Dáithí Mac Giolla. wrote:
apart from the Doegan recordings are there any other substantial bodies of recordings of Dialects now gone.
I know they were done prior to WW2.
But as far as I know there may still have been one or two speakers in many areas well after this date.
Co Clare - maybe as late as 1990's ?
Beara - I think i read some where a speaker in the 70's
East Cork- not sure on date, think post WW2.
South Tipperary - 1950's?
East Mayo-?
Sligo- read once of two elderly brothers living till 1990's.
Tyrone- 1950's?
Louth- around Omeath- 1950's?
Antrim- 1960's?
Was there any work done on recoding these dialects before they passed ?
For East Cork (around Knockadoon/Glenawilling/Pilmore and surrounds), there was a Masters Thesis written by Liam Burke in 1968 (
https://library.ucc.ie/record=b1332653) where he conducted an in-depth review of the phonetics of the (then-extant) dialect, with a number of speakers in their 70s and 80s. There are apparently also audio recordings from this work but I haven't heard them myself.
So it's reasonable to assume that the dialect existed into the early 70s at least, assuming the 5 men he spoke to lived some time after the recordings.
There was a mention on an old Daltaí post that the an episode of Muintir na Mara on TG4 featured a Ballymacoda speaker in the 2000s (I'm guessing this episode -
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt30751256/), but I haven't been able to verify it (TG4 directed me to the filmmakers but I haven't received a response from them).
Incidentally, on Beara, I believe there's a guy on TikTok who has attempted to revive the dialect
https://www.tiktok.com/@ansasanach