While I was in Ireland last month I went to an interesting talk by Michael McCaughan at which he launched his book, Coming Home: One man’s return to the Irish Language.

I have just finished reading the book, and found it very interesting. Although he had to study Irish in school, like everybody else in Ireland, he wasn’t able to speak the language after finishing school. While working as a journalist in South America, he was often asked about the Irish language when people found out he was from Ireland, and he became ashamed that he couldn’t speak it, apart from odd phrases. He became determind to master Irish, and wrote the book about his Irish learning adventures, and also about the history and current state of the language.

He discusses the challenges of learning a minority language, including finding people to talk to, and pursuading native speakers to speak Irish to you, even though it is often easier them to switch to English, unless you’re very fluent. He talks about the growth of Irish in Northern Ireland in both Catholic and Protestant communities, where there is a real hunger for the language. People there don’t let minor things like lack of funds or official permission stop them from setting up schools, radio stations and other things.

If you have any interest in the Irish language and/or Ireland, this book is worth reading.

A friend of mine has a similar story: she grew up in Wales but had no interest in learning Welsh at school. After learning school, she went travelling in Eastern Europe, and was often asked about Wales and the Welsh language when people found out where she was from. She became determined to learn Welsh, and in less then a year, during which time she studied Welsh everyday, and shared a flat with native Welsh speakers, she was more or less fluent. She won the Welsh Learner of the Year competition in 2008, and went on to do a degree in Celtic Studies at Aberystwyth University.

In order to appreciate your own language and culture, is it necessary to spend time in other countries?

Quite a few people I’ve talked to here in Glencolmcille have told me that Irish is a difficult language. This got me thinking about what makes a language difficult to learn.

Here are some aspects of Irish that learners may find difficult:

Spelling and Pronunciation
Irish spelling takes quite a while to get used to. It is far more regular than English, though works in different ways, and there are many silent letters. For example, bhfaigheadh (would get) is pronounced [wiu], which you would never guess from the spelling. Some older Irish texts are written in the Gaelic Script (An Cló Gaelach), which adds a extra layer of difficulty.

Vocabulary
Irish vocabulary is quite different to English, and most other European languages, so very few words are familiar to learners, unless they know Scottish Gaelic or Manx. There are words borrowed from English, and a few from Latin, though.

Grammar
Irish grammar is similar to the other Celtic languages, but quite different to other European languages. For example, the word order is VSO (Verb, Subject, Object); verbs have positive (tá = am/is/are), negative (níl = am not/isn’t/aren’t) and question forms (an bhfuil = am/is/are?); there is no verb ‘to have’; there are no single words for yes or no, and the pronouns fuse with prepositions – le (with) and mé (I) becomes liom, do (to) tú (you, singular) becomes duit, and so on. On the other hand, there are only 11 irregular verbs, no indefinite articles, and verbs only conjugate for person and number in some tenses.

Dialects
Like many languages, Irish has dialects. The differences between then are mainly in pronunciation and vocabulary. If you learn one, you might find the others a little difficult to understand at first, but before long you’ll be able to understand most things.

These are all things that can be difficult in any language. Basically the more differences there are between your mother tongue and the language(s) you’re learning, the more challenging it will be.

Have you learnt or are you learning Irish?

Do you find it difficult?

What aspects of Irish do you find most challenging?