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Euphemisms for the stomach
Sometimes we use language to talk about something without referring to it directly – for fear of flouting social or moral convention, for fear of the thing itself, to conceal and deceive, and so on. In...
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On foot of an Irish idiom
In a comment on my post about 12 Irish English usages, Margaret suggested that I write about the Irish expression on foot of. It was a good idea: the phrase is not widely known outside Ireland and is...
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Look at the cut of this Irish expression
Growing up in rural Ireland, I regularly heard – and still occasionally hear – some version of the phrase the cut of someone. It’s an informal idiom that means the state or appearance of someone and...
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Irishisms in City of Bohane
He was back among the city’s voices, and it was the rhythm of them that slowed the rush of his thoughts. —Kevin Barry, City of Bohane Kevin Barry’s award-winning first novel City of Bohane (Jonathan...
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Savouring each preposition
In ‘The Last Campaign’, from her story collection Orange Horses (Tramp Press, 2016), Maeve Kelly portrays a marriage whose members have deeply contrasting – and sometimes clashing – communication...
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Being bold in Irish English
In standard English the primary meaning of the adjective bold is ‘brave, courageous, unafraid, daring’. This can shade into a related, negative sense of impudence, brazenness, or presumption. Another...
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The Irish diminutive suffix -een
In A Brilliant Void, a new anthology of vintage Irish science fiction edited by Jack Fennell (Tramp Press, 2018), I saw some examples of a grammatical feature I’ve been meaning to write about: the...
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A grand Irish usage
In Irish English, the word grand has the familiar meanings: impressive, magnificent, high-ranking, very large, etc. – size being etymologically salient – but its most common use is in the dialectal...
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The meaning and origin of ‘culchie’ in Ireland
Culchie is a word used in Irish English to mean someone from the Irish countryside (or a small town or village), especially from the point of view of a Dubliner. Though originally pejorative, culchie...
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Are you codding me with all this stravaging?
Brian Moore, last seen on this blog Irishly having tea, uses a couple of interesting dialect words in his 1958 novel The Feast of Lupercal. One of them, codding, is in my idiolect in various forms,...
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Irish English dialect in The Stinging Fly
I have an essay on Irish English dialect in the latest Stinging Fly (winter 2020–21). The issue, just out, centres on Galway – the city, the county, the state of mind – to tie in with its status as...
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Wasn’t It Herself Told Me?
Last month I mentioned my new essay on Irish English dialect, ‘Wasn’t It Herself Told Me?’, commissioned for the winter 2020 edition of the literary magazine The Stinging Fly. If you didn’t get a copy...
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Gently enchanted
The Last of the Name by Charles McGlinchey (1861–1954) is an account of life in rural Ireland generations ago: customs, beliefs, practicalities, peculiarities. Published in 1986 with Brian Friel as...
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Irish words in English and the OED
Dozens of Irish English words and phrases were added to the OED in March 2022, including Irish words used in Irish English. I’ve written about some of these before (hames, notions, plámás, ráiméis,...
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10 more words from Irish English dialect
One of my pet linguistic topics is Irish English dialect, which I explored at length in an essay a while back. Here are 10 words, usages, and grammatical features characteristic of English as it’s...
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Mom vs mam, and Americanisms in Irish English
I was recently approached by the Irish Independent newspaper for comment on the influence of American English and pop culture on Irish English speech. The resulting article, by journalist Tanya...
View ArticleLink love: language (78)
A round-up of linguistic items – essays, news, blog posts, papers, and podcasts on language – for your enjoyment and diversion: Learning Na’vi. On plurals of hapax. Birds in English place names. A...
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Banjaxed and bockety words in Ireland
‘Lucky might get going all of a sudden. Then we’d be banjaxed.’ (Samuel Beckett, Waiting for Godot) Banjaxed and bockety are a fun pair of words in the Irish English vernacular. Banjaxed I heard from...
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