So alla persona irlandese di lingua non irlandese media, questo potrebbe non sembrare un problema. Ma questo è solo qualcosa che mi piacerebbe uscire.
Ulster Irish/Gaelinne Na Mumhan e Connacht Irish/Connacht. All’interno di questi gruppi, ci sono circa 20 dialetti separati.
Gaeilig Uladh aka Donegal Irish: Rann Na Feirste, Baile Na Finne, Gleann Cholm Chille, Ros Goille, Gaoth Dobhair e Tóraigh (Tory è uno dei dialetti più unici in Irlanda) \ T
Munster Gaelinne: Kerry – Corca Dhuibhne, Iiragh, Cork – Múscraí, Cape Clear Island e Deise
Gaeilge Chonnacht (eccoci qui): Galway – Cois Fharraige, Ceantar Na Noileán, Iorras Aithneach, distretto di Sheoigheach, Everyréidh na Gaillimhe, Árann, inis oírr (estremamente vicino a Clare Irish), Mayo – Tourmakeady, Achlais, Iorrais, MATHAIRN.
Perché i dialetti sono importanti? I dialetti rappresentano secoli di sviluppo linguistico attraverso l’esperienza delle comunità. Ognuno è unico a modo suo. Fortunatamente oggi abbiamo cose come TG4 e RNAG per esporre ai dialetti. Parlo personalmente 3 dialetti e posso capire 19. Quindi i dialetti mutabile l’intelligenza non è più una cosa difficile.
Ora che abbiamo una conoscenza fondamentale dei dialetti degli irlandesi. Su al Caighdeán Oifigiúil e cosa è.
Negli anni ’60 fu creato il Caighdeán Oifigiúil. Si discuteva su su quale dialetto si basava. Era quasi basato sull’irlandese di South Mayo in quanto il South Mayo Irish è il dialetto vivente più vicino ai dialetti che sarebbero stati pronunciati da Roscommon a North Dublino. Ma si basava su Munster Irish come all’epoca, un’enorme quantità di Clare, Cork, Kerry, Waterford, parti di Tipperary parlavano irlandesi. Munster era una roccaforte irlandese, quindi aveva senso. Attualmente è Conamara. Ma comunque. Il Caighdeán Oifigiúil è stato implementato in tutto il paese. Ma era sempre inteso come standard scritto. Non uno standard parlato. Ma sfortunatamente è stato silenziosamente implementato come dialetto parlato come sentirai a Gaelscoileanna.
Perché questo è un problema? Non è solo buono che l’irlandese venga parlato affatto? Mentre sì lo è. Ma il Caighdeán Oifigiúil è stato progettato per essere scritto. Quindi non c’è insegnamento sulla pronuncia. Che è un grosso problema. C’è un enorme barriera linguistica tra i parlanti di Caighdeán e gli altoparlanti di Gaeltacht in alcune aree di pronuncia come la R Caol, le cose difficili e le piccole cose come quella che distruggono qualsiasi capacità di comunicare con chiunque. Questo è il motivo per cui si sente parlare di persone che imparano irlandesi alla fluidità, accendendo RNAG e che si perno completamente.
L’altro problema con il Caighdeán è che sta spingendo parole e detti unici per le province che non hanno oratori per correggere detto problema. Ancora una volta, perché è un problema. Bene, immagina che tuo figlio sia tornato a casa da scuola e abbia parlato in un accento americano usando parole come sneaker, spazzatura e altre parole associate all’inglese americano. Li correggeresti perché non lo diciamo. Stessa cosa con dialetti irlandesi. Quando queste persone interagiscono quindi con i nativi della loro provincia, non possono capirle. Questo non è colpa degli studenti però. È colpa del sistema educativo.
So che sembra che possa essere risolto semplicemente lasciando morire tutti i dialetti o costringendo i nativi a usare Caighdeán. Ma se sono atterrato a casa tua con un elenco di parole di Englidh che dovevi usare perché non era stato insegnato a Waht nelle scuole, mi diresti di scopare. Perché dovresti abbandonare le parole che usi? Stessa cosa per le persone di Gaeltacht. C’è un’enorme quantità di patrimonio e conoscenza locale all’interno dei dialetti. Chiunque abbia letto Sea Tamagotchi di Manchán Magan lo capirà.
Conamara è l’unico gaeltacht al di fuori di West Munster completamente immune a questo. Ma tutti gli altri Gaeltachtaí da Waterford, a Mayo a Donegal, stanno prendendo gravi colpi dall’incapacità di comunicare con gli altoparlanti L2. Questo guida un cuneo tra studenti irlandesi e madrelingua.
So che a molte persone non importa. Ma a quelli di voi che lo fanno. Ricerca il dialetto più vicino a te, impara i nativi R Caol e imitano e alla fine suonerai uno. Puoi persino sviluppare il tuo idoletto. Ma soprattutto, presterà secoli di conoscenza e sviluppo.
EDIT: voglio aggiungere qualcosa. Solo perché hai imparato a scuola quello "Questo è il modo di dirlo" Non significa che sia set nella pietra. Taobh per esempio, tutti coloro che leggono questa frase leggono quella parola in modo diverso. https://www.canuint.ie/ga/cuardy?t=taobh Ascolta Canúint.ie. Smettila di dire alla gente che pronunciano le cose sbagliate.
The effect An Caighdeán Oifigiúil has on dialects.
byu/Doitean-feargach555 inireland
di Doitean-feargach555
34 commenti
This is well thought out, if the different dialects were thought it might make spreading, and using the language easier too.
Thanks for this, it’s so interesting. I loved Irish in school but sadly lost confidence in my ability to speak it over the years, but my sons attended a Gaelscoil and a Gaelcholáiste.
We’re from Munster. I can see exactly what you’re saying, especially turning on Nuacht and not understanding what they’re saying at all.
I’ve noticed too that accents can dramatically change pronunciations (just like any language I suppose)
We sometimes visit the North – and fair play to the people of West Belfast for having a vibrant Irish speaking community and a huge Gaelcholáiste.
The difference in pronunciation caused some comical moments – we were putting the emphasis on completely different syllables, and in completely different accents.
I’m wondering if regional accents played a role in shaping dialects, or did dialects play a role in shaping accents, even when speaking English? If that even makes any sense?
The best post I have ever had the pleasure to read on the Irish Reddit.
I was recently downvoted to hell on /r/askireland for pointing out that [Siobhán is not pronounced with a ‘v’ sound](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskIreland/comments/1n84xz1/do_most_irish_people_know_the_pronunciation_of/nccnpv2/) outside Munster. There are a lot of people confident in the little bit that they know.
Yes! And if i could just hijack this post to say that Gaelic and Gaelig are perfectly acceptable names for the language, just because you learned Gaeilge in school doesn’t mean you should be correcting every American you see online
This is a good post. It really highlights the difficulty Irish faces if it ever hopes to be a growing, not shrinking, language.
Some more practical suggestions on how to learn an actual native dialect, as opposed to school Caighdean:
1) Radio. But the only station that reliably has actual mother tongue native speakers is RnG. Radio na Life etc have way too many Bearlachas Gaelscoil graduates. And too much English spoken. Only RnG consistently maintains a strong standard of native Irish.
2) stay well away from TikTok, YouTube etc or else be VERY discerning. Some of the biggest Irishfluencers (and I mean people with book deals etc) speak crap Irish. If you seek out someone from the dialect you’ve chosen, make sure they are genuinely from there and grew up all their life there.
I should say that while doing this is the best way to learn Irish that is genuinely Irish and not some pidgin Bearlachas “English in Irish drag”, it’s ok and honestly understandable if this is disheartening to learners.
It’s incredibly difficult to become a fluent native speaker. It takes a vast investment of time and effort and frankly, I’ve never known anyone who did it without either a) family descent (they’re the child of a native speaker growing up hearing it in an otherwise Anglophone environment) or b) physical relocation to the area it’s spoken.
It’s also counterproductive in SOME senses because one of the motivating factors of studying Irish (either at college or just to be a fluent speaker) is (or should be, for maximum effectiveness) some kind of job/employment benefit. It’s not very encouraging to say to all gaelscoil grads “you’re never going to be ideal teacher material. We don’t want you on TG4”. It feels mean!
Having said that it’s absolutely possible to improve one’s Irish and even if you don’t get to fluency you’ll be better off purely for having exercised your brain and gotten out of the house speaking to humans instead of being on a screen.
I don’t know if I really agree with parts of your premise, but this was a nice read.
I’d say the bigger issue with L2 speakers in non native areas is more the code mixing (interjecting English words into Irish). If you compare certain programs on volunteer Irish language radio stations with RnaG, you’ll hear nearly every second or third word be in English. So if you’re used to that and then switch over to RnaG, where code mixing is much rarer, it will be naturally more difficult.
This isn’t to say that code mixing is bad, natives do it all the time as well, but if you’re a learner and you just stay with what you’re comfortable with, then your level will never improve. Language learning, like any skill, needs you to push yourself in order to progress.
I’ve long been trying to learn Irish in an Ulster dialect, and have finally signed up to classes with Turas. I frequently visit Falcarragh in Donegal, so I’m hoping I’ll be intelligible there. Sadly, Glens Irish has died out, and that would have been the dialect closest to me.
Very interesting read, thanks for that. I think this is something that happens elsewhere by the way. My high level knowledge of the impact of Standardised Chinese indicates it had similar impacts on Chinese dialects.
Also just on your point about Americanisms, to be honest there are lots of those that are now essentially standard in the English spoken in Ireland that weren’t 25 years ago. e.g. people said films where they say movies now.
My (personal) theory is that we should have primary school teachers study for their degree for a full year in a gaeltacht and then we actively teach primary school students a native dialect. Ideally there would be options to choose a dialect that you connect with and that fits into your accent.
Currently we send them to Connemara for 4 weeks and then they come back and immediately switch to Conas ata tus, it’s such a waste of time
Go raibh maith agat as do phost, bhí sé suimiúil.
What accent do you suggest kids in Gaelscoil in a part of the Country where the language is dead? Say Dublin?
That’s actually why it’s very hard, if not impossible, to learn Irish effectively as a foreigner
I would like to add / emphasise that because the Caighdeán is so Munster-oriented, it alienated a lot of native speakers. Instead of finding a middle ground of Connaught Irish or something based on it, they chose a dialect from the far end of the spectrum and immediately limited the number of native speakers who could understand or meaningfully interact with it. I don’t really think it was chosen because there were so many Irish speakers in Munster either, it was more a reflection of the biases of those making the decisions at a linguistic and political level.
Interestingly, I remember reading that Donegal writer Seosamh Mac Grianna advocated for a standard that would be intelligible to speakers of Irish in Ireland and Gallic in Scotland, to create a wider base that would give the language a firmer platform against the growing influence of English etc. Not sure how it would have worked in practice though.
I’m most familiar with Donegal Irish, and I have heard the Caighdeán referred to somewhat disparagingly as school Irish, book Irish and even ‘posh’ Irish. It’s fair to say that most native Donegal speakers wouldn’t feel much affinity with it.
I think one of the by-products of the choices made about the Caighdeán is that now you have two parallel sections of Irish society who use Irish. One is (mostly) middle-class, urban and growing (the Gaelscoil movement etc.), and is based on the Caighdeán. The other, the native speakers with their regional dialects, is in decline.
Anyway, that’s my stream of consciousness on the matter. I shall go to work now. Thank you for your post.
Listen up kids, posts like this just underline the purity of essence that is required to speak Irish. Either you got it in your wheelhouse or don’t even think about using words you are not qualified to appreciate fall out of your mouth, pig-rustling ladder-thieves.
Very interesting and I agree it’s a shame that so much of it is being lost. But from a practical and pragmatic point of view I just don’t see it as feasible in some parts of what you’re saying outside of asking people to take personal responsibility to learn their local dialect.
For example, if you insisted that teachers in Gaelscoileanna all teach in the schools local dialect I think you’d very much struggle to staff those schools adequately. From what I understand they struggle as it is. And if there was no spoken standard you could have 17 teachers all using different dialects which isn’t fair on students. In trying to regrow the language in the context of life in Ireland it’s very much one of those “perfection is the enemy of good” things.
On the other hand there’s so much that could be done from like funding research in the aid of preserving written and oral sources of the dialects and ensuring there’s public access to them to aid people in learning different dialects so that there’s a chance of the dialects at least growing back in the future.
Yeah it’s not too hard to do once you lean on a community, the Celtic Languages Discord I think is good for looking for resources for self-study.
I’d be an example of a guy who’s going for Déise Irish outside of Waterford, although I started by looking at Muscraí/Corca Dhuibhne…the book I have does contain a map with my town on it so it’s as local as I can get, and the local Irish probably was some mix of those anyway.
My own little thing was starting to write Irish in the seanchló, even got a font on the PC.
On another note I think being properly bilingual from a young age could help with learning other languages in the future maybe.
Agree 100% on everything you say but, honestly, Irish is dead if there isn’t a unified language taught to non native speakers
Suimiúil!
I always thought South Mayo/Roscommon was the standard, because that’s the one Douglas Hyde had. But this could be from my little bubble of a national school in a breac-Gaeltacht in that area in the 80s. My mother tells me I came home from school in an almighty huff on the first day of High Infants, because the new teacher was from Cork and “she says everything wrong”. I remember really disliking the soft “d” before “i” and “e” – it was so unsatisfying, and I would respond “Dia’s Muire dhuit” with full gutteral force!
Very interesting that there’s different dialects across the north west, is there a list anywhere of different words? What makes Ranafast different from Gweedore, for example?
This comes up every so often and I don’t think it stands up to the slightest scrutiny.
The Caighdeán is still a written standard. Specifically its a grammar and spelling standard. Nobody created a standard language for Gaeilscoileanna and the way irish is being spoken outside gaeltachtaí is not hurting gaeltachtaí. Kids who go to school in a Gaeilscoil learn from teachers from diverse backgrounds. Your assertion that there is some link between the C.O. and how kids speak Irish in gaeilscoileanna outside the gaeltacht is an artefact of internet discussion, it’s not real.
If it’s not acceptable to tell people in a Gaeltacht to use a load of words they don’t use (a thing that isn’t actually happening) then it’s also not acceptable to tell people who’ve spoken the language in school or even at home outside the Gaeltacht what words they should use. Is it possible that the acceptable “fuck off” could be directed at you? Also, the C.O. doesn’t dictate what words to use.
Your idea that you just speak the closest Gaeltacht dialect geographically to you means telling everyone Dublin they need now speak Connemara dialect in order to speak Irish. That’s a bit skew surely? What about all the people in Dublin who speak Donegal or Cork Irish? What about people who spoke Irish all their lives and didn’t learn it in one of the extant gaeltachtaí? “Sorry you speak the wrong kind of Irish, go speak a pure dialect of gaelic gaeilge for gaelic gaels”. Flann O’Brien had those cards marked 75 years ago.
But the part of you post that I’m really struggling with is that there is a suggestion that because of word selection or pronounciation of certain phonemes that School Irish is not mutually intelligible with Gaeltacht Irish. The extension of that is that Dialects are not mutually intelligible. That is patently absurd. That slender r in Connacht is as different from Muskerry as it is from any school in the country. I speak English every work day with people who use phonemes that do not exist in English (and at least as different as the consonant examples you posted) and nobody’s ability to communicate is destroyed. I don’t believe for one second that Irish is as brittle a communication medium as people such as yourself make it out to be.
The reason gaeltact dialects are under pressure is NOT the C.O. it’s economics. People who would live there can’t get jobs and can’t get a house there because all the houses are holiday homes of wealthy people in nearby cities. The problem in An Rinn is the road from waterford, not how kids in Gaeilscoil in Waterford speak the language.
An-suimiúl ar fad. Grma 👏👏👏
No i absolutely care and this is a great post. Having gone to Gaelscoil and Gaelcholaiste, I was taught School Irish. I got very little exposure to the natural dialects even of my own county of Kerry.
I think one of the reasons is because nowadays, most of the teachers in these schools are not native speakers themselves but rather people who learnt School Irish themselves.
While Irish may not die out, the variety of the language may.
Learning any language to fluency is an enormous undertaking, and trying to incorporate every dialectical quirk into any curriculum is an impossible task.
I learned Finnish to fluency as an adult and Finnish learning has a similar structure where different regions speak widely different dialects of Finnish but everyone studies the centralised, “book” version of the language.
While it is annoying to basically feel like a complete beginner when you speak to a native after 1 year+ of intensive learning, it’s frankly impossible for any generalised curriculum to account for every region’s dialectical differences.
The learner has to understand that the language courses they study in formal settings only serve as a basic, foundational introduction to the language. Even, say, the Higher Level leaving cert paper. Learning a language like Irish requires lifelong application and curiosity, there’s no way to adjust the curriculum to fix that.
Think the post is interesting but as a speaker from Donegal I’d push back on the idea that Munster Irish is unintelligible to me. I’m not used to it and if I meet someone from Kerry it might take a minute for my ear to tune in but we’re speaking the same language at the end of the day.
In terms of the Gaeilscoileanna, it’s only one situation but my nephews are in one in Dublin. The older lad pronounces dearg like the C.O, and it’s a running joke that he corrects us when we say it. But the young fella just went to the same school and has a teacher from Donegal, so he’s pronouncing things with our dialect and he’s been saying dearg with the j sound like home.
So I’m not sure the C.O is the automatic teaching standard, surely it’s teacher dependent?
Tbh part of the problem with Irish was always the desperation to preserve. A standard form was a sneaky way of undermining that.
The real problem now is there are probably more Irish speakers who learned at Gaelscoileanna than in a Gaeltacht. Ultimately they will define how the language is spoken.
Thanks for making this post
Also, an caighdeán oifigiúil has brought in a great number of words and constructions based on English, where there would have been better options based on Irish (or even Irish words already existing in one or more of the dialects).
If I were to attempt to learn mayo dialect for example , without having the resourses for immersion or online classes where would I start?
Local accents in English are disappearing too, I don’t see how Irish has much chance of preserving regional dialects. You’d be doing well to have young people using it at all in day to day life.
But yes, as someone who can understand Connaught Irish and watch about 60-70% of TG4/RNG, being among a room of Dublin neo-gaeilgóirs was a trip. Gaeilge in a D4 accent. Strange, harsh pronunciations, everything sharp annunciation like a BBC shipping report. Good Irish should flow like water, few hard stops, lots of rich throaty currents.
I’ve been wondering for some time if we might just have to start regarding the Caighdeán Oifigiúil as a native dialect given how many people describing themselves as “fluent” (and I have no reason to doubt them) and even some people who say Irish is their first language, use it.
There are very few precedents, but this kind of thing has happened before, where a specific neutral / compromise dialect was used to teach people a language which then ended up being the dialect they spoke fluently (maybe Tagalog in the Philippines, although some of those people still code-switch a bit).
If you’re teaching a language to people who don’t speak it, you don’t have a choice. You have to pick the most neutral? or the easiest? or the best? or a compromise? version of the language and run with it.
I remember the first time I landed in Paris and tried to talk to people in what I have been assured by the Leaving Cert was A-level French. I’m sure most of us have had an experience like that. You end up using what you learned and tooling the “real” French they speak in France around it.
I’m sure that would happen if fluent Irish speakers spent more time in the Gaeltacht. But they generally don’t, so is it just a new native dialect?
I was confused for a second as I thought you were saying massive amounts of Munster were Irish-speaking in the 60s
Good on you for making this post here!
I 100% agree with you on the importance of dialects as someone who’s been actively studying Irish dialectology and phonology, they’re a reflection of the linguistic diversity of our language and the death of dialects would be an immense loss to our language and culture, Irish would only be a shell of itself. I am also very critical of how the Caighdeán was developed, it definitely needs to be reworked (I’m not sure how realistic that would be today but one can hope). When it comes to your point on the barrier between Gaeltacht and Caighdeán speakers’ pronunciation, I think it extends to most sounds to be honest as most of them are mispronounced (think of long vowels like é, ó, ú being pronounced ay, ow, ew, very off compared to native Irish pronunciation, or not only the r caol as mentioned but also r leathan, or even other broad vs slender consonants).
Just a little pedantic note, the Déise dialect is comprised of Waterford and until a couple decades ago South Tipperary, the very north east past of Cork and parts of East Limerick, it did not extend to South Dublin. In Kilkenny, Laois and Carlow, Ossory Irish was spoken, it was a Connacht-like dialect with lots of Munster/Déise influence the further south you went, with some Ulster features even. Wexford, Wicklow, Kildare and most of Dublin were even more Connacht-like, with some Munster and Ulster features as well as many unique features.
When my children went to school here in Co. Cork they told me that I “talked like the CD”. The teacher was using audio material produced by TG4 in Connemara and I’m from west Galway.