why can't the irish pronounce TH's

Alun

dSTAR wrote:

Funny you should mention that. I was just chatting about that exact point recently. I think it is because you say "an herbal remedy" as opposed to "a herbal remedy". Saying it the first way sounds too much of a mouthful if you pronounce it with an H! English language grads/experts correct me if I am wrong here.

To an Englishman such as myself, the American pronunciation ('erbal) sounds just like an English west country accent, you know, country yokels, "Ooooh, aaar!" and all that.

Personally I always say "a herbal remedy", and (another example) "a hotel". "An hotel" although considered "correct" by some, sounds very upper-class English to me.

simu

NotMe wrote:

I just can't pronounce 'th'! Even though my mam is from London (she pronounces 'thing' not 'fing' ) I remember once my granny saying that we (me and my brothers) should learn 'proper' pronounciation so that our English relatives will be able to understand us when we go visit them. :rolleyes:

Just put the tip of your tongue on the tips of your upper front teeth and blow for the unvoiced th (thin, think etc).

Do the same but make your vocal chords vibrate for the voiced th (the, that etc).

dSTAR

derek27 wrote:

cut to it. what strikes me is that irish people have a better qualification in the english language than english people. we have a greater vocabulay and a better undestanding of the proper grammatical use of the language... possibly because it is a compulsory leaving cert subject here. check that out.

Pure conjecture. I think maybe you should go back and reread what you have just written. Bad spellings, incorrect grammar and poor use of language. Is that leaving cert standard english??

:cool:

simu

dSTAR wrote:

Pure conjecture.

Agreed. Ireland may have produced many great writers but I see no evidence that the average Irish person speaks English better than the average English person. Would the posters who have claimed this to be so like to back up their points?

ecksor

Since moving to England I've tended to notice more people who construct their sentences oddly or leave words out of their sentences. However, the various odd things that have creeped into our own way of speaking ("I'm after having my dinner" for example, and most other examples which would have resulted from translations from Irish) wouldn't strike my ear as odd so I wouldn't notice them in Ireland.

dSTAR

simu wrote:

Ireland may have produced many great writers but I see no evidence that the average Irish person speaks English better than the average English person...

This lovely land that always sent
Her writers and artists to banishment.
And the spirit of Irish fun
Betrayed her own leaders, one by one.

Why was it that so many great Irish writers left Ireland? Was it that Irish culture was so stifling to their creativity and genius? If you read through many Irish books by the likes of Joyce and Beckett you will see ordinary Irish people depicted as being oafish and badly spoken or in the words of Oscar Wilde "foolish in their wisdom".

ecksor

Well, as you've implied so often here on the English forum, Ireland is a netherworld filled with troglodytes and illiterates. If only our superiors in the rest of the English speaking world would deign to deploy some weapons of mass destruction to save the world from our impeded speech and backward ways.

simu

dSTAR wrote:

Why was it that so many great Irish writers left Ireland? Was it that Irish culture was so stifling to their creativity and genius?

I don't see what this has to do with this thread but Ireland wasn't the only country to stamp down on freedom of expression in the early to mid twentieth century - see the Lady Chatterly triall in England for example. Different writers left the country for different reasons - it's impossible to generalise and others stayed here happily all their lives. In many cases, Irish culture gave the writers the raw material for their work as well - see Joyce, Yeats etc.

If you read through many Irish books by the likes of Joyce and Beckett you will see ordinary Irish people depicted as being oafish and badly spoken or in the words of Oscar Wilde "foolish in their wisdom".

Well, I've read quite a bit of Joyce and Beckett and I didn't see Irish people being caricatured in this way. Sure, they were honest writers and showed less savoury aspects of the country in their works as well but you could hardly say that their portrayals were completely negative.

nesf

This will not be news to most people, but I feel like stating the obvious.

Well, first off, the "irish dialect" of english, or "hiberno-english" is not pure (although no spoken dialect is pure tbh). It's heavily influenced by Irish, and it's a well established seperate dialect. Although, there is quite a difference within the country. Mostly due to English not becoming the primary spoken language at the same time in all parts of the country. The pale versus the rest of the country and all that

Add in that Irish itself was hugely varied to begin with. Watch someone from Cork trying to speak Irish with someone from Donegal and the confusion is almost amusing.

Also, there is huge variety in the way english is spoken across the world. It's actually very interesting and there are times when two english speakers can barely understand each other, even though they would both spell the words the same. Arabic is worse for it iirc.

Anyways, this wiki should interest people, although most will probably have seen it already: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hiberno-English

Relevant section to this thread.

In some varieties [θ]/ and [t], and [ð] and [d] merger, making thin and tin and then and den homonyms; /tɪn/ and /dɛn/.

It's a different dialect. It's not less proper than "British English". Not that there is really a "british english" spoken by the majority of British people. Scouse versus the Glasgow accent anyone?

Languages, when spoken, will always diverge from the "phonetically proper" formal spoken standard. This doesn't make it less correct or less cultured. Quite the opposite really. Cultural influences are not something to be ashamed of. Irish people speak differently to the proper standard because of both a strong influence from a non-Germanic language (this will naturally effect things strongly, since the sounds, pronounciations and grammatical structure is so different between the two) and because of a natural tendency of a spoken language to evolve within a geographically distinct area.

If we all spoke "perfect Queen's English" it would be totally forced, and not correct with respect to the dialect. Spoken languages don't work like that. Speaking "proper, formal english" is not actually easy. If you do public speaking, you might train yourself to do this, but to be able to speak "properly" is not something you can do overnight. It takes a lot of effort and is not something most people have the time or inclination to learn.

I'll quit stating the obvious now.

dSTAR

simu wrote:

I don't see what this has to do with this thread...

When viewed in the broader context of Irish language and culture it is quite significant. The original question posted was why Irish people cannot pronounce their TH's and my point was used to illustrate why a considerable number of Irish writers had fled Irish shores partly because of stifling culture in Ireland at that time. It has a lot more to do with freedom of expression and points back to the prevailing culture in Ireland at that time.

Below is a quote from a speech by Tom Collins describing various aspects of Irish language and culture.

In Joyce’s case, his depiction of Dublin is invariably negative. He described it as a city built upon a dump. The key themes in his work, especially in the Dubliners, is the theme of death and paralysis.

You can read the entire speech by downloading it in pdf format at:

http://www.dublin.ie/getFile.asp?FC_ID=158&docID=132

ecksor

When viewed in the broader context of Irish language and culture it is quite significant. The original question posted was why Irish people cannot pronounce their TH's and my point was used to illustrate why a considerable number of Irish writers had fled Irish shores partly because of stifling culture in Ireland at that time. It has a lot more to do with freedom of expression and points back to the prevailing culture in Ireland at that time.

This doesn't show any connection between the two things. "Freedom of expression" is not actually the opposite of "speech impediment" in this context.

pickarooney

And what of thick-tongued mumbler Kavanagh whose own delusions of grandeur pushed him into and out of Dublin?

dSTAR

eksor wrote:

This doesn't show any connection between the two things. "Freedom of expression" is not actually the opposite of "speech impediment" in this context.

Let me get this straight. Are you implying that the majority of Irish people have a speech impediment?

simu

dSTAR wrote:

When viewed in the broader context of Irish language and culture it is quite significant. The original question posted was why Irish people cannot pronounce their TH's and my point was used to illustrate why a considerable number of Irish writers had fled Irish shores partly because of stifling culture in Ireland at that time. It has a lot more to do with freedom of expression and points back to the prevailing culture in Ireland at that time.

Are you implying that Irish people don't pronounce "th" because of cultural stiflement? How does that work? I still don't see why you're bringing all these writers and how they were treated in Ireland into what is essentially a discussion on phonetics and dialects.

Below is a quote from a speech by Tom Collins describing various aspects of Irish language and culture.

In Joyce’s case, his depiction of Dublin is invariably negative. He described it as a city built upon a dump. The key themes in his work, especially in the Dubliners, is the theme of death and paralysis.

There's a difference between being negative about Dublin and depicting the Irish as "oafish and badly spoken". Joyce was keen enough on the way Dubliners spoke to make it a central part of his work, after all.

ecksor

dSTAR wrote:

Let me get this straight. Are you implying that the majority of Irish people have a speech impediment?

It was merely a bit of word play. You claim that freedom of expression and how we pronounce 'th' are linked somehow. I was trying to connect the speech / expression and impediment/freedom ambiguity.

nesf

To be fair, if we were all forced to pronounce 'th' in a specific way he'd have a point.

Fortunately, the world we live in and the one his head seem to be quite different.

Firstly, he assumes we all have the same accent. That's just.. mind boggling. I mean the difference between just the provincial accents is so huge that it invalidates what he's trying to say.

Also most of the "quaint irish pronounciations" have their root in Irish. Now Irish was, as we all know, spoken very differently across the country, with many distinct dialects and sub dialects. So the root of these sayings is very different depending on which area of the country you are talking about.

Overall his arguments are as valid as someone trying to claim that all Irish people talk like the characters in those "Murder She Wrote" Ireland specials. The ones where a guy is hiking from Dublin to Cork but decided to pop into the Roscommon hotel as he was passing by.

He hasn't shown a single glimmer of knowledge regarding the irish dialect of english and has no awareness of the variety of dialects within the country itself. All Irish people don't pronounce 'th' the same way. Damnit, two Cork people mightn't pronounce it the same way. Or someone from D4 and someone from Bray for that matter. Nevermind the completely seperate dialect of English that exists in Ulster.

Meh.

dSTAR

"Yis are all tick eejits", as Flann O'Brien noted "...a country full of gawns and gobs'hites"

simu

dSTAR wrote:

"Yis are all tick eejits", as Flann O'Brien noted "...a country full of gawns and gobs'hites"

You still haven't answered my questions. Also, the quote above has absolutely nothing to do with the this thread. Is this the best you can do at trolling?

dSTAR

simu wrote:

Joyce was keen enough on the way Dubliners spoke to make it a central part of his work, after all.

This is nonsense. Joyce like many Irish writers thought that a lot of Irish people were vulgar, stupid and badly spoken. In most of Dubliners he shows the absolute worst aspect of Dubliners, as well as the best (sic). He was no supporter of the Irish Literary Movement and fiercely attacked 'Irishness' as did Flann O'Brien in An Beal Bocht and plenty of other Irish writers.

Many say that he really loved Dublin but my interpretation of reading Dubliners was it was an almost Swiftian style attack on the petty minded uncultured and badly spoken population of Dublin. It doesn't appear you have ever read any of James Joyce's work so I recommend reading it before you make the above assertions.

So as not to be accused of being a troll I will not post anything further to this thread because you seem determined to bring this down into a petty argument and it seems to runs its course anyhow.

To finish off this thread I will leave with a multiple choice questionaire.

Question: Irish people cannot pronounce their TH's because:

a) They are badly educated / stupid
b) Thats just the way they are
c) TH does not exist in Irish (as has been claimed)
d) It comes down to phonetics / dialect

pho·net·ics (fo-nĕt'ĭks)
n. (used with a sing. verb)
The branch of linguistics that deals with the sounds of speech and their production, combination, description, and representation by written symbols.
The system of sounds of a particular language.

ecksor

You know, in your own mind perhaps you're not a troll, but I haven't seen one post from you that doesn't seem designed to either dodge a question or wind someone up. I have no more patience for it.

Praetorian

I believe that the average Irish person speaks and writes English to a higher standard than the people of any other English speaking nation in the world. I converse with Americans, Australians and British people every day and I’m now no longer surprised by their inability to speak or write English properly. Of course each nationality has their own hang-ups, some Irish people cannot pronounce “th” for example, but don’t get me started on the Americans! The education system in Ireland is pretty good, but could be tweaked to iron out the relatively small problem. “why can't the irish pronounce TH's”; barring specific speech impediments, Irish people can if they try

dSTAR please try and familiarise yourself with the rules http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=90759

pickarooney

dSTAR wrote:

Question: Irish people cannot pronounce their TH's because:

a) They are badly educated / stupid
b) Thats just the way they are
c) TH does not exist in Irish (as has been claimed)
d) It comes down to phonetics / dialect

Your question is, as you well know, based on a fallacious assumption.
What you mean to ask is:
Question: some Irish people do not pronounce their TH's in the RP manner because:

nesf

Praetorian wrote:

I believe that the average Irish person speaks and writes English to a higher standard than the people of any other English speaking nation in the world.

Really? I wouldn't go that far. Yes we have a highly educated workforce but that doesn't translate directly into have a high standard of English. Plus something like that is quite hard to measure without making gross approximations.

Alun

nesf wrote:

Really? I wouldn't go that far. Yes we have a highly educated workforce but that doesn't translate directly into have a high standard of English. Plus something like that is quite hard to measure without making gross approximations.

Right! Some of the stuff that passes for English, written by highly qualified engineers, that I have to review before unleashing it onto unsuspecting customers beggars belief.

In_the_sea

county wrote:

why can't the irish pronounce TH's except for posh people is it a class thing or what,three[tree] thunder[tunder]??

Irish people should be speaking Irish, not English. Our language was taken from us. If you teach a German person how to speak English, and they pronounce worried as vorried wud u understand why? Same applies here, our language was different from theirs and they forced it on us and well we pronounced things wrong and like an accent, it stayed with us. So its part of us as being Irish. If you have a problem go somewhere where they speak "posh" English!

pickarooney

If you've a problem with your language being "stolen" from you, you could always just learn it.

Skip

Good point

Btw, An Beal Bocht isn't an attack on the Irish language and culture, but an attack on abusing them in a false and forced way to assert the people's Irishness in order to enhance some "cultural revival". Sure Joyce was very critical about his people too, but just read "Dead" from Dubliners, I wouldn't say it focuses on oafish characters. Without wanting to simplify things or disregard certain aspects, I bet when Joyce wrote those short stories he was disillusioned on every level and dissatisfied with how things were going, so he projected his whole doom on the city -- that's what people tend to do anyway, you don't have to be a writer to say "I gotta fukk off from here, this place is killing me". Although he did it well at least, I mean that's what writers are for

As for not pronouncing th's, I find it charming Of course only after I get used to it and start to understand it And obviously it has nothing to do with someone's being a cultivated person or not, I'm shocked this idea has even come up as a valid or serious assumption.

In_the_sea

actually i can speak irish...and i notice many irish people change their accent to americanise it or whatever...i notice the older people in some towns have the typical accent but the younger ones sound like they have lived somewhere else for a while..good thing about wexford is we have such a strong accent its hard to loose..cities i have noticed have more poeple with put on accents...Irish is irish..why be ashamed, it who u are if u are! no need to be some1 else.!! they dont try to be like us and theyd laugh if we tried to be like them so ur a fool if u try to som1 else! im proud of me and being irish so its all crap tryin to b diff

simu

dSTAR wrote:

This is nonsense. Joyce like many Irish writers thought that a lot of Irish people were vulgar, stupid and badly spoken. In most of Dubliners he shows the absolute worst aspect of Dubliners, as well as the best (sic). He was no supporter of the Irish Literary Movement and fiercely attacked 'Irishness' as did Flann O'Brien in An Beal Bocht and plenty of other Irish writers.

Many say that he really loved Dublin but my interpretation of reading Dubliners was it was an almost Swiftian style attack on the petty minded uncultured and badly spoken population of Dublin. It doesn't appear you have ever read any of James Joyce's work so I recommend reading it before you make the above assertions.

Well, take it to the literature forum and find out where you're wrong!

So as not to be accused of being a troll I will not post anything further to this thread because you seem determined to bring this down into a petty argument and it seems to runs its course anyhow.

You still haven't answered my questions - see post 45 above. If you don't want to, don't bother but there's no need to pretend you're leaving the thread on some moral high ground.


/pffft

egan007

county wrote:

why can't the irish pronounce TH's except for posh people is it a class thing or what,three[tree] thunder[tunder]??

This is a very stupid question.
'The Irish' all 4 million of them can pronounce TH's
there is however a minor factor that you may not of tought about called Accents!

WOW!

Why can't all Irish play hurling...