Irish Traveller Identity, at Odds With the World

The inherited burden of preserving a nomadic identity.

Every society maintains itself by defining civility, so naturally every society has its outcasts to serve as examples of what society is not. Though, with time, the margins shift, people change, power exchanges hands and society redefines itself. But what happens if a people do not change? Is assimilation avoidable without erasure? 

The Irish Travellers are living out the answer to this question. “Being a Traveller isn’t so much a state of mind or derivative of the act of traveling. It is an ethnic bond with a shared history and distinct language (Cant/Gammon/Shelta). Irish Travellers predate written history in Ireland despite the falsehoods that they are displaced farmers from the Famine/ Great Hunger era. We are people of the road and a community of and on Irish land. We are the original storytellers, news carriers, poets and bards,” says Martin Warde, a gay Irish Traveller from the west of Ireland who does everything between stand up comedy, acting, playwriting, journalism, oral history archiving, photography, event producing, TV presenting, LGBTQ+ and Mental Health advocacy.

Despite his many titles, Warde’s name in Irish — “Mac an Bhaird” — means “son of the bard/poet.” He likes to think that he is, “carrying that forward.”

The Irish Travellers are survived by their defiance to modernity and its companionship with civilization. Believed to have separated from the Irish ’settled’ (the Traveller term that distinguishes all non-Traveller people) community at least 1,000 years ago, the Travellers are a people of 67,000 (31,000 within reside in Ireland) who live in temporary settlements, making their living from itinerant labor and remaining removed from Western civilization. The Travellers got their name by moving between places or living in temporary living conditions, such as in mobile homes that often lack vital amenities, including running water and electricity. 

Uniquely maligned from 21st century living and Irish society, the minority is reliant on agrarian and traditional practices. Born from this dichotomy, an ambiguity has followed the Travellers throughout their history and along their country’s pot hole-laden roads. The Travellers are not settled, so their livelihoods are much more instinctual than typical farmer-agrarianism. Yet their traditional means of livelihood – tinsmithing, horse-breeding, hawking, gathering whelks or scrap – have been obliterated. According to Ireland’s Central Statistics Office’s most recent data, there were 10,653 Travellers in the labor force in 2016, 8,541 of whom lacked jobs, adding up to an unemployment rate of 80.2%.

Prejudice against the Travellers is embedded within Irish society; they are wholly unrepresented in the Irish government, policing, and education. Their immense ostracization manifests itself in statistics that report that the Travellers suffer some of the worst discrimination and poverty of any ethnic group in Europe. They are 10 times likelier to experience discrimination when seeking work and 22 times more likely than white Irish to experience discrimination in shops, pubs and restaurants. 

Of Travellers who do secure employment, many of them do so within Traveller organizations. According to the Donegal Travellers Project (DTP), approximately 94% of employed Travellers in Donegal are employed by DTP. Hugh Friel, a member of the DTP, told the Joint Committee on Key Issues Affecting the Traveller Community that many Travellers say they are stuck in Traveller organizations because, while they have the qualifications and the skills to take up other employment, they do not have the platforms due to discrimination.

Amidst historically poor education outcomes for Travellers over generations, the Kerry Travellers Health Community Development Project (KTHCDP) reports undereducation has had a devastating impact on Travellers’ ability to compete in the jobs market. According to the KTHCDP, young Travellers do not see a direct link between education and employment, and young Traveller people are expected to contribute to family life at an earlier age.

A report by the Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI) in 2017 (Social Portrait of Travellers in Ireland) found that there is a sharp increase in the chance of a Traveller being employed as their level of education increases changing from 9% for those with no second level education to 15% for those with lower second level, 27% for those with upper second level, and 57% for those with further or higher education.

Yet according to the ESRI and census data, only 13% of Travellers complete secondary education compared to 92% of the general population; 1% of Travellers aged between 25-64 have a degree, compared to 30% of non-Travellers and 17.7% of Traveller children have no formal education. 

Alongside correlated rates between poor education and employment, the collapse of the traditional Traveller economy in areas such as market trading, horse-fairs and scrap collecting and the role of national legislation and local byelaws in restricting such activities, has worsened Traveller employment and further propagated discrimination. Increased regulations in areas previously key to the Traveller economy have had the effect of pushing Travellers out of these industries, for example, the Casual Trading Act (2005), the Control of Horses Act (1996), the EU directive on end of life of vehicles (2000), as well as legislation on scrap metal, the Itinerant Act (1959) and the Anti-Trespass legislation (Housing (Miscellaneous provisions) Act 2002). 

According to Warde, in the 1960s, the Irish government created a policy of assimilation, calling it the “solution to the Itinerant problem.” Using a model implemented in the Netherlands in the 1940s — when the country’s government aimed to remove gypsyism, nomads, and Travellers —  the Irish government borrowed this policy and were quoted saying it was “a great success” in the Netherlands. 

“For obvious reasons, this was a terrible policy,” Warde said. “In the 2000s, the Irish government brought in the Anti-Trespass legislation, which saw an end to nomadism as it prevented us from camping on historic grounds often in previous generations.” 

To enforce this, the government created a boulder policy, in which boulders were placed in traditional camping grounds to prevent caravans from parking.

The Galway Traveller Movement has reported that there was no impact assessment undertaken on the effect that these regulations would have on the Traveller economy, and no measures taken to mitigate their impact. The Anti-Trespass Act criminalized the Travellers’ way of life and neglected their situation, as they were forced to act in certain ways because of failures from the State to provide any alternative. Members of the Travelling community were forced to trespass on land because of the failure of local authorities to meet their statutory duty to provide sites, as mandated under the Section 13 of the 1988 Housing Act. 

Surviving within a culture that doesn’t tolerate their existence, in housing, job and educational sectors, the Irish travellers are suffering a detrimental mental health crisis. In 2000, suicides in the Irish Travelling community were three times the rate of the country’s general population. Today, suicide is six times the rate of the settled community. For Traveller men aged 15 to 25, it’s seven times as high.

“Suicide is an end result of poor mental health. When you face a lifetime of segregation, discrimination, prejudice, oppression, social othering, and stereotyping, it is easy to see why the mental health of my community is poor. Poverty and the lack of prospects lead to a poor state of mind, and suicide is often seen as a means to end the pain,” Warde said. 

John O’Brien, who oversees a mental health and suicide prevention service tailored for Travellers in Dublin, says that Travellers are grappling with a “loss of identity.” The enactment of the 2002 Trespass Act criminalized entering and inhabiting land, depriving them of the freedom to set up camps at will. Presently, 95% of Travellers reside in established housing or official, frequently congested sites where their caravans are permanently stationed. 

“Now, many don’t know what being a Traveller is anymore,” O’Brien said. 

He also believes that the current surge in Traveller suicides is exacerbated by the “outpouring of love on social media” that follows a death. This leads to an almost “glorification of suicide,” contributing to a contagion effect.

Young Traveller woman inside her motorhome. (Photo courtesy of German photographer Birte Kauffman)

Irish Travellers are described by anthropologists George and Sharon Gmelch as “one of the least assimilated of Europe’s itinerant groups.” Consequently, individual Traveller families maintain close-knit bonds. While strong family relationships typically act as a protective factor against the risk of suicide, in this instance, these close ties may be amplifying the issue, particularly among adolescents.

A 2014 study by Seth Abrutyn and Anna Mueller suggests that exposure to suicidal behaviors in significant others can teach individuals new coping mechanisms for emotional stress. These social connections not only offer social support, but can also contribute to antisocial behaviors, as concluded by the authors.

According to a prior study conducted by Gould, Wallenstein, and Davidson, the occurrence of suicides in the community or media can foster familiarity with and acceptance of the concept of suicide. Taking one’s own life is perceived as a learned choice of action, akin to any other decision.

The government and institutional response have been restrained. Irish mental health services do not document the ethnic status of their patients, making it challenging to ascertain the precise numbers seeking treatment within the health system. Dr. Fiona McNicholas, a professor of child and adolescent psychiatry collaborating with CAMHS (Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services), notes that Travellers who do enter the system often opt out of the free services provided. 

“When I tried to encourage the mother to enroll him for counseling, she refused, saying the problems her child was experiencing was a cross God had sent her to bear,” McNicholas said. She perceives a significant stigma surrounding mental health within the Traveller community, and until this changes, the available services won’t be accessed in substantial numbers.

In 1971, Sharon and George Gmelch immersed themselves in the Travellers community for a year, returning in 2011 to assess changes. While encouraged by the increased presence of young Travellers in full-time education and some women working locally, they believe that settled life has left many individuals, particularly men, feeling adrift. Their book, “Irish Travellers, The Unsettled Life” sheds light on the enduring challenges faced by the families they encountered. 

Gmelch shares McNichols’ perspective, noting “a stigma associated with and discomfort talking about mental health issues,” along with “an unfamiliarity with mainstream societal institutions.” She highlights “communication difficulties within the community, feelings of hopelessness, and an acceptance of suicide (especially if family members have already done it) and not seeing an alternative.”

Jim Connors, a Traveller community member, discusses the consequences when frustration with life reaches a boiling point: “One result,” he says, “is to damage yourself, damage your property, or damage something else.”

David Friel, a 24-year-old from County Donegal, is the first Traveller in the north-west of Ireland to receive a masters degree. Friel believes that young Irish Travellers are struggling to balance their sense of identity with the demands of belonging in Irish society. 

“It’s trying to pass as a member of the settled population, so you’re not being your true authentic self. That mentally is very, very difficult. You’re living two lives, and no one can maintain that,” Friel said. 

Mags Casey, chair of the Irish Travellers National Mental Health Network, spoke to the BBC regarding the halting site – a residential area specifically designed for Travellers and established by the local municipal authority – in Limerick, where she was raised, describing how a substantial wall had been built around the site, effectively isolating it from the surrounding housing estates.

“They deliberately put that wall around us to fence Travellers in completely,” Casey said.

“Away from society. Out of sight and out of mind.”

Yet Martin Warde, and thousands of other Travellers who take pride in their identity, continuously reject this notion. 

“Improving the quality of life of the Traveller community does not mean the erasure of our culture of traditions. To say this would mean that our own culture, which has survived for 1000 years, is detrimental to our existence. This is certainly not true,” Warde said. “Like most indigenous and marginalized minorities, we have a high rate of unemployment and low rate of life prospects. This is largely due to discrimination faced by travellers. To improve our quality of life means the erasure of a tradition of discrimination and racism perpetuated by the Irish majority.”