Ulster Irish
Ulster Irish is the variety of Irish spoken in the province of Ulster. It has much in common with Scottish Gaelic and Manx. Within Ulster there have historically been two main sub-dialects: West Ulster and East Ulster. The Western dialect is spoken in parts of County Donegal and was once spoken in parts of neighbouring counties, hence the name 'Donegal Irish'. The Eastern dialect was spoken in most of the rest of Ulster and northern parts of counties Louth and Meath.
History
Ulster Irish was the main language spoken in most of Ulster from the earliest recorded times even before Ireland became a jurisdiction in the 1300s. Since the Plantation, Ulster Irish was steadily replaced by English and Ulster Scots, largely as a result of incoming settlers. The Eastern dialect died out in the 20th century, but the Western lives on in the Gaeltacht region of County Donegal. In 1808, County Down natives William Neilson and Patrick Lynch published a detailed study on Ulster Irish. Both Neilson and his father were Ulster-speaking Presbyterian ministers. When the recommendations of the first Comisiún na Gaeltachta were drawn up in 1926, there were regions qualifying for Gaeltacht recognition in the Sperrins and the northern Glens of Antrim and Rathlin Island. The report also makes note of small pockets of Irish speakers in northwest County Cavan, southeast County Monaghan, and the far south of County Armagh. However, these small pockets vanished early in the 20th century while Ulster Irish in the Sperrins survived until the 1950s and in the Glens of Antrim until the 1970s. The last native speaker of Rathlin Irish died in 1985.According to Innti poet and scholar of Modern literature in Irish Louis de Paor, Belfast Irish, "a new urban dialect", of Ulster Irish, was "forged in the heat of Belfast during The Troubles" and is the main language spoken in the Gaeltacht Quarter of the city. The same dialect, according to de Paor, has been used in the poetry of Gearóid Mac Lochlainn and other radically innovative writers like him.
Phonology
Consonants
The phonemic consonant inventory of Ulster Irish is as shown in the following chart. Symbols appearing in the upper half of each row are velarized while those in the bottom half are palatalized. The consonants are neither broad nor slender.Some characteristics of the phonology of Ulster Irish that distinguish it from the other dialects are:
- is always the approximant. In other dialects, fricative is found instead of or in addition to. No dialect makes a phonemic contrast between the approximant and the fricative, however.
- There is a three-way distinction among coronal nasals,, and laterals,, as there is in Scottish Gaelic, and there is no lengthening or diphthongization of short vowels before these sounds and. Thus, while ceann "head" is in Connacht and in Munster, in Ulster it is
- is pronounced as if it is spelled after consonants other than. This happens in Connacht and Scottish Gaelic as well.
- is often realised as and can completely disappear word finally, hence unstressed - is realised as,, or. For some speakers is realised as.
Vowels
The long vowels have short allophones in unstressed syllables and before. In addition, Ulster has the diphthongs.
- Before, where an unstressed schwa is found in other dialects, Ulster has with secondary stress, e.g. feargach "angry" and iománaíocht "hurling".
- is more fronted in Ulster than Connacht and Munster, as or even preceding slender consonants. Unstressed and merge with as .
- Stressed word final,, and preceding a syllable containing tend to represent. For example maith "good" and cathaoir "chair", in contrast to and found in other regions.
- Stressed,, as well as after an initial, represent which generally merges with in younger speech.
- has three main allophones: morpheme finally and after broad consonants, before broad consonants, before slender consonants.
- Stressed and represent rather than which is found in the other dialects.
- before broad consonants merges with, and vice versa. That is, merges with before slender consonants.
- represents for many speakers, but it often merges with especially in younger speech.
- and are pronounced, unless beside where they raise to, the main realisation in other dialects, e.g. fón póca "mobile phone".
- Stressed,, and mainly represent, not as in the other dialects.
- Word final unstressed represents, not as in the other dialects, e.g. for samhradh "summer".
- Word final and merge with and, respectively, e.g. leanbh "baby", déanamh "make", samhraidh "summer " and bailigh "collect". Both merge with in Connacht, while in Munster, they are realised and, respectively.
- According to Ó Dochartaigh, the loss of final schwa "is a well-attested feature of Ulster Irish", e.g. for fada "long".
East Ulster and West Ulster
- In West Ulster and most of Ireland, the vowel written is pronounced , but in East Ulster it was pronounced . J. J. Kneen comments that Scottish Gaelic and Manx generally follow the East Ulster pronunciation. The name Seán is pronounced in Munster and in West Ulster, but in East Ulster, whence anglicized spellings like Shane O'Neill and Glenshane.
- In East Ulster, in the middle of a word tended to vanish and leave one long syllable. William Neilson wrote that this happens "in most of the counties of Ulster, and the east of Leinster".
- Neilson wrote was, especially at the beginning or end of a word "is still retained in the North of Ireland, as in Scotland, and the Isle of Man", whereas "throughout Connaught, Leinster and some counties of Ulster, the sound of is substituted". However, broad may become in the middle of a word.
Morphology
Initial mutations
Ulster Irish has the same two initial mutations, lenition and eclipsis, as the other two dialects and the standard language, and mostly uses them the same way. There is, however, one exception: in Ulster, a dative singular noun after the definite article is lenited , whereas in Connacht and Munster, it is eclipsed, except in the case of den, don and insan, where lenition occurs in literary language. Both possibilities are allowed for in the standard language.Verbs
are characterized by having a mixture of analytic forms and synthetic forms in their conjugation. In Ulster and North Connacht the analytic forms are used in a variety of forms where the standard language has synthetic forms, e.g. molann muid "we praise" or mholfadh siad "they would praise". The synthetic forms, including those no longer emphasised in the standard language, may be used in short answers to questions.The 2nd conjugation future stem suffix in Ulster is -óch- rather than -ó-, e.g. beannóchaidh mé "I will bless".
Some irregular verbs have different forms in Ulster from those in the standard language. For example:
- níom "I do, make" and rinn mé "I did, made"
- tchíom "I see"
- bheiream "I give", ní thabhram or ní thugaim "I do not give", and bhéarfaidh mé/bheirfidh mé "I will give"
- gheibhim "I get", ní fhaighim "I do not get"
- abraim "I say, speak"
Particles
| Ulster | Standard | English |
| Cha dtuigim | Ní thuigim | "I don't understand" |
| Chan fhuil sé/Cha bhfuil sé | Níl sé | "He isn't" |
| Cha bhíonn sé | Ní bheidh sé | "He will not be" |
| Cha phógann muid/Cha bpógann muid | Ní phógaimid | "We do not kiss" |
| Chan ólfadh siad é | Ní ólfaidís é | "They wouldn't drink it" |
| Char thuig mé thú | Níor thuig mé thú | "I didn't understand you" |
In the Past Tense, some irregular verbs are lenited/eclipsed in the Interrogative/Negative that differ from the standard, due to the various particles that may be preferred:
| Interrogative | Negative | English |
| An raibh tú? | Cha raibh mé | "I was not" |
| An dtearn tú? | Cha dtearn mé | "I did not do, make" |
| An dteachaigh tú? | Cha dteachaigh mé | "I did not go" |
| An dtáinig tú? | Cha dtáinig mé | "I did not come" |
| An dtug tú? | Cha dtug mé | "I did not give" |
| Ar chuala tú? | Char chuala mé | "I did not hear" |
| Ar dhúirt tú? | Char dhúirt mé | "I did not say" |
| An bhfuair tú? | Chan fhuair mé | "I did not get" |
| Ar rug tú? | Char rug mé | "I did not catch, bear" |
| Ar ith tú? | Char ith mé | "I did not eat" |
| Ar chígh tú/An bhfaca tú? | Chan fhaca mé | "I did not see" |
Syntax
The Ulster dialect uses the present tense of the subjunctive mood in certain cases where other dialects prefer to use the future indicative:The verbal noun can be used in subordinate clauses with a subject different from that of the main clause: