138: Pop-Up Gaeltacht (live with Laura Pakenham and friends)

0:00All right, y'all cut it out because we're burning through our material. We got to have this on the tape. Hello and welcome to this live episode of Because Language, a show about linguistics, the science of language. I'm Daniel Midgley. Let's meet the team. She knows more languages than she

0:34has cats, which is only two, but still it's kind of impressive. It's Hedvig Hurgard. Hello, Hedvig. That seems like a challenge to get more cats. I will discuss this with my spouse. The perfect number of cats is language knowledge plus one. Yeah. Yes. Like food bowls. You're supposed to have one extra food bowl. Like for every N cats, you're supposed to have N plus one bowl. Am I right in that? That's usually litter boxes, I think. Yeah.

1:05Oh, I've been getting, I've been, yeah. Okay. Don't put the food there. It's the other end. Yes. Hedvig, level of Irish fluency. Oh, none. None. None. I know, I've seen, I've seen spelling of Irish names. Like Siobhan and is it Cui, Cui, Cui, Cuiva. C-I-O-Y-M-H-E. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And that, they're fun. Irish names get a lot of slack, but. But I heard that it looks unusual because you're expecting it to be

1:42English phonology, but if you just learn the mappings, apparently it's fairly regular and consistent. So, Irish is far more regular than English. That's all you need, right? Yeah. Yeah. It's difficult. It's different. It's, it's, yeah. As long as it's internally consistent, I'm happy. Okay. Fairly. Kind of. And he's a great person who always puts a smile on my face. It's Ben Ainslie. Ben, hello. Daniel, Daniel, we've spoken, we've spoken about this. We don't mention the ways that I please you. Okay. Like that's, that's private Daniel Ben stuff. And we leave that off the

2:14podcast. Sorry about that, but it's true. I'm going public. Oh no. Level of fluency in Irish? Uh, I've been, I've been strenuously trying to think of a joke here to drop that isn't like a super conventional, like drunken Irish thing. And I couldn't come up with one. And I think that's just like punching down. So I, the, the answer is no, I don't, I don't know any Irish. I too have found Irish names, um, intimidating over the years, but as I'm

2:46sure Laura already knows, because probably half of her family lives where I live, there's a lot of Irish people in Australia now. You've taken all my friends. I've known left. So I work with three aphers alone, right? Yes. I have had exposure therapy to Irish names and I'm a little bit more comfortable. Okay. Well, the reason we're talking about Irish is because this is a special episode all about the Irish language or Gwélg, because we have a very special guest. You've seen her on TikTok. You may have seen her on TG4, the Irish language broadcaster. It's Laura Pakenham.

3:20Welcome. Hello, hello, hello. Give her some jazz hands, everybody.

3:29And Laura, you're also the author of this book, a copy of which came into my possession recently. It's Irish history and culture through language. Laura's going to be helping us know more about this great language and maybe have a chat. So tell me about Gwélg, the name of the language. How many different ways are there to pronounce that? Probably a theme that will come up a lot is the kind of discrepancies between standardized Irish versus the three main spoken dialects. The three main spoken dialects are Ulster,

4:00Munster and Canacht, three of the four provinces in Ireland. So standardized, the most, I guess, kind of neutral, official way that Irish is referred to as Gwélg, G-I-E-I-L-G-E. In Ulster dialects, you would hear it being more referred to as, I don't want to impersonate the accents too much, but it's like Gwélg, or Gwélg, which sounds like Gaelic. And that's when people can, you know, be funny about the whole Gwélg, people calling it Gaelic thing. I'm kind of like, once it starts

4:31with a G-A-E, anything that comes after that, I'm kind of happy. Just, you know, call it what you want. And yeah, Canacht dialect, Connemara Irish would still be fairly, you know, Gwélg. And then in Munster, they call it Gwélg, so Gwélg in the moon, which can have a few variations in spelling. But for the most part, Gwélg is what we go with. Okay. Well, this is going to be a theme because we're, you know, as linguists, we're pretty used to variation in language. So it's good to know that this is, things are falling into place. Yes. Yes. Irish is certainly no exception.

5:03Hmm. Can I ask Laura a follow-up question? Mm-hmm. How do you say the word language in Irish? Tonga, tongue. Ah, okay. I was going to check if Gwélg was the language, but it's not. Yeah. It's specifically Irish. Tonga, which is tongue, so it would be Tonga and Gwélg. Yeah, the language of Irish. Okay. Well, this already has me with a question. So Irish is a Celtic language, but obviously there's been lots of contact. So that would be a loan word, wouldn't it be? Tonga, Tenga.

5:37Um, this is the thing. There's lots in Irish that's not inherently Celtic and bears a lot of similarities to other words. Um, like the word for church and kind of cathedral would be Aglish, which is very like Iglesia. Um, and stuff. I would, I would have quite a bit of Spanish from school and then would have, you know, been able to make some comparisons there. So there's lots and lots of words, like our word for room, Chomre, I believe is influenced from Chambre, French. Sounds like it. So there's, yeah, there's, there's lots of, and then we also have, we would call children

6:10or boys like Gasser, which kind of is Garson. Um, I think it's also French aligned. Yeah. So there's lots, there's lots of loan words and lots of external kind of influences, which is really, really interesting. You know, there's some words that bear absolutely no similarities to any other language that people might've made contact with. And then some that, you know, are quite similar and easy to remember in that way then. Yeah. But correct me if I'm wrong, but like, if you, um, if you take the, the big European branches within the European family, so like Germanic, Slavic, Romance, and Celtic, I was

6:42under the impression that Celtic was like ever so slightly closer to Romance than they are to Germanic and Slavic. So some might also be inheritance sometimes, maybe. Potentially I wouldn't be, you know, the biggest expert on those kinds of things from, from what I know about Germanic languages. I don't feel as though there is much of an influence there on Geilge. Um, but I wouldn't, I wouldn't know the nitty gritty of who went where and where that all came from. Um, and how that leaves us with the Geilge we have today, but definitely from what I've

7:13known myself from, you know, speaking Spanish and stuff, um, I have seen a lot of similarities in that sense. Yeah. Along the way with certain words. I remember from my study of Spanish, there's lots of Celtic influence going on in Spanish. Yeah. Yeah. So I don't know who gave what to who, but like we're kind of, we have some middle ground there. So we're cool. And by the way, Laura, we are giving you as linguists the greatest gift that we can bestow. You get to correct our pronunciation infinity times on this episode. Okay. Exciting. That's great. I love that. Can I, can I, Daniel, can I start off with one?

7:45Please. Uh, so Laura, my favorite piece of Irish language law, for lack of a better phrase, is a short film I once watched, which you probably already know what I'm going to say. Uh, Yu Ming is Aindom. Yu Ming is Aindom. Yeah. Aindom. Okay. So there we go. There's, there's my first thing. So for anyone listening, this is a wonderful, wonderful film, which is a really, I'm going to say a tongue in cheek critique maybe of Irish people by Irish people, which is the, the plot is a, um, a board man in

8:18China sort of wants to see something in the world. He wants to travel and he sort of randomly picks Ireland from a list and sort of looks at what their language is and sees Irish and he goes, great, I'm going to learn the language before I go there. So he arrives in Ireland speaking Mandarin and Irish and can't achieve anything in Ireland. And it's, it's, it's a really wonderful, fun, short film, but I highly recommend anyone who's got like a bit of an interest in this, go and see. It's very cute, very, uh, whimsical. I like it.

8:50Yeah. Yu Ming kind of has this like societal meme status in Ireland and amongst the Irish speaking community. Like Yu Ming is our king. Um, but yeah, that was unintentional. Um, but yeah, it's just, Yu Ming, it's kind of one of those cult classics in, I guess, Irish language kind of pop culture in a sense. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So you'll notice that there are chat bubbles floating by. That's because we're joined by our patrons. If you're listening to the audio version of this episode, there's also a video version on YouTube where you'll

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9:56W., our newest free patrons, Dottir Ma, Morgan D., and Antoni. Thanks for making the decision to support the show. So Laura, first thing I want to do, we're just going to be tossing questions. I've just thrown some questions around some avenues to chat, but let's just start with you. You're a presenter on TG4, the Irish broadcaster. What's that like? What do you do? Yeah, it's crazy. So I have kind of accidentally, happily, delightedly ended up in the world of media. I'm a primary teacher by trade. I studied through Irish. My course from 2019 to 2023

10:33was the first course of its kind recently in the history of the state. Primary teaching would have traditionally at different points been delivered as a college course through Irish, but this was a new course that had started to, I suppose, up the standard of Irish that teachers had in schools, in primary schools. So yeah, I did that and that was great. That was my first time being in Irish medium education because my education for 14 years before that was English medium. So that was quite a jump going into, you know, third level education through the medium of Irish. But anyway, that's what I did. And then I ended up going on an

11:08Irish language dating show after that when I had just finished college. But I always had meaty in the back of my mind, but I had no idea of how to engage with it. You know, I feel like growing up, you can only kind of, in a lot of cases, imagine possible careers for yourself that you know other people in. You know, like I knew teachers, I knew solicitors, I knew doctors. I didn't know any TV presenters. I didn't know any radio presenters. I wouldn't even know how to go about that. This is not what real people do. This is what people on the television do and they're fake people and they come from a fake place.

11:40Exactly. That's not real. And it's not like everyone you see on TV who's like a TV presenter went to like a journalism school, right? Like a lot of them are entirely other routes. So when you're there and you're like, oh, I'd like to do that. It's like, do I apply? Do I get an apprenticeship? This is the thing. It's kind of like, how do you get your in? Do you just email production companies and TV stations and say, hey, I want to be on TV? Like I had no concept of how it worked at all. But I had just finished my final teaching placement and we were sent to

12:11the Gwiltaught, which are the regions of Ireland where Irish is the predominant language of communication. And our college shipped us off for three months to go and teach in one of those regions. And I was in the closest city and I saw a Newacht TG Cahar, so TG Cahar news presenter, up doing a report. And I was like, that looks cool. I want to do that. Let me go and ask him how he got into it. And I thought I was going to have to start from scratch to talk about a cold call out in the wild. And I was just like, hey, this looks fun. How did you get into it? And he said he had done an internship program with TG Cahar. And I was like, cool. And do

12:45you know the whole invisible string theory, just that everything works out how it's meant to. The applications for this internship is open for, you know, maybe two, three weeks of the year. And it just so happened that I had met him within that time period. And I had went and I looked at the different internships they had available. And that year was the first year they had an education and social media internship. So they have social media internships in lots of different categories. But this was the first year they had an education one. And I said, well, that's perfect. That's what I just did. So I applied. And then again, like I just with my own background with the language, I wasn't raised with the language.

13:19I wasn't raised within the community, wouldn't have known anybody else in the community, you know, because, you know, it's so it's such an open community, but it is very, you know, people know who they know. And, you know, they grow up with who they grow up with. And I went into the interview and I thought, Jesus, not a chance. Like I'm a nobody, you know, nobody knows me. But I got that job. And then within that year, I had then been asked to present Nuacht Koola Cahar, which is the new service for children. And so Tiji Cahar has Koola Cahar, which is the kids TV channel, which launched in 2023. And yeah, it's all just gone from there.

13:52And it's crazy because I'm like, I'm 24. I finished my undergrad at 21. And by the time I was 22, I'd been offered to that position in news. And I don't know what I have ever been so fortunate to you know, avail of the opportunities I have, had I been trying to navigate the English media sector in Ireland. You know, it just Irish has just gifted me everything that, you know, has has come my way, which is amazing to know she's she's magic, you know, and she's just giving me so much. But yeah, that's it's amazing. Like being a presenter, it's so fun. Like I love it. And I'm

14:23just like, this is crazy. Like, what do you mean this is my job? But it's really, really fun. Yeah. And you're working with children just a lot or just children's programming all the time? Yeah, so I was full time for a season two of Newacht Cule Cáir, the kids new show. And then I was managing the book. So I took a year freelance to also then go back to college. So I'm doing my master's at the minute in Irish, medium and Gaeilteacht education. So that's what I've been juggling this year, the book and the master's. And I've been working freelance in so lots of shows and dipping in and out between and working on a new kids show at the

14:56minute. We're mid shooting. So we were shooting all last week and we'll be shooting again next week, which is really fun. But I guess something interesting about working, especially in broadcasting and on TV in your second language, because Irish is my second language, is the struggles of navigating grammar and correct pronunciation. Because as much as I'm in front of the camera trying to focus on tone, delivery, remembering my script, interacting with the guests, thinking of my next interview question, responding, body language, that's what you're trying to juggle as a presenter. But then there's this added level of I'm second-guessing

15:30everything that comes out of my mouth. You know, and it's really, it's really difficult because, you know, and I'm sure even those who are, you know, native Irish speakers and it is their first language, they would still have them same concerns. And I never have those concerns when I'm speaking English. But we have on every shoot that Tiji Cajar does, there is a quarter of tanga on set, so a language advisor. And I've worked as a language advisor on a lot of shoots. So it's really, really fun. So I'm working with, you know, my quarter of tanga and then I'll say something and I'll be like, I'll be like, wait, sorry, just give

16:00me a sec. Is that in the genitive? Okay. And what is it then? And it's just, you know, it's just like checking, you know, all these little things. But it's such a, it's such a good learning opportunity because if I'm speaking to someone in Irish day to day, I might be thinking something in the back of my head. Oh, was that right? I don't know if that was meant to be pluralised, X, Y, Z, whatever. But you don't really have a, an intense reason then and there to go and check it. So when you're working on the show, it's like, wait, no, we, we have to get this right. You know, so whether I'm the language advisor myself or I'm working with my language advisor on set, it creates those learning

16:35opportunities, which I have found has really, really improved my Irish. When you have to sit down and you have to check, you know, and you have to make sure. But do you also think that that's an opportunity for like, because there are a lot of second language speakers of Irish, right? And in a way, a lot of the people who might be watching what you're creating as well might also be second language learners. So in a way, having a second language presenter could in some ways be good because maybe you have a tendency to like simplify or something in a way that makes it a little bit more accessible

17:07potentially. But it's also the reality that like language changes. And if there are certain things that are just like a little bit irregular or hard to get wrong, do you think that that is where the language change is coming in and like, are speakers moving in a certain direction or are people more focused on like doing like school cracks Irish? It's, it's a really, like the landscape in Ireland and with the language is really, really interesting because you have on one hand, native speakers and native Irish is so vastly different

17:43from what I would have learned in school. I'm not from an Irish speaking region. So I would have learned Irish growing up very much within the parameters of this is a school subject. It's very robotic, not a lot of link to culture, emphasis on pronunciation and rich native Irish and native Irish. That's so important to protect and to cultivate and to promote. And that is one of, I guess, TG Cajar's in a sense, main values, you know, to make sure we're promoting rich, beautiful Irish. But then also that not, that's not everybody's background. So although I now have

18:13learned Irish to a point where I could align in a lot of cases, you know, with native speakers and maybe have that kind of a sound to my Irish, I'm never going to be one, you know, I'm still, you know, I'm never going to have the nuance and the idioms and all the phrases that they have, but I can align with that in a certain sense. But then you have the vast majority then of us who are learners and, you know, Irish is our second language and who are intimidated by native Irish. And I was for a long time before I got to spend time with and kind of sink my teeth into native Irish. It was intimidating. And it was just, you know, I'd listen to Rádio na Gwiltaugta, which is the Irish

18:47language radio station. And I'd be like, oh, can't even get a word here, having a Scooby. So it's hard to kind of balance the totem. Is that the word? A lot of times because you want to try and, you know, native speakers deserve content in their rich language and rich native Irish. But then learners and those, you know, who Irish is their second language, they also deserve for content to be accessible. But then if you do one, you're kind of leaving one out. You know, learners can't

19:19necessarily understand native Irish, but then native Irish, you know, they aren't getting exposed to the nuances in that sense. So it's a really tricky landscape. And I think, you know, in terms of this is going to happen a lot, what's the word in English?

19:36Inclusivity? Coming together. We'll go with that. Inclusivity, yeah. Inclusivity. In terms of like inclusivity, it's, you know, there's a lot that can, that can and should be done there. But again, it's just, you can't change the landscape of the language. But a really interesting thing that came up on one day when we were doing the news and I had written my script and then my core lord tanga, my language advisor had checked it and was like, oh, this is actually wrong. And I was like, what? It's just, it's an exception. There was this one particular grammatical exception that went against everything that, you know, all the rules we would all know. And then I was like, what? Like, if I say

20:09this, it's this tiny exception that nobody knows about or not a lot of people know about. But it will sound so wrong. If I say that, the mass public will think I have made a grave error here. And they were like, God, does she not know that you have to shave the noun or the adjective after a feminine noun? And like, everyone's like, everyone knows you have to do that. And I'm like, if I don't, because in this case, it was an exception that you don't. I was like, then it's, it gets tricky because it's like, do we just go along with what is perceived to be correct? Or do we try and,

20:44you know, make sure that these nitty gritty details are known and are spread? Yeah. So it's tricky. Or just rephrase the sentence to like avoid that construction altogether. Yeah. The amount of times I do that. Oh my God, I'm a pro at shuffling things around to make life simple for myself. Oh, genie mac, I do it so often. But yeah, it's just, it's a really interesting landscape and it's really tricky, but yeah. Well, some national broadcasters have broadcasts in what they call like a simple version and a native like version. So here in Germany, there's like news in simple German and regular news and Sweden does the same. I think Australia does the same for

21:19English, right? So like already now having Irish broadcasting is nice, but like, yeah, next step up would be maybe to have a special broadcast for simple Irish. If there's a market, if there's like a need. I guess in a way we achieved that through the different presenters, you know, and I'm kind of in a nice middle ground where I could code switch in a certain way. I can kind of go back to the Irish I would have learned at school and simplify it a bit that it would be more accessible to learners. But then I suppose we achieve that through different presenters. If you've a native presenter or then

21:52a presenter who Irish is the second language. That's really interesting though. There's an interesting parallel here with Australia's national broadcaster, the ABC, because it used to be the case that every presenter sounded in a very almost British way of sounding, what's perceived as painfully correct way of sounding. And that was a standard that people felt like we're talking in the 1950s, 1940s, even 60s, a standard that people felt had to be maintained. But then there came a push to have different voices, to feature different sort of people.

22:26Even so, I know that presenters on ABC radio get people phoning up and saying, you did a thing wrong. And I wonder, are you getting any of that sort of thing? Yeah, definitely. And I always say, if I make a mistake, I'll hold my hands up. And if there's somebody there who knows more than me who can help me acquire that information, absolutely go for it. And I see a lot of that online as well. And I would get a lot of that on my TikToks. And the really interesting thing is the kind of community of native speakers that have kind of come together to help me align my Irish with native Irish more. And they'd be like, oh, this is great,

23:01but like, actually, this is the word we'd have for that. Or, you know, you should just be a little bit more careful, maybe you're specific with this particular pronunciation note, which I love, which is so amazing. And the support that comes in is fantastic. Now, it's so funny, like recently, I had to block one person in particular who just was doing my head in with the way in which they gave feedback, especially being an educator. I'm like, okay, there's a way to give feedback that's helpful and constructive. And there's a way that that's not. And I said that he was which is basically just kind of taxing me, you know, instead of helping me, taxing me. And it's

23:32like, okay, I'm not a native speaker, I never will be, you know, so there are going to be gaps there in my knowledge and, you know, how things come out of my mouth, I suppose. But yeah, like, absolutely, people, there's all sorts of feedback, you know, we get the feedback that it's too hard to understand in different circumstances, or, you know, I get all the time that I speak too fast. And I'm like, okay, well, look, I speak fast in English, I'm going to speak fast in Irish, you know, but then again, when needs be, I will code switch it, and I'll slow it down based on the scenario. But yeah, funny enough, like, in terms of what feedback I've gotten online and stuff,

24:05it has largely been positive. Because of the discourse around the Irish language in Ireland, I thought when I started posting that, you know, every second comment would be, it's a dead language, why do you bother? And I was kind of ready for that. I wasn't ready for that. I was like, okay, you know, I'm going to have to support her, I'm going to have to stand up for her here. But no, it's been largely so positive, which is amazing. But I also think that that reflects, or is reflective of the kind of mindset shift in regards to the Irish language that we've seen here in recent years. Let's talk about Irish as a language,

24:35you say in your book, in Irish History and Culture Through Language, there's about, what did you say, 1.8 million, just a bit under 2 million speakers in Ireland, but about half say that they don't speak it well. I know that there are people who don't see the need, or who don't think that the resources spent are necessary. What's going on there? What kind of attitudes are you seeing about how people are feeling about Irish? I know there's a lot of love there. There's also a lot of detractors going on. Yeah, it's a tricky one. And as kind of

25:09encouraging as it can be sometimes, also it's heartbreaking, you know, some of the discourse I see and, you know, opinions I see. Essentially, it's very historical and there's a lot that goes into it. When Irish, Ireland would have been at a point historically when, you know, Irish wasn't the main language of communication or permitted to be the main language of communication, it survived and thrived in rural communities. So then Irish kind of had this status of being an informal language of communication amongst rural communities, whereas English was seen as the

25:41formal language of, you know, official proceedings and the language of education. And to survive then and to, I guess, not even to thrive, just to survive, the language, the native language survived in these rural areas and the Gwemeltacht areas. But then outside of that, for the vast majority of the country, it had to be squashed down into a school subject. And that was the only context for a lot of people in which the language existed, you know. And when you're confining something to just being

26:13a school subject without the historical context, without the cultural context, without the link and the passion and the love for it, you know, there's going to be subjects that people just don't like. You know, I'm not a maths girl. I'm not a numbers girl at all. You could not beg me to sit down and do Sudoku in my own free time as adults. I'm like, I left that behind in school. I don't want to see numbers again. So, you know, you have people who just couldn't, I guess, align with the subject and with the language, you know, and that happens and that's fair. So then when people were only

26:44seeing it as a school subject, if it was a subject they didn't like or they perceived to be difficult, that impacted their, I guess, outlook on the language. And then also, I think something historically important is, you know, a lot of the older generation would say, well, this language was bet into us, you know, it was shoved down our throats, you know, at a time in Ireland where corporal punishment was still in effect in schools. Children would wear a bata score and it was kind of this wooden, this is in the book, it's kind of a wooden stick almost that would be worn around the neck and the notch would be carved into it for every time they were caught speaking Irish.

27:18And then the number of notches on their stick at the end of the day would equate to their beating. So, you know, I'm like, okay, I get why people have this kind of thing about Irish. I absolutely do. But what we've kind of seen, and I guess my understanding of it is, is in recent years with how much more forthcoming Irish language media and music and kind of pop culture, I guess, has become, it's allowing these people who have only ever seen it as a school subject, which they mightn't have liked, to see it as something that's so much more than that. It's kind of been taken

27:51outside of the four walls of the classroom. And people are saying, oh, this is something I can use socially. This is something that people have fun in. You know, you're seeing people, you know, going to concerts and everything and engaging with the language in that sense. Something people have fun with. It's not something that only equates to a grade for me in school and the pressures associated with that. So I think that's why, you know, Irish language media, social media is really, really lucrative because it allows people in different regions to see the impact and the role of the language if that's not present in their region. And that was my case.

28:23I didn't grow up with Irish being anything other than a school subject. And it was one that I happened to be good at, fortunately, and that's why I am where I am now. But if I didn't like Irish in school, I can't see why I'd, you know, particularly care to engage with it as an adult. If I hated it in school and it was a source of dread and fear, you know, you know, fair enough if you don't want to, if you don't see the context. But now people, I think even people who are like, okay, fair enough, I'm never going to be an Irish speaker. It's just not something that fits into my life or would necessarily have a purpose in my life. But use that R, go you. I love that. And that's kind of,

28:56I think, where we're at now. It's that, okay, we're going to have our speakers. We're going to have our people who, you know, might just use it socially, very informally, a little bit here and there. And then you have people who, okay, they mightn't do anything with the language, but they're happy for us to do our thing. And we're not combating, I think, as much anymore, that constant negative feedback. Like if you put into comparison, when I started college in 2019, a lot of the times when I would tell people that I was studying a course through Irish, the response was kind of, God, you're limiting yourself a bit there, aren't you? Would you not be better off, you know, working with a modern language that might take you further? And I was like, oh, whereas now people

29:29see what I do and I tell people what I do and it's, oh, that's so cool. I'd love to be able to speak Irish more, you know, because people have seen now that it actually is not just a subject, that it is living and it's breathing and it's beautiful. And oh, it's just, I think when people, now that people have this understanding of the language, it helps us understand us as a people so much more because so much of our country and us as a people has been formed and shaped by the language. And that's a lot of what the book goes into. It's looking at historical and cultural factors through the lens of the language and how present the language

30:01is even now in the country and within Irish people, even without us knowing. So look, it's a tricky landscape. You know, there's a, there's a lot, there's a lot that goes into it. And that's just my take on it. You know, other people might have a different take, but yeah. I was wondering, so like a couple of years ago, I was in Cardiff visiting a friend of mine, a friend of the show, Sean Roberts, who speaks Welsh. And he took me to a Welsh concert and he said that something that had changed with the Welsh language over time was that it used to be more, I hope I'm paraphrasing him correctly here, that like, for example, Welsh songs used to be

30:36more about Welsh and Wales. And now there were more songs about like, your girlfriend having left you and going to a party. Because like, there's only so many songs maybe you can make and relate to that are about the, the, the struggle of the language and the culture. And now people were just like using Welsh as a more broad domain language to do other things and not just talking about Welsh language revival. It's fun though. And, and that 100% seems like a big change where

31:07like, yeah, I'm not, I'm not saying that it's not important to make some different culture about those topics, but like you can imagine that that limits you somewhat. Yeah. It's, it's people seeing it in a different context that's more global and I guess modern in a sense. You know, I guess it, I guess it comes into a modernization of the language and shaping the language in a way that is reflective of people's lives now, you know, there are shows that people watch just because they're funny and they just happen to be an Irish, you know, there's books that people want to read because they're good books and you know, they might just happen to be an Irish. Same with music,

31:40there's good bands, the music just happens to be an Irish, you know, and it's just, I think, normalized in a sense now and a lot more integrated. And I see kneecap popping up there. Yeah, we've probably all heard of the kneecap effect. And yeah, they're just a rap group from Belfast. Go back, tell me more. What is the kneecap effect? Oh, whoa, Daniel. Daniel. Sorry. Daniel. Yeah. Daniel. Daniel are a rap group, an Irish language rap group from Belfast and their music is just unbelievable. They rap in Irish, they rap bilingually also. And, you know, a lot of their

32:13music, it mightn't have anything to do with Irish history, but then a lot of it, you know, a lot of their music is to do with Irish history and, you know, the discourse around the Irish language and people have just, I think, also leaned into that level of patriotism alongside kneecap. And it's just, I guess they started quite or were part of a movement in making the language cool or accessible or, you know, it wasn't just something that was terrifying in school, you know, it's like, oh, these are class, like, you know, I want to go to this concert.

32:41Yeah, it's worth mentioning, Dani, that one of the reasons I think that me and Ben know about kneecap besides them being a very interesting group is that they have also been very outspoken supporters of Palestine and been critiqued for that. And there's also been many Irish politicians who have been outspoken for Palestine. So they've been in the news a lot for that as well. And it's one of the reasons they made, like, global news. Not that they're not also very interesting positions, but I think that contributed a lot. Yeah, they're very outspoken about marginalised communities and the Irish language community

33:15would come into that as well, you know. So, yeah, they're just, they're very, they're just class, you know. I think there's something also to be said about, in relation to kneecap, but also kind of going back to the broader point about it not being about Irish language revival is, like, you know something is going well when skungy reprobates are doing it, right? Like, it's all well and good for, like, well-off good boys and girls who do the right thing or, like, really diligent, hard-working

33:49people are like, oh, look, I know Welsh or I know Irish or whatever. But when, like, people have more tattoos than teeth and they're just spitting it raw and an Irish rap, like, it's, it's, it's really, really, really, I think that is indicative of something, like, I really got heavy. Well, tattoos and teeth was just such a, yeah, anyway. But I think that speaks to a really healthy shift in the, the tenor and the temperament of,

34:20of, like, a language revival. Because as soon as you can get teenagers being like, a grassroots movement, yeah. That's fucking great. Yeah. That's when you know stuff is going good. This is what it's coming down to. It's just a mindset shift, you know, where the people are like, oh, wait, this is actually cool. People actually speak this. People actually, you know, speak this on, on nights out, you know? Like, I was out with all my Irish-speaking friends last night and, you know, there's, there's a lot of times we'll be out in the club, we'll be, you know, dancing our, you know, the night away, like, in Irish to each other. And the amount of people that, like, would come up to us and be like, are you, you're speaking Irish? They're like,

34:52they're like, wait, you actually choose to do that? I, I think a lot of people didn't realise for a long time that, oh no, like, this is something you actually choose to do. It's not just something you're forced into studying in school, but it's definitely, it's a grassroots movement and it's just people seeing the broader context of the language and linking it to our culture and to our, our national identity. And I think, I think that's what it is now. And people, I guess, being, becoming more aware of, you know, the impact that colonialism had in Ireland and the detrimental impacts it had on the language. And they're like, wait, no, actually, actually, no, no, no, no, no. Okay. I didn't like Irish in school, but I actually don't stand for everything that happened here historically. So I'm going

35:25to say that Irish is cool. I, you know, I'm down with those people that speak it. Great. You know, keep going. You know, it's a, it was a language that had to, I guess, be confined to, I guess, academic parameters to, to survive and to be officialised so that, you know, we would have it. But yeah, it's just becoming a lot more social now, I guess, you know, which is just amazing to see. And I can see that in the general mindset, you know, people's general mindset towards it. 100%. So the scene feels good. Doesn't feel like you're fighting a losing battle. Feels like

35:55it's turned around. Yes, definitely. In terms of the, the, the mindset now, you know, of course, a big issue is always going to be funding. Um, it's always going to be, have we the, you know, the, the necessary resources to do what we need to do to protect the language and to not just protect it. I'm like, okay, we've protected her. She's still here, but like, we need to push through the ceiling now. Okay. We need to be able to take her to the next level that we need to, um, and have the necessary, you know, funding to do so. And, you know, the Gaeilteacht community, there's a, there's a housing crisis and awful housing crisis all across Ireland,

36:27you know, which I'm sure is mirrored, you know, in other parts of the world as well. Um, but in particular Gaeilteacht areas, um, there's a, a group, Banu na Gaeilteachta, who are fighting for, um, Gaeilteacht housing crisis, I suppose. Um, and yeah, it's just, you know, the Gaeilteacht is where the, I suppose in a sense, the heart of the language is. And if, you know, people are being forced out of those areas, what impact does that play have, you know, on the future of the language? But in terms of the mindset, you know, um, in the, in the country, people are pro-Irish, which is great. And I'm like, okay, a lot of

36:59my work is done here. I've convinced you all. I did it. Nice going. Uh, I think an advantage of being pro-Irish is that it also means maybe being, uh, not English, which maybe helps. That's, that's, that, that's where it comes from. Do you know, as I said, people, I guess, taking the time to look at the history and they're like, actually, no, no, no, no, no. Um, and it's the national identity and it's the pride and it's the patriotism and it's saying, well, that was terrible. What happened? Absolutely not. We lost Irish as a result of that.

37:30So, uh, not to, nothing can ever make it right, but I guess in an attempt to maybe undo what was done or I guess fight back against it, people are claiming Irish in that sense, um, as pushing back on the English, you know, which is, which is what, which is what people are doing, you know, and it's, it's that national identity and we're proud to be Irish and speaking Irish aligns with that. Yeah. I can't get over the fact that, you know, cause I looked at your name, hmm, Pakenham. Yeah. Um, I do not have an Irish name. No, no. Which has been said to me. Yeah.

38:03So you really are sort of this, this Irish language advocate, but you've come to it. It's like you're a convert and people love that stuff. Yeah. And I guess that's a big thing that I, I suppose, wanted to campaign for, bring awareness to, and I guess show that the language is accessible. You don't have to be raised with it. You don't have to be educated through it to have it in your life and to speak it. And that's the main message I wanted to spread initially on my TikTok. And so it was like, Hey, I went to English medium schools. You know, I'm not from the Gwailtuchth. My parents don't have Irish. I wasn't raised with it. It wasn't

38:36bestowed upon me by the greater language gods. I chose it and I worked at it and it's doable. You know, it's a difficult language, but as is learning any language, but I did it and anyone can, but yeah, that, that's a comment that has been said to me a lot, um, about my name. Um, you know, it's like, Oh, well, why would I want to learn Irish from someone with a name Pakenham? You know, the people, you know, who took it from us in the first place. And I'm like, I didn't do nothing. I didn't do nothing to y'all. Um, yeah, my, my name would inherently be English. Um, the Pakenham's would have came to Ireland from England and served as landlords and ladies, um, in the particular

39:12region where I'm from. But the story is that my great, great granddad lived, um, in Tully Nally Castle, Pakenham Hall, which is only like 10 minutes up the road from where I now live. But he fell in love with a maid who worked on the estate and was given an ultimatum and he chose her. He chose love and he left it all behind and he was working out of the family history and yeah, moved down 10 minutes down the road, started a new life with her. So we're the poor Pakenham's. We're the poor Pakenham's. We have nothing to do with those people up in the castle. So yeah, but it's funny. There was actually a man, um, my, my brother has done a lot of work in kind of kind of uncovering,

39:45I guess, our family side of it, just, just to know. And there was a man, eh, eh, ooh, eh, no, he was called Eamon. What's the English for Eamon? Edward, Edward. He was Edward Pakenham, Sir Edward Pakenham. And, um, he, he lived up in the castle. He was having a grand jolly hell time, you know, living his life as a, I guess a, you know, the gentry. And, um, he decided to learn Irish and yeah, literally taught Irish to his English wife. He was a patron of the arts. He bankrupted, um, the Pakenham family more or less in, in trying to protect

40:15Irish arts. He wrote plays in the Irish language. And yeah, then he was then called Eamon de Longford. So they Gaelicised his name to Eamon de Longford, Eamon of Longford, Edward of Longford, um, where we're from. So yeah, I kind of, in a weird way, you know, he, he had no reason to do that. And it was so funny. He went over to, um, Eton College, which is where, you know, the royals are sent for, um, their secondary school education, I think. And on his first night, he was in the debate team when he debated in favour of Irish independence and was kicked out and came back home. So in a weird way, I'm kind of like, am I carrying

40:47on a legacy that was started? You know, I don't know. I kind of don't know where the Irish came from other than that, other than, you know, maybe there was a story I had to finish or work I had to do maybe to set something right, balance the totem, I suppose. But yeah, that's a comment I get a lot of times that I feel very out of place sometimes in the Irish speaking community. Like even when I was in college, you know, the names would be like, oh, she only hula one. And then Laura Pakenham. And it's like, oh, well, Jesus, there we go. My cover is blown.

41:16We're talking to Laura Pakenham, author of Irish History and Culture Through Language. We have been asking a lot of questions, but listeners, we want to hear your questions too. So getting ready, because we're going to tackle them on the other side of Related or Not.

41:32Which theme have we got today, Daniel? I decided to go with David's theme because I was just feeling it. The Liquid Jungle version. I hope you're ready to get rinsed.

41:45Oh yeah, it's that one.

41:57Related or Not. Every time, every time I hear that, I am immediately transported to playing a snowboarding game on the PS2. Like that is. It very much gives that energy. That's for sure. Is it you at the end pitched weird, Daniel? What's that? Is it your voice at the end pitched funny or is it. It does sound like it. I do not believe it is. I think it's David's. Okay. I think it's Daniel. Yeah, I hear a bit of Daniel in the robot.

42:27Have I been sampled? I think the call is coming from inside the house, my guy. Okay. Well, let's see if I can reverse engineer that. Okay. This is the time when I give you a few words and we try to see if they are related or not. We're launching the first poll. Here we go. Okay. Now, I've picked some words. Don't vote yet. Don't vote yet because we have to argue about it. Okay. Okay. But I've picked some words that I think are kind of relevant. One is jig, the dance. Another one is gig, the dance, which might not be a word you're familiar with.

42:58I do not. And then jog, not really a dance. So let me tell you about gig. If you do a lot of sort of not early music, but like 1500s, 1600s classical, you'll find that it's very four square. Bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum. And then there'll be a bit in the middle that it's like, da, da, da, da, da. That's in three, four. Da, da, da, da. And that's the gig. And it's dance. What we would call a bridge in contemporary pop music. It really is. In an electronic song, it would be the bit in the middle where everything goes

43:28quiet. And then you start the song again. Yeah, yeah, yeah. All right. So one of these is the odd one out, or at least as close as possible to being the odd one out. Is it jig, the dance, gig, the dance, or jog? Not really a dance. What do you think? Well, Daniel, before we get to this, I'm immediately going to derail, as is my favor. Why not do jig, jig, and jig? Jig, jig, and jig? What's the other jig? Well, you've got jig, the dance, you've got jig, no, the jig, the thing you catch squid

44:01and octopus with, or jig, the thing you use to frame up when you were trying to construct things in like woodwork or metalwork. Anyway, it's fine. Oh my God. We'll do your one. It's cool. Whatever. Like, it's fine. I mean, you had three jigs, but that's cool. I didn't want to do those.

44:17No. I have you know that. One thing about jogging and dancing is that I think I'm terrible at running, but I understand that it's good to have a good rhythm. Ah, okay. And that it's semi-regular. And you're moving your legs. It's true. Minimally. Well, it is definitely done with the legs. I think the, because I hate running with the passion of a thousand suns. Like, I'm a relatively active person, but it is one physical enterprise that I abhor. The similarity, the bigger through

44:52line between jig and jog is that one jiggles. I'm just saying. Some of us do. I assure you, I do. Oh God. I'm 40 now. There's, there's stuff, you know, as we have explained multiple times on the podcast, white people just slowly melt like a candle over time. And now there's just loose skin and it's just, it's, I feel like that all is going to be a frequentative all like spark and sparkle. I'm going to, I'm going to, I'm not the TMI person usually, but I'm, I'm going to try

45:26and expel my information from my brain. Now I want to watch. No, I do not want to watch. Anyway, two dances and one running. I have a feeling that I'm going to say that the middle gig is the old one out. That's what I'm going to vote for. I second that motion and I base it on the wackadoodle spelling. It's so rare in related or not that we come across a thing that sounds exactly the same, but it's spelt hell different.

45:56And it turns out, oh yeah, it just slowly got spelt hell different over time. That doesn't really like, if it's similar, it's similar-ish. Whereas the second jig is really different. Uh, Magistral Annie says, does it give anything away if I say that jig is pronounced with a soft G in French? A jig? Is that right, Annie? Okay. Okay. Okay. Good to know. I'm still going to know. I thought that jog was the odd one out. It's, it's a short, they're all short, but it seems

46:26like words for dancing would be similar or easily borrowed.

46:31Okay. Uh, Laura, what do you reckon? I said jog was the odd one out because I play Irish traditional music and Irish, um, jigs are in 6-8 time. I just, it just felt, it felt right in my bones. That's how I make the majority of my language decisions in life based on vibes alone. Can we also just acknowledge yet another way that like Irish is just inherently better than English everything because the English do boring stately 3-4 and the Irish are like, fuck that noise. Let's double that shit up.

47:04Um, yeah, so Irish jigs, now we have our reels there in 4-4 time, but our jigs are in 6-8. Um, and yeah, I just, it just felt right in my soul. I do think that is how I would have felt like, um, 10 years ago. Then Daniel started doing these really not quizzes to us regularly. And now Ben and I have entirely lost our ability to, to, yeah, smell things out. That's why you just got to go back to the vibes. You got to go back to what your heart tells you. That's how I make grammatical decisions. I'm like, that feels more right than that.

47:36What's good here is we have attempted, we have, we have acquired tribes here amongst the speaking presenters. So I am looking forward to winning with Hedvig, which is unusual. Okay. I'm going to end that poll. I'm going to share the results. Nobody voted that Jig was the odd one out, but a third of us said that Jig or Geeg the dance was the odd one out. And two thirds of us said Jog was the odd one out. The answer is Jog is probably the odd one out,

48:08but there's a story here. Oh, I'm hearing an Axtrix and a Huff. Yeah, there is a bit of one. So there was once in the 1400s, an old French word, Jig or Geeg. I'm going to go with Annie. Jig. It was the fiddle. And by the 1560s, that became the name of the dance. It also became the name of the jig. But the OED, Oxford English Dictionary says that there are some problems like jig came up too late. It came up after Gig was already, or Jig was already obsolete. It may be that Jig had been borrowed from jig.

48:42So it's complicated, but many etymologists are willing to say maybe. On the other hand, Jog, probably from some German word, Schog, which means oscillation, which Ben has ably described in his own jogging activity. The OED also says the suggestion of a Celtic origin for jog is not tenable. English phonology knows nothing of a change from go to joe. So. Our word for jog is bug hudder.

49:14What do you call a violin in Irish? Fizzle. So in Irish traditional music, it's not called violin. We just called it a fiddle. And in Irish, it's a fiddle. Yeah. Because in some languages, it's called a giga, like a jig, like an instrument. Oh, that's cool. I like that. And also, what's that funny? We just have fiddle. You know that funny metal thing you put in your mouth and you play like bing, bing? The mouth organ. Oh, yes. Mouth organ. Yeah. Yeah. That can also be a jig. Oh, very fun. Wow. Mouth harp. Very fun all together. Mouth harp. Mouth harp. Yeah, exactly.

49:49Exactly. Exactly. I've heard organ as well. Let's go on to our second one. And this one is Heath, Heather, and Heathen. This one is from Corrine via email. She says, probably too easy for you all, but Heath, Heather, Heathen, love the show. Which one is the odd one out? Two of them are related. One is not. This is when I need a reminder of what a Heath and a Moor is. I do not know the difference between a Heath and a Moor. There is just some sort of one plant grows on one and not the other something, something. Does heather grow on a

50:23Heath? I'm Googling. What is a Heath? A Heath is a shrubland habitat characterized by open, low-growing, woody vegetation found on acidic, infertile, and often waterlogged or sandy soils. Vegetation, you say? Right. Yeah. And what is a Moor? As in Dartmoor, where all the murders are happening all the time? A Moor is an open, uncultivated habitat found in upland areas characterized by acidic soils, low-growing vegetation, and grasses, and often wet, boggy terrain.

51:00See? Fucking hell. Well, that clears it up for me. Yeah. Fuck. Sorry. English? God damn it. Well, I feel like Heathen is a bit different. I feel like heather could grow on a heath. That's how I feel. So I feel like heathen is the odd one out. Can I ask, Daniel, is there no choice for all related? There is no choice for all related. I decided to keep it simple. Well, because, and I'm guessing this can't be possible because you didn't give the choice, but

51:31it struck me that all three could very easily be related, right? Like a heath is where heather grows, and a heathen is some sort of ne'er-do-well who lurks in said place. That's definitely possible. A heathen could live on the heath. Yeah. It's true. I'm going that heathen. Heathen is, you think heathen is the odd one? I'm going to use my Swedish superpower because I know that heath is heath and heathen is headling, headling, and heather is just a random name. So that's the odd one out. It sounds like it could

52:03maybe be like old, biblical, I don't know, like Rachel, Heather, Ethel. The Swedish gambit. I love it. Yeah, heather is the odd one out, I say. Names are weird. Names are weird. Okay, well, we are seeing the votes piling in. Laura, before we close it off, what do you reckon? I said heathen. Yeah. We went on heathen. Heather, the plant, just grow in a heath.

52:33A heathen, maybe. That was my logic as well. If we were playing Sermantle, Heath and Heather would be like, whoa, the score would be through the roof. Okay, well, I'm closing at three, two, one, bump. Okay, now I'm going to share the results. Let's see what people said. Hmm, it looks like heath. If nobody thought that was the odd one out, it seems, just like jig, nope, everyone seems

53:04to think of that as the basic form and then the others are just deviations they're from. But 39% of us said that heathen was the odd one out and 61% of us said heathen was the odd one out. This looks a lot like the last one, doesn't it? Mm-hmm. Nearly spot on. Um, if you said heather was the odd one out, then you're probably the most correct. Whoa. A heathen heathen are related. A heathen is just somebody who lives on the heath.

53:35It really is a heathen. What? Uh, Etym Online says, perhaps, perhaps, literally, dweller on the heath, one inhabiting uncultivated land, whereas heather comes from a different word from heath. Heath is just have. Heather was hadre. Anatoly Lieberman, our pal, the Oxford etymologist, says, probably altered by heath, but real connection to that word is unlikely. We know that words can grow together if they feel, but they're not, they're not originate, they don't originate from the same

54:10place. Point of information, please, adjudicator. Uh, when we started this particular one, I was like, I reckon all three could be related. And you were like, yeah, yeah, yeah, but I didn't set it up that way or something like that. Maybe I said that. Who knows? It was a long time ago. Yes, it was. Point being, your point is that the word heath and heather originated from a different place, but that one of them, heath, has interested in heather so that they look nearly fucking identical and you still can look me in the eye and be like, hmm, not related.

54:44Yeah. Yep, not related. Just like any and many from last time, from the episode that dropped today. And shenanigans. I am calling shenanigans on this. Like, if heath wasn't around, heather would be like, and heath turned it into heather and you're like, hmm, unrelated. It's called the, people just call it analogy, right? Like an analogical language change. It happens all the time. It's like, it's like if I had a mate in school whose name was Douglas, right? And by the end

55:15of school, everyone called him Ben-less and people were like, well, those two names are unrelated. Really not. But they are. A relationship has been forged. This is a weird example. But Hedwig, what do you think? Do you think, with all your knowledge of language taxonomy or language typology, do you feel that when words grow together, that's a kind of relatedness? How would you regard that? Yeah, I think the game here is like traditional historical linguistics going back to the root

55:50and that's the game we're committing to. It will get really muddy if we do analogical sound change as well. I don't know. It happens all the time. And the cases we're going to be discussing are ones that sound alike. So we're more likely to pick these, right? So we're going to get more of these examples than if we picked random sets of related words. I don't know. In other words, we're fine. I think I like to pick, like, a set of game rules and then apply that and then be unhappy. But like,

56:26I like consistency. I like following rules to the end. Must be order. Our final one. We're moving on. I am going to give you one from the Discord because James gave us this one. Scrap and scruple. Ooh. Do you have any scruples? Ooh, that's really fun. I do. As depressing as it is to say, because for much of my life, I've been like, hell nah. I'm like, wild and free, man. And then I got old and boring. I'm like, no, I scruple now. Now, I scruple. It's a weird word, isn't it? You can have scruples or you can be scrupulous.

57:01Plus, I guess if you're, here's my answer. I think that they are related because if you're scrupulous, you are after every scrap that you can get. You want to get every little tiny piece in order. So that was my, um, that was my logic. I'm saying yes. Related. Okay. Okay. Okay. I'm going to go unrelated. And I've not been doing well in this game so far today. So this is probably a surefire bet, everyone, that you should vote differently from me. Uh, yeah, I don't know. There's, I'm thinking scrap and scruple. Scrap sounds like an older word

57:39to me. And it's probably been around for a long, long time, like maybe for middle English, whereas scruple smells acquired maybe, or just, just a modern ish confection from like the romance period onwards. And so I'm guessing just, yeah, not, not related. Okay. I'm going to Laura. Again, there's gotta be vibes here. This is, this is based on the science of vibes and the science of vibes were pointing me in the direction of not related. They just feel like they, to

58:12me, they don't know each other. They're strangers. They're strangers. They don't know each other. Okay. You know, this is, this is a case of beginner mind because you haven't been playing this game with us for a long time. We've gotten twisted around the axle. Absolutely. We are into this, into this. Um, yeah, I could never compare. Yeah. Yeah. Well, maybe you'll have learned today to go with vibes. Have I been two for two so far? Yes. Did I get the first one? I got the first one. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Beginner mind. Guys, if I'm wrong on this one now, I'm quitting. Sorry, I'm gone.

58:47Okay. Well, uh, people are. I think it smells, it smells fall, fell, that kind of thing. Like this, like a twist in the order argument, something like that. You know what I mean? Like I'm falling, you felled me. Oh, you mean like a causative thing? Yeah. Yeah. Like something is shuffling around. Like I scrapped it. I, it's scrupled me. Blah, blah, blah. I don't know. Okay. I'm good. I'm good. Okay. Let's get those votes in. There's still a few people who haven't committed. I will end

59:24the poll in a three, a two, a one. All right. And now let's share those results. 19% of us said related. 81% said not related. It's pretty lopsided. Anybody want to switch? This is one of those Monty Hall things. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. With only two choices. Here's a goat behind one of the doors. Would you like the other door? James says, and I have checked this. It's, uh, it looks pretty good to me. Unrelated. If you said unrelated, you were

59:57correct. Scrap goes back through Norse and Proto-Germanic to Proto-Indo-European. Scurb to cut. Scruple comes from Latin, scrupus, sharp stone or pebble, which could be used to cut. Although OED has small weight or measure, a small pebble, that kind of thing. Anyway, James continues, though, etymology is unknown before that, so it's possible. But for the moment we're saying, hmm, probably not related. And that's what we must do. I wonder, do we

1:00:31know how small tool to cut turned into scruples as we use them? Is anyone else seeing the semantic throughline there that I'm missing? I think scruples are small sins, right? Ah, okay. There's a small weight on your character. Got it. Okay, so my lack of my heathen upbringing to just do a little bit of a callback. It has not helped me with this one. Well, thank you, James. And thank you to everyone who's given us Related or Nots. Thanks to David for that jingle. You can

1:01:03send us Related or Nots and jingles all the regular ways, Discord, socials, or good old email, hello at becauselanguage.com. Let's bring it back to our special guest, Laura Pakenham. Laura, I got a question. I wonder if you can help me with Irish orthography. You've learned this. You know the tricks. It doesn't make a lot of sense to an English speaker, but it probably makes a lot of sense to an Irish speaker. So can you help me with terms like broad and slender letters or eclipses? Okay. Yeah, see, this is actually interesting because

1:01:40I had to learn the English. I didn't know what lenition was because I just knew that things were shaved. You know, and I didn't know what lenition was. So it's been fun learning the, I guess, the English terminology for this because it's not terminology I would have in the context of English. Right. So an eclipse is an Uru. And an Uru, it's an extra letter that gets placed before another letter in certain circumstances. And we have a little rhyme to remember it. So I want you to all say the rhyme after me. So my brother, my brother, my brother,

1:02:13got caught, got caught, got caught, not doing, not doing, not doing, dishes tonight, dishes tonight, dishes tonight, tonight, nobody gets, nobody gets, nobody gets, nobody gets, blueberry pie. Blueberry pie. Blueberry pie. Blueberry pie. Blueberry pie. Before he finishes. Before he finishes. Before he finishes. Okay. So I'll say that one more time for you. Remember it. And then I'm going to see if you can tell me some eclipses. So my brother got caught

1:02:45not doing, dishes tonight, nobody gets blueberry pie before he finishes. Okay. What is the appropriate eclipse for a word that starts with the letter B? Think of the start of the little rhyme. Blueberry pie. Oh no, my brother. Oh, it's an M. My brother. Got caught. So G is the eclipse for C. Got caught, not doing, N is the eclipse for words that start with D. Dishes tonight, D before T, nobody gets, N before G, blueberry pie, B before P, before he finishes, BH before

1:03:19F. So for example, like there's lots of different circumstances in which you should apply the eclipses. Yeah. Okay. So I'm, I'm, I'm at C. We got my brother. What does the M do to the B if they're placed together? What happens to the B? So you apply in Uru after, um, a lot of times after kind of prepositions. So unbowered, the table beginning with B, but if something is air unmowered, it's on the table. So B-O-R-D, but air on, on the, mowered, M-B-O-R-D. Oh, okay. Yeah. So it can be at the,

1:03:57on the, beside the, in front of the. A lot of time it's, it's, it's, I guess, directional when we apply our eclipses. So another one would be like the gate, ungiata, but if I am at the gate, I'm egg on nyata. Nobody gets, N before G. So there's a, and that's why I think a lot of the things like that throw people off because they've learned that unbowered is table, but then they see egg unmowered and they're like, where is this N coming from? And then we also have our shavu, um, which I,

1:04:28I believe that the correct term is, is, is lenition. Um, it's a, it's, it's a funny one because so in, in Clogwaylach, um, you may have seen it before. If not, I advise you to look up a picture, but it's beautiful. It's the old Irish script, how Irish used to be written. Um, I've not yet mastered it, but I think what's really important and I think what has created this disconnect in understanding spelling is that when Irish, when Clogwaylach was left one side to prioritize, was it, is it Roman or Latin script when everything was kind of standardized for like type writers and stuff? Um, all the letters were kind of standardized. They couldn't, they

1:05:02could do the father, they could do the accent, but we had to say goodbye to how we represented this shavu, this lenition. So it was originally, if you look at any Clogwaylach scripture, you'll see dots above a lot of the first letters in words, a little dot. So Irish had, we still have the accents, the father, which literally means, um, on she and the father, the long stretch. That's what our accents are because you stretch out the letter and she and the father, the long stretch. Um, and then the shavus used to be these little dots. Um, and that just means shavu, shave in Irish just means softening. So you just soften it. So an example

1:05:36would be, um, you would apply shavu to express possession for yourself. So coata is coat, but my coat is moh, chota. Okay. So moh, moh, chota. But now we represent that shavu with the letter H. So this is why people get confused because they're like, but why is the spelling different? It's like, wow. It's not really that the spelling is different. Just the sound changes after certain, you know, prefaces, you know, it's like, well, it's my coat. And when it's my coat, it's moh, chota. Or if it's his coat, it's a chota. And that's how

1:06:08you determine the difference between his coat and her coat. His coat is a chota. Her coat is a chota. So it's a different in sound, but now it's been kind of confined to this letter, this letter H. And it's like, well, it's not a letter. It's a, it's a change to a sound in certain circumstances. So that's why people get so confused with Irish spelling. They're like, well, I've seen coat, but then I've also seen chota because, because they haven't looked at it in the full context of it's moh, chota. So then they're like, well, I don't know. Is there, is there a H in coat? Is there not? And this is what leads to a lot of confusion.

1:06:40I'm having a little trouble figuring out why M plus an H results in a worse sound or a worse sound. Can you talk me through that a little bit? That's the one thing that I look at that and I go, wow, that's so different. Yeah. Again, not a linguist. I don't know exactly, you know, why, but there are words in Irish that have an M H also a different, it, um, is different across dialects. Um, so for example, if I was to say, I would like, ba-wa-lium, that's spelled B-A-M-H-A-I-T-H. But people

1:07:13also say, ba-wa-lium, you know, ba-wa-lium, da-ligin-sha-pa. I would like to go to the shop or ba-wa-lium, da-ligin-sha-pa. You have like, ba-wa-lium, ee-ha-wa, ma-d-za-na-wa, you know, good night, good morning, ee-ha-wa. Um, but yeah, yeah, it's just, it can, depending on the word, she makes a wuh or she makes a vuh. Okay. Colin is also saying M H is a bilabial continuant, which has lost its nasal component. So it's not nasal anymore like an M is. It's just changed over time to be just, just oral. That's cool. I get that. That's good. Okay. Um, I feel like, I feel like I'm getting

1:07:45something. I'm getting somewhere there with the help of your book. I always think it's funny as well. Like whenever languages are described, like people make up like, so, so this like broad and slender terminology or like this, like calling it an eclipse or like calling it this and that, because I'm used to people talking about Celtic initial mutations, um, which is like the, the broader term for a lot of these things. Um, but I find it so fascinating the kind of metaphors people, people use to make them more accessible. So like in, in Swedish dialectology, people talk about thick, uh, of certain consonants, like, oh, that's

1:08:19a thick L. Um, and like, when you hear it, you can understand iconically a little bit what they're getting at with thick, but of course sounds aren't thick and slender or broad or eclipsed or anything like that. These are all metaphors, but I find it really interesting what metaphors people grab onto. This is really cool. Since we're talking about metaphors, let's talk about some of the entries in the book, because a lot of the book, there's, there's big sections of history and culture, which is great. But then a lot of it is like one per page entries of, uh, proverbs or greetings

1:08:50or, and, and there's just so much culture that's, that's found within these. And was it fun sort of working your way through these entries and finding the cultural elements? What are some of your favorites? Yeah, I will say that the interesting thing about the book is that there wasn't, a crazy amount of research to be done. Like the majority of that, I'd say 85% of that is just what I've known already. Um, and stories I know from my family and from my, um, you know, my community and, you know, my upbringing and things that I've learned along the way about

1:09:20the language. And yeah, it's just, it was really, really fun. But, you know, also when we were coming up with the concept of the book, we kind of wanted it to be nearly like a TikToker page, you know, so a different TikToks, I'll take one phrase and I'll teach one phrase and, and, you know, it's just, we wanted it to be clear and concise and kind of just bite-sized a phrase that you could use every single day. And then also a little bit of a deeper delve into it and what it tells us about culture and history. Probably, oh God, like there's so many favorites. Um, I, I love a lot of the, what we have is, um, and the kind of like extra little

1:09:53tidbits of information at the bottom on some of the pages. It's kind of like relatively linked, but not necessarily. And I talk a bit about the phenomenon of the Irish goodbye and how the Irish goodbye has gained like notoriety in media and like everyone talks about the Irish goodbye. And I'm like, like how it's characterized is so not accurate at all. It's like, it's if it's just this magical disappearance that like you just leave an event without saying goodbye. If you did that, there would be search parties sent out for you. Like that is not okay. People are going missing on the daily and blaming it on the Irish goodbye. And I'm like, I don't want to take any credit for this. No, that's not how we say goodbye. Um, but yeah,

1:10:27just, yeah. Another thing I loved was, um, the sentiment of the Irish wake. Um, but this was a nugget of information that actually, um, an ex of mine told me, so I'll be delighted that I've made it into the book, but that, um, the Irish wake, the tradition of, of the Irish wake, which you don't necessarily see mirrored in, in, in other cultures. It came from, um, basically putching. So the traditional Irish distilled drink, alcoholic beverage and, um, putching used to be distilled in lead barrels and also just had such a high concentration of alcohol because it wasn't regulated. So in many cases, either as a result of lead

1:11:01poisoning from the barrels or from just the amount that was consumed at the alcohol percentage, it obviously happened enough that people were prepared to be buried thinking that they were dead. You know, everyone thought that they were dead, but then they would wake up. Um, so it became a tradition in Irish culture to lay the deceased or the presumed deceased out in the house for two or three days, um, before the funeral proceedings to make sure that they wouldn't wake up. So yeah, because people ended up comatose either from this year concentration

1:11:31of the putching, um, or because of the lead poisoning. So yeah, lots of, lots of, there's just so much in there. And then another one I love is the midnight munch. Um, so it was a regulation in Irish, um, nightlife. I suppose anywhere that had a late license for serving alcohol that in the nightclubs, in the pubs, if they're staying open past midnight, they had to serve a meal at midnight to like keep the people going and like give them sustenance. That's similar in Sweden. Really? Does that happen as well? Yeah. Well, so it used to be that everywhere that said alcohol had to also serve food. So you would get like a sandwich being

1:12:05brought out. Like you'd order a drink and there'd be a sandwich, but everyone knew you didn't eat it. You just send it back into the kitchen because you had to order it because you ordered alcohol. So we just go back and forth the same sandwich. You would know which one it is. But then also like at, at weddings, it's still traditional, which we did at our wedding to at midnight serve another meal. So usually it's hot dogs, but you can serve any, any kind of food. Um, but that's mainly for weddings now. I don't. Keep the people going. That's right. Keep the people going on. Some carbs and fat to, to cushion

1:12:37that hamburger as well. Exactly. Yeah. Exactly. Um, but yeah, loads of, oh, it's just, it's, it's a really, um, I think a cozy book to me and, you know, it was, um, written with the international audience in mind. Um, but even for me, myself and, you know, my fellow Irish people who've read it, they said it's so cozy and kind of sentimental and quite nostalgic, you know, and just a nice way, you know, looking at all our little quirks that we have, um, kind of from an outside perspective and just seeing it being framed in that way is, is really beautiful. And it's nice to just kind of revisit that and pay appreciation to it. Um, but yeah, there's

1:13:11a little Irish phrase on every single page that you could, you know, easily, um, integrate into everyday scenarios. And that's what we wanted. We wanted people just to take little bite-sized pieces of the language and learn a bit of culture and history along with it and, um, implement it. Let's open it up to our listeners who have been waiting patiently. If you would like to ask a question to Laura, it doesn't matter which language it's in. If it's, if it's Irish, we would love to hear it. Colin has a question. Hey, Colin, good to see you. Hello, Laura. I've noticed, I think five times you have talked about things as she.

1:13:47Yes. And I'm wondering, is that a personal foible or is it something from your Irish language? Um, so there's a linguistic explanation, but there's also just a cultural, in Ireland, everything is she. If you get a new character, oh Jesus, you know, may she be good to you. Uh, she's a fine motor. Um, you know, she's a good sort. Just in general, everything in Ireland, is she, a bike, a car, a pub, a building, a bus, you know, a lot of things are just she. But then in terms of when I talk about the Irish language, if I talk about the Irish language or

1:14:19Ireland, um, I refer to her as she. Just, just a personal thing. I think it's, it's a way for me to pay homage to the Irish language, even when I'm speaking about her in English, because she's a feminine noun. And yeah, Ireland is named after the goddess Eiru from that stemmed Eiru, which is the name of, um, Ireland in Irish. And, um, yeah, so Ireland is a, is a matriarchy, both culturally, historically, and linguistically. And yeah, Gwailga is a feminine noun because she's the language of a, of a feminine country. And yeah, I just love it. I think it's a lovely way to

1:14:51pay ode to the language. Um, even when I'm speaking about her in English, as opposed to just saying it, I don't just get very impersonal. It wasn't just the Irish language you referred to. I can't remember now, but it was several different things as well. Bunch of things. Bunch of things. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Thank you, Colin. Gwailga. Thanks, Colin. Gwailga. Laura, have you heard a popular expression in Australia is she'll be right, which is, um, it's she. Like it'll be, it'll be okay. And it's always she. It's whatever you're doing,

1:15:24she'll be right. Yeah. Yeah. I love it. I just, I think it's just because we're the ones, aren't we? The ladies are always the ones that figure it out.

1:15:33Pretty good Australian impersonation there. God's sake. Thank you. I like to try my, I'm a bit of an accent fiend, I won't lie. Yeah. Nice. Aria Flayne is here. Hello. Hello. There's a lot going on and I've forgot most of it, but, um, I've learnt Scottish Gaelic rather than Irish. So it's maybe that garlic rather than, I think we, Scottish Gaelic uses Gaelic for Irish, but I could be wrong. I'm a little rusty on that. Um, do you have a favourite Irish

1:16:06word? I, I have two in Scottish Gaelic, which is, um, doi. For some reason, I love the word doi, which is way and smirnychug, which is thinking. Do you have a favourite? Yeah. Just to show how similar the two are for, um, doi is how we say that in Irish and then Sweenaw is thinking. Um, oh, I've lots, I've lots. Um, one of my, I love cackamush, cackamush. I just love the way it sounds. It's kind of like bullshit. Um, cause cack,

1:16:36siassi is, um, like shit, poo. Um, it's poo. And it's like, it's so funny cause like I'd be out walking with like my friends and my family or whatever. And like, I just slip in and out of Irish. So I just be walking, walking down the street and I'd be like, if I see a dog and I'm like, oh, watch the cack. And they're like, no, I can't just say that without the rest of the sentence being in Irish. I'm like, okay. I love, I love siachan. Um, siachan just means like watch, like be careful. You know, if you're about to walk into said cack on the floor, you'd say siachan. Um, I love, yeah, I love siachodes. Siachodes means nonsense

1:17:10or if something is siachodes. Um, it's just nonsensical, you know, like, ah, Jesus, siachodes, you know, if you're calling someone out. Um, there are a few favorites. I love the word for sneeze. It's schnieferts. I just think it's very onomatopoeic. Um, schnieferts, you know, you say it and you kind of nearly want to sneeze. And yeah, there, there are definitely a few favorites that go on and on. I just love, I just love how Irish words sound. And yeah, there are definitely some favorites. Yeah. Thank you so much. Thanks, Aria Flame. Thank you. Magistra Annie's here. Hello. Um, do you have any thoughts

1:17:44about like an Irish diaspora? I guess there's a lot of influence from Irish in Canada and Newfoundland and like the way that they speak is very like, right. Um, like mapped onto like the way that like the Irish language speak, like she's after doing something or things like that. So I don't know, like other, other examples of like where Irish has like left Ireland and like influenced other languages or cultures that, you know, or talk about Newfoundland. I love to talk about Newfoundland. Yes. I literally, I only seen TikTok. I don't know

1:18:14a crazy amount about it, but I literally only seen TikToks of like the people from there speaking. And I was like, whoa, um, that is crazy. But yeah, there was a section in the book about Hiberno-English, um, and kind of idioms. And, um, yeah, I just love Hiberno-English. So like the biggest one that you would hear a lot is like the do be tense in English. Um, and yeah, it's the continuous present tense in Irish. So being Shane of X, Y, Z, he does be doing X, Y, Z. Um, and yeah, so everything in Ireland is do be, he does be busy of a Saturday morning. He does be