The Pronunciation of Irish (Gaelic) Consonants

GRMA as an spreagadh, a Phatchy!
In Irish, each consonant generally has 4 different phonemes, i.e. a different sound that changes the meaning;
broad strong B - bó 'cow'
broad weak B - (a) bhó 'his cow'
slender strong B - beo 'alive'
slender weak B - bheo 'alive' (lenited/softened)
Consonants can be categorised according to which mouth-parts ('articulators') are used in pronouncing them. In Irish, consonants (except glottal [h]) are Labial (lips) or Lingual (tongue);
LABIAL consonants;
All Irish labial consonants are bilabial (both lips, no teeth!) unlike English f and v which are labiodental (lower lip to upper teeth).
Bilabial (lower lip to upper lip); p ph, b bh, m mh.
Slender bilabial consonants are pronounced with the lips pulled back and spread against the teeth (making the mouth 'slender'), making a higher-pitched sound than its nearest English equivalent.
Broad bilabial consonants are pronounced with the lips pushed forward and kept wide apart from the teeth (making the mouth 'broad'), making a lower-pitched sound than its nearest English equivalent.
LINGUAL consonants;
lingual consonants are either coronal (tongue's crown/front) or dorsal (tongue's back).
Slender lingual consonants are palatal(ised), i.e. the consonant is pronounced with the middle of the tongue raised forwards towards the hard/front palate, like English sound y [ j ], generally producing a higher-pitched sound than its nearest English equivalent.
Broad lingual consonants are velar(ised), i.e. the consonant is pronounced with the back of the tongue raised backwards towards the soft/back palate, like English sound w [w], generally producing a lower-pitched sound than its nearest English equivalent.
At least in theory*, the dorsal consonants are broad-vs-slender strong-vs-weak c g ng and the coronal consonants are broad-vs-slender strong-vs-weak s t d n r l.
*Some consonants that were originally lingual have come to be pronounced in a different part of the vocal tract (throat/mouth/nose), e.g. th (originally a tongue-tip alveolar voiceless continuant, in my scholarly opinion!) has lost its tongue-contact and become [h] which is a (glottal) voiceless continuant.
- the dorsal/tongue-back consonants are c g ng, with broad-or-slender & strong-or-weak variants, though ng is always strong; 4 Cs + 4 Gs + 2 NGs = 10 dorsal phonemes.
- the coronal/tongue-front consonants are s t d n l r, with broad-or-slender & strong-or-weak variants) - All consonants before the word's first vowel are by default strong. A weak=soft consonant is nowadays shown by putting an un-etymological h after the softened consonant except after the coronal sonorants n l r; Single n l r are by default strong when before the word's first vowel, i.e. word-initially ná lá rá(dh). After the word's first vowel, strong n l r are generally written double (banna balla barra) whereas weak n l r are written single (mana mala mara).
A phoneme is a "meaningful sound" that can change a word's meaning if replaced, e.g. English nest lest rest.
In theory, English has one n phoneme, one l phoneme, and one r phoneme, each with a different sound, but the Japanese language -for example- considers the English sounds [l] and [ɹ] as allophones of only one sound (unbelievable, no?), and most native Japanese-speakers learning English cannot initially hear or pronounce the difference between English's phonemes /l/ and /ɹ/ in the way native English speakers do.
Through effective teaching and/or the strong self-determination to eventually acquire the praised prestigious pronunciation of native English-speakers, practically every native Japanese-speaker who acquires fluent (=flowing, fast) English acquires the ability to pronounce these phonemes as pronounced by native English-speakers of any particular dialect.
In theory, Irish has 4 n phonemes, 4 l phonemes, and 4 r phonemes, each with a different sound, but English-speakers -for example- consider the Irish sounds [nˠ nʲ n̪ˠ ɲ] [lˠ lʲ l̪ˠ ʎ] [ɾˠ ɾʲ rˠ (rʲ)] as allophones of only three respective sounds [n l ɹ] (unbelievable, no?), and most English-speaking learners of Irish cannot initially hear or pronounce the difference between Irish's phonemes /nˠ nʲ n̪ˠ ɲ/, /lˠ lʲ l̪ˠ ʎ/, and /ɾˠ ɾʲ rˠ (rʲ)/ in the way native Irish speakers do.
Through ineffective teaching and/or the strong self-determination to never acquire the ridiculed unprestigious pronunciation of native Irish-speakers, practically no native English-speaker who acquires fluent (=flowing, fast) Irish acquires the ability to pronounce these phonemes as pronounced by native Irish-speakers of any particular dialect.
Do you see what I did there...?
(The situation of Irish n l r is complicated by dialectal variation. For example, modern Kerry Irish has lost the strong/weak distinction in coronal sonorants (n l r) so the original 12 coronal sonorant phonemes of Old Irish/Goidelic have been reduced in Kerry to only 6, namely broad/slender n l r (2x3=6, maith thú).

[@EGFritz]

The fate of the Irish language hangs on this man posting more videos

[@FergusJohnston]

I wish he'd use a script and stop waffling!

[@EGFritz]

It's a personality disorder but I'm sure it's also what makes him great@@FergusJohnston

[@COM70]

Or give him a job setting standards for Irish teachers in the Irish education system. That would be a poison chalice as 90% of Irish teachers would have to go back to school or quit.

[@CCc-sb9oj]

Review of vowels : 0:25 Labial consonants (Broad=lips pushed out, further forward than in English. Slender=lips spread out against teeth, further back than English) : 4:00 Ph, bh, mh : 8:00 Slender s: 18:13 Alveolar dental : 20:30 (Broad, coronal/tongue front consonants. Comparison between Irish and English) Slender t, d : 22:38 S : 24:55 T : 26:51 D : 29:05 N: 32:29 L : 37:25 R : 47:08

[@gwenbutler9687]

Go raibh MÍLE maith agat..

[@lorenzovalsesia3721]

An-chabhrach! GRMA

[@Mz_Sarah]

Please never stop making these videos! You are SO helpful and so incredibly appreciated!

[@CCc-sb9oj]

Labial consonants (Broad=lips pushed out, further forward than in English. Slender=lips spread out against teeth, further back than English) : 4:00

[@Peru-fc3bi]

Fascinating stuff. I would pay you to tutor me online. I'm an intermediate Irish speaker. There is barely any information on this aspect of learning Irish out there.

[@ferncat1397]

Fascinating stuff! I'm absolutely raging that we don't get to learn all this in school. I always wondered why the speakers in the cluastuiscint sounded so different to the classroom Irish I was used to. I'm trying to read aloud now thinking of everything you said and I feel like I'm learning the language all over again. It's interesting how remembering that Irish consonants are all further back or forward from what English speakers are used to gives me an almost instant accent, although unfortunately it wanders between munster and donegal because I'm reading Peig but more used to donegal and north mayo sounds...

[@stephenmcateer]

"I won't get into that." I'd happily watch the version in which you do. Ramble on! 😃

[@barryharkin]

For the love of all that is good and holy, what is your name?

[@lutherblissetti2862]

the value of this video is uncommensanurable, irish is mostly teched based on english prononuce, wich is the most shameful thing Imho, documents like allow people like me who are non natives to FINALLY here the difference and know the truth, and for this i thank you deeply, that being said; Editing of the video should be done, even adjusting the volume, or simply organizing the exposition a tiny bit, will contribute greatly at the quality of the video, and so to say, to the diffusion of irish language, i heartedly hope a more organized and neat version of this and the previous video on vowels will be uploaded, because this is exactly what irish learners need. thank you either way. Edit: the edited version has been posted and is as good as it gets, GRMA!

[@tomasbyrom3954]

3rd comment on this video, but I just wanted to refute a few of the other commenters by saying that I could listen to you ramble about Irish all day. The tangents and the anecdotes were all charming and the info was awesome.

[@thesunman]

I agree this is true wisdom

[@tomasbyrom3954]

This is amazing! Im an Australian who has studied a bit of Scottish Gaelic and a lot of these sounds are still taught in your average Gaelic class. It makes Irish MUCH more mutually inteligable to Gàidhlig when the full set of consonants (and especially nasals) are fully pronounced. I had real difficulty understanding the word cnó spoken by an Irish speaker a few months back, and in the end she had to tell me in English. I was like "ohhhhh /krõ:/! I thought you said /kno:/!" She couldnt hear the difference but for me it meant i couldnt understand at all

[@CCc-sb9oj]

Alveolar dental : 20:30 to 21.50 (Broad, coronal/tongue front consonants. Comparison between Irish and English)

[@silverkitty2503]

thank you

[@thxverymuch6962]

So good to see a new video from this absolute legend!! Hopefully there’s a few more released in 2021

[@languageoffootball]

I’d say you’d make a great teacher on Italki if you ever had a bit of time now.

[@wotruannwah5678]

He returns

[@88888Rob88888]

Can you give us any good resources on the topics you have discussed and will discuss

[@deoirdanandrei1512]

Go raibh míle maith agat! I am so glad to have finally heard of someone who knows about the bilabials and the true pronunciation of the r’s in Irish among other sounds, the rolled or trilled r’s and the palatalizations of consonants. The way the majority of people speak Irish is absolute cringe, they replace Irish sounds with they’re closest English equivalents, makes Irish sound like a joke, or some English based language (which it couldn’t be further from the truth). I find it really sad that the actual sound of our language is dying as this is not taught about. This actually reminds me about going to bars and pubs in France and Spain and meeting Irish people and talking with people from these countries. One conversation that comes up a good bit is the Irish language, I remember these Irish people teaching the usual “go raibh maith agat”, “slán” and “póg no thóin” which resumes to how much Irish most Irish people have while claiming to be fluent speakers, and when the Spanish people we’d be talking to would repeat the Irish words, they’d end up sounding more like native Irish speakers than the Irishman himself, if not almost like actual native Irish speakers, with their Spanish rolled r’s and vowels. Someone made the argument to me that as long as we still know the language why does it matter. I find this utterly stupid, the proper pronunciation of a language is part of the identity of the language, it’s part of its character and an undeniably important part of the language. Another argument made is that languages evolve constantly, my response is simple, natural language evolution and what’s being done of Irish (and Breton and many more languages) is a completely different. Anyways, I am really glad to have came across your video!

[@deoirdanandrei1512]

@@mmzddx96 I absolutely agree, the retroflex r sounds absolutely awful in Irish, anglicized pronunciation of Irish should have never been taught in schools and should stop being allowed to go through, we need our kids to be taught proper Irish with appropriate phonetics. And yes he does an amazing job at demonstrating the broad and slender consonants (and the doubles like the difference between bile and bille)!

[@deoirdanandrei1512]

@@mmzddx96 I do this exact same thing actually! And one piece of advice would be to look for older recordings or native people speaking, I have a playlist of specifically videos of Irish with all the correct sounds (rolled/flap r’s, broad and slender consonants, proper vowels etc) or with parts in the video when a native speak does speak. Also I know a few good sites to listen to old recordings, one famous enough one is “doegen.ie/recordings”, these are recordings from the 20’s I believe, and the majority of the recordings have perfect pronunciation, and from all dialects, including dialects that are now extinct. Now not every one of those recordings has proper pronunciation as even back then not every Irish speaker was a native or spoke it properly, but nevertheless the majority of the recordings are with original accents and pronunciation. Another one would be “www.rte.ie/archives/2016/0301/771828-learning-irish-in-carraroe/“ not all videos are with real native speakers, but many are and you will definitely find some videos with real Irish. Here’s yet another one: “www.bealoideasbeo.ie/bealoideas/httpdocs/faispriomh.php?sloinne=Ac%20Cullach&ainm=Tadhg&idfais=120”. And this is a page that explicitly includes a description of the Irish r being rolled: “www.nualeargais.ie/gnag/phonol.htm#kon”. This is also an amazing site that gives a clear description of each sound with one speaker from all three main dialects. “fuaimeanna.ie/ga/Recordings.aspx?PhonemeID=47&Page=2”. The Ulster speaker sometimes lets a retroflex r slip, often she actually rolls them, but as far as I’ve heard, the Connacht and Munster speakers only use rolled/flap r’s in any position of the word and do the palatial roll/flap r’s too. If I find anymore sites or resources with proper Irish I will come back to this message thread and post them here :)

[@deoirdanandrei1512]

@@mmzddx96 No problem at all! Also putting the “ messed up the links, when you open these links simply delete the “. Perfect pitch is something I have always wanted to have, I have good pitch but I’m not perfect pitch unfortunately. The “ú” pronounced as in English “ew” as in “new”, “two”, “blue” is a pure anglicization, the proper way to pronounce this vowel is like the “u” in Spanish and Italian, or the “ou” in French etc... the use of the “ew” sound is restricted to non-native speakers and it comes from the fact that the English language doesn’t really have this sound, so it’s replaced by its closest English equivalent. “U” (no fada) sounds relatively like the English u in un-, an in under, unexpected, unfamiliar etc but it’s not the exact same sound, it’s essentially a shorter and less deep version of the “ú” if that makes any sense. The “l” has four sounds, one which is when it’s word initial or doubled, and one when it’s single, and of course when it’s either broad or slender (so broad initial/double, broad single, slender initial/double, slender single). When initial/double and broad, the l would normally be a stronger version of the typical English l, the tongue touches the very front of your alveola all the way to your upper teeth and slightly further (voiced dental lateral approximant), while the non-initial single broad l has the tip of your tongue touching the area right in between your palate and upper teeth (the alveola) (voiced alveolar lateral approximant). When initial/double and slender, it is pronounced with your tongue touching behind your alveola (further back) (voiced postalveolar lateral approxiamant) and of course with palatalization and when the l is non-initial single and slender it’s the usual English l (voiced alveolar lateral approximant) but palatalized. Also depending on the dialect some of these have merged, but this is essentially it.

[@deoirdanandrei1512]

Also as a side note, it’s very common for “é” to be pronounced as “ay” as in “bay”, “grey”, “day” etc... by non-native speakers but this is also an anglicization, it should be pronounced as the French “é” as in “été” or “blé”. And same goes for “ó” being pronounced as “ow” as in “no”, “bow”, “row” etc... but it should be pronounced like the French “ô” so a long and deep o.

[@deoirdanandrei1512]

@@mmzddx96 yes whatever letter comes after or before (sean = slender s, broad n, sin = slender s and n, clois = broad cl, slender s). When it’s e, é, i or í it’s always slender, and when it’s a, á, o, ó, u or ú broad. And I have no idea what’s his name is no, but the contents he makes is better than most Irish learning content out there

[@steaphris]

It's good information, but it would very helpful if you could place more emphasis on saying the sounds for the viewer to hear using words with the sounds as well as the sounds on their own. I recommend the book Blas na Gàidhlig (Scottish Gaelic pronunciation) if you are looking for ideas on good ways to present this kind of stuff to a general audience. Your videos are great, just need a little bit of editing.

[@davidsarif2481]

Oh my God, oh my God, finally!

[@GreenLantern1916]

One video every couple of years - At this rate, it'll take me a hundred years to learn this language! ;)

[@tunatiuh]

i love his accent, anyone knows where is he from? I know Ireland but that's all

[@dennisdonncha]

I’d say Kerry.

[@irishwithrosie2007]

Wow! Físeán iontach! ☀️ I’m blown away by how much you know about the Irish language. 😮 I think I struggle most with my slender r’s…I can do the “zh” version pretty well, but not so much the “palatalized tap.” If you don’t mind my asking, I was wondering what exactly is the tongue placement of that sound; as in what is doing the tapping (tip or blade) and what is it tapping on? 🤔

[@faelan1950]

Tá fáilthe romhat thar n-ais, a mhic

[@neebeeshaabookwayg6027]

Thank you, immensly!!🤗🏆

[@yukiwhitley]

i paused the video at 8:55 to experience the joy of retraining myself to pronounce all f sounds using upper teeth + lower lip

[@altanerener7315]

Funny fact: the velarisation of L happened in Polish language - in this language there are slender L (propounced just as the Irish one) but there is no broad L -- they have this sound replaced with [w] sound instead (marked with the letter "Ł"). Other Slavic languages still retain broad L in those words where Polish has this [w] / Ł.

[@sapphoenixthefirebird5063]

Many East Slavic languages have many pairs of broad vs slender consonants, except it's called hard and soft instead. Russian, for example, has these pairs: Б vs Бь (B) В vs Вь (V) Г vs Гь (G) Д vs Дь (D) З vs Зь (Z) К vs Кь (K) Л vs Ль (L) М vs Мь (M) Н vs Нь (N) П vs Пь (P) Р vs Рь (R) С vs Сь (S) Т vs Ть (T) Ф vs Фь (F) Х vs Хь (Kh) The remaining consonants, Ж, Й, Ц, Ч, Ш, Щ (J, Y, Ts, Ch, Sh, Shch) are all unpaired.

[@altanerener7315]

@@sapphoenixthefirebird5063 thank you for stating the obvious - Russian and Ukrainian are my native languages,so I am quite well aware of what you’ve written to me 😂🤣😂

[@seamusogdonn-gaidhligarain2745]

Some Scottish Gaelic dialects likewise vocalise the broad L into [w]!

[@mickeyanderson4296]

You really do need a script for these kinds of things. While I do enjoy tangents, they get in the way of the education. Otherwise, good shit. Can't wait for more.

[@classuscle1605]

54:00 The Munster pronunciation of "mire" on Teanglann definitely sounds like it has an English "r". Actually I've noticed that a lot of the recordings on there (and on Foclóir) use more English-sounding Rs than you or the IPA would suggest. Are those recordings by native speakers? Is this just a generational sound change? I've noticed the same thing with the Sibéal voice on TCD's Abair service as well as the new text-to-speech on Duolingo (which I think might be the same voice). The phonology sounds very English. Anyone else noticing this too?

[@CCc-sb9oj]

There are three Munster speakers used by Teanglann (I think Foclóir uses the same ones), the youngest of them rarely uses the slender r (uses English r for broad and slender r), the other two are fine and outside of the rs the youngest one is fine too. The new Duolingo audio uses Microsofts Irish text to speech audio and it is atrociously bad. Yes it is one hundred percent English phonology, standard 'school Irish' stuff basically. The dialect recordings you can choose for Abair were good from what I remember but I am not familiar with Sibéal, might look tomorrow!

[@CCc-sb9oj]

The reason for this in the case of the Duo/Microsoft audio is poorly learned Irish thanks to the Irish school system, almost every student learns the language without Irish sounds and with almost all English phonemes bar the lenited/fricative ch sound in some cases. In the case of younger native speakers it has to do with the fragile linguistic reality of many Gaeltacht areas with less speakers raised each generation and increasing pressure and influence of English on each new generation of native speakers.

[@COM70]

@@CCc-sb9ojwouldn’t you love to overhaul the standards for primary and secondary school teachers in Ireland. Imagine the backlash from the civil service and teachers unions.

[@colmcoleman3907]

This room looks very familiar too me

[@legonlavia]

27:48 where can I read this article?

[@whatdisd]

You'll plan a proper video when you have time but the ones you have are almost an hour long each and in dire need of editing 😂😂 Thanks for the content though, I don't see any other channels with info of this quality

[@whatdisd]

Just realised I commented a year ago as well. Shows this guy is the best source, despite going off topic so often

[@ferncat1397]

Knowing that bh is pronounced bilabially makes the ulster pronunciation of 'raibh' make a lot more sense.

[@jakenadalachgile1836]

it helps to bare in mind that in dialectal spelling it's as well

[@jakenadalachgile1836]

people have only written since the introduction of the written standard, and even then many didn't/don't

[@jakenadalachgile1836]

(in Ulster, to clarify)

[@ferncat1397]

@@jakenadalachgile1836 yes, I've also seen 'robh' quite often

[@jakenadalachgile1836]

@@ferncat1397 yes that's even the form in standard scottish gaelic, I believe

[@thesunman]

is anyone else getting tripped out by the objects in the background

[@Looneycheese]

What is the name of the book by Mairtin Verling?

[@Peru-fc3bi]

Would you be interested in giving private coaching over skype to a pidgin irish speaker?

[@roundcrisis3562]

GRMMA !

[@Ajia_No_Envy]

9:17 PH

[@pjflannery7680]

Who are you? You are quite: chaotic; complicated; entertaining and handsome young Cork man ? Please, please,lets introduce yourself. My advise to you is to keep it simple, simply employ and stick to the untainted Connemara & Tourmakeady South Co. Mayo Irish pronunciation please...! As with Co. Donegal, Belmullet, Co. Mayo Irish is hugely influenced by Scot's Gaelic as a consequence of Irish potato picking migrants. Let's support: "A group of young Irish speakers in the South Conamara Gaeltacht have recently set up a new organisation, BÁNÚ, to lobby for a change in housing policy in the Gaeltacht" Let's enthusiastically support BÁNÚ!

[@talideon]

Nah, he's very obviously from Kerry, not Cork.

[@tomasbyrom3954]

#saveallthedialects

[@neebeeshaabookwayg6027]

❤🤗🥰🥰🥰🥰🥰❤🏆🏆🏆

[@Knappa22]

While very interesting it seems a rather neurotic language. I once had a conversation with a Dutch scholar who had learnt both Irish and Welsh and he was a fierce proponent of the former. He loved the purity of it, the complexity of it, the pronunciation rules, the muscular idioms. He regarded Welsh as a rather degenerated poor relation, full of Latin and lacking ‘authenticity.’ My response: “That may well be. But people *speak* Welsh. From the manor house to the council house it is spoken and is alive.” And in the end that’s what matters, not picking over some minutiae of a language that has to all purposes died out as a community, living language.

[@merineyit]

I enjoyed this very much, but, wow, am I glad I chose to learn Welsh and not Irish! No reflection on the beauty of the language, but the level of difficulty is rather mind blowing.

[@whatdisd]

This is very very interesting info but you've had 2 and half years to prepare for it lad. If you'd had a script or a plan to stick to you could have shaved 20 minutes or more off this video 😂

[@kayceegreer4418]

I need to hear you say that Irish word for grandmother and son and grandson. Those are the only words that are important to me. I learned the rest later. I know this spelling "seanmhàthair" but I can't find enough information to tell me how to pronounce it I know the Scottish comes out sounding like "Sean of air", that is if you cram it close together, or (shawn•ə•vairr) on a good day. I've heard it pronounced the same way on these learn how to pronounce videos but I haven't found and authentic language speaker yet. Until I found you I'll search your library, but if you can message me back and explain how to pronounce it on pretty sure I would catch on. I am a bit of a hobby etymologist. I ace the straightforward phonetic languages (Español, Turkiç) that don't have the damn many rules and exceptions and exclusions and conditions and... I have to stop now, jeez, I'm pulling out my hair! lol

[@silverkitty2503]

Im Irish ..i was taught all of these sounds in primary ..tbh i think people are taught more than they like to believe ...but unpractised you forget

[@faelan1950]

I'm currently in 5th year and can confirm that I've never once heard a breath of the subject of this video from any Irish teacher I've had in the past. A lot of this stuff I had to go out and learn by myself, which would be far easier if teachers knew this stuff from the beginning. While communication is important, it's fair to say that an important part of any language is pronunciation. Of course, to each their own - I'd never tell anyone (obviously) to go out of their way to learn this stuff, god knows it's hard enough to do anyway. But personally, I don't really understand why someone wouldn't want to learn our national language at least to the point of having decent sounding pronunciation, because honestly having a good accent while speaking any language adds strongly to how well someone could be able to communicate with native speakers (or that is to say, with any other speaker of that Irish, whether a native, a fluent speaker or a learner).

[@silverkitty2503]

also it doesn't matter what you sound like if you get the phonemes ...once you can be understood ...don't obsess its about communication

[@talideon]

That's fine if you don't mind having a strong accent in the language, but it's typical for anyone learning a language to try to get as close to a native pronunciation as possible. If this isn't something you see value in, then videos like this aren't for you, and that's fine. It's for people who want to minimise their accent.