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- "Tá an phéitseog agus na mils…
"Tá an phéitseog agus na milseáin sa chuisneoir."
Translation:The peach and the sweets are in the fridge.
100 Comments
I'm not wild about having new vocabulary in the eclipsis and lenition lessons. They're already super complicated for a new learner, and I would rather see the changes made to words I already know. This lesson isn't helping me.
It helps me greatly to write the Tips & Notes section down. Not in its entirety, just my own understanding of it. Lenition seems like it's all over the place at first, but there are patterns.
I wonder if there is a way to look at the tips and notes on the mobile app. I feel like I am just trotting along memorizing words and trying to figure out how they fit together with no guidance or understanding.
Here here! Doulingo, if you're listening, please do this!
I downloaded the app and used it exclusively. I had no idea the "tips" sections even existed! I completed every lesson to level 5 all the way to Genetives before discovering it on the website, after hitting a bunch of walls. I realizing I had to go back and look at all the tips. They are conceptual lessons ahead of the practical ones and it made SO much more sense after reading them. Now I have my phone browser open to doulingo.com while using the app, so I can select the tips.
PLEASE DOULINGO, MAKE TIPS AVAILABLE ON THE APP!
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It's not actually the case with all the courses. The more popular languages, e.g. Spanish or German, the tips page are totally accessible from the app. There's even speaking exercises, a lot more audio samples and a slow speaking button in case you didn't quite hear what was said. I'm not really sure why thats the case, it just seems like they don't fully commit to less popular course choices
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The tips are more accessible in the practice mode. you find these in lessons completed and the orange presents as cracked. Hope this helps
I log into a browser on my phone and can read the tips there. It's been a huge help, even though I still use the app for the lessons.
Well said. When I'm focusing on lenition, I agree that the patterns become visible, especially once I internalized the slender vowel thing. But in this lesson it feels like I have to work doubly hard with new vocabulary, first to learn and understand it, and then also apply my already shaky understanding. Learning new mutations of vocabulary we've had for a while seems more useful at this point.
They could include words introduced earlier. Funnily enough, some complain that the questions are too repetitive.
I highlight all the 'Tips & Notes', right click and Copy. Then I print out and also save to my DuoLingo/Languages/Irish file. I find this helps with comprehension and revision.
It's outrageous that no attempt is made to add the tips section to the mobile app. A LOT of people exclusively use it.
I agree. When I was doing Spanish in Duo, I had access to the tips and notes on my phone. But, for Irish, I don't. I don't understand why Irish tips and notes can't be added to the app for Irish. It would help a lot! I don't always have access to my computer, so it's very convenient to be able to do Duo on my phone.
There is nothing to stop mobile users from opening the website in the web browser on their device, and accessing the Tips and Notes in the browser. That way, they can access the notes while they are in the middle of doing an exercise, if they want to, something that would be not be possible if you were using the app to access the notes.
Where are Tips & Notes? I've never seen any and can't figure out what gets lenition and what doesn't! I only have a computer, no apps and no phone stuff.
On the website, when you click on a Skill to practise, there is a light-bulb icon if there are Tips & Notes available for that skill.
Click on the light-bulb.
Yes yes yes thank you! I thought I had just missed something somewhere but I don't remember getting half these words before!
All the vocab we have learned thus far was masculine nouns - if they had taken your suggestion we would have missed out on a rather important rule - feminine nouns being lenited after an.
No, if they had used JoeyH's suggestion we would have learned more feminine nouns before this lesson.
On the other hand we probably wouldn't know which ones are feminine abd which ones are masculine, since that cannot always be so easily determined. Therefore we would be way more confused at this point since that pattern would escape us
I disagree. I think it would have given early exposure to the pattern making it an easier transition. All you have to do is not mark as incorrect for missed lenition before this lesson.
But still notify us that they are lenited, so we don't learn to use words incorrectly, then unlearn our mistakes. I got used to an bhean and maidin mhaith, so I assumed that bean and maith were feminine, but I didn't like to make assumptions about too many words. I hadn't heard of lenition at that point, but it didn't matter.
@JoeyH, i agree, all this lesson is doing is telling you that their are peaches and sweets in the fridge 50 different ways. I started duolingo to learn Irish, and i all ready know what sweets, fridges, and peaches are!
This lesson is giving you a chance to practice when to use lenition, and when to not use it.
The exercises use a limited vocabulary so that you can focus on the process of lenition, and so that you can develop your understanding of when lenition occurs and when it doesn't, rather than being distracted by having to learn new vocabulary.
Lenition can occur because of the gender of a noun (so you have a masculine and a feminine noun, and you can see how the feminine noun can be lenited in places where the masculine noun isn't, and whether the same thing happens for both singular and plural), lenition can occur after possessive adjectives (and it affects both masculine and feminine, singular or plural equally), and it can occur after certain prepositions, so you need a noun that you can use with those particular prepositions.
Learning how to use lenition is pretty fundamental to learning Irish.
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I agree, it's rather mean to introduce new words to the 'Type what you hear' tests - how could we possibly know how to spell them?
It's masculine, so it wouldn't be lenited after an, either. But na isn't mentioned in the notes, so I imagine it's only for an even when it is feminine.
if we didn't have a lesson on the gender/declension of nouns how are we supposed to guess since we are new...
Fem: end in "og"/ slender final vowe/ end in -lann/2 syllables & end in -ocht/ start & end in vowel. For masc: any job/ broad last vowel/end in slender vowel with a fada/ 1 syllable in in -ocht/start with consonant & end in vowel. Hope this helps a bit.
Apart from lenition after the singular possessive adjectives, milseáin is both the nominative plural and the genitive singular of milseán.
As milseán is masculine, it's genitive is lenited after the singular definite article - so blas an mhilseáin is "the taste of the sweet".
There are a number of circumstances that cause lenition. The two causes of lenition that are used with milseán on Duolingo are the 1st person possessives (mo, do, a (his)) Conas atá do mhilseán? and the preposition sa Tá siúcra sa mhilseán
Can someone explain to me the reasoning of using the different phéitseog versus péitseog? I'm confused as to which to use. >.<
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Feminine nouns like péitseog are lenited - 'h' is placed after the first letter, indicating the change in pronunciation - after the definite article an ('the').
Why are they not doing that in every example, then? I've seen it both ways in the last 4 questions. Grrrr!
The difference between an phéitseog and péitseog?
an phéitseog has a definite article, péitseog doesn't.
Because péitseog is feminine, it is lenited after an.
na péitseoga is plural, so it uses the plural definite article.
What about "there is a peach and candies in the fridge"? Shouldn't this be accepted?
Nope: "an phéitseog" is "the peach", while "a peach" would be "péitseog" and the same for "na milseáin" vs. "milseáin".
Just i. But i on it's own triggers eclipsis - i gcuisneoir = "in a fridge".
Why is lenition necessary? If the spelling and pronunciation changes and not the meaning, then why bother?
Irish, like most Indo-European languages, has retained grammatical genders even though English has largely discarded the concept.
Because the pronunciation change is often used grammatically, such as when forming the past tense.
Why does fridge not need an "an" to show it's "the fridge" but peaches and sweets do?
The an is included in the sa.
"in a fridge" is "i gcuisneoir*.
"in the fridge" is sa chuisneoir.
When you combine i and an, you get sa, though in some dialects you will hear ins an instead of sa.
Note that, because of this link to a construction that ends in n, the "dentals dots" rule apples to sa - so, even though sa normally lenites the following word (sa chuisneoir, not sa cuisneoir), if the following word starts with D, T or S, we don't lenite - we say sa teach, not sa theach.
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Can someone please explain the difference in pronunciation for milseán and milseáin? They sound the same to me
I also am really struggling with plural pronunciation, and can't find anything online to help. You can obviously tell singular from plural if someone is saying 'the sweets' or 'the sweet' because 'na' or 'an' would be the indicator. But if someone were trying to tell me 'There is a sweet in the fridge', and I assumed they were saying 'There are sweets in the fridge', I'd feel pretty bad about taking their last sweet out of the fridge. Glad I'm not the only one having a hard time with this
I am so lost with all that is going on... Can someone simply explain what, why and how to use lenitions. This lesson is not being my friend.
Did you read the Tips & Notes?
(You now have to be logged into Duolingo in the browser to access the Tips & Notes).
As per your other examples, why does this not translate as "There are the peach and the sweets in the fridge."? This is like your translation of "Tá peitseog sa chuisneoir." --> There is a peach in the fridge. I translate it as "A peach is in the fridge." Where in God's sake do you get the "there"?
If I ask you "What's in the fridge?" would you answer "A peach is in the fridge?" or would you answer "There is a peach in the fridge?"
If you wanted to refer to one specific peach ("the peach"), would you say "The peach is in the fridge" or "There is the peach in the fridge".
For plurals, you get the same thing - "There are two peaches in the Fridge" vs "The two peaches are in the fridge".
English is irregular. It prefers "there is/are" with indefinite nouns in prepositional phrases. English speakers don't even realize that they are doing it.
Come to Australia and you can basically put all of them in the fridge to avoid melting (including non-choc ones often enough)! Temperatures often are above 35 °C air temp, while the temps in enclosed spaces can go way beyond 80 °C (in my car, the plastic covering of the B column has bubbled up and melted at one occasion in the past - looks fancy now :-/ ) Depending on how your house was positioned with respect to sun, indoor temps without aircon can go above 45 °C as well. First time I saw 'grab a Mars from the fridge' I was puzzled. Until I had a series of melted choc drinks that hid in choc bar wrappers :-/
why is it PHEITSEOG ( with PH pronounced F as in French and not PEITSEOG as in the last lesson( Ta PEITSEOG AICI) ? and how are these 2 different words pronounced ? ok i JUST REVISED the lenition notes and I see that P can be lenified with the addition of an H. so this changes the pronounciation. BUT STILL, why is it TA PEITSEOG AICI and TA AN PHEITSEOG AGUS ..... I must tell you that i have learned the 8 languages that i speak fluently ,like a little child learns his mother tongue i.e. without learning grammar until I could speak. But still, I'd like to know the reason of the above difference. Thanks.
Irish has masculine and feminine nouns. Feminine nouns are lenited after the singular definite article in the nominative case.
"Péitseog" is a feminine noun, therefore "a peach" is péitseog, but "the peach" is an phéitseog.
milseáin is the plural of milseán.
milseán = "a sweet" ("a piece of candy" in American English)
an milseán - "the sweet"
milseáin = "sweets"
na milseáin = "the sweets".
"Ta" - it functions as it always does to tell you that sonething is being. It is modified by "sa" ("in the") to tell us the food is in the fridge (cuisenoir I hope I spelled that right I can't get back to the question ;-;)
I am trying the determine the reason why in this sentence "an phéitseog" undergoes lenition and why "na milseáin" does not. Is it because "na milseáin" is plural? Anybody else know?
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That's one reason. Also, milseán is a masculine noun so even the singular version doesn't get lenited
The singular definite article an lenites feminine nouns in the nominative case.
na is not the singular definite article, and milseán is masculine.
Why isn't milseáin lenited? Phéitseog and chuisneoir are, but why not milseáin?
That question has been asked and answered in the earlier comments on this Sentence Discussion.
When is h pro(s)thesis introduced (adding an 'h' to the beginning of words starting with a vowel)?
There are probably some examples of it in the Plurals skill, just before Eclipsis and Lenition.
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If you can't access the tips sections on the app (I can't for Irish on my phone) go to duolingo.com and Irish will come up and the tips sections are on there. I only found this yesterday
I'm confused as to why peach here is lenitioned to become phéitseog while milseáin does not get the "h" added as well. Why is only one of the words being lenitioned and getting an h added? I understand the h in chusneoir since it is following "sa," but what of the others?
As explained in many of the other comments, the singular definite article an lenites feminine nouns in the nominative case.
na is not the singular definite article, and milseán is a masculine noun.
