Foreign Tongues Victorian Language Learning and the Shaping of Modern Ireland reviewed by Margaret Crowley
Published in The English Historical Review, January 2026.
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Abstract

As befits a book about language learning, Phyllis Gaffney has a way with words, and she has achieved an erudite, entertaining and enlightening read. Indeed, the very title points to the significance language learning in Victorian Ireland held in the creation of modern Ireland. But to view this book solely as a treatise on this subject is to pigeon-hole this illuminating tome. Gaffney scrutinises language learning by Irish scholars, and analyses themes as diverse as empire, philology and the Counter-Reformation, as well as more familiar themes like class, politics and gender. The kernel of Phyllis Gaffney’s book is that Ireland’s engagement with learning languages ultimately led to languages being taught equally to male and female students. Throughout, there are countless stories of men and women whose lives were changed by learning, teaching and working with modern languages, and she illustrates how such learning has had consequences for Irish people’s sense of identity. To do so, her research was meticulous, extending to 700 primary and secondary sources, and she has judiciously used personal letters to add to the sense of fulfilment expressed by students of languages.