Today’s word, pendramwnwgl [pɛndram’ʊnʊgl], is the Welsh word for headlong, topsy-turvy or pell-mell. This word is made up of three parts: pen (head), dra – a mutated form of tra (beyond) and mwnwgl (instep/neck). I came across it the other day and just liked the sound of it. Related words include pendraphen (head beyond head) and wynebwaered (face descent).
Category: Welsh (Cymraeg)
Tourism and minority languages
The other day, I came across an article that discusses the impact of tourism and migration on minority languages, particularly on the Welsh language. While tourism brings a significant amount of money to Welsh-speaking areas, it can also have a negative impact on the language.
When relatively large numbers of non-Welsh speakers visit or move to a Welsh-speaking area, the local people often feel some pressure to speak English rather than Welsh, and English-speaking parents who move to such areas aren’t all convinced of the benefits of education through the medium of Welsh or bilingual education.
Many in-migrants to Welsh speaking areas are apparently those who have been there on holiday before and/or who have a holiday home or a caravan there. Quite a few holiday home owners move to those homes when they retire. One negative aspect of in-migration is on house prices, which tend to rise beyond the reach of the locals.
I suspect similar tensions can be found in other areas where minority languages are spoken, such as the gaeltachtaí in Ireland, parts of Scotland, Brittany and so on.
The original Welsh version of the article can be found here.
Language exports
The other day I read in an article on the University of Notre Dame website that 51 universities outside Ireland teach Irish and that 29 of them are in the USA. Some of those studying Irish in the USA have Irish roots; others came to the language through an interest in Irish culture. The other countries where Irish language is taught include the UK, France, Canada and Germany. Does anyone know in which other countries it’s taught?
These factoids got me thinking about how languages are exported and promoted outside their original homelands. The most successful language export is obviously English, which has spread to every continent. Other successful language exports include French, German, Spanish, Italian, and increasingly Chinese and Japanese.
What about ‘smaller’ languages like Irish and Welsh? Well, Irish seems to be almost more popular outside Ireland than it is in Ireland. In the USA, Welsh is taught by Cymdeithas Madog, an organization that describes itself as being “dedicated to helping North Americans learn, use and enjoy the Welsh language.” There are quite a few other Welsh societies, some of which teach the language, in the USA and Canada. I understand that Welsh is taught at at least one university in Moscow, and there’s a small Welsh colony in Chubut province of Argentina that’s home to several thousand Welsh speakers.
Does anyone know of any other courses in Welsh or other Celtic languages outside their homelands?
My language studies
I’ve decided to try a slightly different approach to my language studies. Up till now I’ve been listening to Irish, Scottish Gaelic and Welsh language radio for several hours each almost every day. In the evenings I read novels in either Welsh or Irish, and also learn a bit more Czech. I’ve also been learning songs in the Celtic languages, particularly Irish.
This week I’ll be concentrating on one language for two days at a time. So today and tomorrow I’m focusing on Welsh – listening to Radio Cymru during the day and going through a lesson in Cadw Sŵn in the evening. On Wednesday and Thursday I’ll be listening to Radió na Gaeltachta during the day and studying from Turas Teanga or another of my Irish courses in the evening. Then on Friday and Saturday I’ll listen to Radio nan Gaidhael and study from one of my Scottish Gaelic courses in the evening.
I’ll continue to study some Czech every day, to read Irish, Welsh and maybe even Scottish Gaelic novels, and to learn songs. By the way, can any of you recommend any good novels in Celtic languages, or in French, German, Spanish or Chinese?
Welsh, Irish and Scottish Gaelic are the languages I most want to become fluent in at the moment. My other languages are less of a prioity, though I do get to practise Mandarin, Japanese and Spanish quite often on Skype and MSN.
Websites that speak
The Welsh Language Board / Bwrdd yr Iaith Gymraeg recently added a text-to-speech facility to their website which reads out the text in either Welsh or English. They are using a system called ReadSpeaker, which can make your website talk in various languages, including Japanese, Swedish, Norwegian, Danish, English (US and UK), French, German, Dutch, Italian, Finnish, Spanish, Portuguese and Welsh. The ReadSpeaker website itself has been translated into quite a few languages and has the text-to-speech facility for most of them.
Text-to-speech technology for English and other major European languages, and for a few Asian ones, has been around for years and works quite well. However I think Welsh version is quite new and could do with more work to improve the voice quality and intonation.
Here is an example of it reading the following text:
Iaith Geltaidd yw’r Gymraeg, sy’n perthyn yn agos at y Gernyweg a’r Llydaweg. Mae’r Gymraeg sy’n cael ei siarad heddiw yn ddatblygiad uniongyrchol i iaith y chweched ganrif.
Ychydig iawn o enghreifftiau ysgrifenedig o Gymraeg Cynnar sy’n bodoli heddiw, gyda’r cynharaf yn dyddio o ganol y nawfed ganrif. Gwelir nodweddion Hen Gymraeg yng ngwaith y Cynfeirdd, sy’n dyddio o ddiwedd y chweched ganrif, er fod y llawysgrifau’n llawer mwy diweddar.
Welsh is a Celtic language, closely related to Cornish and Breton. The Welsh we speak today is directly descended from the language of the sixth century.
Very few examples of Early Welsh exist today, with the earliest dating back to the middle of the ninth century. Elements of Old Welsh are seen in the work of the Cynfeirdd, originally dating back to the sixth century, although all manuscripts are much later than this date.
Source: http://www.bwrdd-yr-iaith.org.uk
Welsh and Gaelic education
According to an article on Eurolang, education through the medium of Welsh is becoming so popular in Wales that there aren’t sufficient places in Welsh medium schools for all those who would like to attend them. As a result, the growth of Welsh medium education is being held up.
Increasing numbers of parents are wanting to send their children to Welsh medium schools, even in mainly English-speaking areas, such as Newport, where 31% of parents surveyed said they would probably send their kids to Welsh medium schools if such schools where available nearby.
At the same time enrolment in English medium schools has been dropping and many schools have empty places.
In other news, a brand new Gaelic medium school opened in Glasgow recently. It has 320 places and provides nursery, primary and secondary for children between the ages of 3 and 18.
Education through Welsh or Gaelic seems to be a very effective way for kids to acquire fluency in those languages, and the popularity of such education is encouraging.
Word of the day – Gaeilgeoir
A Gaeilgeoir is an Irish speaker or Irish language enthusiast. The plural is Gaeilgeoirí. So I could say Is Gaeilgeoir mé – I am a Gaeilgeoir (in both senses of the word). When Irish was the main language in Ireland, I doubt if there was a need for such a word, though I could be wrong.
There’s an interesting article about recent immigrants to Ireland learning Irish here. It also mentions that attitudes to the language are changing partially as a result of increased cultural and linguistic diversity in Ireland. The author, a Gaeilgeoir from Dublin, comments that she used to get stared at and whispered about when talking Irish to her children in public, but this doesn’t happen so much nowadays as there are quite a few other languages being spoken in Ireland.
In Welsh the equivalent terms are Cymro Cymraeg (Welsh-speaking Welshman), Cymraes Cymraeg (Welsh-speaking Welsh woman) and Cymry Cymraeg (Welsh-speaking Welsh people). Cymru-Cymraeg or y Fro Gymraeg are the areas of Wales where Welsh is the main language – the Welsh equivalent of Gaeltacht. There are also terms for non-Welsh-Speakers: Cyrmo/Cymraes/Cymry di-Gymraeg – e.g. Cymraes di-Gymraeg yw fy mam – my mum is a non-Welsh-speaking Welsh woman.
Are there equivalent terms in other languages?
Newyddion o Gymru / News from Wales
Fe ffeindiais i dwy straeon diddorol o Gymru heddiw:
Pwyleg yn Wrecsam
Mae plismon o Wrecsam yn dysgu Pwyleg oherwydd fod tuag 10,000 o fewnfudwyr o’r Wlad Pwyl yn byw yno, a fe wnaeth e ddod yn ail yng Ngwobrau Blynyddol i Swyddogion Cymunedol.
Selsig ddraig
Oherwydd does dim cig draig yn y selsig gydag enw ‘selsig y Ddraig Gymreig’ (a wneir gyda chig moch, cennin a chilli), mae rhaid i gwmni o Grug Hywel newid yr enw, yn ôl Gwasanaeth Safonau Masnach.
Two news stories from Wales caught my eye today:
Polish in Wrexham
A policeman from Wrexham is learning Polish in order to communicate with the numerous Polish immigrants who live there, and he came second in the Jane’s Police Review Community Police Officer of the Year Award.
Dragon sausages
A Welsh company may face legal action because of the potentially misleading name of one of its products: Welsh Dragon Sausages. After analysing the sausages, the fine people at from Trading Standards determined that not one trace of dragon meat was to be found in them, so are advising the company to change the name. The sausages actually contain pork, leek and chilli.
Word of the day – hysbyseb
Today’s word, hysbyseb (pl, hysbysebion), is the Welsh for advertisement or insertion. Related words include, hysbysebu, to advertise or inform, hysbysfwrdd, noticeboard, hysbysiad, announcement, and hysbysrwydd, information, which is also gwybodaeth.
Hysbyseb comes from the hysbys, which means known, and is used in the term for soothsayer, dyn hysbys.
Examples of usage
Dw i wedi gweld hysbyseb am swydd newydd yn y papur heddiw.
I saw an advert for a new job in the paper today.
Gweler ein hysbyseb yn yr atodiad wythnosol.
See our advertisement in the weekly supplement.
Word of the day – amynedd
amynedd [a’mənɛð] = y gallu i ddioddef, goddefgarwch, dioddefgarwch, dyfalbarhad, pwyll
Examples of usage
Amynedd sant sy genno fo.
He has the patience of a saint.
Bydd rhaid i ni fod dipyn yn amyneddgar.
We’ll have to be a bit patient.
Today’s word is something you need plenty of when learning a language – patience. I came across it in the Welsh novel I’m currently reading, Enoc Huws. Another interesting word that came up today was dyfalbarhad (perserverance), which is something else you need when learning languages. When I started reading this novel, I found it quite heavy going and could only read a page at a time. Now I’m becoming more familiar with the story and the vocabulary, I’m able to read whole chapters fairly easily.