Hi there I was wondering if Rosetta Stone was a good way to learn if anyone has experience with it. Also, would it be more of the Southern Irish or Northern Irish dialect. I can't seem to find that out. Thanks!

My understanding is that it tried to remain dialect-neutral (which really isn't possible with Irish), but that the pronunciations are purely Munster. So I guess "Southern-neutral"

I'm not a huge fan of the Rosetta Stone products myself...I feel that they're overpriced, and that there are lots of other computer programs out there accomplish the same thing for a lot less. But that's just me...obviously a lot of people are sold on them. I can tell you that we get a lot of puzzled queries from Rosetta Stone users at IGTF, because it doesn't EXPLAIN anything...and with a highly inflected language like Irish, that really confuses people ("Why is 'mother' pronounced "MAH-hir" here but "VAH-hir" there???" is an example of the type of questions we get).

Someone on IGTF recently posted that Rosetta Stone is offering a free trial of its Irish program through the end of March, so you might want to try it out and see what you think:

http://www.irishgaelictranslator.com/tr ... 05080.html

We also have reviews of various learning products here:

http://www.learnirishgaelic.com/productcomparison/

I don't know if it's OK to post something I'm involved with, but here's a new, reasonably low-cost on-line program you might find interesting as well:

http://www.bitesizeirishgaelic.com/

I don't have any financial interest in the company...I just do some editing and writing for them.

Redwolf

One of the guys in my Irish class used Rosetta Stone. It drastically improved his pronunciation. I didn't see much improvement in his command of the language though.

Ádh mór ort! (Good luck!)

Thanks everyone. I do think Rosetta Stone is extremely expensive. I was just wondering if it was worth its money, like everyone claims it to be.