delendUm - Murab ionann is Carthago/Carthaginem tá ‘An Caighdeán Oifigiuil’ firinscneach.

You've now been placed on Conradh na Gaeilge's watchlist. They're the absolute worst about this, catering entirely to fucking learners in Dublin. They'd rather collect and spend €10m trying to build a 'Gaeltacht' in Dublin than imagine the good that money can do in the actual Gaeltacht areas. It's ridiculous.



This is the key issue. I can rant for hours about the issues with adult education in Irish, at least in Dublin. Indeed, there's two major issues:

1) There's literally no set curriculum. People sign up for the level they think they're at, then teachers teach what they want to learn. This is true even for true beginners. While the levels are theoretically based on CEFR, there's no way of progress. This means you could get someone in the B1 class whose covered topics someone else hasn't -- even if they did A1 and A2 at the same organisation. It's a pathetic way to run things, and just really dumb. There needs to be some standardization, not just letting learners decide the topics they want to learn. Gaelchultúr is, as far as I'm aware, the only one that actually does have a set curriculum for their classes.

2) There's literally not a single class for pronunciation available in Dublin. When I first moved here I emailed all three big groups -- Conradh, Gael Linn, Gaelchultúr -- and not a single one of them had pronunciation classes. Nor could they find any teacher who was willing to work on it with me, even for a higher private lesson fee.

And that's not even me getting into the other issues with Irish language culture in Dublin and how it's divided into many cliques and, well, good luck trying to break into one if you're not already there. It's a huge issue and very unwelcoming at times.

Surely you can find a Conamara native in Dublin who can teach you? You don't have to ask those groups to find a teacher for you. *Maybe those groups would prefer to teach poor pronunciation, as it's easier?

Surely you can find a Conamara native in Dublin who can teach you? You don't have to ask those groups to find a teacher for you. *Maybe those groups would prefer to teach poor pronunciation, as it's easier?[/quote]


I've asked around, but I'm unaware of any who are willing to teach and work on it with me. I know a few Conamara natives here, but none who want to do the extra time working on pronunciation (or who are really trained to teach).

Ireland is a wealthy country where housing prices are through the roof, so it's not a surprise to see tuition fees sky-high, but on https://tutorful.ie/results/irish-beginner you can find Irish tutors - and I see that Nóírín G is top-rated, and charges €44 an hour! As you can see at https://tutorful.ie/tutors/9xpnveqg?sub ... eOnly=true she is a native speaker from the West of Ireland, which implies Conamara. For €44 an hour, this would have to be very good indeed..... That is her online fee. For in-person tuition, it is €56/hour (and you have to supply the condom yourself! )

Another thing is that you would need to find out if a teacher who claimed to be a native speaker really was, or else you would fall into the Eoin-from-Bite-Sized-Irish trap, where someone who has had "Gaelscoil Irish" from the cradle claims to be Gaeltacht-equivalent.

Have you thought about Patchy? He's quite well-known on Youtube, and speaks Mayo Irish, which is quite close to Conamara, and he charges €16 an hour for lessons. See https://www.italki.com/en/teacher/4276448/gaelic(irish) He is very interested in the proper pronunciation too. This is his Youtube channel (all good stuff): https://www.youtube.com/@patchy642

Most language teachers develop of knowledge pronunciation and ability to teach pronunciation last. Some never develop it. This is true outside Ireland too. This is a general trend. Native speakers can make all the sounds but that doesn't mean they know the sounds or can isolate the sounds or instruct on how to make said sounds. So teachers and students get into a little game of saying words back and forth at each other. An experienced educated native speaker is very valuable.
"Up and atom!"
"Up and at them!"


It's rare to find teachers comfortable to teach pronunciation. It takes a decent amount of study to be able to do it well. They are probably just being honest about their abilities.

MR djwebb2021 mentions patchy over on italki.
He seems legitimate about pronunciation.