It came to our attention a little while ago that there is a link on the Welsh FAQ page, under the section about choosing between the Northern and Southern courses, which links to a thread on the old forum. Which is fine, except that those of you who have joined SSiW more recently don’t have an account on the old forum, so you can’t log in and see the advice! Bad times…
So, Aran’s suggestion was that I extract the content from the thread, link to that, and then ask whether any of you nice people on here might be willing to have a look through it and create a sort of summary of what you find to be the most useful advice. The result will be linked to on the FAQ.
Any contributions you might have - even if it’s just a quick reply in here to mention something that you found useful in that document - would be very much appreciated!
The consensus seems to be if you have connections to either N or S then go with that. Otherwise, it doesn’t really matter. But, when you pick one – stick with it. Do not try and do both as that will impede progress.
That’s a great headline summary - we can definitely use that, diolch yn fawr iawn
I’ve also seen over the years that people like more than the simple explanation - kind of crazy, but true - so if anyone has the patience/interest to pull out more of the details, a few quotes, some of the stories that are in there - some people will find it easier to make the decision after reading a page or two than after reading a line or two (even if they say fundamentally the same thing…;-)).
There is so much of it!!
I can’t face the idea of trying to cover it all!! All I can say is that I have been living in Argyll since 2003 and still have trouble understanding people!! Even Janet with whom I share a house!! She said something the other day which I finally realised was a dialect word and which I have already forgotten!! (Oh, it was ‘coped’ meaning ‘flat out tired’!) My brain tries to interpret in terms of likely words I know which sound similar!! I can’t recall how I ‘heard’ coped, but not as anything which made any sense to me!!!
OK, mostly I get on fine, but there are these sudden moments of complete bemusement. So I’d say, you’ll be understood anywhere, but expect some glazed moments!
I am also an ideal example of how not to learn Cymraeg!! I speak a mix of gog and de, with an accent from the west, which causes me to have problems even wanting to sound like Iestyn!!! (Sorry Iestyn! )
I get tangled when I meet words I don’t remember in the southern course and try the north!! I do not recommend that to people who are really learners and want to learn!!! I am trying to rekindle my youth, which is a whole different ball park!!!
Finally, “Lwc dda i pawb!!”
Hmmm … and I just thought the other day that mixing things would be the best ever idea. I’m learning south course, but if you ask me, when one would ask me which word, phrase is which, I don’t have a clue. I just divide such things on those I don’t know (majority of it) and what I know (kind of minority).
Well, with that I actually rather came to another question which I hope is covered in this extract somewhere: What about those of us who don’t have any intention to live anywhere in Cymru, who don’t have any encesters anywhere in Cymru? Which is easier to cope with, which is more wide spread etc, etc. I found out in the process of learning that “lazy” option (read shortenings and similar stuff) isn’t always the simplest and easiest way of expression. I actually have quite big troubles with them and at one point I pondered my thoughts to change from South to North, but didn’t get to know yet if north also contains so many shortened things?
So, I’ll put my TTS Ivona into work to read the extracts for me (they’re just too small fonts and too long to read for me) and try to extract this out of the whole writings. I believe this is one interesting thing to know if you actually only want to learn language without any prepositions what IS suitable to you due to area you tend to live in or ancesters you have.
Or if anyone already managed to get it out of the writings, this would be great to have in such FAQ thing.
This isn’t good writing, or magic, but…I took the old thread and pulled out what I thought were the most relevant parts. I reorganized quotes into “categories” instead of keeping it chronological. It’s still about 4 pages long, which is probably too much. More could be cut out. I don’t see it as a finished product, but more as something that could be a starting point or part of the FAQ. I don’t know if this is the kind of thing you are looking for. I’m not offended in any way if you think it’s rubbish and don’t want to use it. If it is useful in some way, anyone here can feel free to edit it in any way they like. I’m sure someone else will come along and provide something better
Not sure what file formats are useful/viewable to everyone, so here are two different kinds. I’ve not used Hightail before, so let me know if the links don’t work.
If you need anything else, let me know and I’ll help if I can! I’m moving cross-country mid-October, so until about the 21st of October or so I’ll continue to be MIA a lot. After that I’m hoping to dive back in here…it’s been far too long.
@AnnaC: I’ve just noticed one tiny detail in the document - I wonder if you misread “Brecon” as “Breton” and labelled that section as “Brittany” accordingly? If you could possibly edit that and regenerate the PDF (I don’t have a decent facility to edit PDFs here), I’d be enormously grateful - then we can use your document as-is because it’s awesome
@Kinetic I have uploaded a corrected PDF file at this link:
I’m glad you caught that error…there was a string of stuff in the old thread about Breton/Brittany as well, and with all the cutting and pasting I was doing, I must have messed up.
I was only expecting that my work would be a starting point, or that someone else would submit something better. I think I was envisioning a community edit or something. This:
will have me smiling for the rest of the day!.
@megan_rhys_phillips I hope I didn’t offend you by jumping in with my submission. I had some free time, started to play around with it, and thought I would share my results. I certainly never meant to take over, or step on anyone’s toes. Pob lwc with your move!
Not at all! I appreciate the thoughtfulness, though. And thank you for the luck on the move! I’m taking only what I can fit in my VW bug, so lots to go through and get rid of…I’m going to need every bit of luck to keep my sanity by the end!
The result will be linked to on the FAQ.
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