La Langue Jèrriaise Review - Spring 2008

Members of the Section have spent the last few months enjoying the Christmas events and helping to proof read the first draft of our Angliais-Jèrriais Dictionary, the companion volume to our much acclaimed Jèrriais-Angliais publication which was sold out within a week of its launch.

Our programme for the next six months incorporates a mixture of events, learning exercises and a visit to a place of local interest to build up our vocabulary. We will also have meetings at which we will compose short stories or descriptions on certain themes which will help us to improve our language skills.

The major event will be La Fête Nouormande on the Bank Holiday weekend, 24th, 25th and 26th May when we shall participate in three days of Jèrriais, Dgèrnésiais and Norman verse, song and dance, and form part of La Foire de Jersey. We play host this year to people from the other two Norman language speaking areas and have our own dedicated area with the Normandy Traders for the three days at the RJA&HS grounds in Trinity.

Our Dictionary will be launched at the beginning of the week, on Monday 19th in the Members' Room of La Société and there will be events on the following days leading up to La Fête. Some of our meetings will therefore involve some preparation for our performances. In between times, we shall continue our writing practice for the next issues of Les Chroniques du Don Balleine by preparing pieces on 'La Littéthatuthé what it means to us – with examples, and 'Les Sou' – money with a similar approach.

The visit to a place of local interest could be to La Grève de Lecq for example where there is a wealth of interesting features to provide us with vocabulary exercises.

Leading into Autumn, we shall be reading various pieces in order to select one to practise and perform at the Séthées Jèrriaises at the Eisteddfod in November.

Please read the attached flyer which describes our Dictionary and the discount you can obtain by a pre-publication purchase.

Ralph Nichols (Ségrétaithe).