Hi,

I am looking help on the proper pronounciation of the name Diarmuid. I have seen various websites give different varations from 'deermit' to 'jeermit' to 'jeermuid'. My son who is P6 in an Irish language medium school is insistent it is 'jeermit' but I am looking for the 'correct' pronounciation, or indeed are all correct?

Many thanks

I like my name to be said dear-mid which is what some Gaeltacht natives use other native speakers say jeer-mid...dermo and deermo are not acceptable anglicisations!!!!

Jeer-a-mid, beag nó mór!

"Beag nó mór" ... does that mean "more or less"? Sorry, not trying to derail the conversation but I simply had to ask. :)

The D's in Diarmuid (i.e., Irish slender D) to my ear sound essentially like "DZ". I don't hear the "J" which is frequently used to describe this sound.

Hi, thanks for the prompt replies. Its interesting to see the different opinions. The reason I asked was we decided to call my son Diarmuid and he is being Christened soon. We had believed it was pronounced 'deermid' and then read about the other possible variations. The last thing I wanted to do was pronounce my son's name incorrectly therefore it was important I check the correct pronounciation!

Thanks alot, another other opinions would be appreciated.

Donegal: DYAH-rum-widge
[ˈdʲaɾəmʷɪdʲ]

Tagaim leis sin!

The anglicizations seem to forget the empenthetic vowel. All Hail English! (is mise tinn le Gallai i gKorea cheana...)

Maybe the English pronunciation comes from an early Irish pronunciation. Maybe at the time "Diarmaid" became english Dermot, there were no epenthetic vowel. Remember that "gorm" was pronounced [gɔɾm] in Old Irish (I think) and not [ˈgˠɔɾəmʷ] as today... (Dennis please correct me if I'm wrong).

The uncertainty between "deer" and "jeer" is because a consonant before 'i' pr 'e' is palatalized; that is, it is pronounced with the flat of the tongue against the palate. If you put the flat of your tongue to the roof of your mouth and try to say "deer" the sound will be between "deer" and "jeer". (I have a phrase book in which 'j' is written as the pronunciation of palatal 'd', to "simplify".)

As to the "muid", that is the opposite. When a consonant is followed by 'a', 'o', ot 'u', the tongue is low. If you start with your tongue at the bottom of your mouth and try to say "mid", it will sound rather like "muid".

As for the final 'd', I have noticed that when I pronounce palatal 'd' at the end of a word, it often sounds like 't'.

Palatal sounds are called "slender" ("caol" in Gaeilge), presumably because the air space in the mouth is slender. The sounds made with the tongue low are called "broad" ("leathan").

Some books say that the way to pronounce a slender consonant is to put a consonant 'y' after it, and say to pronounce a broad consonant with a 'w' after it. I found that it took only a little practice to pronounce the consonants by putting my tongue in the right place.

quote:

Some books say that the way to pronounce a slender consonant is to put a consonant 'y' after it, and say to pronounce a broad consonant with a 'w' after it.

And that's wrong. Or better said: it's only true with a couple of consonants. It's wrong with most of them...

You put a w-sound only after labial broad consonants (f, ph, p, m, b).

You don't put a y-sound after consonants (actually, with most slender consonants, it's as if you pronounced them and a y at the same time). Labial consonants have no y-glide when they are slender, except before certain long vowels (mainly /oː/ and /uː/).

The consonants are pronounced as they are, and short-hands don't work as the broad set has uvular, velar, velarised, plain, and (bi)labial, the slender set (palatal, palatised, plain, and (bi)labial sounds.

That is, the language has developed to contrast both sets, but there can be variety in the sets due to the particulars of articulation. Rules like place a y here and there, while they may approximate historical phonological conditioning, do not convey sounds that have developed and changed over time. The Irish contrast system is more extreme than other broad/slender languages I have seen.


Here in Korea, they have a non-aspirated/aspirated/strong/tense contrast with it's own challanges.

Still it's simpler than Gaelic -Kameesamida!