{"id":321,"date":"2010-07-25T16:20:16","date_gmt":"2010-07-25T16:20:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/?p=321"},"modified":"2015-08-01T20:18:02","modified_gmt":"2015-08-01T20:18:02","slug":"treoir-don-treoir-a-guide-to-the-guide-for-pronunciation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/treoir-don-treoir-a-guide-to-the-guide-for-pronunciation\/","title":{"rendered":"Treoir don Treoir: A Guide to the Guide (for Pronunciation)"},"content":{"rendered":"

I get a lot of requests for assistance with Irish pronunciation, so I thought I\u2019d do a few more blogs dealing with vocabulary from previous entries and explaining how to read my pronunciation guide.\u00a0 In other words, treoir don treoir<\/strong> (a guide to the guide).\u00a0 I\u2019ve done this from time to time anyway, here and there, but I know new people are always joining the list \u2013 and thanks, by the way!<\/p>\n

My inner linguist tells me I should do all this in IPA, for phonetic precision, but experience teaching Irish (20 year\u2019s worth) tells me that a lot of the people who want to learn Irish don\u2019t necessarily know IPA or want to learn it.\u00a0 Also, there\u2019s the dilemma that there is both standard IPA and the Irish-modified IPA (as used by M\u00edche\u00e1l \u00d3 Siadhail et al.).\u00a0 Those who\u2019ve actually studied the standard IPA have to relearn various features for the Irish-modified version, which is generally what I use when I use it (sounds a bit athr\u00e1iteach<\/strong> but I guess it makes sense to say it that way).\u00a0 .<\/p>\n

So here goes, a \u201ctreoir gharbh d\u2019fhuaimni\u00fa na Gaeilge<\/strong>\u201d [TRzh<\/sup>OH-irzh<\/sup> \u00a0\u03b3AHR-uv DOO-im-ny<\/sup>oo nuh GAYL-gy<\/sup>eh].\u00a0 The rest of this blog, and maybe some of the next one, \u00a0might be dedicated to the pronunciation of that one phrase.\u00a0 I\u2019m not big on sweeping generalizations, so this\u2019ll be a bit detail-oriented.<\/p>\n

a) superscript zh, as in <\/em>[TRzh<\/sup>OH-irzh<\/sup>]: Some people have told me this looks ridiculous but it\u2019s the best I can come up with to distinguish this \u201cr\u201d sound from the other main \u201cr\u201d sound in Irish, which is referred to as a \u201cflapped r.\u201d\u00a0 The traditional terms for these two \u201cr\u2019s\u201d in Irish are \u201ccaol<\/strong>\u201d (slender) and \u201cleathan<\/strong>\u201d (broad), but that doesn\u2019t tell you how<\/em> to pronounce<\/em> them.\u00a0 The nearest equivalent I know of for the Irish slender \u201cr\u201d (which I mark as \u201crzh<\/sup>\u201d) is in Czech, as in the man\u2019s name \u201cJi\u0159\u00ed.\u201d<\/em> \u00a0It actually takes quite a few extra keystrokes to keep typing the \u201czh\u201d as a superscript, so I hope that at least some people find it beneficial.\u00a0 The [rzh<\/sup>] sound is a bit like the French \u201cj\u201d as in \u201cJacques\u201d attached to an \u201cr.\u201d\u00a0 It\u2019s not a typical sound in English, so it isn\u2019t easy at first \u2013 if that\u2019s any s\u00f3l\u00e1s<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Many pronunciation guides ignore the distinction between this \u201cr\u201d (slender) and the flapped Irish \u201cr\u201d (broad) but I think the difference is important.\u00a0 The flapped \u201cr\u201d is not in today\u2019s phrase, so more on that later.<\/p>\n

b) superscript y as in [ny<\/sup>oo]: <\/em>I use the superscript \u201cy\u201d after certain slender consonants, to represent a miondifr\u00edocht<\/strong> in contrast to their broad pronunciation.\u00a0 The good news is that we have this distinction in English constantly \u2013 I just don\u2019t think native English speakers really think about it consciously.\u00a0 If I were going to use my pronunciation guide to describe English, this is how it would work:<\/p>\n

booty [BOO-tee]<\/p>\n

beauty [By<\/sup>OO-tee]<\/p>\n

I make it a superscript so that it doesn\u2019t suggest something like \u201cby-oo,\u201d like \u201cbayou\u201d or \u201cbye\u201d + \u201cooh.\u201d\u00a0 In other words, so people don\u2019t overpronounce it.<\/p>\n

And here are a couple of Irish pronunciation examples of two different \u201cb\u201d sounds, the first two are broad (more like English \u201cbooty\u201d) and the second two are slender, using the superscript \u201cy\u201d to show the broad\/slender difference.<\/p>\n

1. ab\u00fa!<\/strong> [uh-BOO], forever!, as in \u201c\u00d3 Domhnaill Ab\u00fa<\/strong>!\u201d<\/p>\n

2. b\u00facla <\/strong>[BOO-kluh], buckle<\/p>\n

3. bi\u00far\u00f3<\/strong> [By<\/sup>OO-roh], bureau, pronounced basically like the English, where it\u2019s a focal iasachta<\/strong> anyway.<\/p>\n

4. b\u2019fhi\u00fa \u00e9 \u2026<\/strong> [by<\/sup>oo ay, \u201cfh\u201d is silent], it would be worth \u2026, as in \u201cB\u2019fhi\u00fa \u00e9 a dh\u00e9anamh<\/strong>\u201d (It would be worth doing\u201d).<\/p>\n

Whether you think of \u201cbooty\u201d as \u201ccreach<\/strong>\u201d (for p\u00edor\u00e1id\u00ed<\/strong>, etc.) or as a \u201cbuatais\u00edn<\/strong>\u201d (br\u00f3g chniot\u00e1ilte do bh\u00e1b\u00e1n<\/strong>, sometimes spelled \u201cbootee\u201d i mB\u00e9arla<\/strong>) is up to you.\u00a0 In English, the pronunciation is the same.\u00a0 And if you even want to \u201cvoice\u201d the \u201ct\u201d (making it a \u201cd\u201d sound) and add the suffix \u201c-licious,\u201d that\u2019s up to you too.\u00a0 All I\u2019m really concerned about is the difference in the initial \u201cb\u201d sounds.\u00a0 So, remember, the difference between English \u201cbooty\u201d and \u201cbeauty\u201d is about comparable to the broad and slender Irish \u201cb.\u201d\u00a0 And the pronunciation is determined by the nearest adjacent vowel (a, o, u for \u201cbroad\u201d and e, i for \u201cslender\u201d).<\/p>\n

Those even more detail-oriented than I am will ask about the difference between the Irish broad \u201cb\u201d in \u201cbaol<\/strong>\u201d as opposed to the Irish slender \u201cb\u201d in \u201cbean<\/strong>.\u201d\u00a0 And they\u2019d be raising a good point.\u00a0 So I\u2019ll deal with it in a future blog.\u00a0 But please remember that for now, I\u2019m really trying to explain my pronunciation guide, not every aspect of Irish pronunciation!<\/p>\n

As for actually pronouncing [ny<\/sup>oo] based on my pronunciation guide, it\u2019s like the \u201cn\u201d in middle of English words like \u201cminion\u201d or \u201cbunion.\u201d\u00a0 Or \u201cbunyip.\u201d\u00a0 Or \u201ccanyon.\u201d\u00a0 And speaking of \u201ccanyon,\u201d that\u2019s the sound represented in Spanish by the \u201ctilde<\/strong>\u201d above the \u201cn,\u201d so if you know \u201cma\u00f1ana\u201d or \u201cca\u00f1on,\u201d you\u2019ve got it.<\/p>\n

And that\u2019s about it for one blog\u2019s worth of pronunciation detail.\u00a0 More coming up!<\/p>\n

Gluais\u00edn: athr\u00e1iteach <\/strong>[AH-RAWTCH-ukh], repetitive; garbh<\/strong> [GAHR-uv], rough; miondifr\u00edocht<\/strong>, nuance, lit. \u201cmini-difference;\u201d tilde<\/strong> (yes, that\u2019s the Irish spelling too, but note the plural, tild\u00ed<\/strong>, which is different from English, \u201ctildes\u201d).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I get a lot of requests for assistance with Irish pronunciation, so I thought I\u2019d do a few more blogs dealing with vocabulary from previous entries and explaining how to read my pronunciation guide.\u00a0 In other words, treoir don treoir (a guide to the guide).\u00a0 I\u2019ve done this from time to time anyway, here and…<\/p>\n

Continue Reading<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":36,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":""},"categories":[3898],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-321","post","type-post","status-publish","hentry","category-irish-language"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/321","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/36"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=321"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/321\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6989,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/321\/revisions\/6989"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=321"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=321"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=321"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}