably half of them are taking the day off of work to start celebrating early. In Hamatrack, Michigan, the site of the old Poletown, the Polish community is so strong there’s still a Polish speaking minority. If you still don’t believe how strong this identification can be, find a guy named Kowalski in a Hamatrack bar and tell him a Polish joke. ---
**Author:** ![Dogface](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/9d8465/32.png) [@Dogface](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dogface)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2004, 8:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scots-irish-st-patrick/234692/36 "2004-03-17T20:39:31Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > The bagpipe is a traditional Irish instrument as well as a traditional Scottish one. “Bagpipes” in general are. However, the three-drone Great Highland Pipes is a pure invention of Scotland, with no history whatsoever in Ireland–except as it was brought there and imposed by British invaders. > [@](#): > > Scottish type is generally preferred by Americans, and it’s considered close enough. Yeah, like a tuba is “close enough” to a cornet. > [@](#): > > As for tartans, I think (but I’m not certain) that tartans in general are Celtic, not specifically Scottish. Certainly, kilts were traditionally worn on both sides of the Irish Sea. Nothing uniquely “Celtic” about “tartan” patterns. They have been found in North Africa, in Shogun-era Japanese finds, and elsewhere. Your contention about the kilt is nothing but 19th-century fantasy. Pleated garments were worn in Ireland, but not “kilts” as they are known today (no, not even the “belted plaid”)–until, once again, British invaders brought them. The pleated garment worn in Ireland was the _ionar_, a jacket that ended above the waist and had a pleated skirt attached to that bottom. In addition, the Irish wore a very loose shirt underneath, which was drawn up into the belt. Artists’ renditions were mistaken as “kilts” by later people driven more by romantic nonsense than sensible scholarship. In addition (and most dimwittedly), many so-called “ancient kilts” are actually just a representation of the quilted byrnie–a padded armor with no kiltlike qualities, whatsoever. I suggest you consult _Old Irish & Highland dress, and that of the Isle of Man_ by H.F. McClintock. He’s still the best source on the matter, especially since he is one of the very few sources that presents what original material is known to exist rather than just rehashing some old rehash of some old rehash that goes back to a pair of clever Polish con men. ---
**Author:** ![Dogface](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/9d8465/32.png) [@Dogface](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dogface)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2004, 8:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scots-irish-st-patrick/234692/37 "2004-03-17T20:43:22Z")
Ah, here we go. A site that rather well debunks the tired old lie of the “Irish kilt” [http://www.reconstructinghistory.com/irish/IrishKilts.html](http://www.reconstructinghistory.com/irish/IrishKilts.html) A page that gives examples of far more accurate reconstructions of traditional Irish clothing: [http://www.reconstructinghistory.com/irish/](http://www.reconstructinghistory.com/irish/) ---
**Author:** ![TitoBenito](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/2acd7d/32.png) [@TitoBenito](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TitoBenito)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2004, 9:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scots-irish-st-patrick/234692/38 "2004-03-17T21:57:34Z")
> [@Futile Gesture](#): > > It depends where the child is brought up and lives. > > If an ‘Scotch-Irish’ is to all intents and purposes identical to an American except for what they do today (St Patrick’s day), then ‘Scotch-Irish’ isn’t much of an national or cultural identity. What do those who not American and are ‘Scotch-Irish’ all year round do? > > Which is why I said that there was no longer any such thing. Sorry people, but if you are born and raised in America then you are American. You don’t get to co-opt other nationalities as a one-day party piece, there’s a bit more to it than that. > > This is very different from celibrating your _heritage_. Even if the idea of what Irish culture is seems to have lost track somewhere amongst the leprechauns and green Guinness. I really think you don’t understand the whole concept of ethnicity in the US. When someone claims to be English, Irish, Russian, German, Greek what have you, they are not actually claiming to be an Englishman, an Irishman, a Russian, a German, or a Greek. They are merely explaining their ancestry. I can claim to be Scots-Irish just as I can claim to be English or German. By saying so, I’m not claiming to be a (notice use of indefinate article) something, but that I am somethingish (notice adjectival form). I am an American and I have no real desire to be another nationality, but this doesn’t mean that I have no right to explain my ancestry if asked (its a terribly boring subject and I would never bring it up). ---
**Author:** ![Matchka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/77aa72/32.png) [@Matchka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Matchka)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2004, 10:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scots-irish-st-patrick/234692/39 "2004-03-17T22:08:42Z")
((Matcka sips his Guinness. Shifts in his seat. Looks about for a larger worm can)) Seriously, good stuff on the history, pipes, tartan, citizenship, etc. I have a large thoroughbred Scot friend who insists St. Pat’s is his day…from what I’m hearing, this is really only the case if he is decended from Irish swimmers. ---
**Author:** ![Buran](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/a88e57/32.png) [@Buran](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Buran)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2004, 10:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scots-irish-st-patrick/234692/40 "2004-03-17T22:11:26Z")
> [@Mk VII](#): > > there has always been a certain amount of population movement between Ulster and Lowland Scotland (just about visible across the Irish Sea at its nearest point on a clear day) More than just about visible, from my home in NI I can easily see the West coast of Scotland (Mull of Kyntyre…spelled wrong) which is roughly 20 miles away. Its actually a very useful way of determining the weather, the clearer the view the more likely bad or at least cold weather is on the way. Sometimes its extraordinary how far you can see. A few miles north up the coast from Torr Head to Scotland at its closest point they’re seperated by a mere 8 miles. I’ve seen Scotland virtually every day of my life but I’ve never been there… [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scots-irish-st-patrick/234692.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scots-irish-st-patrick/234692.md?page=3)