Sentence examples for first official language from inspiring English sources

Irish (Gaelic) is the first official language of Ireland, but in practice almost everybody speaks English.

The state they created made Gaelic compulsory and insisted that it must be the "first official language".

The constitution lists Irish as "the national language" and "first official language"; English is merely "a second official language".

Since then, Irish has been recognized as the first official language of the state; it is a compulsory subject in all of the schools and is a requirement for civil service and some other posts.

De Valera's new constitution, ratified by referendum, came into effect on December 29 , 1937 and made "Ireland"—the new name of the state ("Éire" in Irish, which was now proclaimed the first official language)—an independent republic associated with the British Commonwealth only as matter of external policy.

The Gaelic language - a member of the Celtic language group that also includes Welsh and Breton - was displaced by English as the main language of most Irish in the 18th and 19th centuries, but is the republic's first official language.

She circumvented the sensitive issues of making Russian a second official language or joining NATO.

Swift-thinking NATO officials quickly shifted to the alliance's forgotten second official language, French.

In 1999, Mirandese became Portugal's second official language, thanks to regional lobbying and a lawmaker sympathetic to the cause.

The second official language is Arabic, which is spoken chiefly in northern Somalia and in the coastal towns.

Seth Kugel visits a remote corner of Portugal to get a taste of the country's second official language, Mirandese (above).