I am looking to better understand the word striapacha
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/striapach

I understand it to be derogatory. However I am interested in "reclaiming" it and using it in a non derogatory way for a project which is about Irish sex worker history and culture.

Something like the way LGBT+ people have reclaimed the word Queer, which was originally derogatory.

I understand my sex work and my history well, but I have a very poor understanding of Irish language.

Could anyone offer any insights into the word striapacha which might help me better understand it?

Thanks

Lucy

lucys, a chara,

I think that one thing that you should keep in mind, and that is very important to many Irish speakers and learners, is that Irish is not English. Because of that, words being 'reclaimed' is a phenomena that has developed relatively recently and is most often a feature seen in English. Many of the modern Irish words were, you could say, made up by a group of non-native speakers in Dublin, who didn't want to use the Irish language as something to strengthen traditional culture, but to help them politically; and, to do this, they essentially made up words in order to give every English phrase a direct translation into Irish.

You can even see this here on the page that you provided, in which 'máistir striapach' is given, which I assume wasn't used up until the creation of the Caighdeán Oifigiúil.

To my understanding, striapach wasn't used derogatorily until whore was used derogatorily in English. Traditionally, it would have just meant a prostitute (but then, of course, the British started using it as an offensive term and the Dubliners had to follow after). So basically, I don't really think there's much to be 'reclaimed' here.

At any rate, take everything that I say with a handful of salt, as I'm by no means an expert, so I advise that you wait for the input of others before continuing any further.

Lé meas,
Séamus

Thank you very much Séamus. This is a very thoughtful and helpful reply.

The sense I'm getting trying to decipher old Irish texts is that it could have a move diverse meaning than simply prostitute or whore, like it could mean slut or fornicator.

For my purposes this would probably be good as I think in modern Irish history there has been situation where all sorts of women and girls, not just sex workers, but unmarried mothers and rape victims etc have often been grouped together and all called prostitutes or 'fallen women', when things are really much more diverse. So if a word like striapacha could have a meaning more diverse than simply prostitute that would suit the purposes here. I considered 'fallen women' but that is obviously exclusively female and I'd like to not be restricted to female.

I guess this is another consideration I have with striapacha? Can males be striapacha?

My sense that there needs to be some sort of "reclaiming" the way LGBT+ people have reclaimed queer is that it does seem that striapacha is generally considered derogatory. It is not my intention to be derogatory towards the people whose lives this history project will follow. The opposite is the case. I want to reject stigma and shame around people who led lives that were not fitting with social propriety of the time. So I feel like maybe I need to clear I'm reclaiming the word, I'm not using it as derogatory.

Anyway, thank you so much for your time and thoughts. I hope by thinking on this I will come to an answer. But not knowing Irish I will really benefit from feedback from those who do know Irish better than me.

Lucy

It would not be authentic to try to reclaim this word. Reclaiming words is a form of culture war by people in the West who have been taught by the cultural elite to try to run everything down.

Sex work, as you term it, is a personal decision, and maybe in certain circumstances, in order to quickly resolve a cashflow problem, you could say that if the person was willing, then it is no one else's business. But I think we as a society should aim not to force people into this type of thing, e.g. by adopting policies to keep house prices low.

In any case, in Ireland, it is illegal to buy sex, but apparently not to sell it. In other words, it is illegal for the customer only. In Northern Ireland, the situation will be the same as in the rest of the UK: it's not illegal, for either the prostitute or the customer, as long as there is no sex trafficking involved, no "kerb-crawling", and no use of a brothel or house of ill-repute (the UK has made most aspects of it illegal, while not the actual main thing).

I don't think anyone not a Far Left weirdo with blue hair would be interested in reclaiming selling your body. In the end, being a whore is not a real career, and using the word repeatedly and apparently with approval doesn't change that.

The thing you have to understand is that Ireland before the 1980s was a very, very, very traditionalist place, with a strong Catholic ethos. The idea that striapach was anything other than extremely negative at any point in Irish history would be wrong. You go back to 1980 and you would be struggling to find people in Ireland who would tell you anything other than that whores and prostitutes go to hell. Since the 1990s, there has been a considerable and rather amazing shift in Irish culture, but you can't read that back into previous decades and centuries.

Focloir.ie has buachaill aeraíochta for "rent boy", and striapach fir for "male prostitute", where fir in the genitive singular modifies striapach and makes it clear it is referring to a man. Aeraíocht means, literally, enjoying open-air activities, and so buachaill aeraíochta didn't originally have this meaning, and the word may have been totally invented for the website focloir.ie. It obviously refers to the use of aerach, "airy", to mean "gay", a use that is also a recent invention.

Funnily enough, one of the arguments for retaining Irish made by people like Father Peadar Ua Laoghaire during the Gaelic Revival was that the Irish language would insulate the Irish people against moral degeneracy emanating from England. The Irish language was supposed to be used to prevent the normalisation or reclaiming of striapachas.

Thank you for your feedback djwebb2021.
Your insights have been very helpful.
But I think we might be clashing somewhat on the issue of prostitution or sex work.
I do not think it is "selling your body", it is providing a service. As a historian I also don't see "work" as something that has always been good and non exploitative and a career.

Unfortunately, Irish vocabulary may not be as diverse as English, which has arguably the most words of any language. I don't think that Irish has words for all of the English phrases that you have above (i.e. 'unmarried mothers', 'rape victims', 'fallen women'). Traditionally, I would say that striapach just means a prostitute or a whore (a word that traditionally was not offensive). A term such as Mná Tite (quite literally 'Fallen Women') would be viewed as Béarlachas (i.e. words/phrases taken directly from English [= Béarla], translated literally without much thought or tradition).



Traditionally, no. You mentioned working on a "project which is about Irish sex worker history and culture", and historically, only women would have been striapacha until recent times. However, this is obviously not the case today, so I guess it just depends on if you want to take a more modern or historical approach. Teanglann lists striapach fir as meaning 'whore-master', but perhaps it could take on the meaning of a male prostitute (although this meaning would not be historical nor traditional).



Again, I perhaps feel the need to say that the idea of 'reclaiming words' isn't really an idea that exists in many languages other than English, especially not in languages such as Irish (languages tend to be more conservative and are not spoken by a large number of people). However, this is your work and your decision, and I think that any work done for the Irish language is helpful for spreading awareness and providing support for this dwindling community.



Tá céad míle fáilte romhat - I'm glad I was able to help.
Be sure to let me know if you need any more help.

Thank you again Séamus for all this which is so helpful.

To explain a little more about the project, it is to be a website that will promote events and creative work around the theme of the history of sex work and also some more broadly less explored histories of people. It is likely it will be mainly modern history as we don't as yet have too many possible contributors who would do older history. All the projects will be like individually organised by the person and group leading on them, rather than directly run by the website, which will be more like a place to promote all these things. It is important to give a website a short name. The name does not need to reflect every project. It won't be perfect for every circumstance but several people like the idea of striapacha, and Irish name, and it is sort of top of my list at the moment whilst I carry out more research and consultation.

The idea that we don't need to reclaim this name because it wasn't originally a derogatory name is quite beautiful. The idea that we would need to reclaim the name was based on an understanding of it being a inherently and always derogatory word. You have given me to much to think about and I am more excited that ever to keep exploring this word.

Thank you

Lucy

I would urge you to abandon the project. It is just an attempt to degrade society with smut. Stop trying to tear down society and try doing something constructive. No healthy society needs or would welcome this form of information.

I also just found this useful 12 minute podcast about prostitution in medieval Ireland:
https://www.irishhistorypodcast.ie/medi ... delhackere
Interestingly this historian say prostitutes were known at that time as something that sounded to me like mullianaire communis (meaning a common woman). I will try to find the right spelling now!