Ok, I am looking at pictures with these captions that are supposed to be placed on each one. I read "Seo é m'athair." I understand this to mean "Here he is with father." Right? Then I read "Seo é mo theaghlach." I understand this to mean "Here he is with the family." Am I right so far? OK. NOW, I read "Seo í mo mháthair." I understand this to mean "Here she is with mother." Is this right? If I am right, then Rosetta is messing with my head because it is a picture of the SAME boy with his mother! PLEASE, tell me I am NOT going insane, OK?!

Thanks again,

Anísa

There are several ways to say "with" in Irish (le, in éineacht le, i dteannta, etc.) but none of them appear in these sentences. "Seo é m'athair" is simply "This is my father."

quote:

"Seo é m'athair." I understand this to mean "Here he is with father." Right? Then I read "Seo é mo theaghlach." I understand this to mean "Here he is with the family." Am I right so far?

No, you aren't.

Seo é m'athair = This is my father.
Seo é mo theaghlach = This is my family.
Seo í mo mháthair = This is my mother.

seo = this is
é = just a dummy pronoun with no extra meaning (It's referring to m'athair, that's why "he")
m'athair = my father
etc.
Where do you read "with"?

Lars

As I said, I "read" it that way. It does not mean that I am right (this is why I am so new to this! LOL!). However, in each picture the boy is in the front of the picture; hence, I saw it as The boy and mom, dad, family and so on.

Now, this is the problem with giving pictures with words (especially if one wants to make "sense" out of them!).

Here is the LOGIC and I will also point out what I SAW was, to me, illogical.

Picture 1. Boy in front in picture of the whole family. The pronoun é is used. Now, if family is plural and boy is singular, then é must refer to boy. [Seo é mo theaghlach.] Therefore, I interpret the caption as: This is the boy and family. Is/was my linguistic choice wrong at this point?

Picture 2. Boy in front of his older brother. Boy is still prominent in perspective in picture. Again, the pronoun é is used. Again, é CAN refer to EITHER one (boy OR older brother), however, because some plural form of a pronoun was NOT used in the first picture, then, again, é must refer to the boy as it did in the first picture. [Seo é mo dheartháir.] Now, I see this as: "This is the boy and older brother."

Picture 3. Boy in front of his mother. Again, the BOY is in the front and is foremost. However, this time, cognitive dissonance sets in and something "different" has happened! The é is GONE! Now í takes its place. It can NOT refer to the boy this time because it is a word for a "female"! This makes NO sense at this point. The pattern is set that the captions will read "This is the BOY and family, and older brother, and mother." However, this pattern has been changed in a linguistic way that makes no sense. If a "plural" family [better represented with "sinn" or "siad"] has no effect on é, the older brother has no "visible" causative effect on é, then how does "máthair" have a causative effect? [Seo í mo mháthair.] Now, to me, this reads: "Here SHE is with mother." Again, it makes NO sense at all! Where did HE go?

I hope that this totally clarifies what I am talking about.

Can anyone tell me a "good" way to view such a sentence structure so that it will make some sense to me. Even grammar or linguistics would help?

Again, thank you.

Anísa

Lars,

I re-read what you said. I guess "pictures" don't really tell the WHOLE story. While every caption in the series of 8 pictures has the sentence pattern "Seo [é or í] mo [noun of person(s)]." it is a bit disconcerting. If the boy were somehow poised to 'point' to these people, then, I am sure that this would all make sense. This is areal problem with constructing useful and clear teaching and learning tools. They often don't "match" the words that they are trying to convey.

So, do you think that, when I am looking at these pictures, I should essentially forget the kid is in the picture at all and that he is "really" behind or next to me telling me, as anyone would, "This is my family," "This is my older brother," "This is my mother," "This is my best friend"? Does this make sense to you?

I am beginning to believe that it does . . .

Thanks for giving me some perspective.

Anísa

Anísa

Re picture 1, the English word family is singular, as is the Irish teaghlach

The captions could be translated as

"here he is, my father"

"here it is, my family"

"here she is, my mother"

and these forms would not be uncommon in Hiberno-English

Great Lars. I hope I don't come screaming here to often!

Now, I did ask about a "good" grammar book that will help me. Which would you recommend?

Thanks.

Anísa

For these sorts of questions, I highly recommend Lars' grammar. I'm not sure if it's available in book form or not.

As your Irish improves, you'll want to start referring to the Graiméar Gaeilge na mBráithre Críostaí.

A Dhomnailí

Is there really a link to "Lars' grammar"?

Gabh mo leithscéal, a chara. Feictear dom gur bharrscoitheas an URL gan chuimhneamh orm féin agus tá sé rómhall anois chun é a cheartú. Seo an URL ceart: http://www.nualeargais.ie/gnag/gram.htm.

also remember that it's critical whether there is a caption or a speech bubble.

If i recall, the boy is talking in those pictures (thus would not refer to himself as "him")

A Anaíosa,

This book was just recommended to me today. It's called A learner's guide to Irish and is available for free download in PDF format here: http://coislife.ie/books/academic/learners.htm. Go mbaine tú sult as!