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30 May 2012
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The Voices Recordings


About this interview
Manx speakers Manx speakers, who have a common interest in their native language, discuss how particular words have come into being. Sayings, slang and dialect occupy their thoughts.

Interviewees:
John Bernard Caine, Phoebe Elizabeth (Betty) Kelly, Stewart Bennett, Maralyn Brown,

Click on names to find out more about the participants.

Relationship of interviewees: Friends

Where: St John's, St John's

Language of interview: Manx
About this interview
Voice clip 1
The group talk about male partners and how they would refer to them. Stewart previously suggests that co-ilhiabbagh is used for female partner in the Manx bible - concubine bedfellow.



Voice clip 2
The group talk about the words they would use to describe soft shoes worn for PE, the word 'kittyses' is mentioned but only a few members of the group have heard of it.



Voice clip 3
The group discuss the words they would use for chamber pot - and come up with some rather amusing alternatives.


This clip contains language which some may find offensive.


Voice clip 4
The group discuss the saying used to describe being drunk such as 'the moon is full tonight but I'm full every night'. They have a laugh when Bernard is asked about being drunk as he is tee-total.



More clips from this interview

Stewart Bennett
Stewart talks about the little karts children used to make when he was a child.
Interview's notes

Long description of interview: An interview with four Manx speakers at St John's House, St John's, Isle of Man. The common interest for this group is the Manx language and culture. Stewart Bennett is a self-employed builder/handyman and has been learning and speaking Manx for the last 30 years. Betty Kelly has done various jobs in her life, working on local farms, picking spuds etc. She is aged 80 plus and first began learning Manx circa 1940. Part of the lessons consisted of reading the Bible in Manx and translating into English. Bernard Caine worked in the hospital path lab and began learning Manx as a schoolboy in the 1950s. Maralyn Brown is a civil servant and a fluent Manx speaker. The interviewer has known them for many years meets them regularly to read the Bible in Manx and translate it back to English. This is not a particularly pious exercise - the language is the interest. Stewart and Bernard were the most vocal and confident of the group, Betty the least as she was rather shy. As far as the spider diagram goes, as expected, not much variation in the learned language but there were some interesting asides regarding commercial use of dog muck!

Recorded by: Marie Clague, Manx Radio

Date of interview: 2005/05/05
Interview's notes

Jonnie Robinson, Curator, English accents and dialects, British Library Sound Archive, writes:


INTERVIEWER: Isn't co-lhiabbagh a male partner? Stewart: It's the same thing but a man... MARALYN: Man partner, I wrote... STEWART: There was a woman in Peel about 40 years ago and she wasn't married to the man and she said "my man" when she was talking about him. INTERVIWER: What about 'himself'? STEWART: That's right, himself. Bernard: That's common enough. MARIE: They still say that, 'himself'.


INTERVIEWER: Child's soft shoe? Stewart has a word for that. BETTY: Kittyses. STEWART: Kittyses, that's in English but in Manx it says ittsyn. MARALYN: In the school across the road they just say pumps. Does anyone else know about that? BETTY: In Peel they're saying kittyses. STEWART: Its a word particular to Peel. BETTY: Indeed, Indeed. MARIE: I haven't heard of it. STEWART: Well, I've heard it many times.


STEWART: And what word was there for chamber pot then? BERNARD: We just used to say chamber. STEWART: Po? that's it. BETTY: Po. BERNARD: That's just pot de chambre. MARALYN: There was a Manx word. STEWART: Mmn. Piss pot! MARALYN: Is it? STEWART: Well is, it's in one of the recordings of the last native speakers. MARALYN: Piss crock? STEWART: It wasn't, it wasn't the native speakers, it was Juan Gell had it. I think that's the piss pot it is, emptied out of the window. MARALYN :Piss crock. STEWART: Oh crock or croagan what would you say? BERNARD: They didn't always throw piss away, they used it. STEWARD: They didn't throw anything away in Douglas. MARALYN: Even the piss, God bless me BERNARD: I'm not joking but they make use of it. STEWART: I have heard. BERNARD: It becomes like ammonia as they would say and then it cleans wool and the like and when they were saying it, what would they say? I don't know in Manx for tweed. When they were making tweed they would put the tweed in the piss and then 'waulk' it, as they would say. STEWART: They sing at the same time they say weedilo, waddilo. BETTY: They used to collect it for the mill.


INTERVIEWER: What about drunk? MARALYN: Meshtit, scooryrit. STEWART: As full as an egg. MARALYN: That's good. STEWART: Wasn't there a man and sometimes he was saying "the moon is full tonight but I'm full every night". MARALYN: What about Bernard? BERNARD: Well... STEWART: There isn't a word for Bernard. MARALYN: It isn't worth asking him. BERNARD: Full of ale. MARIE: Full of ale? Bernard: It is and drunk, drunk.


   

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