Pronunciation of Irish language

Subject: RE: Pronunciation of Irish language
From: pavane
Date: 21 Jun 04 - 02:28 PM

No, I am still here.

But Mrs Pavane says I can't even pronounce the names of the Welsh tunes properly, (I am a Londoner, after all) and thinks I should stick to English, so I won't be able to use any of this :-(>

Thank you all anyway, it has been most interesting.

(I may still try to sneak some in though.)

Subject: RE: Pronunciation of Irish language
From: GUEST,JTT
Date: 22 Jun 04 - 01:36 PM

Well, the offer's open; if you want to learn the pronunciation of the phrases you mention, I'll record them.

Tell the missus that it's thinking like that stops the English from learning French, German, Japanese, Chinese, etc, while the rest of Europe chatters away multilingually. Can do, Pavane.

Subject: RE: Pronunciation of Irish language
From: belfast
Date: 25 Jun 04 - 05:18 AM

Mind you, it would be foolish to assume that the Irish names given in O'Neill are the "real" names of the tunes. I have spent many a night in the company of musicians and have never heard any of them (including fluent Gaelic speakers) use the Irish name of a tune. And I would strongly suspect that O'Neill himself knew these tunes by their English names and translated them into Irish for his book. There are, of course, some pieces that arre only known by their Irish name- An Coolin and Roisin Dubh, for example.

Subject: RE: Pronunciation of Irish language
From: GUEST,JTT
Date: 25 Jun 04 - 05:37 AM

Or it could be that names have changed over time, as English came to be universally used and Irish declined. Thuas seal, thios seal...

Subject: RE: Pronunciation of Irish language
From: GUEST,keef
Date: 25 Jun 04 - 05:38 AM

Just wondering. Here in "Girt By Sea" we now have lots of sheilas called Caitlin which of course we pronounce as Kate Lin . Just wonderin if this is perhaps the gaelic spelling for Cathleen, pronounced Cath Lean. Same as equal numbers of Sheilas are called Megan pronounced Mee Gan whereas the original? Welsh name is Megan pronounced Meg Ann.
Yors pedantically
Keef

Subject: RE: Pronunciation of Irish language
From: GUEST,dave in N.Z.
Date: 12 Nov 04 - 10:00 PM

Forgive me for being ignorant, but, how is "adh mor" pronounced. Phonetically would be easiest to understand if anyone can help?!!

Vah! Denuone Latine loquebar? Me ineptum. Interdum modo elabitur.
[e-mail]

Subject: RE: Pronunciation of Irish language
From: GUEST,gaedilgeoir
Date: 08 Aug 06 - 06:54 AM

There are 3 main dialects of Gaedilge. They are heard in the News broadcasts of Radio na Gaeltachta. They differ a little and systematically in pronunciation. Native speakers of one easily understand the others and Scots gaelic. The northern dialect was spoken north of a line roughly joining Dundalk and Bundoran. Its sounds reflect the nearness of Scotland. It is the second-largest in everyday use.
The main population spoke a central dialect a line joining Wexford to Ennis. It remains the largest in everyday use and literature.
A southern dialect was spoken in the south.
Mixtures occurred at the borders. A phonetic type spelling is taught since 1976 and learners vary in sounds.
a as uh   accented as aw    e as e accented a 'jay' without the 'j'
i as ih   accented as ee    o as uh accented as 'oh'
u as uh   accented as oo   bh & mhas 'v' before i,e, 'w' to aou

Subject: RE: Pronunciation of Irish language
From: Brían
Date: 08 Aug 06 - 06:23 PM

Here is a link with some sound samples that might help with pronounciation: Daltaí na Gaeilge

Brían

Subject: RE: Pronunciation of Irish language
From: GUEST,Cecil
Date: 24 Jun 07 - 06:49 PM

I was searching on the web for the pronounciation of giorria (hare), and since you mentioned it here, I've read through the page, but unfortunately I couldn't find the answer. :(

So would anyone be so kind as to help me how to pronounce giorria?

Many thanks in advance!

Subject: RE: Pronunciation of Irish language
From: Big Mick
Date: 24 Jun 07 - 07:04 PM

girr-ee-ah with a hard G sound, would be close.

Mick

Subject: RE: Pronunciation of Irish language
From: Declan
Date: 24 Jun 07 - 07:31 PM

Mick is right on the nail for one pronunciation of the word.

In a different dialect, more Munster I think, it would be more like G-yurr-ee-ah.

The language can sound differently in the local accents of the area it is spoken, so there's rarely one right answer to questions like this.

And if Dave in NZ is still waiting for an answer after all these years ádh Mór is pronounced Awe (as in John Wayne) More or Moore (depending on the dialect again).

Subject: RE: Pronunciation of Irish language
From: Theodore
Date: 07 Aug 07 - 12:22 AM

I've noticed that singers pronounce what I'll call the "h-mutation" differently in several recordings, and apparently in disregard of the spelling. So, Ciaran O Gealbhain in singing Casadh an tSúgáin pronounces féin as /hen/. In fact, in this recording, he seems to aspirate practically everything...a lovely sound, but confusing. He's from Co. Waterford. Does that impart a particular accent? In the same song, he very consistently pronounces liom as /ljaum/, a distinct "ow" sound, which is different from the Bothy band and Sean o Sé.

Subject: RE: Pronunciation of Irish language
From: Cluin
Date: 08 Aug 07 - 12:12 AM

Ask 5 different speakers of the Gaeilge and you'll get 5 different pronunciations.

Subject: RE: Pronunciation of Irish language
From: Cluin
Date: 08 Aug 07 - 12:14 AM

`Course that's true of what we all call the English language as well.

Subject: RE: Pronunciation of Irish language
From: MartinRyan
Date: 09 Aug 07 - 02:46 PM

Theodore:
Yes - the Waterford intonation can be quite different from others. In particular, first language Irish speakers from An Rinn (the Gaeltacht area concerned) have a number of what I would call very "diphthong-y" sounds! That pronunciation of "liom" is a case in point. Also - how do you think "An Rinn" is pronounced?!

Regards

Subject: RE: Pronunciation of Irish language
From: MartinRyan
Date: 11 Aug 07 - 03:27 PM

I'm told that that unusual pronunciation of "liom" is largely confined to use in singing - it's not common in speech.

Regards

Subject: RE: Pronunciation of Irish language
From: GUEST,kath
Date: 23 Jan 09 - 11:53 AM

looking for the phonetic pronunciation of:

"suaimhnigh sibhse!"

Subject: RE: Pronunciation of Irish language
From: MartinRyan
Date: 23 Jan 09 - 12:10 PM

"suaimhnigh sibhse!"

Subject to all the reservations implied in the rest of this thread (!):

First syllable : soov
Second syllable : nigg (short i, hard g) or nee , depending on dialect,
Third syllable : shiv (short i again)
Fourth syllable : sheh (as in "shell")

Stresses on first and third syllables.
Translation: "Calm yourselves!" (emphatic)

Regards

Subject: RE: Pronunciation of Irish language
From: GUEST,Dave MacKenzie
Date: 23 Jan 09 - 07:26 PM

I'd heard that there are people who pronounced Caitlin (Kathleen) as Kate-Lynn but I didn't think it was that common.

Going back to Welsh mutations they are the equivalent of the Irish or Gaelic lentitions and aspirations, so depend on a bit of grammar.

Subject: RE: Pronunciation of Irish language
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 23 Jan 09 - 07:49 PM

I have a student and a friend, both named Cáit - pronunciations here (Cork) vary from Cawt (caught, taught, thought) to Coit, both with a slightly softened T. My friend Caitlín flattens the first vowel out slightly, but I think that's just a concession to us blow-ins who are deaf to the tonal subtleties (she's a fluent Irish speaker and singer). As with so many other words, this pronunciation probably varies from region to region. Packie (an Ulsterman) used to say that Munster Irish was nearly a foreign language to him.

-lín would be Lean, and the name is Irish for Kathleen.

Subject: Martin Ryan's help
From: GUEST,Guest Kath
Date: 23 Jan 09 - 11:15 PM

Thank you Martin Ryan. You've calmed me with your thorough response to my request for the phonetic pronunciation of "suaimhnigh sibhse." I'm writing a play with some Gaelic phrases and hope I can call on you again for your expertise?! Kath

Subject: RE: Pronunciation of Irish language
From: MartinRyan
Date: 24 Jan 09 - 03:06 AM

By all means, GuestKath

Regards

Subject: RE: Pronunciation of Irish language
From: The Sandman
Date: 24 Jan 09 - 12:56 PM

yes, well the surname whooley,is pronunced welly,and wooley,by two different families,who only live fifteen miles apart.
likewise niall,can be pronounced neal,but is often pronounced [nile]Ithink the latter is an anglicisation,[not being a native Irish speaker, I stand corrected if I am wrong]
logically it[ni] should be spoken,like niamdh[neeve],but how much of the population does it take , when usage,makes it [nile], correct.

Subject: RE: Pronunciation of Irish language
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 24 Jan 09 - 01:20 PM

I know three native Nialls who all use the Irish spelling on both first and surname, but two pronounce it Neal, and the other says Nile. A bit like Cawt and Coit, I guess - they're not based very far apart either.

Subject: RE: Pronunciation of Irish language
From: Marilyn
Date: 26 Feb 09 - 02:45 PM

Can anyone tell me the correct pronunciation of Bodhran, please?

I have always pronounced it bo run with a long o sound as in 'so' and the stress on the first syllable but last night I heard it pronounced with the o as in cow, bough-run.

Which is correct? Or is it something different entirely?

The irony of it is that my mother was a native Irish speaker; they spoke only Irish at home and English everywhere else but her grandmother spoke only Irish and never managed to get her tongue round the 'heathen English'. I can't ask my mother's help though as she has been dead for many years and she never spoke Irish in front of us children so we didn't learn to speak that lovely language. Isn't that a shame?

Subject: RE: Pronunciation of Irish language
From: MartinRyan
Date: 26 Feb 09 - 03:06 PM

In Ireland, the usual English pronunciation, using your clues, is bough-rawn, with little difference in stress between the two syllables. Gaelic pronunciation will vary with dialect - ranging from bo-run with long o and first syllable stressed, to bough-rawn with the second syllable noticeably lengthened and stressed.

Regards

Subject: RE: Pronunciation of Irish language
From: Big Mick
Date: 26 Feb 09 - 03:17 PM

..... and, as my friend Seamus Kennedy is fond of saying, "If it is made with the skin of a dog, it is a ..............












.......... bow wow ron.

There are some things for which transportation is an appropriate punishment. That joke is one of them.

All the best,

Mick

Subject: RE: Pronunciation of Irish language
From: bubblyrat
Date: 26 Feb 09 - 06:04 PM

I'll tell WFD that it is definitely "Bough-Rawn",then.She insists on calling it a Bore Ran, of course.We did try asking a bloke from Northern Ireland,and he said"We call it a Bore Ran", so there you go.
And you still haven't explained about Mary Chainsaw properly : I mean,is she Mary O'Casey, or what ??Thank God I won't ever have to introduce her !

Subject: RE: Pronunciation of Irish language
From: MartinRyan
Date: 26 Feb 09 - 07:44 PM

Yeah - the "Bore - ran" is very much the northern pronuciation.

Regards

Subject: RE: Pronunciation of Irish language
From: MartinRyan
Date: 27 Feb 09 - 03:43 AM

bubblyrat

Sorry - I had to go back through the thread to see who "Mary" was!

Máire ní Chathasaigh is the lady's name, as far as I know. Mary Casey is the English translation. Conversely, Martin Ryan is my name and Máirtín Ó Riain is the Irish translation. It's a matter of which version a person wants to give priority to in normal usage.

The Ó / ní / uí prefix is a bit complicated - particularly since divorce reached Ireland's shores! Basically, ní suggests she's unmarried. Whether it turns up as O in the equivalent English name is not governed by rule - it varies.

Regards

Subject: RE: Pronunciation of Irish language
From: Marilyn
Date: 27 Feb 09 - 04:15 AM

Thanks Martin - I think I'll probably carry on pronouncing bodhran as bore-ran because that's what I'm used to but it's good to know that bough-rawn is correct too.

Subject: RE: Pronunciation of Irish language
From: Marilyn
Date: 27 Feb 09 - 04:19 AM

Just a thought - if someone would be kind enough

My mother's family were from Galway, could anybody tell me how people from that neck of the woods pronounce bodhran given that the pronounciation differs so much from one region to another? The way I'm pronouncing it might have my old grannie spinning in her grave!! :-)

Subject: RE: Pronunciation of Irish language
From: MartinRyan
Date: 27 Feb 09 - 04:25 AM

Marilyn

The bough-rawn version would certainly slow down the rate of spin, at least. bore - run would puzzle her!

Regards

p.s. In Irish, there would be an accent on the a - hence the long aw sound.

Subject: RE: Pronunciation of Irish language
From: Marilyn
Date: 27 Feb 09 - 04:36 AM

Thanks Martin - help very much appreciated.
I shall have to train myself to say bough-rawn from now on.

Marilyn

Subject: RE: Pronunciation of Irish language
From: sian, west wales
Date: 27 Feb 09 - 04:51 AM

It isn't my intention to drift this thread, but I'd like to make a small correction to what pavane was saying about Welsh mutations ("These occur when the mutated letter follows particular other letter") That isn't exactly the case. Mutations for the most part depend on the gender of the noun. In Bryn Coch, Bryn is masculine so the C in Coch does not mutate. However, in "Y Ddraig Goch", "Draig" mutates to "DDraig" (remembering that 'dd' is a single and distinct letter in Welsh) because 'dragon' is feminine (and, yes, I've heard most of the jokes) and 'coch' becomes 'goch' because if follows a feminine noun.

Where pavane is correct is that there are 6 consonants which can mutate (p,t,c,b,d,g) in 3 ways (soft, nasal, aspirate). 'll', 'm', and 'rh' can also undergo soft mutation only.

There are other reasons for mutations, e.g. usually adjectives follow nouns in Welsh but a few do precede the noun, like 'hen' (old) and the following noun then undergoes a soft mutation.

It really isn't as difficult as it looks, and I notice that some 'natural' Welsh speakers who have never had Welsh-medium education don't a) stick to the rules or b) even know they exist. And it strikes me that there is a heavy dose of regionalism in its employ as well.

There. Just thought I'd throw in this bit of detail, us being on the down-slope to St David's Day and all.

sian

Subject: RE: Pronunciation of Irish language
From: ard mhacha
Date: 27 Feb 09 - 07:25 AM

I find the Cork-Kerry English is difficult for lots of northerners, likewise when I worked in England a Geordie [north-east] accent was double-dutch to lots of Londoners, surely all of that difficulty with listening to Irish is simply different accents.

Subject: RE: Pronunciation of Irish language
From: MartinRyan
Date: 27 Feb 09 - 07:43 AM

I find the Cork-Kerry English is difficult for lots of northerners, likewise when I worked in England a Geordie [north-east] accent was double-dutch to lots of Londoners, surely all of that difficulty with listening to Irish is simply different accents.

Simply? Weelllll......

It's a mix of accent and dialect. If someone handed me a transcript of a piece of Donegal Irish, I would expect to be able to understand the bulk of it - but depending on whether the original was from a native speaker or not, there would be words and phrases that would be very different from what I would be familiar with. If a native speaker, at normal speed, SPOKE the original to me, I would be half a lap behind at best!

If the original were Munster Irish, I would have no difficulty in either situation. Connemara Irish? It would depend on dentition! ;>)

With non-native speakers, the situation is rather different. When I was a schoolboy, we strove to avoid "Dublin Irish" which was effectively a reduced vocabulary version of the language which tended to use English grammatical and idiomatic structures rather than Irish and paid little attention to the niceties of pronunciation. (In some cases, of course, you had expressions which had semi-migrated from Irish to Hiberno-English finding their way back to Irish!). There's plenty of that version still around - and now there's even a kind of "Belfast Irish" equivalent to it!

Regards

Subject: RE: Pronunciation of Irish language
From: ard mhacha
Date: 28 Feb 09 - 03:27 PM

Martin, My fellow Ulster Gaels who spend their holidays in Munster or Leinster can get by with ease, I am referring to speaking the language, surely TG4 has a wide spread of accent/dialect not beyond any Gaels interpretation.

Subject: RE: Pronunciation of Irish language
From: MartinRyan
Date: 28 Feb 09 - 05:30 PM

Ard Mhaca

Your mention of Leinster is interesting. The nearest thing to first language Irish there is, as you know, Rath Carn which is a transplanted enclave of Conemara Irish. I have no real experience of the dialect or accent involved - the numbers are very small.

My basic point remains. The three main streams of first language Irish differ significantly in intonation, vocabulary and idiom. Yes - native speakers of each can, with some adaptation, understand each other in speech. That doesn't take away from the fact that the differences exist.

Non native-speakers (such as myself) tend to use a more standardised vocabulary and, often, mixed intonation and a phraseology with greater or less transfer from english idiom. This is neither a criticism nor a defence - it's a simple statement of my experience over more than fifty years of speaking a language I love!

Beir bua.

Subject: RE: Pronunciation of Irish language
From: Big Mick
Date: 28 Feb 09 - 05:46 PM

OK, so let me pose this to both of you. As an American cousin, if I were to recommend tuition, which "stream" would one recommend to others who want to learn? I have been told that there is more day to day spoken communication in the North which would lead the learner towards Ulster. Yet the people I learned from, family and friends, were from the Galway area, which as Martin points out, differs from my good friends from Derry and Donegal.

All the best,

Mick

Subject: RE: Pronunciation of Irish language
From: MartinRyan
Date: 28 Feb 09 - 06:31 PM

Big Mick

I wouldn't worry about it. IMO, the main priority would be to find a competent teacher who would basically stick to the the "caighdeán" (official standard) but also impart a flavour of one of the main streams. There is increasing emphasis on a standardised set of (EU based) levels in the teaching of, in particular, adult learners. This will probably increase the convergence among that group.

Incidentally, Galway/Mayo still holds the largest population of first language Irish speakers, as far as I know - having taken over from Cork/Kerry some years ago.


Regards

Subject: RE: Pronunciation of Irish language
From: Declan
Date: 28 Feb 09 - 08:50 PM

While agreeing with what Martin says, if you feel you have to choose I'd go for the Galway/Mayo dialect given a choice, if only on the basis of being geographically half way up the coastline it's probably a near fit to either of the exiting Western dialects Its a bigger learning curve to go from either Donegal to Kerry or Vice versa.

Subject: RE: Pronunciation of Irish language
From: Big Mick
Date: 28 Feb 09 - 09:26 PM

Yes, Declan and Martin, that makes sense. I am very rusty, as there are few speakers around me any more. It is why I love these threads.

All the best,

Mick

Subject: RE: Pronunciation of Irish language
From: MartinRyan
Date: 01 Mar 09 - 03:49 AM

As a late convert from Munster towards Connemara, I'd tend to agree with Declan's diagnosis - even though there are some sounds in that dialect which it just goes against the grain for me to make!

Regards

Subject: RE: Pronunciation of Irish language
From: Marilyn
Date: 01 Mar 09 - 05:55 AM

May I be a pain and ask for more help, please?

I'm in a band (Halfe Pannikin) and we play a lovely tune called Kathleen O'Hehir. We're dreading someone asking us what it's called because we haven't a clue how to pronounce it (the O'Hehir bit, we're OK with Kathleen [grin])

If you're ready for a laugh - I say something like oh -huh-heer

Not what should it be, please?

Ta,
Marilyn

Subject: RE: Pronunciation of Irish language
From: MartinRyan
Date: 01 Mar 09 - 06:02 AM

Oddly enough, it's pronounced as two syllables; oh-hare
Stress is, as expected, on the second syllable.

No pain!

Regards
p.s. That's "hare" as in "Hunt the hare and turn him down", of course!

Subject: RE: Pronunciation of Irish language
From: Marilyn
Date: 01 Mar 09 - 06:08 AM

Thanks, Martin, much appreciated.

Regards,
Marilyn

Subject: RE: Pronunciation of Irish language
From: ard mhacha
Date: 01 Mar 09 - 06:23 AM

Martin, Sound advice for Mick, staring with a good teacher of standard Irish is ideal,my advice to anyone learning Irish is a course in a Gaelteacht area, immersion in the tongue is the sure-fired method of learning.

Subject: RE: Pronunciation of Irish language
From: ard mhacha
Date: 01 Mar 09 - 07:46 AM

Sorry Martin a correction to my reference to the Meath Gaelteacht [Leinster] that should have read Connaught.

Subject: RE: Pronunciation of Irish language
From: GUEST,Meg
Date: 08 Jul 09 - 04:45 PM

I was wondering how you pronounce the word "hope" in Gaelic.

I've found that the word is Dóchas and from what I've been able to maybe piece together it would sound like doe-kas. Is that right? Or am I totally off on it?