must...increase...competencies..

[featherynscale]

I spent some quality time on the ADF website last night, doing some work on tonight's Wild Hare Samhain ritual (I am not a member, but triadruid is, and was kind enough to let me use his login to poke about), and discovered that they've got audio files of a very musical-sounding fellow speaking useful ritual words in Welsh. So I learned some of them, what fun! (No, really. Seriously. Welsh = fun sounds in my mouth.)

So I was thinking to myself that I should learn to speak Welsh. I mean, it's exactly the sort of skill that I can get excited about having: It'd be fun to practice, I could pretend that it's religiously motivated, and it would be almost completely useless in day to day existence. What could be better than that?

Comments

[duriyah.livejournal.com]

Welsh is the most beautiful language I have ever heard spoken. I think learning Welsh is a fabulous idea.

Iechyd da!

[featherynscale.livejournal.com]

I am really looking forward to working on this -- thank you for the words of encouragement. :)

yea for the welsh

[rio-luna.livejournal.com]

years ago I took a celtic language & lit class with a prof from Dublin. part fot eh fun waslearning this weird-feaky phonology and vocab, and the way things would rapidly dissolve into Yiddish if you didn't take care.
\
i think that would be a very cool project.

Re: yea for the welsh

[triadruid.livejournal.com]

We mentioned last night that it's got a lot of the same phonemes as Yiddish... this was an audio file of somewhat limited quality, so it was occasionally hard to parse as anything else.

Re: yea for the welsh

[featherynscale.livejournal.com]

What does one study in Celtic lit, exactly?

Re: yea for the welsh

[rio-luna.livejournal.com]

lotsa folklore, actually. we learned about the different types of stories in the various oral traditons and read parts of the Mabinogi in translation.

[fionnabhar.livejournal.com]

I don't know where you could do that locally. I emailed the St. David's Society or whatever it's called, offering them a free antique Welsh bible, and I got no response whatsoever. Would you for some reason be interested in having it? I could bring to tonight even.

[featherynscale.livejournal.com]

That would be full of shiny -- then I would have a text to practice the reading with that I'm already somewhat familiar with. Yay! Thank you!

[hrj.livejournal.com]

The "classical" translation of the Bible into Welsh is a literary masterpiece and well worth practicing on. You will, however, run smack dab into the differences between literary Welsh and modern everyday spoken Welsh. Personally, I think that having a grounding in the literary language can give you a much more solid context for the spoken vernacular, but there are a lot of differences between the two. (I've had an even worse time trying to get my brain around modern spoken Welsh since my primary study has been the 13-14th century language. If you're ever tempted down that path, check out the forever-in-progress lessons I set up at http://www.heatherrosejones.com/medievalwelshlessons/index.html (http://www.heatherrosejones.com/medievalwelshlessons/index.html).

[fionnabhar.livejournal.com]

It's yours, then. It dates from at about the mid-1800s. It was purchased for me ostensibly as a Gaelic bible, but alas, it is Teh Welsh.

Gwefreiddiol !

[gamera-spinning.livejournal.com]

"Edmund: Have you ever been to Wales, Baldrick?

Baldrick: No, but I've often thought I'd like to.

Edmund: Well don't, it's a ghastly place. Huge gangs of tough sinewy men roam the valleys terrifying people with their close harmony singing. You need half a pint of phlegm in your throat just to pronounce the placenames. Never ask for directions in Wales Baldrick, you'll be washing spit out of your hair for a fortnight."
-Black Adder, Amy and Amiability

Joking aside, it can be a beautiful language. There are some Welsh phrases for practice here. And if not, and you're still looking for languages that useless in your day to day existence, there's always esperanto (which is good to know if you find yourself watching the film Incubus featuring William Shatner, which was filmed entirely in Esperanto).

Re: Gwefreiddiol !

[featherynscale.livejournal.com]

I have just added "watching Shatner films in Esperanto" to the list of things I hope I never have to do. Who knew that such a thing even existed?

Aside from that, though, I rather like close-harmony singing, and appreciate the link.

Let's see Mel Gibson make an entire film in Esperanto

[gamera-spinning.livejournal.com]

Though I have never actually seen Incubus, I have purchased it as a gag-birthday gift after it came out on DVD. I expect it's noted in the Geneva Convention and is probably being used on people in Guantanamo.

Close harmony singing is indeed a good thing, despite what Black Adder says.

Re: Let's see Mel Gibson make an entire film in Esperanto

[wildnsquirrelly.livejournal.com]

"Let's see Mel Gibson make an entire film in Esperanto"

No. That one guy that doesn't need any encouragement to create hours upon hours of snail-paced storyline and con some poor schmuck of a producer into fronting the deal.

Keep in mind that the man's recovering from alcoholism, and he's likely to obsess on something just like that to keep his mind off of wanting the booze.

Once more, just for good measure, No.

[lady-bronwyn.livejournal.com]

How cool!

I studied Welsh as part of my translations comparisons for my master's degree, using the text _the Mabinogion._ Good and tough lanuguage --I adore the bumper sticker, "Vowels for Wales," ah, how true that is....

I have dictionaries, books, and more books if you are interested.

BTW, there is a traveling Welsh intensive that I took the year it was at Berkeley (1998?), and it rocked verily. They will be heading to New York in 2007, which is not too bad for airfare, actually. Check out Cwrs Cymraeg: http://www.madog.org/cyrsiau/eleni/index.shtml

A few helpful links:
A Welsh Course//online : http://www.cs.cf.ac.uk/fun/welsh/Welsh.html

I cannot find the link to the professor whose website helped me immensely; he was helpful in preparing my defense. Any rate, at one point, I wanted to teach English classes to kids in Wales. Alas, no more...other things happened in life. Of course, due to the outright banning of the language in the 1940s and 1050s in the UK, school kids today in Wales are required to be dual-languaged so that they can maintain cultural heritage and presence. It is amazing at the initiatives the UK government put forth to re-acclimate new generations into Welsh, despite the prejudices against the Welsh speaking population for centuries.

Good luck!!

[lady-bronwyn.livejournal.com]

How cool!

I studied Welsh as part of my translations comparisons for my master's degree, using the text _the Mabinogion._ Good and tough lanuguage --I adore the bumper sticker, "Vowels for Wales," ah, how true that is....

I have dictionaries, books, and more books if you are interested.

BTW, there is a traveling Welsh intensive that I took the year it was at Berkeley (1998?), and it rocked verily. They will be heading to New York in 2007, which is not too bad for airfare, actually. Check out Cwrs Cymraeg: http://www.madog.org/cyrsiau/eleni/index.shtml

A few helpful links:
A Welsh Course//online : http://www.cs.cf.ac.uk/fun/welsh/Welsh.html

I cannot find the link to the professor whose website helped me immensely; he was helpful in preparing my defense. Any rate, at one point, I wanted to teach English classes to kids in Wales. Alas, no more...other things happened in life. Of course, due to the outright banning of the language in the 1940s and 1050s in the UK, school kids today in Wales are required to be dual-languaged so that they can maintain cultural heritage and presence. It is amazing at the initiatives the UK government put forth to re-acclimate new generations into Welsh, despite the prejudices against the Welsh speaking population for centuries.

Good luck!!