My apologies for the late response, I’ve had quite a busy few months and haven’t had a chance to check all the responses. The Irish people have always felt separate to the British, and honestly I’m not completely sure why there was no assimilation. We’re talking about an occupation that lasted the best part of eight hundred years, yet Irish people still maintained a separate identity. Scotland is a slightly different case, as the ruling classes there were largely adhering to the Norman culture long before England Scotland United under one monarch. By the time England and Scotland were unified, the Scottish kings already spoke a language called “Scots", which is essentially a dialect of English, and Scottish Gaelic had been relegated to the periphery of the country. In Ireland, on the other hand, both the people and upper classes still spoke Irish/Gaeilge. Even the Anglo-Norman lords, who came over in the first English invasion, adopted the Irish language and customs, becoming “more Irish than the Irish themselves". And while England had a presence in Ireland for a long time, it was only really during the Tudor area that they took de facto control of the entire country, with the so called “Flight of the Earls" where the last Gaelic lords left the country.
English attempts to assimilate Ireland consisted of a series of plantations, where British Protestants were given land in Ireland displacing the native Irish Catholics. Few of these plantations were successful, but in the North of the country it largely worked and that’s why six counties are still part of the United Kingdom. But the native Irish never really took to British culture and still viewed themselves as separate. As a colony, Ireland was largely ungovernable and every few decades there would be a major revolt.
The main aspect of Irish loss of culture was in language. While Irish is still the official language, few people are fluent speakers and even fewer use it in day to day life. To be fair to the British this wasn’t a conscious effort to destroy the language, it was more economic necessity, as if you wanted a decent job you needed English. Other aspects of Irish culture survived, and indeed experienced a resurgence under the British. Gaelic games and music were always in the background, but in the 1800s there were successful movements to re-popularise them.
I don’t really mind Irish being viewed under the umbrella term of European, as long as people realise that European in itself doesn’t mean much due to the vast differences between nations and cultures. If someone was to call it a “British" culture, then it would be a problem, because many people died fighting to protect our culture specifically from the British. Overarching categories have their place, but they do tend to hide the individuality underneath. I hope that answers your questions ☺
