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Bilingual transcription: Naidheachdan

Bilingual transcription: News

Watch this clip where Joy gives us some of her useful tips and favourite phrases.

JOY

Nach tòisich sinn le na prìomh naidheachdan ma–thà, headlines, prìomh naidheachdan, a phrase you’ll often hear at the start of Gaelic news bulletins.

Most prògraman naidheachd, news programmes, are brought to us by a neach–naidheachd, a journalist, neach–naidheachd who is usually beò air an èadhar, live on air, beò air an èadhar.

They bring us the news stories of the day. And in this context, a story is often referred to as an aithris, report, aithris or aithrisean, reports, aithrisean.

To say someone is reporting, they are ag aithris, reporting, ag aithris but you can also use a’ toirt iomradh air, reporting on or mentioning, a’ toirt iomradh air.

Quite often we see the neach–naidheachd asking or putting questions, a’ cur cheistean air, a’ cur cheistean air.

And these questions are more often than not asked of a neach–poilitigs, a politician, neach–poilitigs.

These are the building blocks which allow us to discuss and refer to news stories.

Now, remember the phrase I used at the beginning of this episode:

A bheil càil às ùr? Is there anything new? A bheil càil às ùr? You can use it to find out how someone is, but you could just as easily use it in conversation if you wanted to know what was happening.

Let’s say, however, that you missed the day’s news, you could always ask: An robh càil às ùr? Was there anything new? An robh càil às ùr?

If you wanted to know a little bit more about a particular story, you could ask:

Cò mu dheidhinn / a bha e? What was it about? Cò mu dheidhinn a bha e?

Up to this point, we’ve heard cò used for who, but in this situation we use cò mu dheidhinn, to ask what was it about, cò mu dheidhinn.

To find out whether someone agrees with what they’ve just heard or been told, you can ask:

A bheil thu / ag aontachadh? Do you agree? A bheil thu ag aontachadh?

And although that question is likely to elicit a Tha or Chan eil response, it will inevitably lead to the carson question!

Now you’ll remember in the previous episode we learned about the passive voice of the verb to be, bi. In news items it’s very common to hear these passive voices used with both regular and irregular verbs, such as:

chunnacas, it was seen, chunnacas, or chualas, it was heard, chualas, Nise, nach cùm sibh cluas ri claisneachd, saoil an aithnich sibh dè a tha a’ dol anns a’ chòmhradh seo.