How to ACTUALLY pronounce broad and slender consonants Irish Gaelic (L, D, T, N, G, C)
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- Опубликовано: 1 июн 2024
- Nail how to pronounce broad and slender consonants in the Irish language.
Contents:
Intro 0:00
Broad L 1:42
Slender L 4:44
luí vs lí 6:35
duibhe vs dí 7:56
tuí vs tí 9:48
naoi vs ní 10:42
cuimhin vs cinn 11:38
gall vs geall 13:33
Tips 15:05
Find the audio I used here: www.teanglann.ie/ga/
Recommended video by An Loingseach: • The Pronunciation of I...
I speak decent Russian and grew up around Russian speakers. I can confirm the best way to learn broad v slender is to already know a Slavic language.
Thank you so much for this. My mother is from Donegal but didn’t speak Irish to me when she left Ireland. I can hear the difference between broad and slender sounds fairly well because of her, but have struggled to make them as an English speaker. This helped so much!
Best description I've found so far of the broad and slender consonant distinction! Velarising a consonant made sense to me intellectually, but practically putting my tongue on the velum was difficult until you walked me through it. Thank you so much for making this video! 😍 Would love more content like this.
Excellent descriptions for actually making the consonant sounds ! Will you do a video on the broad and slender vowels too? Thank you
I haven’t thought about a video on vowels to be honest, but I’ll add it to the list. Glad this helped!
I’ve been teaching Irish to Australians for over 25 years. Your descriptions are good - and accurate. Australian English actually has a broad and slender - dark and light - L equivalent - so that’s pretty easy. So, like you, it’s where I start to build an analogous template for my students. I have written a small reference booklet describing the sounds, and how they are written (as opposed to the usual wrong-way-around approach of looking at (written) letters and trying to pronounce them. It includes the International Phonetic Alphabet, diagrams and charts, useful information such as how A and AO are pronounced in different dialects, ‘tongue twisters’ and a comparison guide using IPA for Irish and (Australian) English consonants and vowels.
Great to hear you're teaching pronunciation from the get go. I dare say it's 100% overlooked by almost all teachers at all stages of learning.
_Australian English actually has a broad and slender - dark and light - L equivalent_
For sure, and it's not just Australian English - lots of velar Ls in the US and Canada too. Funnily enough Portuguese has them as well, which I suppose is part of why people think it sounds like Russian.
_It includes the International Phonetic Alphabet_
I'm not sure if it matters to you given you're an established teacher but I personally find IPA a bit cumbersome.
I'm not sure if you've ever come across them, but the 'Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies' has a series of books on Irish dialectal pronunciation from the 40s (or so) which make use of simplified systems per dialect (sometimes borrowing from IPA).
The books themselves are a no go for an absolute beginner, but their systems are easy to follow for learners once the formation of a sound is understood e.g. in 'The Irish of West Muskerry', they'd write something like 'tháinig an bhean' phonetically as [ha:n’ig’ ə v’an]. So broad/slender consonants are differentiated with an apostrophe and long vowels indicated with a colon.
The books use a slightly different system per dialect, so on second thought, if you're covering a lot of the dialects in your lessons, then maybe IPA is better for the vowel sounds, especially as Donegal Irish vowels are very different from Munster/Connacht ones.
This series may be of interest to you regardless.
@@davelearnsirish Thank you for your generous comments. I'd be delighted to send you a pdf copy of my booklet, if you wish. It is based on the pronunciation guide in Micheal Ó Siadhal's Learning Irish, with modifications to suit the 'standard' sounds.. I'm considering revising it, and preparing a new edition later this year. I'd appreciate any feedback, but only if you want to offer any comments or suggestions.
I don’t know if I’ll be any help but sure fire it through when you have it revised. You can email me at my channel name at gmail
Tremendous job friend- you should keep up the great videos. Informative and breaks down the linguistic terminology into understandable pieces. Grafting English pronunciation onto Irish is one of the biggest issues Gaelscoil kids and adult learners have.
Explaining this concept as being similar to hard/soft sounds in Slavic languages is helping me a ton. I spent like a year and a half studying Russian, and this really helped me get the difference in sound. I pronounce luí like I would pronounce лы, and lí like I would ли.
Glad it helped. I’m not sure if the sounds are produced in 100% the same way but I know a few Russians - and every time they teach me a sentence they’re always surprised at ‘my accent’. But I just try copy them as best I can using Irish phonetics 🤷🏻♀️
I'm studying Linguistics at university and I was curious about Irish phonology, but it's sometimes hard to understand from IPA transcriptions alone. You did a great job explaining the consonants in a way that covered the processes, while also making it easy to understand. Nice pedagogy!
Dave, this is brilliant! I have been struggling to listen to native speakers and I try to imitate, with only some success. This is a great explanation of the placement of the tongue and the force of the air (particularly starting with English words as a comparison.) Go raibh míle maith agat! I'll now search to see if you have a video on the "slender" r!
Glad you find it helpful. Some other commenters have added some other pointers that may help - worth a look too.
Unfortunately I don’t have a video on the slender r yet.
Really helpful! Exactly what I've been looking for. Thank you! 😊
PHENOMINAL!!!! Excellent explanation.
Great video! Thank you🙌🙌
Yeah, I could follow this. I look forward to practicing. Thanks much!
Iontach! Tá mé ag foghlaim na Gaeilge le dhá bhliain, agus is féidir liom léamh agus scríobh go measartha maith. Ach nuair a labhraím tá rud éigin mícheart.... I can't tell you how much I appreciate this, because I could always tell I have been doing something wrong with some of the more subtle broad/slender consonants. As a native English speaker from America, it took me a while to even be able to hear the difference in some cases, such as the slender R. When trying to pronounce "naoi" or "luí", I have never been able to figure out how to pronounce the vowels, but the problem was that I was focused on the wrong part because my tongue was starting in the wrong position! I will be visiting Galway and the Aran Islands in July, and with some practice I hope to feel a bit more competent by then. Can't believe this video doesn't have more views. I'm going to share it with some fellow learners. Go raibh maith agat!
Glad to hear it’s helped! I wouldn’t agonise over pronouncing everything perfectly over here, you’ll learn a huge amount by interacting with native speakers.
Full disclosure, pronunciation differs slightly across the country and I’ve purposely focused on Munster phonetics in this video (as it’s the least complex for English natives).
So some consonants (sometimes) may differ in being alveolar vs dental. But the velarisation etc. works in the same way. I’ll eventually do videos on this but I didn’t want to put people off learning with too much complexity. But don’t sweat this either, you’re gonna sound WAY more authentic regardless.
Also the slender r is a whole other ballgame! Its clearest heard at the end of a sentence where it’s noticeably different to the broad r. I’ll do a video on it at some point when I’ve figured out how to explain it
Just found this now but found it really useful - cheers!
Super well done!
Thanks for the video
Thanks for the video! I'm just starting to learn Irish
No sweat! If you’re at the start of learning I wouldn’t agonise over pronouncing everything perfectly, but definitely revisit it after you level up a little
Great job!
But. . .
Well, in my opinion the phoneme for the broad L is NOT found in the English spoken by most native speakers outside of the southern part of England, so even at the end of "waterfall" it's still the same as the slender L, although now that you mention it it is somewhat closer to the broad version, but still slender, to my ear.
Somebody from say London with the usual local pronunciation definitely DOES pronounce this final L the same as the broad Gaelic L, but only at the end of words, for example also the second L phoneme of the word "little", or the third consonant of "bottle".
Either way, well done, and you've of course nailed it when you gave the examples in Gaelic.
Yes you're totally right, the exact phoneme is not found in English, hopefully I didn't give that impression.
Dark Ls in English are indeed velarised but of course not to the same extent of a broad L in Irish. Furthermore the level of velarisation is dialectal as you mention.
- "although now that you mention it it is somewhat closer to the broad version, but still slender, to my ear"
Yeah absolutely. I've found that once people can 'feel' the sensation of velarisation via a familiar sound, they can then exaggerate it and start to produce the broad Irish sounds.
Great video! It's ridiculous you and An Loingseach are the only ones explaining this on RUclips!
I want to share two tips from the book Blas na Gàidhlig that helped me to pronounce broad and slender consonants (they equally apply to Gaeilge):
For broad consonants, put something like a strawberry or anything of that size on top of your tongue and then pronounce the sound. You will automatically make the correct sound as your tongue is forced into the correct shape.
After practicing the sound a few times like this, you can take the strawberry off but keep your tongue in the same shape, and then try to pronounce the sound without the strawberry.
For most slender consonants (like c, g, l, n, ch, etc., but not t or d) it helps to first pronounce a y sound.
Feel where your tongue approaches the roof of the mouth when you make the sound.
Then try to make the consonant in that same place.
Great tips! I wish I had stumbled upon that book beforehand!!!
For the slender t and d sounds your tip still applies in Munster Irish, which is what I was going for in this video. But for example, in Galway slender t and d are made in much the same way, but with the tip of the tongue resting just behind the lower teeth.
@@davelearnsirish Glad you like them!
Oh, I didn't know the pronunciation of slender d and t depends on the dialect. That explains why I've seen them transcribed sometimes as palatalised, sometimes as a pure palatals.
Brilliant video, maith thú
Dia dhuit, Dave. This was a terrific video, and I appreciate how straightforward you are, never overcomplicating things. While I'm in awe of "An Loingseach" 's knowledge (what is he 20 years old year? He'll be some professor yet), I find it very frustrating that he constantly goes off on these tangents such as unnecessary etymology lessons, complaining about 20th cen standardisation, insisting on the annoying Gaelic font etc. It's like you're learning to drive and the instructor insists on teaching you how to race the car on a track - you don't need it! I still wish he'd make more video, his Munster accent is as authentic as it gets on a modern younger person.
While I was watching your video here I kept being reminded of how the native speaker from Co. Clare talks in the viral video "Monolingual Irish Speaker". Although he is elderly (thus far deeper in pitch than us), and maybe reciting something (poetry?), the broad consonants are extremely noticeable. I'll be honest with you, Dave, as soon as I started listening (for intonation, pronunciation, not for understanding) to proper native speakers, it became like night and day between them and a teacher who is an L2 speaker. Its as if the later is a piano player who doesn't or cannot use all the available keys - they'll still give you lovely music but it will not be Chopin, it will not be comprehensive. I love "Learn Irish", he is full of enthusiasm and clearly fluent, but he lacks that dynamic accent (or maybe that's Wexford/Leinster Irish?).
I hope this wasn't too long to read. I'm an Irish person trying to get back to the native tongue after a while spent on other languages.
Not too long a read at all and thanks for the feedback. I'm glad you found the video helpful and fair play for getting back into it.
@@davelearnsirish I was wondering Dave if you'd any opinion on English fillers (pause words) being imported into Irish? I find it terribly jarring, as you'd never expect them in Spanish or French, so why in Irish? The culprits being "you know", "I mean", "like", "yeah", "so" and "well". I suppose the last one has an excuse being Gaelicised with some time now as "bhoil".
Funny you should mention this. I was chatting to a Mayo native speaker from Erris recently and he brought up that there was no need to force Irish words onto English words that have already been imported into the language. Specifically he brought up 'bicycle' and 'puncture' as examples - and no doubt, you can hear 'mo bhicycle', 'mo bhall' and the like. Although I think in Munster you'll come across the words 'rothar' etc.
Similarly in French, as purist as they can be, I've come across some imported words like 'fun' and 'cool' in native usage.
Back to your question though. When learning a language, there's a temptation to fall back on your native tongue in terms of pronunciation, intonation, filler words, direct translations and so on. So as a learner who wants to become fluent I think it's a best to avoid English usage in the target language and to immerse yourself in the real deal as best you can. Otherwise you run the risk of importing habits from your native language.
Outside of this, I believe it's entirely up to native speakers to determine what constitutes good use or slang of the language, and if that includes hesitation words so be it. Like you said, I think 'bhuel' is probably regular Irish at this point and I've heard very strong speakers mix in the occasional 'yea' with 'sea' and 'só' every now and again. Off the top of my head I'm not sure if I've commonly heard 'like', 'I mean' and 'ya know' outside of learners or Gaelscoil speakers but I could well be wrong on this, I don't live in the Gaeltacht. Personally I find them jarring as you do.
You've also reminded me of a piece on rnag's Saol ó dheas I heard yonks ago between Kerry native Helen ní Shé and Déise native Noel ó Murchadha which is probably worth a re-listen:
www.rte.ie/gaeilge/2021/0119/1190736-so-like-really-do-these-words-have-any-place-sa-ghaeilge/
And funnily enough he says 'radio' instead of 'raidió' here, another example I suppose.
@@davelearnsirish I've heard the fillers 'like', 'I mean' and 'ya know' from "Gaeilge i mo chroí", one of the two biggest channels aimed towards Irish learners. She's a twenty-something, who I believe is not a native speaker. However, in a conversation video she did with a person who was a native speaker of the Ulster dialect, I did notice an enormous amount of "You know" from her guest, and that half depressed me. It surely wasn't a coincidence that he was also a twenty-something, though I will hand it to him for speaking with a flawless accent. I wish there was native Gaelic filler words that could step into its place. Maybe in old recordings we'll find them? Or better yet, the fifty-somethings + on TG4 or RnG still living.
If I interrupt a non-native English speaker to make one minor correction to his/her pronunciation, am I language policing? Surely, I'm not, and I think the learner would be glad of my assistance, provided I'm not being excessive. It should be the same in Irish. Natives should strive to perfect the phonology of L2 speakers, and a little quick interruption here and there, very gently, during conversation is the best way. As long as the attitude isn't patronising, but encouragement.
I would distinguish between an imported filler and a loanword. The latter is surely inevitable to some degree, is it not? Think of "le weekend" en français. Or people in the UK using the American-English "I guess". Seomra is a loanword in Irish from the French chambre, and it's been there centuries, as far as I know. I suppose when the loanwords start to dominate the language then you do have a problem, which they call a pidgin. But Irish is relatively resistant to that, isn't it? It's always coming up with words of its own like French usually is, no? That's the written form though, the fillers are in everyday speech and that's the part of the language I care far more about. An imported filler feels like you're betraying your mother tongue, polluting the new target language if that's not too crude a thing to say.
I'd totally agree with leaving the idea of good Irish and slang up to the native speakers, we can't second judge them. "Sea" is also there with a while, and you can always interchange with "tá!". Looking at the dictionary, "só" seems to be already reserved as the word for comfort/peace of mind or luxury? Do we not have "mar sin" to mean "so"? I like "anseo" as it reminds one of "alors" in French, "allora" in Italian or "alors" and "bueno" in Spanish. As I mention below, however, this may be a calque way of thinking. "Mar sin" might be more natural.
I get the impression there are 3 methods of translation from one tongue to another: loanword (with or without modification; mod process known as anglicisation, gaelisation etc), transliterate (word for word translation aka calque) and translation of meaning (transferring the jist of an idea into another tongue using the dynamics of the new language). Professional translators preferring the last one, though it also requires more lucid and imaginative thinking.
Could radio' instead of 'raidió' be a dialect thing? Even within Munster, I've heard a person from Waterford remark how those in the other end of the province were pronouncing their very own Gaeltacht, "An Rinn", strange (to her ears). English phonetically: rinnnnne vs riiiiiiiine.
You've touched on a lot here!
_I wish there was native Gaelic filler words that could step into its place_
These absolutely exist, and could make a fun video!
_Could 'radio' instead of 'raidió' be a dialect thing_
It could indeed be.
_I've heard a person from Waterford remark how those in the other end of the province were pronouncing their very own Gaeltacht, "An Rinn", strange (to her ears)_
This is absolutely dialectal. Munster is very consistent, but across munster (and indeed the country) you see a variation in how 'll' and 'nn' (amongst some other consonants) are pronounced as well as what happen to vowels that precede them.
For example 'rinn' gets pronounced (very approximately!) as 'rín' in Kerry, 'ríng' in Cork and 'ryng' where the 'y' approximates the english word 'eye'. So you can already see how the regions vary a little with the slender 'nn' more or less being a slender 'ng' sound in Cork and Ring but a regular slender 'n' in Kerry.
Furthermore the 'nn' in this case causes a lengthening in the prior vowel sound from 'i' to 'í' in Kerry and Cork and in Ring it gets diphthongised (a diphthong being a single vowel sounds made up of two vowel sounds, think the 'o' sound in 'own' in English, your lips move throughout the vowel sound even though we native speakers perceive it as a single vowel sound).
Interestingly enough, the lengthening/diphthong disappears when a vowel follows the 'nn'. So in something like 'gaeilge na Rinne', 'Rinne' is pronounced as 'rine' in Kerry and 'ringe' in Cork and Ring!
I wouldn't let your head spin about this though. Picking up these variations is akin to hearing a variation in someones English, you notice them as you're exposed to a wider array of speakers.
Saying loch vs leck with the L's are good for practice.
Wondering if you could explain the caol R in Irish. I can hear it but am unsure how to pronounce it properly. Thanks! Great and very useful video!
It's an alveolar flap (like in the American pronunciation of the t in 'water' or another word in which the t is between vowels) and a y sound at the same time.
If you don't know how to make the flap, pronounce 'toddy' many times as quickly as possible. You'll automatically start making a flap.
So for the slender r, try to pronounce a y, then keep your tongue in that position while you make a flap.
I have the impression that in some dialects or some parts of a word it's just an alveolar flap without the 'y', though.
@@d.k.7570 I've noticed that tapped r only shows up in some areas. My earliest teachers all used an english r and gádhlig speakers exclusively use the tapped r with a trilled r occasionally.
@@peterhoulihan9766 I don't think native speakers (and when I say native speakers I don't mean people raised in Irish by learners of the language) would use the English r for slender r, although I've read some young native speakers have been corrupted by the school system and started to pronounce their language like English because that's what their teachers do.
@@d.k.7570 Possibly.
Personally I'm having serious trouble telling any difference between broad and slender consonants. I had no idea they existed up until a few days ago.
Like I've seen people comparing them to polish dark L and bright L, but the difference between those is night and day.
The tapped R is the broad Irish R (it’s the sound that English newsreaders used to use for every initial R). It is also the R used in Japanese.
The slender R is similar to the Czech R in ‘Dvorak’ - with a diacritic over the r. It is a bit like the S in ‘pleasure’. Try to say ‘draw’ really slowly, and feel your tongue drag from D to R, sliding from the teeth-ridge. Make sure (like all slender consonants) that the centre of your tongue is raised towards the hard palate.
Go raibh míle agat!
I'm English and not an Irish speaker, but I am a phonology fan. I am aware of the way in which the "glide" can be different in different areas. I think of Diarmuid Gavin the TV gardener (London-born but grew up in Dublin) who, because he says the word "garden" so often, my English ear hears the velar-palatal release out of the consonant as "gyarden". But I knew a woman (from Galway I think) whose family name was (Ní) Thuama, and, try as I might, I could NOT reproduce the broad 't' at the start of the surname; she certainly didn't say "tyooma". I guess that a glide is audible or not to the unaccustomed ear dependent upon the speed with which the rear of the tongue moves away from the velum/palate into the subsequent vowel; and I would imagine that for a learner of Irish it would be important to learn how to do that as quickly as possible so that it doesn't sound ridiculously exaggerated. I wonder if you agree?
Glides certainly vary throughout the dialects and I’d think in some cases they’re less noticeable particular with Munster speakers.
Instead of thinking about glides as something to learn explicitly I prefer to think of them as a consequence of the vowels that surround the broad and slender consonants. As once you’re able to reliably replicate them the glides tend to fall into place.
@@davelearnsirish REally appreciate you replying Dave
No sweat!
Ok but what sound does slender c represent and what sound does browd c represent
Should be here 11:38
Ardfhear! 💪😃
GRMA a chara!
Físeán iontach! Tá ceist agam duit mura miste leat, cé chomh fada atá tú ag foghlaim Gaeilge?
Ní miste! Deacair a rá, bhínn im chónaí sa Ghaeltacht ar feadh bliana nuair a bhíos i bhfad níos óige ach táim ag athfhoghlaim le bliain go leith anuas b’fhéidir
@@davelearnsirish Ó go maith, ní raibh a fhios agam riamh. Cén Gaeltacht?
Gaeltacht na Rinne, fad an lá!
@@davelearnsirish oh iontach, beidh mé ag dul go dtí an Gaeltacht an samhradh seo
It would be helpful if this lad could speak up instead of mumbling the other man was definitely very clear and precise. Maybe he should go and listen to himself before going on youtube.