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Pronouncing celtic names driving me crazy!


Jay3fer
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Trying to introduce some Celtic (or Celtic-style) read-alouds to go along with our SOTW Middle Ages history readings, but I keep getting stuck on the awful unpronounceable consonant and vowel patterns in the names!

 

Are there any guidelines anywhere for pronouncing some of the more common names?

Any websites with audio so I can get a good listen?

 

Also, since I'm curious... why am I finding these so hard when I have dealt with all manner of strange pronunciations before now, including German, French, Arabic, Chinese and more...? Does anyone else have this problem?

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I don't know any resource exactly, a good book should have a pronunciation guide somewhere.

 

As a tip, consonants we have a soft pronunciation for are nearly always hard. And consonants that are usually hard are soft, especially in the middle. And all vowel clusters elide.

 

Sorry, that's not very helpful. Hopefully, someone else can give some good specifics.

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Thank you for the link! My dd11 is an Irish dancer and I can't pronounce the names of most of the other dance schools. Often for competitions, the hotel rooms are discounted, but the block is reserved under the name of school that sponsors the competition, and I can't prounounce it! The reservations clerk has try to find the block based on my poor efforts at prounouncing something that is not pronounceable for most Americans, LOL.

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My dd competes in Irish fiddle and last year I volunteered to help out at the competition. My job was to call the kids up to compete and nearly half the names were Gaelic with extra consonants everywhere. I butchered them the first round then got smart and asked the judges pronunciations of the names for the next round before it started. After all that practice, I am getting pretty good at Gaelic names now.

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Oh, wow... IrishMum, that Irish Baby Names site may make things very nice and simple, plus it's Frank McCourt. I didn't even realize it was him until he was pronouncing a name and I thought, "that sounds just like Angela's Ashes!"

 

It doesn't have all the names, but does give a good idea of how to pronounce tricky consonants, like that "m". :-)

Thanks!

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