Welcome to the second Motherfoclóir Mailbag show! Listener feedback allows us to see how we’re doing, bring any clarifications to light and gives us ideas for new shows. You can email us at motherfocloir@headstuff.org if you want to get in touch, or even leave a review on iTunes. Correspondence has been flooding in from near and far in relation to recent episodes. Regular offenders Darach and Gearóidín are joined by neutral observers Antoin Beag and Aifric who consider topics ranging from pronun...
Jul 06, 2018•37 min•Ep. 45
Your ex – the one who doesn’t like you as much as you like them and knows it – sends a “you up?” text at 11.32pm. Should you not pick up the phone… or, instead of replying, why not practice your Irish on Duolingo instead? The popularity of Duolingo’s Irish course flies in the face of critics of the language and has been a huge encouragement to those involved in the promotion of Irish. How can we capitalise on this interest? In this week’s episode, Darach and Peadar are joined by Alan Maguire and...
Jun 29, 2018•46 min•Ep. 44
This week's episode is about Bród - no, not Miggledy Higgins's best dog (sorry Shadow!) but LGBTQ+ Pride, which is celebrated in Dublin from the 21st to the 30th of June. Ever since the 2015 marriage equality referendum and the ascension of Leo Varadkar to Taoiseach, LGBTQ+ inclusion has been central to how Ireland has presented itself to the world. However, this is an all-too-recent development and until 2018's publication of An Foclóir Aiteach (the Queer Dictionary) the vocabulary for many ter...
Jun 22, 2018•34 min•Ep. 43
In the second episode from our live show at the International Literature Festival Dublin, Darach and Éimear are joined by the King of (Book) Clubs himself, Mr. Rick O'Shea. The Rick O'Shea Book Club (ROSBC) has over 17,000 members and has managed to maintain a cordial atmosphere and a low spoiler rate in an internet otherwise teeming with mean jerks. How does he do it? He tells us the secret, as well as answering questions from the audience (including Darach's Mam). You can find ROSBC on [Facebo...
Jun 15, 2018•56 min•Ep. 42
In this week's episode - recorded live at Smock Alley Theatre as part of the International Literature Festival Dublin - Darach and Éimear are joined by Terry O'Hagan, the man behind the Vox Hiberionacum blog. Terry's research combines history, archaeology and linguistics as he tackles misconceptions about early medieval Ireland. Celts, Druids, Ogham and snakes all get a sceptical interrogation and we even hear about fart jokes and hungover doodles from the 7th Century. You can see Terry's blog h...
Jun 08, 2018•38 min•Ep. 41
The Irish for Wakanda Forever is "an Uácaind Abú!" The Irish language has enough problems to deal with without being co-opted by bigots. Earlier this year, for example, a protester against the Black Lives Matter movement in America wore a t-shirt bearing the slogan "gorm chonaí ábhar", a translation of Blue Lives Matter so bad it's hard to know where to even begin correcting it. Irish survives and thrives as a confident, modern language that welcomes all the people who want to speak it. In today...
Jun 01, 2018•31 min•Ep. 40
It's Referendum Day, and given the massive task of counting votes that is ahead of us, what better time to chat about the way counting works in Irish? It's all especially intriguing as the way we count people is different than the counting of mere objects and beasts. Peadar tells Darach about Irish dancing, the link in counting between uimhir a sé and the séimhiú and the mysteries of plural nouns in both languages. Also, Darach has an epiphany about 1980s children's telly. --- Contact the show a...
May 25, 2018•40 min•Ep. 39
There's been a lot of talk about obstreperous women lately, so what better time to consider the fierce female characters of the Táin? In this week's episode, Éimear tells Darach about Cuchulainn's wife Emer (pronounced Ever in the old Irish) and Caitlín discusses how Medb has been represented over time. There's still time to buy tickets for the Motherfoclóir live show! http://ilfdublin.com/events/motherfocloir-live-podcast --- Contact the show at https://twitter.com/motherfocloir or email us at ...
May 18, 2018•41 min•Ep. 38
Host Darach and Motherfoclóir regular Siún share many obsessions, but the one they discuss on today's show is the writer Flann O'Brien… also known as Myles na gCopeleen… also known as Brian O'Nolan. As a displaced Northerner, O'Nolan was an outsider in the Irish language word in the Free State, belonging to neither the official Gaeltachts nor the bourgeois Dublin revivalists. This - as well as the restrictions placed on published writings by civil servants - contributed to a body of writing that...
May 04, 2018•38 min•Ep. 37
The number 8 is full of mystery in the Irish language. There's the "hateful eight" letters that were added in the 20th century. There's a Eighth Amendment, which you may have heard of. And then there's Article 8 of Bunreacht na hÉireann. In this week's episode of Motherfoclóir, Gearóidín wants to clear up any confusion between Article 8 (the status of the Irish and English languages) and the 8th Amendment. They discuss shade in the constitution, the importance of not taking individual lines out ...
Apr 27, 2018•32 min•Ep. 36
This week Darach is in London on Motherfoclóir business and is broadcasting from the British Library at Kings Cross rather than the HeadStuff studios. This setting is appropriate as this week's topic is An Vicipéid, the Irish language portion of Wikipedia. Darach is joined by Dr. Claire Murray, a chemist by day and lover of the world's free online encyclopedia. As well as giving an overview of her own work, Claire tells Darach about the standards Wikipedia expects and enforces and they encourage...
Apr 20, 2018•38 min•Ep. 35
"Are we all just characters in a Roddy Doyle Facebook status?" Dublin City's official motto is Obedientia Civium Urbis Felicitas - obedient citizens, happy city. But do they obey because they're happy or are they happy because they obey? It's a suitably elliptical sentence for a city defined by its murky relationships with obedience and happiness. In this week's episode, Peadar and Darach consider Dublin's happily disobedient use of language. In particular they consider certain articles of Dubli...
Apr 13, 2018•25 min•Ep. 34
Today's episode is a game of two halves. In part one Darach chats to Jody Coogan about certain articles of Hiberno-English slang (specifically, Munster slang) and they discuss whether they have an Irish origin or not. Such slang words enter the language when spoken English and Irish collide. Speaking of spoken Irish… in part two, Darach is visited by Ola, Clodagh and Gearóidín and they discuss the Irish Leaving Cert Oral exam and go through the irregular verbs (Bí, Feic, Téigh, Déan, Faigh, Abai...
Apr 06, 2018•34 min•Ep. 33
"Languages are like ogres; they have layers". Éimear Duffy knows a thing or two about Ireland and Irish in the rare aul' times (specifically the 7th to 9th century). In this week's episode, she tells Darach and Gearóidín about widespread misconceptions of early Irish society, honour prices of different statuses of people, the random sequence of recorded events in the annals and even how to retrofit modern words into earlier forms of Irish. --- Contact the show at https://twitter.com/motherfocloi...
Mar 30, 2018•34 min•Ep. 32
Teresa Lynn is a computational linguist who specialises in technology and Irish language. She visits Darach, Gearóidín and Ola on today's episode to defend machine translation from all the misguided criticism it's been getting. She also talks about how systems like Bing and Google Translate work, emergency translation and the phenomenon of code switching. You can find out more about her work here: http://www.computing.dcu.ie/~tlynn/ --- Contact the show at https://twitter.com/motherfocloir or em...
Mar 23, 2018•31 min•Ep. 31
It has been said that bookshops are the afterlife for good trees and the sound of turning pages is a kind of prayer to them. Belfast bookworm Caitlín Nic Íomhair is the manager of An Siopa Leabhar on Harcourt Street, Dublin’s finest specialist Irish language bookshop. Just like another famous Harcourt Street institution, the walls of An Siopa Leabhar stand witness to tales of heartbreak and debauchery… but unlike Coppers, they usually have page numbers on them here. She tells Darach and Éimear a...
Mar 16, 2018•22 min•Ep. 30
There's going to be a lot of talk about Bunreacht na hÉireann in the coming weeks, a document where the subtle differences between wording in English and in Irish can make a big difference. In today's episode, Gearóidín and Darach look at the constitution in general but the 8th Amendment in particular, putting its origins in context and outlining the relevant Irish terminology. Although there is no swearing in today's episode, the subject matter necessarily leads the discussion into adult themes...
Mar 09, 2018•35 min•Ep. 29
Ireland has been producing some remarkable YA fiction in recent years, much of which has addressed received notions of Irishness implicitly and explicitly. This is a valuable exercise in the context of Ireland and the Irish language being used as tropes in YA and fantasy literature abroad. In this week's episode, Irish Book Award winner Darach Ó Séaghdha interviews Irish Book Award winner Dave Rudden (ably assisted by future Irish Book Award winner Ola Majekodunmi). They chat about the writing p...
Mar 02, 2018•35 min•Ep. 28
As languages don't match each other exactly, linguists and psychologists have debated if specific grammatical features shape the thought patterns of separate language communities differently. Are Germans better listeners than Greeks because they are politely waiting for the verb at the end of the sentence? Are they more punctual because their half six really means half five? This concept pops up in Irish most frequently when we translate the English words "yes" and "no", words which have a power...
Feb 23, 2018•25 min•Ep. 27
The Buddha teaches that "when words are true and kind, they can change our world". Today's special guest, Sineád Burke, exemplified this spirit when she decided to get an entry included for "little person" in the Irish language to supersede the unsuitable existing terms. She tells Darach, Éimear and Gearóidín all about the process in this episode as they discuss attitudes to language, ability, disability and who gets to decide what "normal" is. You can find out more about the work of Little Peop...
Feb 15, 2018•30 min•Ep. 26
"An sgéal fada ní hé is fearr" - the longest tale is not the best. As Valentine's Day approaches, the Motherfoclóir gang turn their thoughts to the wealth of love poetry written in the Irish language. Darach, Éimear and Peadar take turns reading poems (and their English translations) from "Filíocht Ghrá Na Gaeilge", which covers a thousand years of Irish love poetry. It covers the whole spectrum of the human heart. While the gang don't swear, there are adult themes in the episode. You can buy th...
Feb 09, 2018•34 min•Ep. 25
The beating heart of this podcast is its wonderful lucht leanúna - the loyal listeners. We're always keen to know how you think we're getting on, and in today's episode Darach, Éimear, Peadar and Gearóidín read out and discuss some of the correspondence we've received. Will your letter be in there? --- Contact the show at https://twitter.com/motherfocloir or email us at motherfocloir@headstuff.org. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Feb 02, 2018•55 min
"Éist means listen, péist is a worm, éistphéist is an earworm". Just like Alan Rickman's character in Die Hard, Darach rhapsodises over the benefits of a classical education in today's episode. The genitive case is the grammatical device in languages that applies to possession… and as possession is nine tenths of the law, it gets our attention today. In the lucid company Gearóidín and Peadar, Darach examines the séimhiú- when it is and isn't used and what to watch out for. Did all the Cockney dr...
Jan 26, 2018•34 min•Ep. 23
The Irish for a chat-up line is 'briathra meala'. An innocent bystander might be forgiven for thinking that there are two Carl Kinsellas: one, the articulate and outspoken writer with joe.ie… and the other, the High King of Irish pun gags on Twitter. Carl joins Darach and Éimear in the studio in this week's episode and talks about the cheesy bilingual chat-up lines that have made him an internet star. They also discuss the perils of the tinder age and going viral (and give out about various spec...
Jan 19, 2018•24 min•Ep. 22
“By fifth and sixth year, you’re dreaming in Irish”. It’s a little Coláiste Íosagáin reunion on Motherfoclóir this week as Darach is outnumbered by two past pupils: regular contributor Ola Majekodunmi and special guest Ailbhe Malone, who is Lifestyle Editor at Buzzfeed UK (after stints with NME, Nylon, Heat, the Irish Independent and many others). Ailbhe tells us about moving from an English language primary school to an Irish language secondary school, shares her stories about getting a foot in...
Jan 12, 2018•32 min
Although it is regularly cited as the reason some people dislike Irish, Peig has been off the school curriculum for so long that we have adult Irish speakers wandering the streets and hills who were born after its removal. One such adult is the effortlessly cool catóg Clodagh McGinley, who you’ll remember from recent episodes. She tells Darach about the differences between studying Irish at school and at university, moving from the world of sraith pics to the wonders of Cúirt an Mheán Oíche. ---...
Jan 05, 2018•25 min
So here we are, at the end of another year, the 2017th year… can you believe there have already be 2017 years on this planet? Amazing really. Anyway, what we have compiled here is the best of The HeadStuff Podcast Network 2017, short clips from a range of our shows. If something piques your fancy, […] La entrada Best of The HeadStuff Podcast Network 2017 se publicó primero en Headstuff. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Dec 29, 2017•39 min
Nollaig shona to all our listeners! In today’s very special yuletide special, Gearóidín tells the gang about Christmas in Finland, Peadar gets excited about wrens, Darach dwells on the practicalities of decorating with a toddler and Clodagh reminisces over Sylvanian Families. Please consider supporting one of the charities listed in today’s podcast. --- Contact the show at https://twitter.com/motherfocloir or email us at motherfocloir@headstuff.org. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaph...
Dec 22, 2017•50 min
“Chomh ramhar le rón – as chubby as a seal” In Germany, BMW (Bayerische Motoren Werke) is pronounced BMV. In Latin, Vs are pronounced as Ws. Humans have been switching these sounds with each other for some time. While neither V nor W are in the traditional 18 letter alphabet, W is so verboten that it is often replaced with a V in some loanwords – tvúit for tweet being a famous example. In Irish, the letters B and M –when combined with a h – can make a V sound (Siobhán, Niamh) or a W (abhaile, ra...
Dec 15, 2017•29 min
As the author of five YA novels and the presenter of HeadStuff’s Sweet Valley High podcast “Double Love”, Anna Carey knows a thing or two about teen drama. In this week’s episode, she joins Darach and Éimear to share her memories of being a cinnire (a camp counsellor at Irish college) during the 1990s. They discuss how mix tapes and graffiti were the ancestors of today’s social networking, the translation of pop song lyrics to Irish, narcs, céilís and slang as Gaeilge. --- Contact the show at ht...
Dec 08, 2017•30 min
