Enjoying this a lot. Small question: In challenge 5 we meet “os” being used to cover the English “whether” ( (I don’t know whether it will be fine tomorrow) as well as “if” ( I will go to town if it is fine). Is this a feature of spoken versus written SW welsh?
I don’t think it’s a case of spoken versus written. In the first sentence you gave as an example, you could replace “whether” with “if” in English and it means the same, so I think that’s just the easiest way to translate it into Welsh.
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It’s just that my Grammar book (by Christine Jones, p242) says that Welsh makes the distinction, whereas in English it is optional. I agree that it really doesn’t matter. I was just curious.
Technically, where the ‘if’ can be interchanged with ‘whether’, then it should be a
e.g. I don’t know whether/if it will be fine tomorrow - Dwi ddim yn gwbod a fydd hi’n braf fory
BUT you’ll hear os, being the primary Welsh word for if, and due to the influence of English, often being used in speech in both cases - where the if = whether and where it it doesn’t (in both N and S).
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Thank you for this. It clears it all up.
Michael
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I think the word whether is abused a little in English. I believe Whether should indicate there are options . E.g. I don’t know whether it’s going to be sunny tomorrow or going to rain. Where as if doesn’t imply an option. E.g I don’t know if it’s going to rain tomorrow.
I know it’s probably semantics and either way you’d be understood so whether probably gets overused in English.
There is an underlying option, @gareth-mitchell - “I don’t know if it’s going to rain tomorrow (or not)” or “I don’t know whether it’s going to rain tomorrow (or not)” - and in that case you can use a - sa i’n gwybod a fydd hi’n bwrw glaw fory (neu beidio)