Irish speakers speaking poor English

somairle

May seem like a funny request but Im interested in hearing native Irish speakers, with less than fluent English, speaking. Im just curious to hear how that sounds, it is interesting to me to hear that like a French person speaking English.

I know there are not many left without fluent English, but surely some older recordings?

Thanks for indulging me!

who the fug

Know a guy in London , stutters in English perfect in Irish

DeBrugha

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UP4nXlKJx_4

somairle

as beautiful as that is I wanna hear him attempt English i'm interested in how Irish people would sound without great English, in the same was French or Spannish people speak English who have learnt it later on, itd just be interesting to hear is all

An gal gréine

If you are willing to travel you'll find plenty of the older folk in the Gaeltachtaí who are clearly ill-at -ease speaking English. The first noticeable aspect is how slowly they put their sentences together. Personally, I prefer when the person who had them speaking English is gone from the scene, but I understand the curiosity when you have'nt heard it.

1ZRed

An gal gréine wrote: »

If you are willing to travel you'll find plenty of the older folk in the Gaeltachtaí who are clearly ill-at -ease speaking English. The first noticeable aspect is how slowly they put their sentences together. Personally, I prefer when the person who had them speaking English is gone from the scene, but I understand the curiosity when you have'nt heard it.

I'm from the Gaeltacht and a lot of the times I hear old men speaking terrible English to the point where it's embarrassing.
I don't know why, but whenever they speak it, they're always shouting and you can hear their boggerish conversation a mile away.

By far the worst of heard is;
"I was drinking wadika while riding my wicycle but I ended up womiting"
If you didn't hear that, I suggest you turn up your wolume! :rolleyes:

An gal gréine

That brings to mind hearing children recently in different Gaeltacht counties say "I vos" for "I was"

P. Breathnach

An gal gréine wrote: »

That brings to mind hearing children recently in different Gaeltacht counties say "I vos" for "I was"

Such things are not particularly connected with having poor English. Native Irish speakers have a particular set of phonics (which vary according to their dialect) and they use their Irish phonic set in speaking English. It's a thread in life's rich tapestry.

Many English speakers quite like hearing English spoken by Francophones; they consider it charming.

1ZRed

P. Breathnach wrote: »

Such things are not particularly connected with having poor English. Native Irish speakers have a particular set of phonics (which vary according to their dialect) and they use their Irish phonic set in speaking English. It's a thread in life's rich tapestry.

Many English speakers quite like hearing English spoken by Francophones; they consider it charming.

I'm a native Irish speaker and I do not use an Irish phonic set when speaking in English. All my friends that I went to school with in the Gaeltacht never spoke that way either. It's really only some people from way back the islands that speak like that. Definitely no young person today that's not living back in the sticks has such a dialect.
That's just a deluded misconception that we speak poor 'funny sounding' English!:p

P. Breathnach

1ZRed wrote: »

I'm a native Irish speaker and I do not use an Irish phonic set when speaking in English. All my friends that I went to school with in the Gaeltacht never spoke that way either. It's really only some people from way back the islands that speak like that. Definitely no young person today that's not living back in the sticks has such a dialect.
That's just a deluded misconception that we speak poor 'funny sounding' English!:p

I should have written "Some native Irish speakers".

But I won't give you a free pass unless I hear you speak English, because underlying the point I was making is that many Irish speakers use Irish phonics because their ear does not discriminate between some English-language phonic values and Irish-language phonic values. Éist leat féin: say "house"; say "houses"; does the "s" in "house" sound the same in both?

[Your use of English also reflects Irish: "way back the islands".]

An gal gréine

P. Breathnach wrote: »

Such things are not particularly connected with having poor English. Native Irish speakers have a particular set of phonics (which vary according to their dialect) and they use their Irish phonic set in speaking English. It's a thread in life's rich tapestry.

Many English speakers quite like hearing English spoken by Francophones; they consider it charming.

Yes, the children I heard had good English and just as some, like myself, found it charming, I know that others found it highly amusing.

1ZRed

P. Breathnach wrote: »

I should have written "Some native Irish speakers".

But I won't give you a free pass unless I hear you speak English, because underlying the point I was making is that many Irish speakers use Irish phonics because their ear does not discriminate between some English-language phonic values and Irish-language phonic values. Éist leat féin: say "house"; say "houses"; does the "s" in "house" sound the same in both?

[Your use of English also reflects Irish: "way back the islands".]

How condescending. I do not have an accent stereotypically representative of my area. If anything, it's more of a neutral one. Listen to Síle and Gráinne Seoige speak English, it's the normal neutral accent of the country. Both are from the Gaeltacht and can speak perfect Irish yet their English is unaffected by it, like my own.
All of my friends from where I'm from speak this way. It's only when you go back further than Carraroe that the heavy dialect usually sets in-but not always.

I have to laugh because your surname is written in Irish yet you will never be able to pronounce the language as well as a native Irish speaker but I would be able to speak english as well as you.

And no, I say "house" and "houzes". How low is your opinion of people from the Gaeltacht anyway? I'd love to know where you're from.

P. Breathnach

1ZRed wrote: »

... How low is your opinion of people from the Gaeltacht anyway? ...

Not at all low. I don't despise my kinfolk.

I really don't see why you are getting so annoyed.

An gal gréine

Your interpretation of what P.Breathnach wrote seems way off to me, unless it was he who wrote...

1ZRed wrote: »

I'm from the Gaeltacht and a lot of the times I hear old men speaking terrible English to the point where it's embarrassing.
I don't know why, but whenever they speak it, they're always shouting and you can hear their boggerish conversation a mile away.

Davidius

Is it supposed to be pronounced 'houzes'? I don't speak Irish and I say the s the same in both.

Su Campu

I think the real issue is the widespread poor standard of English shown by most native speakers of ENGLISH! The old reliables of using apostrophes in plurals, saying "there is" instead of "there are", their/there/they're, etc. I would imagine that a native Irish speaker would probably speak and write better English than many English speakers, as they will probably give more thought to these simple basics.

P. Breathnach

Davidius wrote: »

Is it supposed to be pronounced 'houzes'? I don't speak Irish and I say the s the same in both.

You are probably from the islands!

Yes, in the plural, the "s" is usually rather like a "z". Whether it is supposed to be or not is an interesting question. Who has the authority to set the rules?

Gumbi

1ZRed wrote: »

P. Breathnach wrote: »

I should have written "Some native Irish speakers".

But I won't give you a free pass unless I hear you speak English, because underlying the point I was making is that many Irish speakers use Irish phonics because their ear does not discriminate between some English-language phonic values and Irish-language phonic values. Éist leat féin: say "house"; say "houses"; does the "s" in "house" sound the same in both?

[Your use of English also reflects Irish: "way back the islands".]

How condescending. I do not have an accent stereotypically representative of my area. If anything, it's more of a neutral one. Listen to Síle and Gráinne Seoige speak English, it's the normal neutral accent of the country. Both are from the Gaeltacht and can speak perfect Irish yet their English is unaffected by it, like my own.
All of my friends from where I'm from speak this way. It's only when you go back further than Carraroe that the heavy dialect usually sets in-but not always.

I have to laugh because your surname is written in Irish yet you will never be able to pronounce the language as well as a native Irish speaker but I would be able to speak english as well as you.

And no, I say "house" and "houzes". How low is your opinion of people from the Gaeltacht anyway? I'd love to know where you're from.

Native speakers tend to have quirks in their English, just as you do That wasnt a condescending post. That was P. Breatnach's point.

Enkidu

1ZRed wrote: »

How condescending.

P. Breathnach's post contained nothing condescending, he was not the one talking about people who have "boggerish conversations", he was simply saying that speakers of a certain language (even bilingual ones) will show an influence of that language on their other languages.

I do not have an accent stereotypically representative of my area. If anything, it's more of a neutral one.

There is no such thing as a neutral accent.

I have to laugh because your surname is written in Irish yet you will never be able to pronounce the language as well as a native Irish speaker but I would be able to speak english as well as you.

And speakers of Cork Irish will judge you to speak poor Irish since you don't form the genitive and dative in the historically correct fashion and use a corrupted form of the prepositional system and some speakers of British English will judge you (and myself) to have poor English because of our dialect features.

I also don't understand why the simple fact that you are bilingual would make you laugh, or what it has to do with P. Breathnach's post.

And no, I say "house" and "houzes". How low is your opinion of people from the Gaeltacht anyway? I'd love to know where you're from.

How does the phonetic value of the symbol "s" relate to one's opinion of somebody? You are the only person making value judgements.

Paz-CCFC

Since when did having a distinct accent/dialect of English become an "embarrassment"? And how is it condescending to recognise this?

Gumbi said above that native Irish speakers tend to have "quirks". Native Hiberno-English speakers have them, as well. Here's a few:

• "How's she cuttin'?". Ask that to a non-Irish English speaker, and they'll likely reply "Who's she? What's she cutting? What are you talking about?"
• "How did you find your trip to Cork?". "What do you mean? I found it by following the signposts/GPS. How else would I find it?"
• [After being asked how they were] "Well, I'm not too bad now." "You're not too bad, now? So, you're feeling a bit bad now and earlier you were feeling worse?

Native English speakers have these quirkes, what's wrong with Gaeilgeoirí having them?

Gumbi

Paz-CCFC wrote: »

Since when did having a distinct accent/dialect of English become an "embarrassment"? And how is it condescending to recognise this?

Gumbi said above that native Irish speakers tend to have "quirks". Native Hiberno-English speakers have them, as well. Here's a few:

• "How's she cuttin'?". Ask that to a non-Irish English speaker, and they'll likely reply "Who's she? What's she cutting? What are you talking about?"
• "How did you find your trip to Cork?". "What do you mean? I found it by following the signposts/GPS. How else would I find it?"
• [After being asked how they were] "Well, I'm not too bad now." "You're not too bad, now? So, you're feeling a bit bad now and earlier you were feeling worse?

Native English speakers have these quirkes, what's wrong with Gaeilgeoirí having them?

Nothing is what! Another might be the tendancy to favour "back the road" (siar) instead of "up the road". There are a plethora of other examples, too.

somairle

Very interesting to hear the opinions if Gaeltacht people. 'boggerish' was a particular highlight, I do not classify people with poor english as boggerish I was just interested in hearing how Irish people sound when English is not their native language. It doesnt make them backward, just part of a subculture that havent been exposed to English as much as most people.

That isnt an attack on you, its great Gaeltacht people like you have good English, its essential in this country, was just interested in hearing what few people are left where their English is limited. Why? Just interested to hear what the accent is like

Rhedyn

I'm sure we'd love to hear what you sound like IZRed.

A little soundfile would be nice.

Davidius

P. Breathnach wrote: »

You are probably from the islands!

Yes, in the plural, the "s" is usually rather like a "z". Whether it is supposed to be or not is an interesting question. Who has the authority to set the rules?

I'm not, lived in Wicklow my whole life and my family's not from there either. Think I may have just picked up an odd pronunciation.