Irish Question

waygook

Hi all,
I'm not sure whether I'm posting this in the right place, so please forgive me if it should be somewhere else
I'm currently working on my Irish for the interviews in Pat's and Hibernia. I've been reading up on Lenition and Eclipsis, and I'm glad to say it's coming back to me from my school days. What I'm having trouble with however is remembering which pronouns and articles lead to which mutation.

I know 'i' (in) takes the uru, and 'mo' takes the seimhiu, but I'm struggling with other examples, and have yet to find a page that gives a list.
I would be eternally grateful if anyone had any information on this, or could suggest a book or other material.

Go raibh mile maith agaibh.
Karen

Rosita

All the aidiachtaí sealbhacha (possessive adjectives) take either a seimhiú or an urú (at least with letters where these are used.

Mo chota
Do chota
a chota (male)
a cota (female)

ár gcota
bhúr gcota
a gcota


Nouns also take an urú if you use numbers between seacht & deich before them e.g. seacht/ocht gcapall, but trí chapall. Also note the use of the singular when giving numbers of things in Irish. There are exceptions, one of which you might find useful to note – bliain becomes bliana when there is between 3 and 10 years in question e.g. trí bliana (seacht/ocht mbliana). Incidentally, this is not the normal plural which is ‘blianta’, but rather is the genitive singular version. I mention this as it is one you might actually use in the interview as you will probably be discussing how long you worked somewhere or studied.

Other urú situations are after ‘ag an’, ar an’, ‘leis an’, ón (ó + an) excepted where the noun after ‘an’ begins with ‘d’, ‘t’ or a vowel. The other big one (there are many many others such as the ginideach plural) is masculine nouns beginning with a vowel - an t-iriseoir, or feminine nouns beginning with ‘s’ – an tseachtain, which is a remarkably common error.

The ‘h’ is used in nouns after ‘sa’, ‘ar’ (when ‘an’is not used e.g. ar bhord, but ar an mbord). There are mountains of these but I mention these few as they are hugely common errors.

To deal briefly with the examples of mutation, as you call it, - i + an = 'sa' , do + an = don, de + an = den (all of these cause a 'h' in the following noun unless it starts in d, t, or l)

I would now recommend that you forget pretty much everything I have just written, because you will probably be cross-eyed by now having read that and probably wondering why on earth you are even attempting this. The simple answer to this is not to worry too much about this. Learning long lists and then expecting to transpose all that information to conversational Irish simply will not happen. If you do want to learn the grammar I would suggest getting a really good grammar book rather than relying on information from such sources as this. But getting into the minutia of grammar for the sake of an oral exam is inadvisable.

Instead, concentrate merely on cutting down silly common errors. Consider what you are actually likely to be asked and to say in the interview. There’s no point in going in there and being able to say the “the cow jumped over the moon” in word-perfect Irish as it isn’t going to crop up. Learning, for example, how the ginideach plural works is an utter waste of time (for someone in your situation) as in normal conversation it will almost never be used. How often do we use it even in English? This is the kind of thing that you could waste valuable time on. Like I said, concentrate on what you are likely to need.

You need to know, for example, the ginideach of rang, múinteóir etc. - terms that will be relevant to the subject matter in the interview - and to be able to use them confidently and without errors if possible. Phrases such as 'Smacht an ranga' (control of the class), 'iarrachtaí an mhúinteora (efforts of the teacher), and the use of 'scoile' (ginideach) where relavant, or 'scoileanna' (plural) where relevant. Many people fall down on small things like this rather than just dropping a 'h' here or there, and they will be hammered far more for it.

These are relatively predictable phrases and vocab you will use. You can learn only so much in the time allotted so if you concentrate on doing the basics well and not waste time trying to learn stuff that (a) you will not need in your interview and (b) you cannot possibly hope to master sufficiently well in time.

For example, you can confidently predict that you will have a chance to say “d’fhreastal mé (I attended) ar choláiste ollscoile Baile Átha Cliath (or wherever) rather than just chuaigh mé go dtí…………..

If you can get the really relevant verbs and use them all the better. And if you are digging out new ones, be sensible and don’t waste you time learning parts of the verb that you won’t use in the interview. Past tense, future tense, and conditional first person singular is all you’ll need most of the time.

That said, if you can occasionally throw in a briathar soar all the better. But again, be sensible and do not try to learn stuff that will not be reproducable on the day, either in terms of relevance to the interview, or your chances of actually remembering it.

If you intend using plural nouns try to use plural adjectives with them e.g. cúrsaí maithe (good courses). Again this is a common error.

Try to avoid repetition such as saying everything was “ana-mhaith” – try “thar barr”, “sár mhaith”. Repetition of words and phrases strongly suggests limited vocabulary and there is no point in putting this on a plate for them.

Make sure you are very confident in your verbs/tenses. Concentrate on the verbs you will use – the 11 irregular verbs are usually critical. This is more important than getting bogged down in learning vocabulary that you will not use or remember under pressure.

And since you are in an interview you will inevitably be asked questions in the módh coinníollach. It is very important to answer these in the módh coinníollach.

Cad a déarfá? (what would you say) should be answered using “déarfainn” (I would say) and so on. Tip - if the ending of the verb in the question is "aw", your answer will end in "ing" - déarhaw & déarhing in the example I just used.

If they ask something in the conditional mood, they will expect an answer in the conditional mood. It is one of the primary reasons that you are asked this - to see if you can use it.

Similarly if you can use the aimsir gnáthchaite to answer something you used to habitually do in the past it looks better than the simple past tense, but I would not worry too much about that.

You should also avoid the curse of the ‘bearlóir’ and not give answers like ‘sea’ when you are agreeing with something they say. This is difficult for an English speaker, but there is no word for ‘yes’ in Irish and the verb they use in the question should be repeated in the answer. Generally you should be starting a reply with the verb they used in the question.

Also try to avoid giving short, informal type answers where you are using sentences without verbs. The point is to show what you are able to say. If they ask you something it is more to see if you can answer properly than for information. They can glean whatever information they want from the English part of the interview. So your answers don’t have to be true – just accurate and confidently delivered!

The key thing is to be reasonably fluent and confident and as error-free as possible. You will gain nothing from knowing the Irish for some obscure term (which anyone could learn five minutes before the interview) if it is not clear that you have heard of the conditional mood or cannot confidently and seamlessly move from past tense to future tense (which is a far greater indicator of general standard).

And finally, you can learn all you want beforehand, but it is utter folly to expect that you will suddenly develop a flair and fluency for the language on the day of the interview. It simply will not happen if you have not practiced. You should do at least two or three mock interviews with an Irish teacher and they will give you feedback on your errors and suggest areas for improvement. But you will need to practice on your own as well. If you go in expecting it all to fall together without genuine practice at speaking it, you will be filletted, so that is critically important.

waygook

Rosita,

I can't thank you enough for taking the time to reply, especially in such detail. Thank you so much.

Waygook