{"id":6747,"date":"2015-05-28T19:45:03","date_gmt":"2015-05-28T19:45:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/?p=6747"},"modified":"2016-01-04T17:00:22","modified_gmt":"2016-01-04T17:00:22","slug":"emoji-rua-irish-for-a-red-haired-emoji-ach-an-bhfuil-siad-ann","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/emoji-rua-irish-for-a-red-haired-emoji-ach-an-bhfuil-siad-ann\/","title":{"rendered":"Emoji Rua? (Irish for ‘a red-haired emoji’) – ach an bhfuil siad ann?"},"content":{"rendered":"

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

\"An<\/a>

An bhfuil emoji ann d\u00f3ibh? C\u00e9 hiad na daoine seo? Lucht freastail ar Roodharigendag (L\u00e1 na nDaoine Rua, Redhead Day i mB\u00e9arla) sa chathair Breda san \u00cdsilt\u00edr sa bhliain 2008. By Bartr (Own work) [CC BY-SA 3.0 (http:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by-sa\/3.0) or GFDL (http:\/\/www.gnu.org\/copyleft\/fdl.html)], via Wikimedia Commons.<\/p><\/div>\n

This spring has seen a flurry of articles about the absence of red-haired emojis, especially now that more diversity than ever is available, with 5 or 6 types of skin tones (toin chnis<\/strong>) and numerous combinations with hair colors (dathanna gruaige<\/strong>).<\/p>\n

The 5 vs. 6 aspect is mostly thar sc\u00f3p an bhlag seo<\/strong>, but if you’re really interested you can read more at http:\/\/dermatology.about.com\/od\/cosmeticprocedure\/a\/fitzpatrick.htm. \u00a0The Fitzpatrick scale has 6 categories of ton cnis<\/strong> but the first two are collapsed together for the emojis, making 5 categories.<\/p>\n

Whatever one may think of the divisions and the omission (initially, at least) of a red-haired option, it’s a good opportunity to practice the Irish word for red-haired (rua<\/strong> [ROO-uh]).<\/p>\n

One convenient thing about the word “rua<\/strong>” is that it has just one form in most Modern Irish spelling, just “rua<\/strong>,” with no changes for plural, gender, or grammatical case.\u00a0 So we have:<\/p>\n

bean rua<\/strong>, a red-haired woman<\/p>\n

fear rua<\/strong>, a red-haired man<\/p>\n

bean an fhir rua<\/strong>, the red-haired man’s wife<\/p>\n

fear na mn\u00e1 rua<\/strong>, the red-haired woman’s husband<\/p>\n

There is, of course, a well-known and beautiful song, “Bean an Fhir Rua<\/strong>,” played instrumentally by the Chieftains on their Water from the Well<\/em> album and sung by St\u00e9phanie Makem (grand-niece of Tommy Makem) at https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=kZiOjX8T6q4.<\/p>\n

If you watch the St\u00e9phanie Makem video, with subtitles, you’ll see that the caption says, “Bean an Fhir Ruaidh<\/strong>” although the host of the session really appears to say, “Bean an Fhir Rua<\/strong>.”\u00a0 So what’s “ruaidh<\/strong>“?\u00a0 Remember, I referred to “most<\/em> Modern Irish spelling.”\u00a0 The older spelling of “rua<\/strong>” was “ruadh<\/strong>,” with a silent “dh” (as were words like “nuadh, sluadh<\/strong>, etc.).\u00a0 With that “-dh” ending, the word could take on inflection, with “ruadh<\/strong>” [ROO-uh] becoming “ruaidh<\/strong>” [ROO-ee].<\/p>\n

Curiously, a similar pattern still applies to the word “nua<\/strong>,” although the “-dh” is gone.\u00a0 The added “i” is still present, showing up as an “i-fada<\/strong>” (\u00ed), replacing the original “-idhe” and “-idh.”\u00a0 The form is “nua\u00ed<\/strong>,” used for comparisons (n\u00edos nua\u00ed<\/strong>) and for saying “of the new __,” when the noun is feminine and singular, like “dath na culaithe nua\u00ed<\/strong>” or “luach na muince nua\u00ed<\/strong>.”<\/p>\n

At any rate, back to “rua<\/strong>,” and some plural examples.\u00a0 Remember–no change!<\/p>\n

\"gruaig<\/a>

gruaig rua (By Sunny Ripert (Flickr) [CC BY-SA 2.0 (http:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by-sa\/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons)<\/p><\/div>\n

na mn\u00e1 rua<\/strong><\/p>\n

na fir rua<\/strong><\/p>\n

fir na mban rua<\/strong><\/p>\n

mn\u00e1 na bhfear rua<\/strong><\/p>\n

A few more uses include:<\/p>\n

capall rua<\/strong>, a chestnut horse<\/p>\n

pingin rua<\/strong>, a “red” cent<\/p>\n

An Mhuir Rua<\/strong>, the Red Sea<\/p>\n

rua-\u00fall<\/strong>, a russet apple<\/p>\n

And a few related words:<\/p>\n

ruacht<\/strong>, redness (of hair)<\/p>\n

ruadh\u00f3<\/strong>, to scorch, lit. to “red-burn”<\/p>\n

ruathuile<\/strong>, a strong flood<\/p>\n

Of course, all of these are in contrast to the other Irish word for “red,” which is “dearg<\/strong>,” as in “geansa\u00ed dearg<\/strong>” or “ti\u00failip<\/strong> dhearg<\/strong>.” “Rua<\/strong>” is used for hair, fur, and for coppery, rust-colored, and brownish shades of red.\u00a0 “Dearg<\/strong>” is used for practically everything else.<\/p>\n

Anyway, that’s some practice for “red-haired” in Irish and some other related phrases.\u00a0 As noted above, there is some controversy surrounding the issue of redheadedness and emojis.\u00a0 And just how controversial has the multiplicity of images become?\u00a0 The emojipedia article, “The Trouble with Redheads,” describes it as inclusive (uileghabh\u00e1lach<\/strong>), divisive (siosmach<\/strong>), overdue (thar t\u00e9arma<\/strong>, i.e. a rabhthas ag tn\u00fath go m\u00f3r leis<\/strong>), or not even necessary (gan riachtanas ar bith<\/strong>) (http:\/\/blog.emojipedia.org\/the-trouble-with-redheads).\u00a0 Not that the original emojipedia article provided the Irish vocabulary in parentheses.\u00a0 I did that, just for a little more d\u00fashl\u00e1n st\u00f3r focal.\u00a0 C\u00e9ard \u00e9 do bhar\u00fail f\u00e9in faoin gconsp\u00f3id?\u00a0 N\u00f3 an s\u00edleann t\u00fa gur consp\u00f3id at\u00e1 ann? \u00a0Cad a dh\u00e9anf\u00e1 d\u00e1 mbeife\u00e1 i mbun na n-\u00edomh\u00e1nna emoji? \u00a0SGF — R\u00f3isl\u00edn<\/strong><\/p>\n

Gluais<\/strong>: ton cnis<\/strong> [ton knish], skin tone, pl: toin chnis<\/strong> [tw<\/sup>in hnish].\u00a0 Both of these are pronounced with “dental t,” about half way between an English “t” as in “Tom” and a “hard” English “th” as in “thin” or “think.”\u00a0 Basically like the “t” in a (stereo)typical Irish pronunciation of “I t(h)ink so,” or “Thin Lizzy.”<\/p>\n

As for the vowels, the “o” of “ton<\/strong>” changes to more of an “ih” sound (as in “it” or “in”) for the plural (toin<\/strong>), because of the added “i,” like the “oi” sound of “pointe<\/strong>” or “foinse<\/strong>.” So I’ve added the superscript “w” in the transcription, but it’s not a perfect solution since Irish “toin<\/strong>” doesn’t sound exactly like English, “twin,” just a little bit.\u00a0 The vowel combination “oi” rarely sounds anything like the English words “coin” or “boy,” although a relatively small number of words, like “oighear<\/strong>” or “oigheann<\/strong>” tend in that direction, because of the “-gh-.”<\/p>\n

But the big caveat for this phrase is “NO S\u00cdNEADH FADA<\/strong>“!\u00a0 If we had the word “t\u00f3in<\/strong>” (with o-fada<\/strong>) we’d be looking at the word for “butt” or “backside,” as in “P\u00f3g mo th\u00f3in<\/strong>.”\u00a0 That’s just one backside–the plural would be “t\u00f3ineanna<\/strong>.” If we had the very hypothetical phrase “*t\u00f3in chnis<\/strong>,” it would mean something like “butt of skin,” in other words, a butt consisting of “skin,” as opposed to, hmmm, well, I guess, whatever other material you could imagine. Actually I’d probably want to use “craiceann<\/strong>” for that, so, “t\u00f3in chraicinn<\/strong>,” but we are getting an-hipit\u00e9iseach<\/strong> here, aren’t we?\u00a0 At any rate, note the different ways the plurals are formed, for “ton<\/strong>” and “t\u00f3in<\/strong>“:<\/p>\n

ton<\/strong>, pl: toin<\/strong><\/p>\n

t\u00f3in<\/strong>, pl: t\u00f3ineanna<\/strong><\/p>\n

By the way, I’m sure it’s obvious, but that wasn’t “butt” as in “cask” or “barrel.”\u00a0 That would be “buta<\/strong>,” as in a “butrach<\/strong>” (a buttery), as in the name of the eatery at Trinity College Dublin.<\/p>\n

And one last point, making this “gluais<\/strong>” almost as long as a full blog post.\u00a0 In the pronunciation guide, the “k” of “knish” (for “ton cnis<\/strong>“) is<\/em> pronounced, unlike similar-looking English words (knee, knight, knock, where the “k” is silent”). The “kn-” sound with the “k” pronounced is like the Danish pronunciation of\u00a0 the surname “Knudsen,” sort of like “canoe” if the two syllables were collapsed together. As for the “hn” sound of “hnish” as a guide for pronouncing “chnis<\/strong>,” I don’t think there’s anything like it in English.\u00a0 It’s basically “huh” and “nuh” superimposed on each other. \u00a0At any rate, it’s nothing like the “ch” of English “child” or “chew,” not that “ch” in Irish ever is.\u00a0 It’s either the guttural sound of “loch<\/strong>” or the breathy sound of “o\u00edche<\/strong>.”<\/p>\n

So far, all that glossary was just for the one phrase, “ton cnis<\/strong>.”\u00a0 Here’s a bit more: \u00edomh\u00e1<\/strong>, image (one of the relatively few nouns\u00a0that end with “a-fada<\/strong>“; foinse<\/strong>, source; oigheann<\/strong>, oven; oighear<\/strong>, ice; pointe<\/strong>, point<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\"\"

(le R\u00f3isl\u00edn)   This spring has seen a flurry of articles about the absence of red-haired emojis, especially now that more diversity than ever is available, with 5 or 6 types of skin tones (toin chnis) and numerous combinations with hair colors (dathanna gruaige). The 5 vs. 6 aspect is mostly thar sc\u00f3p an bhlag…<\/p>\n

Continue Reading<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":36,"featured_media":6759,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":""},"categories":[3898],"tags":[362403,229593,254952],"class_list":["post-6747","post","type-post","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-irish-language","tag-emoji","tag-red","tag-rua"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6747","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=6747"}],"version-history":[{"count":16,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6747\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7500,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6747\/revisions\/7500"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6759"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6747"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6747"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6747"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}