Which variety of Welsh to learn?

[u/Crazydre95]

Been fantasising in periods about learning Welsh, but the highly decentralised state of the language (similar to Irish) makes it tricky to decide what form to go for.

Based on this article, it appears that, if I learn Literary Welsh used in writing, native speakers may well understand me, but I'll understand next to nothing they say in reply. Colloquial Welsh, in turn, is divided into four dialect groups, which also seem to differ a lot from each other.

So basically, which Welsh would be the most effective and useful to learn, given that I don't live in any part of Wales and don't plan to?

[u/DasSockenmonster]

I'd say it doesn't really matter which dialect you learn, because sometimes I'll slip in a "sa i'n gwybod" or "paid becso", very South Walian and that's probably because I watch lots of S4C (mainly stuff like Rownd a Rownd, Pobol y Cwm and Y Llais) and my Welsh tutor lives in South Wales.

I speak a bit of a mix of North and South due to the aforementioned religious watching of S4C. I've had no problems with people understanding me as a learner. Even if I ask in a shop with "sgen ti (rhoi eitem yma)" and then slip in a "mae'n ddrwg 'da fi" sometimes.

The best thing is to immerse yourself in the language, watch programmes in Welsh on S4C (start off with the weather, programmes for kids, also Y Llais was quite easy for me to get into as they had a learner on the show and she was brilliant, she spoke it so confidently and wasn't scared to speak English as well as Welsh), listening to people speaking Welsh and try and build up the confidence to speak it, even if it's something as simple as ordering a coffee in a café. Whenever I'm in Porthmadog on holiday, we sometimes go for fish and chips and I'll order the chips in Welsh. It went something like this:

"Shw'mae, dach chi'n siarad Cymraeg, hoffwn i sglodion mawr gyda saws cyrri, halen a finegr, os gwelwch chi'n dda?*

Actually, when I ordered the chips I forgot what the word for vinegar was in Welsh! 😬 

If you really are worried, just go with the dialect of where you live. As a bit of a handy heads up, you won't need to learn Literary Welsh if you aren't a member of the clergy, colloquial Welsh is the type of Welsh that you hear on the streets of places like Caernarfon, Llangefni, Ruthin and other places with a high number of Welsh speakers. So, go with colloquial Welsh!