Ceallaigh's Blog
Tonight is the first board meeting for Dìleab: The Association for Intergenerational Language Transmission in Nova Scotia. This organization is spear-headed by Dr. Emily McEwan-Fujita, who has asked me to sit on the board primarily as a technical advisor and web site developer. This is an exciting opportunity for me and for Triskele Media, because it means that I have the opportunity to integrate more fully into the Gaelic community here, and my business has the opportunity to work with Gaelic organizations.
Later this month, Dìleab will be co-sponsoring a lecture by Dr. Leanne Hinton entitled, 'Bringing the Language Home: Language Revitalization in the Family', which will coincide with Dr. Hinton's visit to Nova Scotia. If you're local, I hope you'll come.
I'll post more on this as time passes, and I have more to tell.
It looks like I won't be able to make it to the Celtic Gathering Canada 2011 after all. Our first several months in Nova Scotia have taken their toll, and we need to focus our energy and our income on our new life here for awhile. Maybe next time...
I'm delighted to report that my poem entitled, "When I arrived, this is what She said" will appear in the Fall 2011 issue of the very fine poetry journal Goblin Fruit.
I've been asked to provide a reading of the piece, so I think I'm going to head to Peggy's Cove and see if my iPad can successfully record my voice against the sound of the ocean hitting the rocks there.
I've just learned that attendees of the Celtic Gathering Canada 2009 have asked if I'll be teaching bodhrán again this year, so my bodhrán workshop has been added to the 2011 schedule.
The traditional Scottish Gaelic milling group I sing with, An Cliath Clis, will be recording its second live CD at the annual An Cliath Clis milling frolic in late April. I'll be singing two songs for the CD, Alasdair Mhic Cholla and Coisich a Rùin. The CDs will be $20 each, and they'll be as close as you can get to authentic Gaelic song without passing the cloth yourself.
It also looks like I'll be offering a presentation about the preservation/revival of Gaelic in Nova Scotia at the Celtic Gathering Canada 2011 in Mansfield, Ontario. I delivered two presentations at the first Celtic gathering two years ago; a survey of Celtic languages and a bodhrán workshop.
UPDATE: Pentacle Magazine hasn't updated its web site since Autumn 2010, and its editor hasn't responded to my query about this piece, so I have withdrawn it and submitted elsewhere.
I'm pleased to announce that my article, "Blood Rites: The Case Against Animal Sacrifice" will appear in a forthcoming issue of Pentacle Magazine. The article is a polemic against the practice of food-based, ritual animal slaughter in Paganism.
I am delighted to announce that my poem "A Path Without Bones", which was published in the Spring Equinox 2010 edition of Eternal Haunted Summer, has been nominated for the 2011 Rhysling Award.
This is my first Rhysling Award nomination, and I couldn't possibly be happier about it. My thanks to Rebecca Buchanan, editor of Eternal Haunted Summer, for giving this poem a voice.
I've been interviewed by Deborah Blake! Check it out here.
I am a Druid member of the Order of Bards, Ovates and Druids who prepared the attached gwers as a gift to the Order upon completion of the Ovate grade. If you are a member of the Order in the Ovate Grade or higher, you can request the password to this document by sending me an e-mail that contains the first sentence of the first paragraph on the first white page of your first Ovate gwers.
Yours in the Grove,
Ceallaigh