Christopher Lewin

This article discusses two neologisms eaghtyrys 'authority' and clooisag 'pillow' introduced in the 1775 Manx New Testament, which incorporates a revision of the 1763 Gospels and Acts, adducing phonological, orthographical and circumstantial evidence to show that the revisers adapted these items from Scottish Gaelic ùghdarras and cluasaig in the corresponding passages in the 1767 Scottish Gaelic New Testament. This provides further evidence for the senior Manx clergy's interest in the other Gaelic languages, as seen also in their contact with James McLagan (Ó Muircheartaigh 2016) and John Kelly's pan-Gaelic lexicographical enterprises (Thomson 1990).

Lewin, Christopher (2023). ‘Lexical influence of the 1767 Scottish Gaelic New Testament on the Manx Bible translation’, Studia Celtica Fennica 19: 5–13.
https://journal.fi/scf/article/view/130259

The present article explores issues relating to territorially-differentiated community language development policy in the Scottish Gaelic and Irish contexts, and evaluates recent contributions to debate on the topic. The historical backdrop to current provision for Gaelic community development is explored within the wider context of Gaelic governance structures and funding streams. The article analyses current developments in the Scottish Government's policymaking process in relation to Gaelic, and argues in favour of the potential for a new framework for Gaelic community development based on the model of the Irish Gaeltacht Act (2012). This would address both the heartland and urban contexts, create a more localized level of language planning with greater community control and input, and establish the principle that Gaelic community development should be an elaborated policy area in its own right, with a clear statutory basis.

A more concise version of this discussion is published in Scottish Affairs 32 (2023): 154–181, available at https://www.euppublishing.com/doi/abs/10.3366/scot.2023.0453.

This bibliography aims to include all published academic works (books, articles, chapters, reviews) on the Manx Gaelic language and its literature and history to date, and also as many degree theses and dissertations as are known to the compiler, where these are referred to in the published literature. Works are included where the main focus is on Manx, or where Manx is one of the primary topics, or is named in the title. There is also a select list of publications which discuss or mention Manx in passing, with indication of the sections or pages in which the relevant passages may be found.

This thesis elucidates some of the hitherto poorly understood aspects of the diachronic development of Manx phonology. By tracing phonological changes from earlier varieties of Gaelic, and within the attested period of writte n and recorded Manx, it frames these developments within the wider contexts of Gaelic dia lectology and historical linguistics. Manx provides an important source for understanding the linguistic development of the Gaelic languages. A lack of systematic treatments and reliable datasets for the language, however, has obscured this fact and led to its neglect within Gaelic studies. The thesis focuses, in particular, on the development of the language’ s prosody, suprasegmental features, vowel system and sonorants, the latter having a particular bearing on vowels. Five principal methodologies are deployed to investigate t hes topics: • Re-evaluation of existing descriptions and datasets provided by previous scholarship, especially those collected by Rh ŷs in the 18...

In this article the role of different ideological viewpoints concerning corpus development within the Manx revival movement in the second half of the twentieth century is explored. In particular, the work of two prominent figures is examined: the Celtic scholar Robert L. Thomson, who published extensively especially on Manx language and literature, and also contributed to the revival, particularly as editor of several pedagogical resources and as a member of the translation committee Coonceil ny Gaelgey, and Douglas Fargher, a tireless activist and compiler of an English-Manx Dictionary (1979). Broadly speaking, Thomson was of a more preservationist bent, cautious in adapting the native resources of the language and wary of straying too far from attested usage of the traditional language, while Fargher was more radical and open especially to borrowing from Irish and Scottish sources. Both were concerned, in somewhat different ways, to remove perceived impurities or corruptions from ...

ZusammenfassungDieser Artikel umfasst eine Ausgabe und englische Übersetzung des zweitältesten bekannten manx-gälischen Prosatextes, einer handgeschriebenen Predigt aus dem Jahre 1696 von John Woods (von 1696 bis zu seinem Tod im Jahre 1739 Pfarrer von Malew im südlichen Teil der Insel Man), sowie eine historische und linguistische Einführung und Anmerkungen. Die Predigt ist vor allem deshalb von Interesse, da sie gewissermaßen als „fehlendes Glied‟, der Sprache und Orthographie bezüglich, zwischen dem Früh-Manx des von Bischof John Phillips übersetzten Book of Common Prayer der anglikanischen Kirche und dem klassischen Manx der gedruckten religiösen Texte des 18. Jahrhunderts gelten kann, und auch aufgrund der Einsicht, die sie zum Gebrauch und der Überlieferung des Phillips-Manuskripts und des Predigtkorpus gibt.

This article evaluates perceptions of Manx orthography within Celtic scholarship. The predominant view is well summarized by Jackson (1955: 108): ‘Manx orthography is an English monstrosity which obscures both pronunciation and etymology’. Similarly, O’Rahilly dismisses Manx spelling as ‘an abominable system, neither historic nor phonetic, and based mainly on English’ (O’Rahilly 1932: 20). The article sets these perceptions in the sociohistorical context in which the system was developed by the Manx clergy in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. It is argued that the system is neither so directly dependent on English conventions, nor so unsystematic and inconsistent, as has been often claimed. Such weaknesses as do exist from the perspective of contemporary scholars and students of the language should not necessarily be viewed as such in the light of the needs, priorities and assumptions of those who practised Manx writing in its original context. It is shown that there was in ...

This article presents a typology of phonological, morphosyntactic, and lexical features illustrative of factors conditioning the usage of speakers and writers of Revived Manx, including substratal influence from English; language ideologies prevalent within the revival movement, especially forms of linguistic purism; and language-specific features of Manx and its orthography. Evidence is taken primarily from a corpus of Revived Manx speech and writing. The observed features of Revived Manx are situated within Zuckermann's (2009, 2020) framework of ‘hybridization’ and ‘revival linguistics’, which takes Israeli Hebrew as the prototypical model of revernacularization of a non-L1 language. However, Manx arguably provides a more typical example of what to expect when a revived minority language remains predominantly an L2 for an indefinite period, with each new cohort of speakers able to reshape the target variety in the absence of a firmly established L1 norm. (Manx, Celtic, languag...

This article evaluates perceptions of Manx orthography within Celtic scholarship. The predominant view is well summarized by Jackson (1955: 108): 'Manx orthography is an English monstrosity which obscures both pronunciation and etymology'. Similarly, O'Rahilly dismisses Manx spelling as 'an abominable system, neither historic nor phonetic, and based mainly on English' (O'Rahilly 1932: 20). The article sets these perceptions in the sociohistorical context in which the system was developed by the Manx clergy in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. It is argued that the system is neither so directly dependent on English conventions, nor so unsystematic and inconsistent, as has been often claimed. Such weaknesses as do exist from the perspective of contemporary scholars and students of the language should not necessarily be viewed as such in the light of the needs, priorities and assumptions of those who practised Manx writing in its original context. It is shown that there was in fact an increase in the phonological transparency of certain elements of the system during the standardization of the mid-eighteenth century represented by the publication of translations of the Book of Common Prayer (1765) and the Bible (1771-72). On the other hand, countervailing pressures towards phonological ambiguity, iconicity and idiosyncrasy are discussed, including the utility of distinguishing homophones; real or presumed etymologies; the influence of non-standard or regional English spelling conventions; tensions between Manx and English norms; and an apparent preference in certain cases for more ambiguous spellings as a compromise between variant forms. Negative outcomes of the received view for scholarship on Manx are also examined, with a case study of the neglect of orthographic evidence for the historical phonology of the language. The wider context of English-based orthographies for Gaelic is also briefly considered.

Article available open access on the journal's homepage:
https://sciendo.com/article/10.2478/scp-2020-0003

This article presents a typology of phonological, morphosyntactic, and lexical features illustrative of factors conditioning the usage of speakers and writers of Revived Manx, including substratal influence from English; language ideologies prevalent within the revival movement, especially forms of linguistic purism; and language-specific features of Manx and its orthography. Evidence is taken primarily from a corpus of Revived Manx speech and writing. The observed features of Revived Manx are situated within Zuckermann's (2009, 2020) framework of ‘hybridization’ and ‘revival linguistics’, which takes Israeli Hebrew as the prototypical model of revernacularization of a non-L1 language. However, Manx arguably provides a more typical example of what to expect when a revived minority language remains predominantly an L2 for an indefinite period, with each new cohort of speakers able to reshape the target variety in the absence of a firmly established L1 norm. (Manx, Celtic, language revival, language ideology, language shift, language contact)*

Published open access at https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/language-in-society/article/continuity-and-hybridity-in-language-revival-the-case-of-manx/FFAC5B3FC9E340F17EA26EBA4A7512D7 under the following creative commons license: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

This paper examines the development of the Old Irish diphthongs */ai/, */oi/, */ui/ in later varieties of the Gaelic languages. These are generally accepted to have merged as a single phoneme by the end of the Old Irish period (c. 900). In all modern varieties the regular reflex of this phoneme is a long monophthong, represented orthographically as AO.

There are three main developments: (a) in southern Irish AO has merged with /eː/ and/or /iː/; (b) in southern Scottish and Manx varieties AO remains a mid-central vowel, may be fairly fronted and may perhaps have weak rounding; and there is merger between /əː/ representing AO and reflexes of earlier */aɣ/; (c) in northern Scottish and northern Irish varieties AO is realized as a high back unrounded vowel /ɯː/, which is contrastive with mid back unrounded /ɤː/ representing earlier */aɣ/ (these may merge with /iː/ and /eː/ in Ulster).

Building on suggestions of earlier scholars, it is argued that the developments of */əː/ are explained by its anomalous position in the phonological system of earlier varieties of Gaelic, and its interactions with the palatalization contrast of the consonant system.

This thesis elucidates some of the hitherto poorly understood aspects of the diachronic development of Manx phonology. By tracing phonological changes from earlier varieties of Gaelic, and within the attested period of written and recorded Manx, it frames these developments within the wider contexts of Gaelic dialectology and historical linguistics. Manx provides an important source for understanding the linguistic development of the Gaelic languages. A lack of systematic treatments and reliable datasets for the language, however, has obscured this fact and led to its neglect within Gaelic studies.

The thesis focuses, in particular, on the development of the language’s prosody, suprasegmental features, vowel system and sonorants, the latter having a particular bearing on vowels. Five principal methodologies are deployed to investigate these topics:

• Re-evaluation of existing descriptions and datasets provided by previous scholarship, especially those collected by Rhŷs in the 1880s and 1890s, and material from the last generation of speakers presented by Broderick in his Handbook of Late Spoken Manx.
• Interpretation of the evidence of the two main Manx orthographies and non-standard variations thereof.
• Analyses based, as far as possible, on the whole attested lexis of the language, making use of Cregeen’s and Kelly’s dictionaries.
• Quantitative approaches to all of these sources of data where appropriate.
• Instrumental phonetic analysis of recordings of the terminal speakers of Manx.

Chapter one places Manx in its historical and dialectological context, reviews previous scholarship, discusses the primary sources, and introduces the interpretative difficulties of the orthographies.

Chapter two examines developments in the short and long vowels, and the impact of the consonant system on vowel changes.

Chapter three examines the development of the vowels ao(i) /əː/ and ua(i) /uə̯/ in Manx. The written evidence, description and recorded data are complex, and some scholars have claimed that these vowels fell together with one another and with other vowels. It will be shown that these vowels in fact remained contrastive for the most part in Late Manx.

Chapter four investigates developments in the sonorant consonants, especially the R, L and N phones. Changes in vowels preceding historically tense sonorants are also examined, as well as the origins and spread of the phenomenon of preocclusion.

Chapter five examines suprasegmental and prosodic features including stress shift, unstressed long vowel shortening, and the conditioning factors for these.

Chapter six provides concluding remarks assessing the thesis’ contribution to current scholarship, and the prospects for future research.

[This doctoral thesis was completed in the University of Edinburgh with supervision from Dr William Lamb (Celtic and Scottish Studies) and Dr Pavel Iosad (Linguistics and English Language). I am grateful to the AHRC Centre for Doctoral Training in the Celtic Languages for funding the research.]
 

Review (in Scottish Gaelic) of the National Museum of Scotland’s 2019 exhibition ‘Wild and Majestic: Romantic Visions of Scotland’. The article reviews different aspects of the exhibition from a Gaelic perspective, arguing that there has been a marked improvement in Gaelic-medium and Gaelic-themed content in comparison with previous exhibitions, but that there is still much room for improvement.

The exhibition homepage:
https://www.nms.ac.uk/national-museum-of-scotland/things-to-see-and-do/past-exhibitions/wild-and-majestic/

The Gaelic Views (Seallaidhean Gàidhlig) booklet: https://www.nms.ac.uk/media/1160437/gaelic-views-booklet-gaelic.pdf

The guidebook: https://booksfromscotland.com/2019/06/wild-and-majestic-romantic-visions-of-scotland/

The review originally appeared in the online Gaelic magazine Dàna, and also in Misneachd’s magazine Buaidh (issue 3):
http://danamag.org/fiadhaich-glormhor-leirmheas-taisbeanadh-ur-nms/
https://www.misneachd.scot/

Gille-chrìost MacGill’Eòin / Christopher Lewin
An t-Òg-mhios / June 2020

Pre-publication draft

Introduction

This is the tenth sermon in the volume of 22 translations of Bishop Wilson’s sermons printed at Bath in 1783. The title page has Lioar 1, but apparently only one volume was published [proofs of a second volume have since come to light with a further 13 sermons CL]. According to Cubbon (1933: 343), ‘The sermons were translated into Manx by the Rev. T. Corlett, vicar of Kirk Christ, Lezayre. The volume was printed at the expense of the son of Bishop Wilson, Dr Thomas Wilson of London, in honour of the Bishop’s memory’. There are four volumes of Wilson’s sermons in English; the Manx volume is a selection from the first three English volumes. Since these sermons constitute a significant body of Manx prose (amounting to almost 500 printed pages), and since they have been little studied, it seemed worthwhile to present a sample of this material in the form of the text of one of the sermons with a commentary. It is hoped that the rest of the sermons, as well as other little-known Manx texts, will soon be examined.

Pre-publication draft. Published version: https://www.degruyter.com/view/journals/zcph/62/1/article-p45.xml

Zusammenfassung

Dieser Artikel umfasst eine Ausgabe und englische Übersetzung des zweitältesten bekannten manx-gälischen Prosatextes, einer handgeschriebenen Predigt aus dem Jahre 1696 von John Woods (von 1696 bis zu seinem Tod im Jahre 1739 Pfarrer von Malew im südlichen Teil der Insel Man), sowie eine historische und linguistische Einführung und Anmerkungen. Die Predigt ist vor allem deshalb von Interesse, da sie gewissermaßen als „fehlendes Glied‟, der Sprache und Orthographie bezüglich, zwischen dem Früh-Manx des von Bischof John Phillips übersetzten Book of Common Prayer der anglikanischen Kirche und dem klassischen Manx der gedruckten religiösen Texte des 18. Jahrhunderts gelten kann, und auch aufgrund der Einsicht, die sie zum Gebrauch und der Überlieferung des Phillips-Manuskripts und des Predigtkorpus gibt.

Pre-publication draft.

Zusammenfassung:

Dieser Artikel betrachtet die Entwicklung der theoretischen und ideologischen Standpunkte, die einem großen Teil der wissenschaftlichen Arbeiten zum Thema des Manx-Gälischen vom 19. Jahrhundert bis heute zugrunde liegen. Vorgeschlagen wird, dass in Diskussionen des Manx die Annahme herrscht, die Sprache sei ein zerfallener, anglisierter bzw. kreolisierter Dialekt, was in O’Rahillys bekannter Erklärung dargelegt wird: ‘Manx hardly deserved to live’. O’Rahillys Ansichten haben zu unterschiedlichen Graden die Auffassung nachfolgender Wissenschaftler von der Sprache beeinflusst, so sehr sie auch seine rhetorischen Exzesse verwerfen mögen. Der Artikel untersucht die Behauptungen dieser Wissenschaftler und stellt die generelle Ansicht bezüglich kontaktinduzierten Sprachwandels im Manx-Gälischen infrage. Kritisch betrachtet wird auch Williams’ Theorie eines mittelalterlichen nordisch-gälischen Patois als Grundlage des späteren Manx angesichts Trudgills Ideen zur soziolinguistischen Typologie.

Journal of Celtic Linguistics (2016), 17, 147–239

While accounts of the syntax of the element usually called the 'verbal noun' are available for different periods of Irish and Scottish Gaelic, as well as the Brythonic languages, the details of verbal noun constructions in Manx have never been fully described. Thomson (1952: 285-89) deals cursorily with the topic, and touches on various aspects in his grammar of Early Manx (Thomson 1953: 51-4, 62-9), in two lectures (Thomson 1969, 1986) and in commentaries on Manx texts (Thomson 1981, 1998). The matter is also discussed briefly by Broderick (2010: 345-46). Many of their ideas and suggestions will be explored in depth here.

This paper focuses particularly on the way pronominal objects of verbal nouns are expressed (whether by means of a possessive proclitic or as an object personal pronoun), and how this is related to the changing analysis of the verbal noun in Manx (and to varying extents the other Celtic languages), from a noun to a non-finite verb. The shift is examined in terms of reanalysis and grammaticalization, with particular reference to the common cross-linguistic phenomenon of the development of verbal nouns into infinitives and other non-finite verbal elements.

https://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/uwp/jcl/2016/00000017/00000001/art00005

In this article the role of different ideological viewpoints concerning corpus development within the Manx revival movement in the second half of the twentieth century is explored. In particular, the work of two prominent figures is examined: the Celtic scholar Robert L. Thomson, who published extensively especially on Manx language and literature, and also contributed to the revival, particularly as editor of several pedagogical resources and as a member of the translation committee Coonceil ny Gaelgey, and Douglas Fargher, a tireless activist and compiler of an English-Manx Dictionary (1979). Broadly speaking, Thomson was of a more preservationist bent, cautious in adapting the native resources of the language and wary of straying too far from attested usage of the traditional language, while Fargher was more radical and open especially to borrowing from Irish and Scottish sources. Both were concerned, in somewhat different ways, to remove perceived impurities or corruptions from the language, and were influenced by the assumptions of existing scholarship. A close reading of the work of these scholar-activists sheds light on the tensions within the revival movement regarding its response to the trauma of language death and the questions of legitimacy and authenticity in the revived variety. Particular space is devoted to an analysis of the preface of Fargher's dictionary, as well as certain features of the body of the work itself, since this volume is probably the most widely consulted guide to the use of the language today. Finally, it is argued that the Manx language movement today would benefit from a reassessment and discussion of the ideological currents of the past and present, and a judicious evaluation of both the strengths and weaknesses of existing reference works.

Final published version available open access at https://content.sciendo.com/view/journals/scp/2/1/article-p97.xml

Draft of paper published in Cambrian Medieval Celtic Studies 77 (summer 2019), special issue 'Sir John Rhys studies', based on paper delivered at the John Rhys conference at Aberystwyth University, February 2015. Journal available here: http://www.cmcspublications.com/publications.html

Abstract

The purpose of the present article is to provide a concise account and assessment of John Rhys’s pioneering fieldwork on the Manx language in the 1880s and 90s, and the continuing importance of his descriptions of Manx phonology, grammar, dialectal variation, and sociolinguistic situation. A brief description of the Manx- related materials in the Rhys papers in the National Library of Wales will also be given.

Final (post-viva) research masters dissertation, Aberystwyth University, 2016. A published version with significant revisions and additions is envisaged.

The present thesis provides a linguistic overview of the revived variety of Manx Gaelic, the Celtic language of the Isle of Man currently spoken by a few hundred people who have learnt it as a second language, and a small number of children raised bilingually. The introductory chapter presents an overview of the recent history and current situation of Revived Manx; the academic literature on both varieties of Manx; the study of language revival in general; and the ideological issues surrounding the terminology of language ‘revival’ and of language ‘death’. In Chapter 2 an overview is given of the linguistic features of Revived Manx (RM) with comparisons to the traditional variety (Traditional Manx, TM), with sections on phonetics and phonology, morphology and syntax, and lexis, idiom and style. In Chapter 3 RM is placed in the wider context of the phenomenon of language variety, with particular focus on comparisons with Revived Hebrew (and the problems with such comparisons); the concept of interlanguage; language revival as language contact; and existing language ideologies prevalent in the RM community. Finally consideration is given to the future prospects of the language, and recommendations are made concerning ideological clarification and corpus planning.

This is a draft section of a reference work explaining Manx spelling and pronunciation for a general (not specifically academic) audience of students of Manx and the Gaelic languages.

This section consists of an alphabetical index of graphemes representing vowels and diphthongs, with lists (exhaustive unless otherwise indicated) of Manx lexemes with particular grapheme-phoneme correspondences, with sounds explained with IPA transcriptions, phonological terminology, as well as comparisons with roughly equivalent English sounds (Isle of Man / RP - non-rhotic), and Gaelic cognates or other etymologies given for each item. The orthography is the standard of the Manx Bible (1772/1819) and Classical Manx more generally.

The complete work will contain extensive introductory material, a corresponding section on consonant spellings, and phoneme-to-grapheme indices. It is intended that audio recordings of the word lists will also be provided.

I would be grateful for feedback on (a) general typos etc. - many of the sections were copied and pasted from one another with minor modifications, so there may well be errors arising from this;  (b) any omissions or errors in the Manx data; (c) errors or alternatives in the Irish and Scottish Gaelic etymologies.

I am grateful to Culture Vannin (Manx Heritage Foundation) for supporting this project.

Phrasal or multi-word verbs, many of them formed with the frequently-occurring irregular verbs, are a ubiquitous feature of Manx. They may be divided into the following categories: 1. verb + adverbial / adjective / prepositional phrase, e.g. çheet er y hoshiaght 2. verb + adverbial / adjective / prepositional phrase + direct object, e.g. cur magh 3. verb + adverbial + prepositional object, e.g. shassoo magh noi 4. verb + prepositional object, e.g. goaill rish 5. verb + reflexive prepositional pronoun, e.g. troggal ort, cummal ort hene 6. verb + reflexive prepositional pronoun + direct object e.g. cur lhiat 7. verb + fixed direct object e.g. goaill arrane 8. verb + fixed direct object + prepositional object, e.g. goaill baght jeh 9. verb + non-finite verb, e.g. goll dy lhie 10. verb + non-finite verb + direct object, e.g. cur dy lhie 11. verb + adjective + prepositional object e.g. çheet jesh da The phrasal verbs are listed in alphabetical order by their verbal noun, with fixed direct objects following (e.g. goaill arrane, rather than arrane y ghoaill). A second-person singular prepositional pronoun indicates that the preposition agrees with the subject. Verbs which take, or may take, a prepositional object in their primary sense, or without modification of the sense (e.g. cooney lesh 'help'), are not incuded here. Obvious literal collocations are omitted, so ceau ersooyl is listed in the sense 'wear away, perish' but not 'throw away'.

This bibliography aims to include all academic published works (books, articles, chapters, reviews) on the Manx Gaelic language and its literature and history to date, and also as many unpublished theses and dissertations as are known to the compiler. Works are included where the main focus is on Manx, or where Manx is one of the primary topics, or is named in the title. There is also a select list of publications which discuss or mention Manx in passing, with indication of the sections or pages in which the relevant passages may be found. Certain adjacent topics such as place-names, and the Gaelic language in the Isle of Man in the medieval period, are not as yet included in the bibliography.

This paper compares language ideologies and approaches to corpus-planning in two closely-related minority languages, Scottish Gaelic and Manx. A framework developed to analyse language ideologies of Scottish Gaelic speakers (Ó Maolalaigh et al. 2014), and based on Fishman (2006), is applied to Manx. Broadly speaking, the dominant ideologies of the contemporary Manx speech community are the reverse of those of Scottish Gaelic speakers. Speakers of Scottish Gaelic, including L2 speakers, are much less open to non-traditional neologisms than Manx speakers. It is argued that this is associated with the fact that contemporary Manx is a revived language, with no L1 speakers of the traditional native variety, whereas in the case of Scottish Gaelic, L1 speakers of the traditional variety remain dominant within the speech community. A minority ideology within the Revived Manx community is also identified, which is more similar to the dominant ideology of Scottish Gaelic speakers. The importance of engaging with both majority and minority views in very small language communities, especially in the context of language revival, is emphasized. Language ideologies are also situated in the context of speakers' construction of language death and continuity, and explored in terms of Jaffe's (1999) "resistance of reversal", "resistance of separation" and "radical models of resistance".

The paper is an expanded version of a conference presentation delivered at the Celtic Sociolinguistics Symposium in University College Dublin in June 2015. Posted online here July 2019.

Caithfear súil sa pháipéar seo ar na foclóirí atá ar fáil do chainteoirí agus d'fhoghlaimeoirí Ghaeilge Mhanann, ar an gcaoi ar tháinig ann dóibh, a gcuid buntáistí agus laigí, agus féidearthachtaí d'fhorbairt na foclóireachta don teanga amach anseo. Ós rud é nach maireann Gaeilge Mhanann mar theanga dhúchais phobail a thuilleadh, is maith an rud é gur chuir cainteoirí dúchais, John Kelly (1750-1809) agus Archibald Cregeen (1774-1841), dhá fhoclóir téagartha Gaeilge-Béarla le chéile san ochtú agus san naoú haois déag ina bhfuil a lán focal ar marthain a bheadh caillte murach iad. San fhichiú haois foilsíodh dhá fhoclóir Béarla-Gaeilge i gcomhthéacs na hathbheochana, English-Manx Pronouncing Dictionary le J. J. Kneen (1938) agus English-Manx Dictionary Douglas Fargher (1979), chomh maith le Manx-English Dictionary Phil Kelly (1991) atá bunaithe ar shaothar Fargher. Is díol suntais nár foilsíodh aon fhoclóir nua ón am sin, cé go bhfuil leaganacha digiteacha inchuardaithe den chuid is mó de na foclóirí thuasluaite anois ar fáil, chomh maith le corpas téacsanna suntasach (corpus.gaelg.im) a choinnítear ar bhonn deonach agus a bhfuil sé mar aidhm aige go fadtéarmach a bheith mar bhunús foclóir stairiúil. Bheadh sé féaráilte a rá gur leagtaí níos mó béime ar chúrsaí 'praiticiúla' ó na 1980idí i leith, mar shampla ar naíonraí agus tumoideachas a bhunú, seachas ar an bpleanáil chorpais. Tá an chuma ar an scéal, áfach, go bhfuil tuiscint ag fás go bhfuil acmhainní teanga nua de dhíth agus tábhacht ag baint leo maidir le rath an phobail teanga amach anseo.

Páipéar curtha i láthair ag 'An Béal Beo: Foclóireacht agus Frásaíocht na Gaeilge', Coláiste na hOllscoile Corcaigh, 24-25 Samhain 2023

Approximately 650 manuscript sermons in Manx survive from the late seventeenth to the mid-nineteenth century, outnumbering the extant contemporaneous material in this genre in both Irish and Scottish Gaelic combined. The sermons were originally preached in the Anglican parish churches of the Isle of Man during the period when the language remained the dominant community language, and diocesan policies prescribed its regular use in church services, even if the linguistic abilities and literacy skills of the clergy varied. A recent project at Aberystwyth University to transcribe a subset of the sermon corpus has shed new light on linguistic and orthographic variation and change in the texts, as well as their wider social and historical context. This paper will consider the complex relationship between Manx and English illustrated by the material, (1) intertextually, with respect to the role of translation and adaptation of English source texts; (2) in terms of the clergy's own linguistic competence and education; and (3) in terms of language contact, diglossia and language shift in the wider Manx community. The discussion will focus on a case study of a particularly linguistically and orthographically divergent text from 1752 preserved in the Sir John Rhŷs Papers at the National Library of Wales. Indeed, this anonymous sermon has arguably the 'worst' Manx of the whole corpus examined to date. However, the idiosyncrasies of the text provide all the more scope for discussion of the significance of features such as the especially free use of loanwords, and the frequent use of quoi 'who' (Irish cé) as a relative pronoun, a phenomenon found much more sporadically elsewhere. The text is an abridged translation of English clergyman Stephen White's printed sermon A Disswasive from Stealing (London, 1745), allowing an assessment of the Manx preacher's skills as a translator (or lack thereof), and issues of audience design and reception.

Presented at Tionól, Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies, November 2022.

Approximately 650 manuscript sermons in Manx survive from the late seventeenth to the mid-nineteenth century, outnumbering the extant contemporaneous material in this genre in both Irish and Scottish Gaelic combined. The sermons were originally preached in the Anglican parish churches of the Isle of Man during the period when the language remained the dominant community language, and diocesan policies prescribed its regular use in church services, even if the linguistic abilities and literacy skills of the clergy varied. A recent project at Aberystwyth University to transcribe a subset of the sermon corpus has shed new light on linguistic and orthographic variation and change in the texts, as well as their wider social and historical context. This paper will consider the complex relationship between Manx and English illustrated by the material, (1) intertextually, with respect to the role of translation and adaptation of English source texts; (2) in terms of the clergy’s own linguistic competence and education; and (3) in terms of language contact, diglossia and language shift in the wider Manx community.

The discussion will focus on a case study of a particularly linguistically and orthographically divergent text from 1752 preserved in the Sir John Rhŷs Papers at the National Library of Wales. Indeed, this anonymous sermon has arguably the ‘worst’ Manx of the whole corpus examined to date. However, the idiosyncrasies of the text provide all the more scope for discussion of the significance of features such as the especially free use of loanwords, and the frequent use of quoi ‘who’ (Irish cé) as a relative pronoun, a phenomenon found much more sporadically elsewhere. The text is an abridged translation of English clergyman Stephen White’s printed sermon A Disswasive from Stealing (London, 1745), allowing an assessment of the Manx preacher’s skills as a translator (or lack thereof), and issues of audience design and reception.

A full edition of this text is in preparation.

[English below.]

Anns an taisbeanadh seo nìthear coimeas eadar suidheachadh Gàidhlig Mhanainn san latha an-diugh agus na dùbhlain a tha mu choinneimh ath-bheòthachadh mhion-chànainean eile a leithid Gàidhlig na h-Alba, gu h-àraid a thaobh coimhearsnachd no sluagh cànain a stèidheachadh às ùr agus a chumail a' dol. Chan ainneamh a dh'ainmichear cùis Gàidhlig Mhanainn anns an dol seachad ann an deasbadan mu na dh'fhaodadh a bhith an dàn don Ghàidhlig agus do chànainean eile a tha fo chunnart, ach is eu-domhain an sgrùdadh mar as trice. Do chuid, cha mhòr nach e leisgeul a th' ann an ath-bheòthachadh Gàidhlig Mhanainn mar chànain lìonraidh am measg luchd-labhairt dàrna cànain airson beachd 'coma co-dhiù' air mairsinneachd nan coimhearsnachdan dùthchasach; do dh'fheadhainn eile chan fhiach ath-bheòthachadh cànain idir mura h-eil ann ach cur-seachad no cuspair foghlaim 'mar Laideann'. Seachad air an iomsgaradh seo tha an fhìrinn nas iomadh-fhillte. Gabhaidh am pàipear beachd air na chaidh a choileanadh agus na dh'fhairtlich air luchd an athbheòthachaidh anns an Eilean Mhanannach gu ruige seo; suidheachadh agus dùbhlain dheamagrafach na cànain; na chaidh a ghleidheadh agus a chall de ghoireasan cànanach an luchd-labhairt dùthchasach; agus na diofar id-eòlasan a tha nan cùl-taca no nam bacadh do dh'oidhirpean cuimsichte gus a' choimhearsnachd a neartachadh anns an ùine fhada. Leis gu bheil rannsachadh a' sealltainn gu soilleir gu bheil Gàidhlig na h-Alba mar chànain choimhearsnachd ann an cor èiginneach, 's e ath-bheòthachadh airson a' chuid as motha, seach glèidheadh cànain, a tha a dhìth gu h-àraid am measg na h-òigridh: thèid bruidhinn gu h-aithghearr air na leasanan a ghabhas togail bhon t-suidheachadh Mhanannach. Bheirear sùil cuideachd air na tha an lùib 'sluagh' agus fèin-aithne cànain a thogail agus a neartachadh ann an suidheachadh às dèidh sioft cànain.

This presentation will compare the current situation of the Manx language with the challenges facing other minority languages such as Scottish Gaelic, with particular focus on rebuilding and sustaining the speaker community. The Manx case is not infrequently mentioned in passing in debates on the future of Gaelic and other endangered languages, but the analysis is generally superficial. For some commentators, the relative success of the revival of Manx as a network language among second language speakers appears to serve almost as an excuse for a complacent attitude to the maintenance of traditional communities; for others language revival is futile if the language is perceived to survive only as a hobby or educational pursuit ‘like Latin’. Beyond this simplistic binary the truth is more complex.
The paper will examine what has been achieved (or not) by the Manx language revival movement to date; the demographic situation and challenges of the community; what has been preserved and lost of the native speech community’s linguistic resources; and the language ideologies which may support or hinder targeted efforts to strengthen the community in the longer term. Since it is clear from recent research that Scottish Gaelic is in a critical condition as a community language, future prospects rest primarily on language revival rather than language maintenance, especially among the younger generations: lessons from the Manx situation will be briefly discussed. Consideration will also be given to the question of what it means to reconstitute an ethnolinguistic group and identity in a post-language-shift scenario.

This paper examines the process of standardization of written Manx from the seventeenth century up to the completion of the Manx Bible in 1772. The analysis will focus particularly on the evolution of the orthography and its relation to idiolectal, diatopic and diachronic variation and change, as well as the sociolinguistic context in which the system was created and refined. The bulk of the data is from a corpus of manuscript sermons recently transcribed as part of a British Academy/Leverhulme and Culture Vannin-funded project at Aberystwyth University, supplemented by other key printed and manuscript texts from the period in question. Long derided as 'an abominable system' (O'Rahilly 1932), 'an English monstrosity' (Jackson 1955) and 'a historical abomination' (Fargher 1979), the evidence shows that there is considerably more regularity in Manx spelling than has often been assumed, as well as significant innovations to represent phonological contrasts not found in English or, sometimes, the other Gaelic languages. At the same time, certain features of Manx orthography which can appear as flaws to modern commentators from the point of view of phonological transparency, such as etymological spellings (spurious or real), apparently deliberate ambiguous spellings accommodating variant forms, and distinct spellings for homophonous items, must be understood in terms of the beliefs and functional priorities of those who created and practiced the Manx written tradition in its original sociolinguistic context.

This seminar will examine the development of the two principal orthographies used in Manx Gaelic writing from the seventeenth century onwards, that of Bishop John Phillip’s manuscript translation of the Book of Common Prayer (c. 1610), and that of the eighteenth-century printed texts, most notably the Manx translation of the Bible (completed 1772).

Although it has long been derided by Celtic scholars and Manx language activists alike as ‘an abominable system, neither historic nor phonetic’ (O’Rahilly 1932), ‘an English monstrosity’ (Jackson 1955), and ‘a historical abomination’ (Fargher 1979), quantitative linguistic research demonstrates that there is considerably more regularity in Manx spelling than has been previously assumed, as well as significant innovations to represent phonological contrasts and developments not found in English or, sometimes, the other Gaelic languages. The Manx orthographies are revealed to be a valuable resource for tracing historical sound changes, unparalleled in other Gaelic dialects where conservative literary standards tend to obscure developments in the vernacular language.

The presentation will focus on a case study of the Manx orthographic representation of reflexes of the Gaelic vowels ua(i) */ua/ and ao(i) */əː/, a particularly complex area of Manx phonology. It will be argued that a full and fair assessment of Manx orthography requires careful consideration of the historical sociolinguistic context in which it was created, and that apparent redundancies and ambiguities in its representation of the phonological system may be functional and intelligible within this context.

Bilingual (Welsh / English) conference presentation about Sir John Rhŷs's pioneering linguistic fieldwork in the Isle of Man in the 1880s and 90s, and its enduring importance today.

Association of Celtic Students Conference, Edinburgh, March 2018.

Lecture in Manx, based on Lewin (2015). A Manx sermon from 1696. Zeitschrift für celtische Philologie 62: 45–96.
Draft here: https://www.academia.edu/42831413/A_Manx_sermon_from_1696
Published version: https://www.degruyter.com/view/journals/zcph/62/1/article-p45.xml

Paper presented at the 16th International Congress of Celtic Studies, Bangor University, July 2019. It is hoped to develop this study further with a larger sample from the Bible corpus. Thanks to AHRC Centre for Doctoral Training in the Celtic Languages for funding.

ABSTRACT:

This paper will examine the genesis and development of the Manx Bible translation, and seek to evaluate the extent to which the text (or texts) can be taken as representative of spontaneous spoken usage and contemporary linguistic variation in eighteenth-century Manx.

The first installment of the Bible (the gospel of Matthew) was published in 1748 and the final section of the Old Testament appeared in 1772. The task of translation was shared among the island’s Anglican clergy, who were generally native speakers of Manx, with an editorial team overseeing the work and seeking to standardize orthography and terminology, but seemingly less so morphology and syntax.

Substantial sections of the manuscript drafts of the translation survive and are preserved in the Manx National Heritage Library in Douglas (MS 5690C). The present study will investigate two samples from this manuscript corpus, from both the Old and New Testaments, as well as an earlier printed edition of St Matthew's Gospel, examining the editorial emendations on four dimensions: grammatical conservatism, closeness to the English text, idiomaticity, and verbosity.

Especially when the manuscript corpus is taken into account, it will be concluded that the language of the Manx Bible translation provides reasonably reliable testimony to contemporary spoken usage, if analysed judiciously. Indeed, Manx texts may offer one of the best insights available into the linguistic development of a vernacular Gaelic variety in the Early Modern period, unobscured by the inherent conservatism of a long-established pre-existing literary tradition.

'Manuscripts of the Manx Bible: linguistic features and editorial choices'

Paper delivered at Celtic Students' Conference, University of Edinburgh, March 2019, bilingual script. English abstract below.

Bheir am pàipear seo sùil air mar a thàing eadar-theangachadh a’ Bhìobaill gu Gàidhlig Mhanainn gu bith, agus thèid measadh a dhèanamh air dè cho faisg ’s a tha na teagsaichean seo air cleachdadh agus caochlaideachd nàdarra a’ chànain anns an ochdamh linn deug.

Chlò-bhuaileadh an earrann as tràithe den Bhìoball Mhanainneach (soisgeul Mhata) ann an 1748 agus nochd a’ phàirt mu dheireadh den t-Seann Tiomnadh ann an 1772 (grunn bhliadhnaichean mus do chuireadh crìoch air an eadar-theangachadh gu Gàidhlig na h-Alba).

Chaidh obair an eadar-theangachaidh a roinn air a’ chuid as fheàrr de shagartan Anglacanach an eilein, aig an robh Gàidhlig Mhanainn bho thùs mar bu trice aig an àm. Bha buidheann deasachaidh a’ cumail sùil air a’ phròiseact agus a’ feuchainn ri litreachadh agus briathrachas a chunbhalachadh, ach cha do rinneadh sin chun na h-aon ìre le gràmar agus cruthan nam facal, mas fhìor.

Tha pàirtean susbainteach de dhreachdan an eadar-theangachaidh a’ mairsinn ann an làmh-sgrìobhainnean ann an leabharlann Taigh-tasgaidh Mhanainn.

Bheirear sùil air sampall den chorpas seo de làmh-sgrìobhainnean, agus sinn a’ beachdachadh air na h atharrachaidhean a rinneadh leis an luchd-deasachaidh a-rèir ceithir slatan-tomhais: glèidhteachas gràmarach, faisge air a’ bhun-teagsa Bheurla, snas cainnte, agus lìonmhorachd fhaclan.


This paper will examine how the Manx Gaelic translation of the Bible came into being, and will assess how close these texts are to the natural variation of the vernacular language in the eighteenth century.
The earliest portion of the Manx Bible (the gospel of Matthew) was printed in 1748, and the final part of the Old Testament was published in 1772 (a number of years before the Scottish Gaelic translation was completed).

The work of translation was divided among most of the island’s Anglican clergy, who generally were native Manx speakers at the time. An editorial team oversaw the project and sought to regularize spelling and terminology (e.g. technical terminology relating to Jewish sacrificial rituals), but this was not done to the same extent with grammar and morphology, it would seem.

Substantial sections of the translators’ drafts survive in manuscript in the archive of the Manx Museum.

A sample of this corpus will be examined, assessing the emendations made by the editors on four dimensions: grammatical conservatism, closeness to the English text (AV), idiomaticity, and verbosity (wordiness).

Presentation at Celtic Students’ Conference, University of Glasgow, March 2017.

Argues that linguistic developments in Manx which have described as 'creoloid' features and attributed to language contact with Norse and English (e.g. Ó Sé 1991, Williams 1994) are more likely to have primarily internal motivations, although language contact may have been a contributing factor in some cases.

For more detailed exposition see Lewin (2017) '"Manx hardly deserved to live": perspectives on language contact and language shift', Zeitschrift für celtische Philologie 64: https://doi.org/10.1515/zcph-2017-0005.

Paper delivered at Teangeolaíocht na Gaeilge conference, Maynooth University, 2015.

In this paper I argue that the use of the substantive verb with noun predicate (Irish *tá sé fear) is an internal development in Manx, rather than a symptom of the language's 'creolized' nature or 'simplification' (Ó Sé 1991: 170, Williams 1994: 738-740). In no period of Manx does the substantive verb supplant the copula and substantive verb + preposition constructions; rather the different constructions co-exist (indeed some Manx copula constructions are more conservative than Scottish Gaelic), their distribution apparently determined by the semantics of permanence v. transience, tense, syntactic complexity etc. Evidence from corpora of eighteenth-and nineteenth-century Manx will be used to illustrate this distribution. I argue that the emergence of the substantive verb + noun predicate construction is to be explained by 1) the lack of an augmented past / conditional form of the copula (Scottish Gaelic b' e) 2) the lack of the development of the clefted construction with the preposition 'in' (Scottish Gaelic is e tidsear a tha annam) 3) emergence of substantive verb to clarify tense of copula (e.g. she dooinney mie v'eh 'he was a good man'), which then leads to v'eh / t'eh dooinney mie 'he was / is a good man' as the unfocused equivalent.

Paper intended as an accessible introduction to linguistics, delivered at an inter-disciplinary Welsh-medium conference 'Gair am air', Centre for Advanced Welsh and Celtic Studies, Aberystwyth, May 2018. The paper focuses on syntactic change in Manx and Welsh with regard to pronominal direct objects of the verbal noun.

Gwna’r papur hwn gymhariaeth rhwng prosesau tebyg o newid iaith ym Manaweg y ddeunawfed ganrif a’r Gymraeg heddiw o ran dadansoddiad yr elfen gystrawennol a elwir yn draddodiadol yn ‘ferfenw’. Hyd y gellir, defnyddir iaith hygyrch nad yw’n rhy dechnegol i esbonio diddordeb a phwysigrwydd y pwnc i gynulleidfa gyffredinol. Ni thrafodir yn fanwl theorïau ieithyddol penodol felly.
Mae’n glir mai enw go iawn oedd y ‘berfenw’ yn wreiddiol, a bod brawddeg fel “rwy’n taro’r ci” wedi golygu ar un adeg rywbeth fel “rwy yn y trawiad o’r ci”, hynny yw “wrthi’n cyflawni trawiad o’r ci”, ond go brin y byddai siaradwyr Cymraeg heddiw’n ei deall yn y ffordd hon. Casgliad y rhan fwyaf o ieithyddion cyfoes yw mai berf yn hytrach nag enw yw’r ‘berfenw’ yma. Ers canrifoedd yn yr ieithoedd Celtaidd mae’r berfenw wedi bod yn graddol golli ei ‘enwolrwydd’ ac yn mynd yn fwyfwy berfol. Gweler, er enghraifft, yr amrywiaeth rhwng ‘fy ngweld’, ‘fy ngweld i’ a ‘gweld fi’ – ac mae’n debyg mai’r opsiwn olaf aiff â hi yn y pen draw. Noder nad dylanwad uniongyrchol y Saesneg yn unig sydd wrth wraidd hyn, gan fod yr un newid yn digwydd gydag enwau go iawn, e.e. ‘ffrind fi’, er nad oes posib dweud *friend me yn yr iaith fain.
Mae amrywiaeth debyg iawn i’w gweld yn y Fanaweg (iaith Aeleg Ynys Manaw sydd nawr yn farw yn ei hymgnawdoliad traddodiadol), yn enwedig yn nhestunau’r ddeunawfed ganrif, lle y gellir gweld y newid ar droed. Mae hyd at chwe ffordd i fynegi gwrthrych rhagenwol ‘berfenw’ yn y Beibl Manaweg a gwblhawyd ym 1772. Tybed a yw’r un patrymau’n ymddangos yn y datblygiad Cymraeg? A beth yw rôl cysylltiad iaith, tafodiaith, oedran, rhywedd a chywair (lefel ffurfioldeb), yn ogystal â ffactorau ieithyddol mewnol, yn y newid?

Celtic Sociolinguistics Symposium 2018, NUI Galway

Proponents of the 'new speaker' concept have heralded a shift away from language learning ideologies that focus on emulation of native-speaker models, which they describe as 'essentialism' (O'Rourke and Pujolar 2013; O'Rourke and Walsh 2015), or 'native authenticism' (Hornsby and Quentel 2013). These ideologies are presented as potentially harmful and counter-productive both to native speakers (by romanticizing and museifying them) and to second-language learners and speakers (by stigmatizing hybridized new speaker varieties and focusing on language deficits rather than skills).

It is claimed by new speaker scholars that more 'social constructionist' ideologies are gaining ground among some L2 speaker communities, and that these offer a path away from more essentialist models. However, as these scholars also acknowledge, 'essentialist' deference to native-speaker models remains a prominent strand in the ideologies of new speakers. Focusing on the Celtic languages, this paper will argue that the case against 'essentialist' ideologies may be reductive and overstated, and that new speaker scholars have not adequately considered how a shift away from native-speaker models might play out in practice, e.g. in corpus planning and pedagogy.

'Essentialist' or 'native authenticist' ideologies may potentially have benefits in language learning, identity construction, and in some cases are clearly closely linked to deeply-held motivations for acquiring the second language. 'Native authenticists' are often among the most committed language activists and may play an out-sized role in development of resources and networks. Scholars should pay more attention to ways in which ideological clarification might take place, bringing actors with differing language ideologies and backgrounds together constructively.

Celtic Linguistics Conference, Cardiff University, September 2016

The received view in Manx scholarship is that grammatical gender in Manx ‘has been rather badly confused’ (O’Rahilly 1972: 119). Broderick (1999: 165) and Thomson (1986: 9) both claim that the feminine gender in inanimate nouns was largely defunct and replaced by the masculine even in seventeenth or eighteenth century Manx.

In this paper evidence will be adduced to show that in fact the grammatical gender system in Manx was maintained intact, much as it is in Irish and Scottish Gaelic, at all periods of Manx from the seventeenth to the nineteenth century, with the exception of the terminal speakers recorded in the twentieth century. Instances of gender concord / lack of concord in terms of lenition and pronoun replacement were counted in five texts from different periods of the language, plus the transcriptions of two of the terminal speakers (Broderick 1984–6 I). In all five texts occurrence of expected lenition with feminine inanimate nouns was between 70.9% and 98.2%, while occurrence of expected pronoun replacement was between 54.0% and 83.3%.

The most striking result was that in the writings of Edward Faragher (b. 1831) expected lenition is found in 93.6% of cases and expected pronoun replacement in 83.3%, while in the speech of his younger neighbour and acquaintance Ned Maddrell (b. 1878) the figures are 35.7% and 0.0% respectively. To some extent this could reflect the difference between careful writing and spontaneous speech, but overall, it is likely that Faragher’s usage reflects the maintenance of grammatical gender in his grammar while Maddrell (and the other terminal speakers) have not acquired grammatical genders because of inadequate exposure and inadequate socialization in the language. Loss of grammatical gender is thus not a feature of gradual change over centuries but a sudden development in the final generation of speakers as a result of language shift.

The case of Maddrell, who acquired English from his parents before starting to acquire Manx from an elderly relative between the ages of three and five, is compared with the case of Greek-English bilinguals studied by Unsworth et al. (2012). Based on such research, it seems likely that the overall quantity of input for the terminal speakers of Manx was not sufficient for full acquisition of redundant features such as gender. Late onset of acquisition of Manx, and the existence of an already developing linguistic system lacking grammatical gender (English), in the case of Maddrell, could also impede the acquisition of the gender system. In contrast, earlier generations of speakers growing up in a much more Manx-dominant community would have no such problem. It is likely that the received view argued against here is rooted in an assumption that Manx is a “decayed” variety of Gaelic, represented by O’Rahilly’s (1972: 121) well-known claim that ‘[f]rom the beginning of its career as a written language English influence played havoc with its syntax… Manx hardly deserved to live’.

Paper presented at the Cambridge Endangered Languages and Cultures Group postgraduate workshop, June 2019.

Anti-prescriptivism has been axiomatic in most branches of linguistics since the inception of the discipline (Cameron [1995] 2012), which has largely stood aloof from the normative concerns and anxieties of lay-people. This has included many strands of language policy and planning-even though reflexive, subjective choices to speak a particular linguistic variety are often central to language revitalization. Linguists have nonetheless tended to view prescriptive ideological constructs such as 'purism' mostly as obstacles, to be minimized or tolerated at best (Dorian 1994).

More recently, scholars working with the 'new speaker' concept have heralded, and encouraged, a shift away from 'essentialist' understandings of language and identity among L2 speakers of minoritized languages, including weakening of the historical focus on the model of the L1 rural native dialect speaker.

Although the 'new speaker' framework is claimed to represent a departure from earlier assumptions within linguistics (O'Rourke and Pujolar 2013), this paper will contend that it faces similar problems to other iterations of anti-prescriptivism. It will be argued that linguists' efforts would be better spent on exploring paths towards ideological clarification among speakers, rather than denouncing particular ideologies with labels such as 'essentialism'.

The focus will be primarily on the Celtic languages.

Introduction to linguistics at an inter-disciplinary Welsh-medium conference, with a focus on similarities between syntactic changes in Welsh and Manx with regard to the 'verbal noun'.

Gwna’r papur hwn gymhariaeth rhwng prosesau tebyg o newid iaith ym Manaweg y ddeunawfed ganrif a’r Gymraeg heddiw o ran dadansoddiad yr elfen gystrawennol a elwir yn draddodiadol yn ‘ferfenw’. Hyd y gellir, defnyddir iaith hygyrch nad yw’n rhy dechnegol i esbonio diddordeb a phwysigrwydd y pwnc i gynulleidfa gyffredinol. Ni thrafodir yn fanwl theorïau ieithyddol penodol felly.
Mae’n glir mai enw go iawn oedd y ‘berfenw’ yn wreiddiol, a bod brawddeg fel “rwy’n taro’r ci” wedi golygu ar un adeg rywbeth fel “rwy yn y trawiad o’r ci”, hynny yw “wrthi’n cyflawni trawiad o’r ci”, ond go brin y byddai siaradwyr Cymraeg heddiw’n ei deall yn y ffordd hon. Casgliad y rhan fwyaf o ieithyddion cyfoes yw mai berf yn hytrach nag enw yw’r ‘berfenw’ yma. Ers canrifoedd yn yr ieithoedd Celtaidd mae’r berfenw wedi bod yn graddol golli ei ‘enwolrwydd’ ac yn mynd yn fwyfwy berfol. Gweler, er enghraifft, yr amrywiaeth rhwng ‘fy ngweld’, ‘fy ngweld i’ a ‘gweld fi’ – ac mae’n debyg mai’r opsiwn olaf aiff â hi yn y pen draw. Noder nad dylanwad uniongyrchol y Saesneg yn unig sydd wrth wraidd hyn, gan fod yr un newid yn digwydd gydag enwau go iawn, e.e. ‘ffrind fi’, er nad oes posib dweud *friend me yn yr iaith fain.
Mae amrywiaeth debyg iawn i’w gweld yn y Fanaweg (iaith Aeleg Ynys Manaw sydd nawr yn farw yn ei hymgnawdoliad traddodiadol), yn enwedig yn nhestunau’r ddeunawfed ganrif, lle y gellir gweld y newid ar droed. Mae hyd at chwe ffordd i fynegi gwrthrych rhagenwol ‘berfenw’ yn y Beibl Manaweg a gwblhawyd ym 1772. Tybed a yw’r un patrymau’n ymddangos yn y datblygiad Cymraeg? A beth yw rôl cysylltiad iaith, tafodiaith, oedran, rhywedd a chywair (lefel ffurfioldeb), yn ogystal â ffactorau ieithyddol mewnol, yn y newid?

Introduction from my book Lioar-lhaih Ghaelgagh: Original Manx Prose 1821–1907. This is a reader of Manx Gaelic texts with extensive linguistic and historical notes, intended for advanced students of the language. The volume comprises two parts: pieces originally published in newspapers in the mid-nineteenth century, many of a political or satirical nature; and the original stories and reminiscences of Edward Faragher (Ned Beg Hom Ruy) (1831–1908). The texts are presented in normalized orthography. This is the most significant collection of original secular prose in the language, and an important source for Manx idiom and vocabulary, especially in domains not covered in other texts, which are mostly translated devotional literature. The book is available in bookshops in the Isle of Man, and also directly from the publisher:

https://www.culturevannin.im/publication_302533.html

Recording available here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D14NnstkFMU&t=894s

This presentation will consider a number of issues and challenges in reconstructing linguistic features of Manx, the Gaelic Celtic language of the Isle of Man. The language is extinct as a native vernacular but attested in a sizeable, mainly translated religious literature from the seventeenth to the nineteenth centuries. The discussion will focus on morphosyntactic features in the Manx Bible translation completed in 1772 and the various drafts and editions of this text-or rather collection of texts-to which most of the island's clergy contributed. General problems of historical linguistics and sociolinguistics will be explored, as well as issues specific to the historical circumstances of Manx, including its diglossic relationship with English, the translated nature of the corpus, and processes of standardization.

Lecture for the Arizona Celtic Linguistics Group, University of Arizona, 19 November 2021.

Chaidh an òraid seo a thoirt seachad aig Fèis Blas ann an Inbhir Nis anns an Dùbhlachd 2019. / Lecture delivered at Blas Festival, Inverness, December 2019.

Anns an òraid seo, bheir Gille-chrìost MacGill’Eòin seachad beachdachadh air cor na Gàidhlig san latha an-diugh bho shealladh pearsanta – mar neach-iomairt agus rannsachaidh, mar Mhanainneach a tha a’ fuireach ann an Alba, mar neach-ionnsachaidh agus mar ‘neach-labhairt ùr’, agus mar Ghàidheal, ma dh’fhaodte, de sheòrsa air choreigin. A bheil leasachadh na Gàidhlig agus an còmhradh mun cuairt air a’ dèanamh feum, no a’ falach staing a tha a’ sìor-fhàs nas doirbhe sheachnadh? Chan eil teagamh nach eil suidheachadh na Gàidhlig mar chànan coimhearsnachd uabhasach cugallach, ach tha neart fhathast ann am beairteas cànanach is cultarail nan Gàidheal agus anns an dualchas aca a thaobh ar-a-mach an aghaidh fòirneart. Mar chuideigin à dùthaich Ghàidhealach a chaill a cànan dùthchasach cha mhòr gu h-iomlan mar chainnt àbhaisteach an t-sluaigh eadar an naoidheamh linn deug is an fhicheadamh linn, ach far am facas ath-bheòthachadh nach bu bheag o chionn nam beagan deicheadan a dh’fhalbh, bidh Gille-chrìost cuideachd a’ gabhail beachd air na leasanan a th’ ann do Ghàidheil na h-Alba bhon Eilean Mhanainneach.

Tha Gille-chrìost MacGill’Eòin air PhD a chrìochnachadh aig Oilthigh Dhùn Èideann far a bheil e air a bhith a’ sgrùdadh eachdraidh chànanach Gàidhlig Mhanainn a thaobh fuaimneachadh agus dòighean-litreachaidh. Bidh e cuideachd a’ dèanamh rannsachadh air cuspairean a thaobh sòisea-chànanachas agus ath-bheòthachadh cànain.

In this lecture, Christopher Lewin will explore the present-day situation of Gaelic from a personal perspective – as an activist and a researcher, as a Manxman who lives in Scotland, as a learner and ‘new speaker’, and as a Gael, perhaps, of some sort. Are Gaelic development, and the discourse surrounding it, fit for purpose, or hiding a crisis which is becoming ever more difficult to ignore? There is no doubt that the position of Gaelic as a community language is extremely fragile, but there is strength still in the linguistic and cultural richness of the Gaelic community and in their tradition of resistance to oppression. As someone who hales from a Gaelic nation which lost its native language completely as the spoken vernacular of the people between the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, but where a significant revival has taken place in recent decades, Christopher will also consider the potential lessons of the Manx situation for Scottish Gaeldom.

Christopher Lewin is a doctoral graduand at the University of Edinburgh, where he has written a thesis examining the linguistic history of Manx Gaelic in terms of pronunciation and orthography. He also researches topics pertaining to sociolinguistics and language revitalization.

University of Edinburgh undergraduate dissertation, Celtic and Scottish Studies, 2014.

The nominal system of Manx Gaelic has two genders as in Irish and Scottish Gaelic. These partially reflect natural gender (in animate nouns), but inanimate nouns display an arbitrary grammatical gender, only partially predictable by phonetic shape and vague semantic categories. As in other Celtic languages, gender is marked in two ways: (1) agreement inflection, principally initial mutations within the noun phrase marking feminine gender, and (2) pronoun replacement.

It has been observed that grammatical gender in inanimate nouns had lapsed completely or almost completely in the terminal generation of speakers recorded during the twentieth century (Broderick 1984–86 i: 25) (i.e. all inanimate nouns are treated as masculine, and/or initial lenition becomes arbitrary), but scholars have been uncertain as to the degree to which the gender system was preserved in the earlier stages of the language, from the 17th century Manx of Phillips’ prayer book translation down to the last generations of speakers for whom Manx was a full community language with a significant proportion of monoglot and Manx-dominant speakers.

The questions to be answered essentially are as follows: at which stage, if at all, in the history of Manx did grammatical gender break down to be replaced by natural gender, and was it a gradual or a sudden process? Furthermore, if changes are observed, can probable causes be identified?

With some qualifications, the position taken by previous scholars such as Thomson (Thomson 1953: 15) and Broderick (1999: 106, 165) is that the system of grammatical gender in Manx gradually declines throughout the attested history of the language, with feminine marking of inanimate nouns being restricted to a very small class of common nouns, insofar as it is preserved at all, until it reaches a point in the final speakers where all inanimate nouns are treated as masculine. In this dissertation I advance an alternative view, that the grammatical gender system was largely preserved until the mid-nineteenth century, only breaking down significantly in the language of the terminal speakers, for reasons associated with the death of Manx as a community and household language. I present corpus evidence to support this interpretation, and discuss the probable mechanics of the loss of gender in the terminal speakers.