{"id":3543,"date":"2012-11-30T14:06:40","date_gmt":"2012-11-30T14:06:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/?p=3543"},"modified":"2012-12-09T01:40:06","modified_gmt":"2012-12-09T01:40:06","slug":"cailini-firinscneach-staileanna-baininscneach-go-figure","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/cailini-firinscneach-staileanna-baininscneach-go-figure\/","title":{"rendered":"Cail\u00edn\u00ed — firinscneach? Staileanna — baininscneach? Go figure!"},"content":{"rendered":"

(le R\u00f3isl\u00edn)<\/strong><\/p>\n

Very early on in learning Irish, most people see phrases like “an capall<\/strong>” (the horse) and “an bh\u00f3<\/strong>” (the cow).\u00a0 Or “an seomra<\/strong>” (the room) and “an chistin<\/strong>” (the kitchen).\u00a0 Then, somewhere along the way, we learn that the basic form of “cow” is “b\u00f3<\/strong>” (not “bh\u00f3<\/strong>“) and that the basic form of “kitchen” is “cistin<\/strong>” (not “chistin<\/strong>“).\u00a0\u00a0 These different forms of the word have different pronunciations: b\u00f3<\/strong> [boh] but bh\u00f3<\/strong> [woh OR voh, depending on dialect] and cistin<\/strong> “KISH-tchin” but “chistin<\/strong>” [HISH-tchin].<\/p>\n

“Capall<\/strong>” and “seomra<\/strong>,” however, stay the same, even when the definite article (“an<\/strong>“) is taken away: \u00a0capall<\/strong> (horse), an capall<\/strong> (the horse), seomra<\/strong> (room), an seomra<\/strong> (the room).<\/p>\n

Here are some more pairs:<\/p>\n

cearc <\/strong>[kyark], hen; an chearc<\/strong> [un hyark], the hen.\u00a0 NB: the [hy] is like the “h” in “humid” or “human”<\/p>\n

coileach<\/strong> [KIL-yukh], rooster; an coileach<\/strong> [un KIL-yukh], the rooster<\/p>\n

crann\u00f3g <\/strong>[KRAHN-ohg], lake-dwelling (house built on support posts); an chrann\u00f3g<\/strong> [un KHRAHN-ohg], the lake-dwelling<\/p>\n

teach<\/strong> [tchakh], house; an teach<\/strong> [un tchakh], the house<\/p>\n

g\u00e9<\/strong> [gyay], goose; an gh\u00e9<\/strong> [un yay], the goose<\/p>\n

gandal <\/strong>[GAHN-dal], gander; an gandal<\/strong> [un GAHN-dal], the gander<\/p>\n

Notice any pattern here?\u00a0 Pertaining to “na h-anna<\/strong>“?<\/p>\n

So as you may have noticed, certain words get the letter “h” inserted after the first consonant when we add the word “the” (b\u00f3, an bh\u00f3<\/strong>, etc.).\u00a0 Others don’t (capall, an capall<\/strong>, etc.).<\/p>\n

You might also have noticed that some of the words that take the additional “h” pertain to female animals (cearc, g\u00e9<\/strong>).\u00a0 Bhuel, “g\u00e9<\/strong>” can sometimes refer to geese in general, fireann agus baineann<\/strong>, but technically speaking, a male goose is a “gandal<\/strong>” (gander).<\/p>\n

So, lo and behold, we’ve stumbled upon the key to grammatical gender (inscne ghramad\u00fail<\/strong>) in Irish.\u00a0 One blog can’t possibly describe the entire situation, but here are some of the basics:<\/p>\n

1) Like most European languages (except English), almost all Irish nouns have grammatical gender.\u00a0 That means that almost everything, animate (duine<\/strong>, m) or inanimate (bosca<\/strong>, m), biologically gendered (cearc<\/strong>, f) or not (aim\u00e9ibe<\/strong>, f), is either masculine or feminine in Irish.\u00a0 You may have encountered a similar situation in a language like Latin, with “puer”<\/em> (m) and “puella”<\/em> (f), “p\u0113s<\/em>” (leg of a table, m) and “m\u0113nsa<\/em>” (table, f). \u00a0Or Spanish “el ni\u00f1o<\/em>” and “la ni\u00f1a<\/em>.”\u00a0 How about French “le roux<\/em>” (m) and “la fondue<\/em>” (f)? \u00a0Or, also in “la belle France<\/em>” (f), the land of “le beau geste<\/em>” (m), we find “le chien<\/em>” and “la chienne<\/em>.”\u00a0 Finally, although grammatical gender is rare in modern English, we usually do differentiate “fianc\u00e9e” from “fianc\u00e9,” and we might differentiate “blonde” from “blond.”\u00a0 \u00a0Or less commonly still, “brunette” from “brunet.”<\/p>\n

2) There are a few exceptions, Irish nouns with no gender, most of which only occur now in fossilized expressions, such as “f\u00e9idir<\/strong>” (“possibility,” often translated as “possible” or “can”), which do not have gender in modern Irish (Is f\u00e9idir liom<\/strong>, etc.).<\/p>\n

3) Grammatical gender in Irish may be related to biology, or it might not.\u00a0 So we have “an chearc<\/strong>” and “an gh\u00e9<\/strong>,” and “an bh\u00f3<\/strong>,” and also “an ch\u00e9irseach<\/strong>” (the female or hen blackbird) and “an chr\u00e1in<\/strong>” (the sow), among others, for animals.\u00a0 For people we have “an bhean<\/strong>” [un van, the woman], an ghirseach<\/strong> [un YIRzh-shukh, the little girl], and “an chliob\u00f3g<\/strong>” [un HLIB-ohg, the big strong girl].\u00a0 On the masculine side, we have “an coileach<\/strong>,” “an gandal<\/strong>,” “an tarbh<\/strong>” (the bull), “an lon dubh<\/strong>” (the blackbird), “an collach<\/strong>” (the boar), “an fear<\/strong>” (the man), “an gas\u00far”<\/strong> (the boy, though sometimes “child” in general), and “an cliobaire<\/strong>” (the strong, able-bodied man).<\/p>\n

4) On the other hand, we have thousands and thousands of inanimate nouns in Irish that also have grammatical gender, among them: \u00a0bosca<\/strong> (box, m), cos<\/strong> (foot, leg, f), bord<\/strong> (table, m), cathaoir<\/strong> (chair, f), teach<\/strong> (house, m), otharlann<\/strong> (hospital, f), leabhar<\/strong> (book, m), leabharlann<\/strong> (library, f).<\/p>\n

5) Irish just has one form of the word “the” for singular nouns — it’s “an<\/strong>,” pronounced like “un.’\u00a0 It doesn’t have a masculine and feminine form such as we see in some other languages (le\/la, el\/la, il\/la<\/em>, etc.).<\/p>\n

So how do we tell which words are masculine and which are feminine if we don’t have the definite article to help us as we did for languages like French or Spanish?\u00a0 There are two main ways.\u00a0 One is by looking at the ending, which I’d say is helpful about 75% of the time.\u00a0 For example, the “-\u00f3g<\/strong>” ending is almost always feminine, as in “an chliob\u00f3g<\/strong>.”\u00a0 But there are many feminine nouns that don’t have any actual suffix ending (bean, cearc, traein<\/strong>, etc.) and others with different endings (Gaeltacht, p\u00e9inte\u00e1il<\/strong>, etc.).\u00a0 The second way is to check for lenited adjectives following the noun (bean mhaith<\/strong>, not “maith<\/strong>;” “cearc mh\u00f3r<\/strong>,” not “m\u00f3r<\/strong>).<\/p>\n

There’s actually a third way — look the word up the dictionary and see if it says “m” or “f.”\u00a0 Note that some two-way dictionaries only give the gender in the Irish-to-English section, not in the English-to-Irish section.\u00a0 \u00a0Some dictionaries will say “f” for “firinscneach<\/strong>” and “b” for” baininscneach<\/strong>,” so be sure to check out what the system is.<\/p>\n

Once you learn a new noun and its gender, try to practice it as much as you can so you can remember whether it’s firinscneach <\/strong>or baininscneach<\/strong> even if there are no surrounding clues (like lenited adjectives or definite articles).<\/p>\n

Any surprises in all of this?\u00a0 T\u00e1, cinnte<\/strong>!\u00a0 Consider the title of this blog.\u00a0 Yep, “cail\u00edn\u00ed<\/strong>” (girls) in Irish are firinscneach<\/strong> (masculine)!\u00a0 Grammatically, that is.\u00a0 And “staileanna<\/strong>” (stallions) are baininscneac<\/strong>h (feminine)! \u00a0But better not tell them<\/em> that or An Gra\u00edolach N\u00e1isi\u00fanta<\/strong> might be affected! \u00a0Mar a d\u00fairt m\u00e9 sa teideal, <\/strong>go figure!\u00a0 SGF, R\u00f3isl\u00edn<\/strong><\/p>\n

For more examples of grammatical gender in Irish, please check out Transparent Language’s video at\u00a0http:\/\/m.youtube.com\/watch?v=5Vt6p1wF5xw<\/a><\/p>\n

Gluais: baineann<\/strong>, female; fireann<\/strong>, male; gra\u00edolach<\/strong>, stud (as in horse stud farm)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

(le R\u00f3isl\u00edn) Very early on in learning Irish, most people see phrases like “an capall” (the horse) and “an bh\u00f3” (the cow).\u00a0 Or “an seomra” (the room) and “an chistin” (the kitchen).\u00a0 Then, somewhere along the way, we learn that the basic form of “cow” is “b\u00f3” (not “bh\u00f3“) and that the basic form of…<\/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":[96490,111082,96491,111083,74,255534,96586],"class_list":["post-3543","post","type-post","status-publish","hentry","category-irish-language","tag-baineann","tag-baininscneach","tag-fireann","tag-firinscneach","tag-gender","tag-grammatical","tag-inscne"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t