Sorry about that folks...

I see that the petition against Enda Kenny's Fine Gael policy is hotting up thought the English media in Ireland don't seem to be picking up on it.

Take a peek at http://www.anghaeltacht.net/fisenda.html to get the essential hypocrisy. The ENDA GAEILGE Policy

I find it difficult to see how allowing teenagers decide whether to take the subject or not can "equip our people, and especially our young people with a real, useful and a communicative knowledge of the Irish Language."

Déan vótáil go moc is go minic!:-)

"Conradh agus Fine Gael ag dul chun doirne"


http://www.gaelport.com/index.php?page=clippings&id=1110&viewby=date

Everyone who respects Gaeilge and who would like to see it kept on an educational par in Ireland with English and Maths http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leaving_Certificate#_ref-IRISH_0 should do their utmost to encourage both friends and family to sign the petition above.

Now that one party has made Gaeilge a political football, we may see matters come to a head as regards the language. It's vital that Gaeilge doesn't come out the worst for wear in the struggle which has just been sprung on us by Enda Kenny and Dinny Mc Ginley. Ná ligimis gurb ea.

Go raibh maith agaibh.

1542 ar maidin!

Over 100 per day - not bad!

Tá muid ag fás!

E

1685 - is the number who have signed the petition to date.

If you haven't already done so go to http://www.petitiononline.com/gaeilge/

Headlines etc about it on http://www.anghaeltacht.net/fisenda.html

Beir bua!

E

Maybe people have seen this already but if not I'm posting it to be safe:

http://www.petitiononline.com/gaeilge/

Stop posting on the Daltaí if you want Irish to go away, you dog! That's not what this board is for!

Who are you talking to ?

Stop posting on the Daltaí if you want Irish to go away, you dog! That's not what this board is for!

Cé leis a bhfuil sé ag caint? Teagann faitíos orm...

A Eoin.

Tá aiféala orm faoi sin. Bhí mé hearráideach agus shíl mé sé bhí duaisiúil a cothaigh Fine Gael. Le do thoil ceartaigh mo Gaeilge. Cad is "teagann?" Go raibh maith agat.

Teagann faitíos orm...

Rud canúna é, ná bac leis sin. Is ionann “tagann” agus “teagann”.

Go raibh maith agat. Cá atá mo Gaeilge?

1817 ar maidin - táimíd ag fás...

Glad to see that you understood the irony on the site Caroline...eventually..:-)

Nice day here in Conamara this morning, scammalach acht tirim...

E

Tóchann sé corruair an scaitheamh le mé tuig. Le do thoil ceartaigh mo Gaeilge, aithním sé caithfidh dona. An bhféadann tú réidh léann tú sé? : (

Is my Gaelic totally incomprehensibe? That was my second go at writing it. Maybe I should save this thread and look back years from now and laugh at my attempt.

Caroline,

First, good for you for diving right in! Here's what I make of it with a little guess work:

Sometimes it takes me a while to understand. Please correct my Irish. I know it must be bad. Can you easily read it?

Uaireanta (sometimes) tógann sé (it takes) a lán ama (a lot of time) orm (on me) rud éígin i nGaeilge (something in Irish) a thuiscint (to understand). = Sometimes it takes me a long time to understand something in Irish.

Ceartaigh mo chuid Gaeilge, le do thoil. (In talking about things that you don't have a monopoly on, such as the Irish language in this case, you'll say "mo chuid X" = my share of X.)

Tá a fhios agam (I know) go bhfuil sí (that she (it) is) go dona (bad -- lit. "badly", but this is a special idiom). = I know that it's bad.

An féidir leat (is able with you) í a léamh (it to read) go héasca (easily)? = Can you read it easily?

Does that work?

That's perfect! Thank you so much!

Céard is bri "agam" i "Tá a fhios agam"?
What is the meaning of "agam" in "Tá a fhios agam"?
(Is this correct?)

Céard is brí le "agam" in "Tá a fhios agam"?

Maith an cheist! (Good question!)

agam = ag + mé = at me (You must say "agam", never ag mé.)

Tá (is) a fhios (its knowledge) agam (at me). In relaxed speech, "tá a fhios" is reduced to something that sounds like "tás".

GRMA! But why did you put "an " before "cheist", le do thoil?

ceist mhaith = a good question

Maith an cheist! is short for "Is maith an cheist í sin!"

Literally: tis good the question she there.

fear maith = a good man

But: Is maith an fear é. = He's a good man.

Although you could also say:

Is fear maith é.

Is maith an leabhar é. = Is leabhar maith é. = It's a good book.

Is maith an fear é. = He's a good man.
Literally: Tis good a man is?
If so, why dosen't the verb come first? And why is "ceist mhaith" lenited?

It seems that for every answer you give me I have two more questions. Thank you very much.

In English, we tend to almost exclusively use the volume and stress of our voice to indicate stress and emphasis.

In Irish, there are other mechanisms.

"mé", when stressed, becomes "mise".
"tú", when stressed, becomes "tusa".

I wasn't in the garden, I was in the kitchen!

would become:

Ní sa ghairdín a bhí mé...

I believe this is called "cleavage", where the thing to be stressed and emphasized is moved to the beginning of the sentence.

Another example is:

Maith an fear é!

rather than:

Is fear maith é.

You don't learn a new system of emphasis overnight... so don't expect to cop how these work straight away. I myself got the hang of it by trial and error, and eventually I just got a feel for how I should express certain things. The best way is to read and hear examples.

Most (if not all) learners are confused by the simple sentence:

Mise Seán.

They think the emphatic form of "mé" somehow indicates that the conversation went something like as follows:

-That's Seán over there.
-That's not Seán, I'm Seán.

Again, this takes more than five minutes to explain... and you need to practise it to get the hang of it.

Yes I learned this emphatic form months ago, it's in Chapter 1 of my Irish book. So that answers my first question... Thank you very much shoe man.

Is íontach go deo an suíomh seo!

Tá mé fós ag foghlaim rudaí a bhí fhios agam ach nach raibh tuiscint ceart agam ortha go dtí seo.

Maith sibh...

Thar nais chuig ábhar na téada seo tá breis is 2436 siniucháin ar an aichiní anois...

Back to the thread there are 2436 signatures on the petition now...I hadn't looked at it for a few days so it is still growing...

E

And if you get a million comments, if will make no difference.

It will not be taught right. There is no respect for Gaeilg. Lately the second Irish teacher in my former secondry school was commited to a mental home for stress. He is a native from Dún na nGall. The first las is only out lately.

Personally, I see no point in teaching Irish to British children when it is not their native language.

(Message edited by admin on June 01, 2006)

Why would British children even WANT to learn Gaeilge?

Robert is in good form today. He is calling Irish people who can't/don't speak Irish "British".

You are right in one thing Robert a chara,
Irish doesn't get enough respect and that is the problem. But you are being a bit harsh calling children who havn't any Irish British. It isn't their fault that their parents don't speak it and thus they don't themselves.

Beir bua

No Aonghus, I'm including myself in that. Our culture is British, and as a consequence exhibits much of the tendencies one expects of that realm. I say this after reading on why Spain is still the most popular money destination for Irish people investing abroad. The reasons given where famialr food, climate etc. But the real reason is that the parent country (England) is attracted to it, thus the zeitgeist is to 'follow-by-the-nose' via channels such as Sunday suppliments, TV shows etc

My comments were int he vein of cultural anthrpology

As for Speaking irish and nationality, they are decoupled in my mind. Anyway, not been a native speaker, on what feet would I stand using it as a ram? My ancestors a few generations ago gev it up, so I couldnt use that ploy.

Baroness Ó Catháin, Conservative and Unionist must have a few words to say about that

And that is why I found it slightly interesting that you would say that because you didn't have Irish as a first language so in your surmise you would be included in the "Britishification" of the society as you put it.

And as to your instructor, the poor creature, I hope he comes out allright in the end. How did you even know about that all since you've not been in secondary school for some time now.

Beir bua

I new about it as I heard about it from a friend who have one side of the family from Donegal. Plus, its a small world here. Its a pity, as he was no con (native & fluent etc)

I imagine Robert wont be signing the petition then?

2602 sigd this morning!

Beir bua!

PS I would prefer to go to Spain because the were far seeing enough to adopt the Euro...and in fact my understanding is that far more Germans go to Spain than British..

E

quote:

I believe this is called "cleavage", where the thing to be stressed and emphasized is moved to the beginning of the sentence.

I thought it was called "fronting." I never heard of this definition for "cleavage," but I suppose since it something that's 'stressed and emphasized', it's sounds like an appropriate definition. In my humble opinion, the more cleavage the better, and I'm speaking solely from a linguistic viewpoint of course. :)

Deirtear "cleft sentence" -- "abairt scoilte" i nGaeilge, .i. abairt a bhfuil "fronting" inti.

Tá sé mall inniú!

Níl ach 2645 ar an liosta ar maidin...

Seans go bhfuil an aimsir ró-mhaith...

An iomarca "cleavage" le feiscint...?1?

E

I might put my 'name' to it if I knew what it hoped to achieve; not that I dont wish it well

I stuck my name on it, but I don't know how valid it will be because they don't know who all these people are who signed and there's probably people from all over on there. But its a nice petition and it was easy to sign it.

Beir bua agus beannacht

A petition on this site was very important in the campaign to achieve official status for Irish in the European Community when over many tens of thousands signed it..

2699 have signede up to this morning...

E

This morning the numbers have increased to 2776 so it appears to be rising again...

Beir bua!

Eoin

http://www.petitiononline.com/mod_perl/signed.cgi?gaeilge

2953 Total Signatures at 7.52 IST

E

Just wondering what your goal is, how many you seek to get.

As many as possible...

I think Panu's list for Stádas in the EU had up to 80 or 90 thousand...

Bheadh sé seo thar bharr...! :-)

E

Other than being in the school curriculum, how strict are the irish language requirements for government/public corporation work?

For example, here in Canada, we have two official languages (English/French), although one of our northern territories is primarily Inuktitut speaking. Here is an article dealing with requirements for government work there:
http://www.cbc.ca/story/canada/national/2006/06/07/inuktitut-language.html

Does Irish have anything like this? Are Irish citizens entitled to service in Irish only? If so, do people fight to receive it? I would think that if there is a need, and work, people will fill it/learn it. Perhaps the Irish language school requirement could become mute then? Sort of like opting out of math. =O

Iqqanaijaaqajjaagunniiqtutit?

And I thought Welsh had long words!

Very interesting article - go raibh maith agat.

(Message edited by mickrua on June 07, 2006)

student

my understanding is that every sentence is one word long. some central word is its own word (perhaps the noun), while all other concepts (verbs, adjectives, cases, etc) in the sentence are prefixes and suffixes to that central word.

A Antaine,

Thanksverymuchforthatexplanationitisveryinteresting.

In written Japanese there are no spaces between words. To someone who doesn't know the language it looks like each sentence is one long word. Particles and characters help make the breaks between words obvious to the reader.
istáméagceapadhgodtarlaíonnanrudcéannisinís

Scríobhtar Thai gan spásanna idir na focail. Úsáideann siad aibítir, gan aon kanji ná aon rud eile a sheasann amach go soiléir.

For the record every person who writes to a government department or agency or semi-state body (about 600 in all) in Irish is entitled to a reply in that language.

They are also entitled to a be answered in the phone in that language too bur=t that is not as strict a rule.

The setting up of the Coimisinéar Teanga under the Acht Teanga and the regulations of that act give a legal status to this and each company/dept/agency is to decide how it is to implement the use of Irish in its particular area.

See http://www.coimisineir.ie/ for the full details


There are 3152 signatures on the petition now!

E