eòlas and aithne

We have questions.

Who are we? Where are we? For me, the two can’t be separated.

This is dùthchas, the bondedness of people and place over time. We are more than our individual selves. We are not new.

I recognise this place as the Gàidhealtachd, and in that word we find the information that the term Highlands hides. The land of the Gaels, though little Gaelic now passes our lips. Even so, it’s in us somewhere, thickening our throats like the coming of tears, or down in our guts like love.

We’re not sure, always, how to describe ourselves, or what makes us who we are, but we recognise it in each other. We are still here.

We have questions, but there are things we already know. Some cultures have detailed knowledge of plants and animals encoded in their languages and practices; the Traditional Ecological Knowledge of a people and their place. In Gaelic culture and language I find a Traditional Social Knowledge: how to introduce ourselves, how to weave creativity into daily life, how to give a warm welcome, how to care for strangers, how to understand art. And even if we don’t speak Gaelic anymore, something of that worldview persists, carrying all this with it.

Maybe knowledge isn’t quite the right word. In Gaelic, we talk of eòlas and of aithne, which can also mean familiarity and experience. It’s an embodied sort of knowing, a knowing through doing, something you feel as much as think, something that grows with you.

So how do we share our eòlas? Should we? We have questions, and maybe they’re easier to deal with. Questions can be playful, critical, modern, arty, while knowledge can seem closed and stodgy and nostalgic and preachy. Questions are your trendy twenty-something cousin, while knowledge is your granny. But they’re definitely related. They love each other.