Dia dhaoibh, is mise the guy who wrote the bí/copula ask yesterday! I thought I might reach more people by posting another ask rather than reblogging the post, because obviously people who saw the original are following this blog. Agus GRMMA ar do bhlag, tá grá againn duit!
Fainic! This post is long and has complicated grammar.
Táim ag scríobh anois to address something that came up in the notes a few times:
the rumour that the copula is for 'permanent' things, and bí is for 'temporary' things.
There is *some* amount of truth to this, but it's not that simple - definitely not simple enough to be the first thing to tell foghlaimeoirí about what the copula is. Part of the problem seems to be that teachers in schools used the old "the copula is for permanent things" to avoid having to actually teach their students what a noun is, which of course is silly. (All nouns are permanent, all adjectives and verbs are temporary? There's no way that can go wrong).
What if you're saying, my hair is brown? (Tá mo chuid gruaige dhonn)? How is that any less permanent than 'I am a teacher'? (True, I could dye it tomorrow, but equally I could quit my job tomorrow, plus my hair has beeen brown since I was born). Yet you can't say 'Is mo chuid gruaige dhonn'.
So what is the truth to this copula-permanence stuff, other than the dubious assumption that all nouns are permanent?
If you use a *valid* bí construction that links two nouns, it *may* suggest less permanence than the copula. Wikipedia (the Irish syntax page) compares 'Is dochtúir é Seán' (copula) to 'Tá Seán ina dhochtúir' [approx. 'Seán is in his doctor, ina = i + a (in his)]. The second option suggests *to some extent* that Sean is a doctor for now, at the moment. The copula doesn't have any element of that.
In this way, it might be true that copula implies permanence. but it is NOT true that if Sean is only being a doctor for the week, you can say 'Tá dochtúir Seán'. The key word is a VALID bí construction, which means this isn't helpful to know when you're just starting to work out when to use bí vs copula.
Also, there are multiple possible bí constructions (Múinteoir atá ionam and Táim i mo mhúinteoir are two different ones, and I'm not sure how many others there might be). I am not a native speaker (just a grammar lover) and I'm not sure whether the '___ atá i ___' construction carries the connotation if 'for now' the same way the 'tá ___ ina ___' one does.
Here's another interesting subtlety of the copula that could lend credence to the copula-permanent thing: the copula can be used where you would expect bí for adjectives in some cases. Example - is maith (é) sin! That's good!
We would expect 'Tá sé sin go maith', which to my knowledge is also acceptable. This site I found (www.rosenlake.net/er/irish/lrslinger-copula.html) refers to 'is maith sin!' as 'exclamatory'. To paraphrase the site, using the copula means you have to put the adjective (maith, good) earlier in the sentence, so it becomes more emphasised in the sentence. (If you say those two versions aloud, you will probably agree that 'maith' seems to be the whole point of 'is maith sin!', but by the time you've said 'tá sé sin go maith!' you've almost forgotten what the point was.) The website specifically says that this exclamatory copula construction can only be used for adjectives that are permanent and subjective. (It doesn't cite a source for this, though.) The 'permanent' aspect of 'that's good!' sounds a bit strange, but I suppose if an event occurred that you say 'that's good' about, the event being good is unlikely to change in the future.
Another example of 'is' for an adjective: you can say tá sé tinn (he is sick), but also, 'is tinn atá sé' (it is sick that he is). This one is more clearly a rearranging of the sentence. Again, it's to emphasise the adjective (he is SICK, it's SICK that he is), although not in an 'exclamatory' way like the is maith sin example (that would be, 'is tinn é!' which isnt acceptable according to this site because it is neither permanent nor subjective). The site also gives this example: 'Is aisteach bealaigh Dé'; the way of God is strange. (They are strange, the ways of god!) They say that 'aisteach' is a permanent adjective, so this is an acceptable construct. You could also say 'tá bealaigh Dé aisteach' (less emphasis).
A third example is 'Is bán an páipear é', the paper is white (inherently). Tá an páipéar bán would be the typical construction (adjective, so use tá).
These copula constructions for adjectives are all *optional*. Using the normal bí (tá) is completely acceptable, so it might be a good idea to stick with your basic 'Tá [noun] [adjective]' phrasing until you're confident.
You can see that things get complicated, and while there is apparently truth to the rumour that 'the copula is for permanent things', but it's not simple, and it's definitely not the first rule to teach beginners, ceapaim.
Start with the Thing = Thing rule for using the copula, and you'll never get it wrong.
Fun fact! Apparently, 'is maith sin' is the origin of the somewhat outdated British adjective 'smashing', meaning good, or excellent, used as an exclamation.
Slán, agus go raibh maith agaibh!
