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Celtic Radio Community > Scottish Gaelic > Forms Of Address? |
Posted by: AutumnFire 15-Feb-2008, 09:49 AM |
I'm just beginning to study and wanted to know if there were different forms of words used when an adult is speaking to a child and vice versa. For instance, if an old woman is speaking to a young child, would she say something that would translate as "I cannot see you, child" or would she use a different word instead of 'child'? Also, I noticed in an online dictionary that there were many words for a male child (depending on the age of the child), but I couldn't find any for female children. I know many cultures valued males over females, but am I missing something or are there generic words for 'child'? If anyone could shed a light on this, I would deeply appreciate it. |
Posted by: bradan 16-Feb-2008, 08:10 PM |
I'm not sure what words you found, but if they had (m) next to them, that only means their grammatical gender, not their actual sex. The most common words for child are generic for both sexes, like leanabh (baby), pāiste (young child). Lullabies are sung to 'mo leanabh', whether boy or girl. When they're a bit older, you would say balach (boy) and caileag (girl). Forms of address: a bhalich, a chaileag. (lad, lass) Having said that, you would probably call them 'm' eudail' and 'droch isean' most of the time: pet or wee brat! And adults would use 'thu' to a child, and children 'sibh' to an adult, including older relatives - traditionally. No longer necessarily the case. |
Posted by: bradan 16-Feb-2008, 08:12 PM |
That should be 'a bhalaich' - form of address. No edit buttons on here? |
Posted by: GunChleoc 18-Feb-2008, 02:17 AM | ||
Chan fhaod thu atharrachadh dad an-seo.
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Posted by: AutumnFire 18-Feb-2008, 09:38 AM |
<i>I'm not sure what words you found, but if they had (m) next to them, that only means their grammatical gender, not their actual sex.</i> I found them here at http://www.ceantar.org/cgi-bin/search.cgi on MacBain's online dictionary. Thank you so much for your clarification! When I was studying Japanese there were definite differences in forms of address in regards to elder-to-youth and vice versa. It just made sense that there might be something similar. |