I was wondering what accents of Irish could (tenously) say about pre-historical tribal and settlement patterns.

For example: Cork/Kerry: Lilt
Ulster: Twang
Rest of Ireland: Brogue

(Dubs an honourable exception of course!)

Most of Munster, Leinster, and Connacht have that very plain vowel auld brogue which suggests that once either they spoke the same dialect, or the same underlying language.

Ulster might be explained by the interplay with Scotland, whatever that means historically

Cork and Kerry are the best examples of something different, as there is a huge difference between them and the rest of the south and south west.

Correct me if I'm wrong in the following:

The southern and eastern border counties as well as Meath, once mostly Connacht speakers began to come under the influence of Ulster Irish (hence Cavan and Navan cant)

Formerly English speaking parts of Leinster came under the speech of Munster, but perhaps a form of Déise Irish.

The West and Midlands stayed Connacht speaking, maybe with midlands been mixed to some degree

West Cork and Kerry stayed as they were


I know we are seeing numerous historical threads intertwined in a way that cannot be seperated, but hey

Just out of interest, you might like to know about the strongest lowest-of-the-low working class accent/dialect in Dublin: They put an "r" sound before every short vowel sound and they drop the initial H on words a lot of the time:

He is going to do it = E ris gonna do rih

The R sound before vowels is the single greatest indicator of social class in Dublin, as it's a staple of the lowest social class there is.

This has got me thinking lately though. If we were to consider three social classes: Working, Middle and Upper, then linguistic observations can be made:

Upper: These people tend to be very posh and proper and try to preserve their language as best they can

Middle: These people aren't as stringent about being proper, but they'll make an effort to preserve the way they speak.

Working: These people really don't give a f*** about preserving the language and they mould and shape it to suit their convenience.

So this has me thinking that maybe language evolution has a hell of a lot to do with the Working Class? Maybe it takes minds that are free from the shackles of social stigma to actually make the language evolve?

For all we know, maybe the Dublin Upper class will be saying "E ris" soon enough. . . ?

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I was wondering what accents of Irish

Irish? Is whole of Ireland Irish-speaking all of sudden? What are you talking about?

You know what I mean!

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Irish? Is whole of Ireland Irish-speaking all of sudden? What are you talking about?

It's arguable that the accents that are in place in Ireland now are the same accents that were in place when Irish was spoken widely. Slight evidence of this would be that no Irish native speakers of English pronounce Engish's two "th" sounds properly, but rather subsitute a D or T sound.

And by the way you'll easily find speakers of Irish in all of the 32 counties... if not in every country in the world.

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It's arguable that the accents that are in place in Ireland now are the same accents that were in place when Irish was spoken widely.

It is one more of those myths that are engrained in nation's psyche. Just like if someone has Irish ancestry that person must have an impeccable pronunciation in Irish. However, if you take any scientific account of English dialects in Ireland, then to your dismay you will learn that Englishes in Ireland are a natural continuation of England's Englishes, especially Midland type. This is obviously due to Cromwellian plantations when the last Irish speakers from Leinster were all harassed and resettled into Conamara. The same applies to Ulster. Thus it makes sense only to talk about Co. Corcaí English, and north Connacht, where Irish was lost 3-4 generation ago. Majority of Ireland, though, says more about Birmingham's or Leeds' dialect than about ancient Irish dialects.

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Irish speakers substitute "th" for D and T

So? This phenomenon is well known in England itself. Cockney speakers substitute those sounds with "v" and "f", but nobody is claiming that their accent is last remains of Pictish!

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you'll easily find speakers of Irish in all of the 32 counties

Speakers produced by the school and/or migration don't say anything about local variety of Irish as spoken in 17-18 century. E.g. neonatives in Belfast don't represent East Ulster Irish, but rather Donegal Irish where they routinely travel to brush up their competence.

"It is one more of those myths that are engrained in nation's psyche."

Another good one is that Ireland did not change culturally, that we are wholly gaelic, despite all the changes since the 17th century. IT is like a conditioned reflex -there is no thought involved. Just ask them if Ireland had become Russian speaking, would it be the same? Obvious inference.

I couldnt agree at all with the last comment. The irish dialects are the basis for most the Hiberno english dialects found today. If you take the uraban accents such as the dublin accent out of the equation this is even more true. Take for example a native speaker from Donegal this person has the same accent in English as in Irish. This is also true of people from Muscrai and the Deise and all the other gaeltachts. Even in areas where irish died out as the vernacular the accent in english corresponds to the irish accent on recordings. If you were to listen to the last native irish speakers from Tyrone you would find their accent corresponds modern english accents in Tyrone.
Furthermore it should be noted that the irish were never sent to connaught as the jacobites said. It was the native irish rulers or aristocracy who were. The peasants and their vernacular remained. I would doubt that twenty cromwellian settlers and their decendents would displace the vernacular of several thousand peasants. Look at all the asians who have moved to the north of england what does the accent of the second generation asians sound like in Barnsley.

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This is obviously due to Cromwellian plantations when the last Irish speakers from Leinster were all harassed and resettled into Conamara.

Tá tú ar strae.

Bhí cainteoirí Gaeilge i nGleann an Smól, Co. Átha Cliath, go dtí an 19ú céad.

Níor díbríodh gach Gael, ná baol air, go Connachta.

Ach seachas sin, is dóigh liom go bhfuil cuid den cheart agat, a Róman; agus cuid den cheart ag an mBreac Bán.

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Furthermore it should be noted that the irish were never sent to connaught as the jacobites said. It was the native irish rulers or aristocracy who were.

It is all nice theoretical discussion and it was my point of view as well before I read myself the description of English dialects in Ireland in a thich book devoted solely to English dialects. Dublin English is not very much related to Irish for a simple fact the place was never properly Irish at any point of its history, so let's leave it aside.

The rest of Ireland can be split into 2 parts - Cork, Donegal, Iveragh, Mayo - places where Irish disappeared only recently and the rest - where Irish is gone for a long time. The fact that last speaker of Tyrone Irish sounded much the same as English speakers from Tyrone - doesn't prove anything. At the last stages of language decease tongue is extremely polluted and the first thing to suffer is phonetics. Even native speakers having spent long time abroad on their way back are surprised to learn that they acquired foreign accents. It is thus very understable that last Gaels surrounded by sea of English speakers and force to use English for the most of their day lose the sense and feeling of the native tongue. The grammar gets compromised, idioms lost and sounds replaced by English ones.

recté nGleann na Smól

About Fear na mbrog's theory of linguistic change. I suggested it to my linguistics teacher (I'm so glad it is almost over with that class) and he thinks that instead of the lower classes insighting language change it is the middle classes. I still agree with Fear na mbrog because his theory made more sense to me.

Beir bua agus beannacht

Ríona, I think you'll find that a lot of the theories I post here are off-the-cuff, not really thought through, but nonetheless yes I think there's quite a possibility that it's the working class that lend the greatest influence to language evolution.

Let me add something there .
Couldn't there be others reasons why the way of pronouncing a language changes?

For those who know german a little : german has been carried throughout the last two centuries mostly by writing tradition and not oral tradition . This language is very strict, and has strict grammar rules, with a certain order of the words in the phrase etc...and this grammar hasn't changed a lot for the two past centuries. And I bet the way of pronouncing german words hasn't changed a lot either.

In comparison, Dutch has had quite an evolution since the last 50 years (I know it well because of a part of my family); maybe because there aren't so many Dutch writers as in Germany and, maybe, as Bearn was saying about the interplay between Ulster and Scotland, because the Netherlands are a tremendous interplay between so many peoples...and also because so many Nederlanders settled in other countries where others peoples lived (Afrika, for instance...)So, that would be because of the other peoples'accents having a direct influence. And that would be like the influence of English over Irish. So that I agree plainly with Roman.

French has had an evolution too : this "fada"( like a little hat) you have over some vowels such as "o" and "a" and which is meant to remind us of an old "s" (lost by now) (example : hôtel for hostel , etc...) isn't pronounced anymore by my generation . But some old people I know would still pronounce it plainly (you pronounce it like a very broad "oo" or very broad "aa". Why has it been altered? Would'nt it be just because it is easier to pronounce every "a" and "o" in the same way? I think this fact of "being easier" is very important in the evolution of a language. I'm not saying that we don't like to make efforts but we must admit that we like pleasure, sport and amusement more than work, musnt't we?

Another reason maybe : just as in the US, England or The Netherlands, so many various people (with different cultures) live in France and you must have an harmonization of certain ways of pronouncing if you want the language to perdure throughout the ages ...? So it could be a matter of life and death for a language to adapt itself to other ways of pronouncing ?? I'm wondering.
And that would have to do with this tendency of our world to increase communication and so forth to mix up
so many cultures... interaction ... which is life ...

whaouh! what a philosophy!!! I amaze myself!