Irish 101: Week 1
I have wanted to do the Irish 101 course on FutureLearn for some time now. I keep putting it on my wishlist and every time it comes around, the timing has never been right. A couple of weeks ago, I got an email to say that it was starting again at the end of June. I had the time and a reasonable amount of brains so I thought I'd give it a go. It's only a four week course so it's not very long, although judging by this first week, it's going to cram a lot of information into that amount of time! It's been a while since I've done a MOOC too. These are my notes and thoughts from this first week, they might be fairly lengthy...
Week 1 is divided up into 6 sections: introduction, the alphabet, basic greetings, names, blessings and curses(!), and a summary. One of the reasons that I particularly wanted to do this course was that it doesn't just focus on the language, it includes Irish culture as well which I think is an important part of learning any language.
Introduction
There's a brief run-down of what the course will include and its aims. Then it starts with some history of the Irish language and explains that Celtic languages are split into two branches: Goidelic - Irish, Scots Gaelic and Manx; and Brythonic - Welsh, Breton and Cornish. I knew that Irish and Scots Gaelic were similar, as are Welsh and Cornish, but I didn't know how they related to each other or where the other two fitted in. I have dabbled briefly in Welsh which I found very interesting, but I doubt it will help or hinder me here! There's also some information about dialect. Apparently there are three dialects for Irish - Ulster, Connacht and Munster - but no standard pronunciation. There's quite a difference between those three dialects too, not just in the pronunciations but also in the words that are used. It doesn't seem like there will be focus on one particular dialect either, there will be examples of all three throughout the course.
Alphabet
The first script for the Irish language was Ogham (pron. Oh-m) dating from around the 5-7th centuries. Each letter is named after a tree or plant that was in the surrounding area, and it's thought that the script for each letter came from the direction of the veins on the leaf from the tree/plant that gave the character its name. That's quite incredible and very creative! There are only 20 letters and 6 diphthongs. There was a task to find which tree corresponded to our first initial and then put our first name into Ogham. N corresponds to Nuin, the Ash tree, and Nathaniel in Ogham is ᚅᚐᚈᚆᚐᚅᚔᚓᚂ
Following this, the course moves onto the modern alphabet and pronunciations. Originally the letters j, k, q, v, w, x, y and z were not included in the Irish alphabet but these have been introduced from words that have been adapted into Irish, such as veidhlín/violin and zú/zoo. It then explains the three important factors of the language: síneadh fada/acute accent, séimhiú/lenition and urú/eclipsis, all of which change pronunciations and spelling of various words. They sound quite complicated but I think they're the sort of thing that happen naturally in a language to make transition between sounds easier. I imagine they happen in English too but I don't necessarily need to think about them! Checking on Wikipedia for more information, it says that lenition happens in American English, in words such as 'waiting' and 'twenty'. I think that's the sort of glottal stop that happens with the t in both words. I think eclipsis might be similar to the a/an situation in English but I'm not entirely sure. It might be easier to understand when using the words in sentences. I also learnt a handy keyboard shortcut for adding an acute accent to letters which is always appreciated 🙂
Basic Greetings
Now we can get to the talking bit! Hello in Irish is Dia duit which literally means 'G-d be with you'. If responding to someone who has already said Dia duit, the phrase is Dia is Muire duit which means 'G-d and Mary be with you'. The course assures me that these days, it really does only mean 'hello' but knowing how fundamental religion is in Ireland, it still feels overtly religious. It reminds me of Grüß Gott, a greeting used, I think, in Austria and southern Germany. Goodbye, or Go safely, is Slán, although I quite like Slán go foill which means 'Goodbye for now'. There's a lot of ways to introduce yourself: Nathaniel is ainm dom is 'Nathaniel is my name' but Mise Nathaniel is just 'I am Nathaniel'. There's a short video showing two people saying hello and introducing themselves, asking how the other is, and then saying goodbye. Lots of the comments from the other learners mention their confusion with the pronunciations; there's been several different variations for duit, including 'hoyt', 'ditch' and 'hovit' which is making it quite difficult.
This variation intensifies when learning to ask 'how are you' because there's different ways depending on the dialect being used! Munster: Conas atá tú?; Ulster: Cad é mar atá tú? and Connacht: Cén chaoi a bhfuil tú? At least there's no variation in the answers!
The last part here introduces pronouns as well as the emphatic form which is a new one on me. Rather than putting stress on the pronoun, Irish adds a suffix to indicate the emphasis instead. It's usually done in response to a question, such as: Q-What is your name? A-My name is Sean. What is your name? / Q-Cad is aimn duit? A-Seán is ainm domsa. Cad is aimn duitse? It reminds me of the -ka suffix in Japanese which is used to indicate a question.
Names
This section starts off with a story about how the Irish hero Cú Chulainn got his name. It goes on to explain naming traditions in Ireland, and how people were given an additional marker to their first name to distinguish them from other people with the same name. Often a person was given the name of their parent or grandparent to show which family they were from, such as Mícheál Chóil Phaidí where Mícheál is the person's first name, Cóil is his father's name, and Paidí is his grandfather's name. This tradition is still practised in some parts of Ireland. There's also the Irish form of junior for a child who has the same name as their parent or grandparent, so Óg is added to a child's name and Beag to a grandchild's name.
There's a task to find the Irish version of our names which is quite a challenge for mine! I found a website that says it's Natanael but another one said it was Nollaig. I doubt the second is right because that's the word for Christmas!
The final part of this section introduces the vocative case, which is used when addressing someone directly. For most names, it involves putting 'a' before the name. However, for Irish names, it becomes a lot more complicated. Lenition is applied to female names - this means putting a séimhiú after the first letter of the name if it's a particular consonant (only b, c, d, f, g, m, p, s and t) so Brid, Máire and Mairéad become a Bhrid, a Mháire and a Mhairéad. Male names also have the séimhiú added but they also get slenderised, which means adding an 'i' after the final vowel. So Sean becomes Sheain. This is seriously confusing and I would never have expected that people's names changed spellings and pronunciations! How do people remember all these changes? There's a quiz on the vocative case on various names and I only checked once whether a letter required lenition or not, and still managed to get them all right which is amazing! So, Ar mhaith leat cupán tae, a Natanaeil? You bet I do.
Blessings and Curses
Ooh, this sounds interesting! Oh, it's mainly greetings such as Go n-éirí an t-ádh leat/Good luck or Breithlá sona duit/Happy birthday. That is disappointing. There's some curses of the 'may you choke on it' nature. This is followed by an article on The Curse of Mayo, which is the Mayo Gaelic football team who haven't won a championship final since 1951. It reminds me of the Curse of the Bambino where the Boston Red Sox were denied a win at the World Series for 86 years! The last bit is about the song Bean Pháidín/Páidín's Wife where a woman who is in love with a married man curses his wife so that she can have him for herself. It includes an animated video created by TG4. It's remarkably upbeat for such a dark theme!
Summary
So here we are at the end of the first week. I have found it to be very involved, there's a lot to get through in one week. I found the history of the language very interesting as well as the information about Irish culture. I'm struggling a bit with pronunciations and the different dialects but I hope they will get easier with time. The course itself finishes off with a proverb of the week and this week's proverb is Tús maith leath na hoibre or well begun is half done. I hope week 2 is easier!
Week 1 is divided up into 6 sections: introduction, the alphabet, basic greetings, names, blessings and curses(!), and a summary. One of the reasons that I particularly wanted to do this course was that it doesn't just focus on the language, it includes Irish culture as well which I think is an important part of learning any language.
Introduction
There's a brief run-down of what the course will include and its aims. Then it starts with some history of the Irish language and explains that Celtic languages are split into two branches: Goidelic - Irish, Scots Gaelic and Manx; and Brythonic - Welsh, Breton and Cornish. I knew that Irish and Scots Gaelic were similar, as are Welsh and Cornish, but I didn't know how they related to each other or where the other two fitted in. I have dabbled briefly in Welsh which I found very interesting, but I doubt it will help or hinder me here! There's also some information about dialect. Apparently there are three dialects for Irish - Ulster, Connacht and Munster - but no standard pronunciation. There's quite a difference between those three dialects too, not just in the pronunciations but also in the words that are used. It doesn't seem like there will be focus on one particular dialect either, there will be examples of all three throughout the course.
Alphabet
The first script for the Irish language was Ogham (pron. Oh-m) dating from around the 5-7th centuries. Each letter is named after a tree or plant that was in the surrounding area, and it's thought that the script for each letter came from the direction of the veins on the leaf from the tree/plant that gave the character its name. That's quite incredible and very creative! There are only 20 letters and 6 diphthongs. There was a task to find which tree corresponded to our first initial and then put our first name into Ogham. N corresponds to Nuin, the Ash tree, and Nathaniel in Ogham is ᚅᚐᚈᚆᚐᚅᚔᚓᚂ
Following this, the course moves onto the modern alphabet and pronunciations. Originally the letters j, k, q, v, w, x, y and z were not included in the Irish alphabet but these have been introduced from words that have been adapted into Irish, such as veidhlín/violin and zú/zoo. It then explains the three important factors of the language: síneadh fada/acute accent, séimhiú/lenition and urú/eclipsis, all of which change pronunciations and spelling of various words. They sound quite complicated but I think they're the sort of thing that happen naturally in a language to make transition between sounds easier. I imagine they happen in English too but I don't necessarily need to think about them! Checking on Wikipedia for more information, it says that lenition happens in American English, in words such as 'waiting' and 'twenty'. I think that's the sort of glottal stop that happens with the t in both words. I think eclipsis might be similar to the a/an situation in English but I'm not entirely sure. It might be easier to understand when using the words in sentences. I also learnt a handy keyboard shortcut for adding an acute accent to letters which is always appreciated 🙂
Basic Greetings
Now we can get to the talking bit! Hello in Irish is Dia duit which literally means 'G-d be with you'. If responding to someone who has already said Dia duit, the phrase is Dia is Muire duit which means 'G-d and Mary be with you'. The course assures me that these days, it really does only mean 'hello' but knowing how fundamental religion is in Ireland, it still feels overtly religious. It reminds me of Grüß Gott, a greeting used, I think, in Austria and southern Germany. Goodbye, or Go safely, is Slán, although I quite like Slán go foill which means 'Goodbye for now'. There's a lot of ways to introduce yourself: Nathaniel is ainm dom is 'Nathaniel is my name' but Mise Nathaniel is just 'I am Nathaniel'. There's a short video showing two people saying hello and introducing themselves, asking how the other is, and then saying goodbye. Lots of the comments from the other learners mention their confusion with the pronunciations; there's been several different variations for duit, including 'hoyt', 'ditch' and 'hovit' which is making it quite difficult.
This variation intensifies when learning to ask 'how are you' because there's different ways depending on the dialect being used! Munster: Conas atá tú?; Ulster: Cad é mar atá tú? and Connacht: Cén chaoi a bhfuil tú? At least there's no variation in the answers!
The last part here introduces pronouns as well as the emphatic form which is a new one on me. Rather than putting stress on the pronoun, Irish adds a suffix to indicate the emphasis instead. It's usually done in response to a question, such as: Q-What is your name? A-My name is Sean. What is your name? / Q-Cad is aimn duit? A-Seán is ainm domsa. Cad is aimn duitse? It reminds me of the -ka suffix in Japanese which is used to indicate a question.
Names
This section starts off with a story about how the Irish hero Cú Chulainn got his name. It goes on to explain naming traditions in Ireland, and how people were given an additional marker to their first name to distinguish them from other people with the same name. Often a person was given the name of their parent or grandparent to show which family they were from, such as Mícheál Chóil Phaidí where Mícheál is the person's first name, Cóil is his father's name, and Paidí is his grandfather's name. This tradition is still practised in some parts of Ireland. There's also the Irish form of junior for a child who has the same name as their parent or grandparent, so Óg is added to a child's name and Beag to a grandchild's name.
There's a task to find the Irish version of our names which is quite a challenge for mine! I found a website that says it's Natanael but another one said it was Nollaig. I doubt the second is right because that's the word for Christmas!
The final part of this section introduces the vocative case, which is used when addressing someone directly. For most names, it involves putting 'a' before the name. However, for Irish names, it becomes a lot more complicated. Lenition is applied to female names - this means putting a séimhiú after the first letter of the name if it's a particular consonant (only b, c, d, f, g, m, p, s and t) so Brid, Máire and Mairéad become a Bhrid, a Mháire and a Mhairéad. Male names also have the séimhiú added but they also get slenderised, which means adding an 'i' after the final vowel. So Sean becomes Sheain. This is seriously confusing and I would never have expected that people's names changed spellings and pronunciations! How do people remember all these changes? There's a quiz on the vocative case on various names and I only checked once whether a letter required lenition or not, and still managed to get them all right which is amazing! So, Ar mhaith leat cupán tae, a Natanaeil? You bet I do.
Blessings and Curses
Ooh, this sounds interesting! Oh, it's mainly greetings such as Go n-éirí an t-ádh leat/Good luck or Breithlá sona duit/Happy birthday. That is disappointing. There's some curses of the 'may you choke on it' nature. This is followed by an article on The Curse of Mayo, which is the Mayo Gaelic football team who haven't won a championship final since 1951. It reminds me of the Curse of the Bambino where the Boston Red Sox were denied a win at the World Series for 86 years! The last bit is about the song Bean Pháidín/Páidín's Wife where a woman who is in love with a married man curses his wife so that she can have him for herself. It includes an animated video created by TG4. It's remarkably upbeat for such a dark theme!
Summary
So here we are at the end of the first week. I have found it to be very involved, there's a lot to get through in one week. I found the history of the language very interesting as well as the information about Irish culture. I'm struggling a bit with pronunciations and the different dialects but I hope they will get easier with time. The course itself finishes off with a proverb of the week and this week's proverb is Tús maith leath na hoibre or well begun is half done. I hope week 2 is easier!