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Contents 1 GAR 2 Interpreting move discussion 3 HELP ME 4 Tweants has roots in upper class English?? 5 Request for assistance 6 Grammar reference 7 Languages of country|region|continent articles 8 NOTICE. Request For Comment: Changes to Naming policies which may affect WikiProject naming conventions. 9 Cantonese 10 Confusion 11 Question 12 Assistance with a FAR 13 Request for Criticism in Tamazigh 14 Yue / Cantonese 15 WikiProject Latin 16 Assessment reuest 17 Paamese 18 "Standard XXX" de facto standard naming scheme inadequate? 19 Exceptional language acquisition 20 Deletion discussion for voseo 21 Linguistics Wikibooks 22 Cantonese 23 Suggestion 24 Automatic archiving 25 Political languages

[edit] GAR

I've just delisted Logba language (which couldn't be helped) and have now initiated a GAR for Phla-Pherá languages at Talk:Phla-Pherá languages/GA1. It doesn't meet the criteria so far, but this might possibly be fixed. For Scots language, a GAR might be in order because of missing in-line citations, but for the time being I've only posted a short note on the talk page that this issue has to be addressed. If it indeed gets addressed, GAR would not be necessary. G Purevdorj (talk) 09:27, 20 May 2009 (UTC)

Nothing has happened on Scots language, so I'll initiate a review. I'm wondering what to do about Japanese grammar: it clearly lacks most in-line citations, but given the overall very mediocre qualitiy of data - little to no recent research or interesting analyses present, so any information can be checked virtually everywhere - this doesn't render the data difficult to verify. On the other hand, this very average, maybe learner-oriented presentation of grammar itself might be a point of critique, and I would strongly have opposed that this article becomes GA - but given that it is GA at the time being, one might say that it is just this average info that is agreed upon by most and thus more suitable for a lexicon ... G Purevdorj (talk) 09:29, 31 May 2009 (UTC)

Scanian dialects lack most linguistic infos and are therefore a candidate for GAR. The High German consonant shift is a problem as it seems to contain only information that are easily verifyable even without the missing in-line citations. The status of Shabo language (as I see it) depends on the availability of info on this tiny language. Ultimately, the same holds for the grammar part of Canadian Gaelic, although this article appears to be on rather save grounds. G Purevdorj (talk) 19:16, 1 June 2009 (UTC)

Delisted Phla-Pherá languages and Scots language, retained Canadian Gaelic. G Purevdorj (talk) 09:23, 7 June 2009 (UTC)

I would say that Japanese grammar should be delisted. Indeed, inline citations are still important for this article and the vast majority of it should be cited. Although some of the examples likely don't need to be (unless you're using word-for-word, which in case needs quotation marks), statements detailing how to set up structure, use certain words, etc. should be. I'm assuming there are many available books on the topic that could be used to source the material. It may take a while, but would help to improve the article. A good rule of thumb is to source any statement that a reader who knows nothing of the topic would likely question (within reason). In addition, with a quick glance the article's lead needs to be expanded. It would also be beneficial to convert some of the lists to prose, but definitely follow this project's style guidelines for what an article like this should require. If you need further clarification, let me know on my talk page as I'm not watchlisting this page. --Happy editing! Nehrams2020 (talk • contrib) 21:49, 7 June 2009 (UTC)

Initiated GAR for Scanian dialects. G Purevdorj (talk) 22:53, 9 June 2009 (UTC)

Initiated very thorough GAR for Japanese grammar. G Purevdorj (talk) 10:42, 11 June 2009 (UTC)

Delisted Scanian dialects. G Purevdorj (talk) 19:47, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

Delisted Japanese grammar. G Purevdorj (talk) 17:27, 18 June 2009 (UTC)

Initiated GAR for High German consonant shift. G Purevdorj (talk) 23:27, 18 June 2009 (UTC)

Delisted High German consonant shift. G Purevdorj (talk) 18:51, 7 October 2009 (UTC)

[edit] Interpreting move discussion

Please help if you can -- Currently, the article Interpretation, a disambiguation page, says "Interpretation may refer to... Interpreting." A discussion is taking place at Talk:Interpreting#Requested move to figure out a possible solution, but due to a lack of participants, the discussion isn't going very well. Please weigh in if you can and help build a consensus. Thanks! Equazcion (talk) 16:55, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

[edit] HELP ME

The article Extremaduran language, needs a grammatical revision. --O extremenho (talk) 23:36, 27 August 2009 (UTC)

[edit] Tweants has roots in upper class English??

I am very curious about the evidence that links Tweants to upper class English. I'd like to see some "historical events" explained here. Not that I think for a moment that there are any. All of this is rather funny really:

"Tweants shares many features with multiple varieties of British English. This can to some extent be ascribed to historical events, that evoked language contact.

Tweants, like upper class British English, has a linking -r, or intrusive -r. Another distinct feature of Tweants is the "swallowing" of final -en syllables (especially in infinite verb forms), which can also be referred to as syllabic -n. This may be compared to British RP pronunciation of mutton, which is pronounced somewhat like mut-n, although Tweants applies this to all verbs: The infinite verb to eat, which in Dutch is eten (pronounce: ay-tə) , is etn (pronounce: etn). Tweants is to a great extent non-rhotic. Speakers do not pronounce final /r/ in words consisting of more than one syllable, if no clarity or emphasis is required. In monosyllabic words, the /r/ is not pronounced before dental consonants. Tweants uses extensive lenition in its spoken form. All strong consonants can be pronounced as their weak counterparts in intervocalic position (e.g. "better" can be pronounced either as /betə/ or /bedə/). Tweants has little or no diphthongisation, mostly found in loanwords from Dutch. Native speakers have a distinct accent when speaking Dutch, and are hence easily recognised. Particularly the distinct pronunciation of the 'O' and 'E' is renowned, and is somewhat similar to the Hiberno-English pronunciation of the 'O' and the 'A'."

Tweants is a rural Saxon dialect. Old Saxon had some features in common with Old English. But to suggest a direct link through "historical events that evoked language contacts": Oh come on, please. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Collideascope (talk • contribs) 03:21, 30 August 2009 (UTC)

Very clear and accurate info about the (unfortunaly) declining 'Tweants' speach/dialect. I myself do speak Tweants besides Dutch and for own purpose studying dialects/languages in general. I dont really understand the comment from the first (propably Dutch?) questioner. As clearly is told, Tweants is a Low Saxon dialect, did you know for example 'the white horse' used in Kent (South East England) is the same as the one used on the 'unofficial' flag of Twente, Niedersachsen (Low Germany) and so onn called the 'Saksenros'(German: Sachsenross). Also the first Conquers of England 'Hengist and Horsa' who defeated the King Vortigern who arrived in South East England have (Angel?) (Low) Saxon roots which are pointing to Twente / Low Saxon. About what is said about the finals -en, I can add that in general many 'unnecessary' consonants are left out in the dialect for example like the Dutch word 'laten' (to allow) is in Tweants 'loat'n' spelled but (almost or totally) spoken like loa'n with a glottal stop (like for example in Cockney dialect). 82.75.128.63 (talk) 20:20, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

[edit] Request for assistance

I am a biologist/taxonomist working on two articles, one on Nomenclature and another on Common names. I need someone to look over both articles in relation to the content on language/linguistics and nouns in particular. For example I think the article on common names could mention that common names are not the same as common nouns (necessarily). Is it fair to say that common names, like hammerhead shark and red robin, are proper nouns while shark and robin are common nouns because common nouns describe a class of entities (such as city, planet or person) as stated in Lester, Mark &; Beason, Larry 2005. The McGraw-Hill Handbook of English Grammar and Usage. McGraw-Hill. p. 4. ISBN 0071441336. I am looking for the right words to describe this. Any help out there to put the relevant sections in order? Granitethighs (talk) 23:47, 5 September 2009 (UTC)

[edit] Grammar reference

Would someone please review the changes at Present simple which have changed a redirect to a simple guide, with an external link to an "Online exercises and grammar rules" web site. Petr Kulaty (talk · contribs) has made several similar edits. I'm conflicted because on the one hand, the simple guide is probably extremely useful for anyone needing it, yet it may conflict with the more encyclopedic style normally used here, and the web site may be linked too often. Johnuniq (talk) 04:11, 6 September 2009 (UTC)

I have rewritten the article, simple present and will try to have a go at some others later. I may be taking a bit of a leap here but I am pretty sure that Wikipedia's not intended to be a usage guide. --Île_flottante~Floating island ^Talk 18:17, 8 September 2009 (UTC)

I have rewritten present continuous --Île_flottante~Floating island ^Talk 20:12, 9 September 2009 (UTC)

Past simple has been rewritten and renamed to simple past. --Île_flottante~Floating island ^Talk 23:17, 11 September 2009 (UTC)

[edit] Languages of country|region|continent articles

I noticed that there are over 40 Languages of X articles in this project where X is a region, country, or continent, for example Languages of Europe or Languages of Nicaragua. In addition there are similar articles not in the project such as Languages of Switzerland. I think they serve an useful purpose especially when dealing with language politics but need to be treated differently from the articles about specific languages, etc. In particular should they go in a separate subcategory (not sure how to do this in a template) and an effort made to find the ones not already categorized? A method of determining how they should be placed on the importance scale might be useful. Thoughts?--Erp (talk) 05:37, 9 September 2009 (UTC)

Abandoning the importance scale altogether would greatly facilitate ratings. But given that language families (genetics) have been proposed to be "High" importance, areas such as countries should not be treated differently. On the other hand, it would be greatly welcome to point down what an article of that kind should contain. A subcategory that only contains language areas as defined by politically defined areas would be useful. If the definition I just proposed would be taken up, such a category would also have to contain standard languages of given territories. G Purevdorj (talk) 20:46, 9 September 2009 (UTC)

I was actually thinking of just subcategorizing the Language of X articles Talk pages. The actual articles are already catalogued by continent, region, country. --Erp (talk) 01:00, 12 September 2009 (UTC)

[edit] NOTICE. Request For Comment: Changes to Naming policies which may affect WikiProject naming conventions.

Following recent changes by some editors to the Wikipedia:Naming conventions policy page, a Request For Comment, (RFC) is now being held to debate the removal of the passage specifying that individual WikiProject and other naming conventions are able to make exceptions to the standard policy of using Common Names as the titles of Wikipedia articles.

This WikiProject is being notified since it operates such a specific naming convention. Editors are invited to comment on the proposed change at this location. Xandar 01:22, 16 September 2009 (UTC)

The above "notification" is a grossly biased misrepresentation of the changes under discussion. The old version of the naming conventions policy tried to lay down binding rules; we don't work that way, so it was necessary also to make explicit exceptions. The new version articulates principles, and allows for consensus to establish how they should be applied. Thus there is no longer any need for exceptions. In fact, making exceptions is nonsense, since there are no rules to make exceptions to. These changes are good for specific conventions. Xandar is trying to induce moral panic in those who stand to gain the most from this. Xandar is only opposed to the new version because he thinks the wording, not the general thrust, weakens his position in a dispute unrelated to this RfC. Don't be fooled. Hesperian 02:43, 16 September 2009 (UTC)

[edit] Cantonese

Please see Talk:Yue Chinese where discussion is taking place about a unilateral move to this name from Cantonese (linguistics) that ignores the results of previous WP:RM discussions. 76.66.196.139 (talk) 07:32, 18 September 2009 (UTC)

[edit] Confusion

How may it translate into English the name portugués alentejano. I wait an answer --Der Künstler (talk) 18:05, 19 September 2009 (UTC)

I guess I'd call it "Alentejo Portuguese" in English. This is the only relevant link I could find at Google Books, though. +Angr 19:57, 19 September 2009 (UTC)

Yeah, I doubt there's an established expression for it. kwami (talk) 20:10, 19 September 2009 (UTC)

I believe that is more appropriate the name Alentejan Portuguese. --Der Künstler (talk) 17:38, 20 September 2009 (UTC)

[edit] Question

Does work this wikiproject too in articles about dialects? --Der Künstler (talk) 01:23, 22 September 2009 (UTC)

Yes. See for example Ulster Irish, Connacht Irish, and Munster Irish; or American English, Canadian English, and Australian English. (I haven't checked all their talk pages, but they should all be tagged as being part of this WikiProject.) +Angr 05:57, 22 September 2009 (UTC)

Danke schön! --Der Künstler (talk) 22:43, 22 September 2009 (UTC)

[edit] Assistance with a FAR

The FAR Nafaanra is at FAR with a newly added request for a general copyediting of the article. Any assistance on this one would be a major boon to the project.

Peter ^Isotalo 06:59, 22 September 2009 (UTC)

[edit] Request for Criticism in Tamazigh

This may seem odd, but I was wondering if Tamazigh (or THamazighth if you like) speakers could criticize and correct the following, keeping in mind I don't know the language so it's hard to interpret the vowels (as if Tamazigh were written directly into Arabic with no diacritcs).

r-b-w-n m-n-h-n g-sh '(a)-p m-h-r Possibly pronounced something like (Ribuun manahan gesh aap mahher).

I'll leave it ambiguous for now. Thanks. Michael Sheflin (talk) 07:05, 25 September 2009 (UTC)

[edit] Yue / Cantonese

There is a poll at Talk:Yue_Chinese#Last_vote over whether to move the article to Yue (Cantonese) or to Cantonese (Yue). Argument for the latter is that 'Cantonese' is the more familiar term, and takes priority per Common Name; argument against is that Yue is the more precise term, and that Cantonese would be interpreted as license to conflate Yue into Cantonese in other articles. —kwami (talk) 07:33, 7 October 2009 (UTC)

[edit] WikiProject Latin

I have recently started up a WikiProject about the Latin language. So I felt that as this is technically our parent project, some of the members here might wish to join us or support us in some way. Currently we have 4 members and 100 articles as well as a user who says he will be open as a consultant. 95jb14 (talk) 17:31, 13 October 2009 (UTC), First Member and Founder of theWikiProject.

[edit] Assessment reuest

article on the Chakma language has been improved. would anyone plz provide ratings+suggestions?Souvik.arko (talk) 09:38, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

[edit] Paamese

G'day all.

I've just created an article on paamese and was wondering if you guys could have a look and fix up and problems you see. Thanks. The bellman (talk) 13:43, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

[edit] "Standard XXX" de facto standard naming scheme inadequate?

20+ articles in Category:Standard languages use the convention "Standard XXX" to refer to the somewhat standardized form(s) of a language that are used in media and other intercommunication as opposed to local dialects. This has been questioned repeatedly at individual articles on the grounds that some languages are not regulated by formal standards bodies, that multiple "standard" forms exist (pluricentric language), or that "Standard XXX" is not actually a common name for the language. This convention has not actually been discussed and made policy, but apparently has appeared informally. Rather than just debating it individually at each language article, WikiProject Languages should consider whether this or some other convention is desirable; then if the project does decide on some convention, it can be a recommendation to various language articles, subject of course to consideration of individual characteristics. --JWB (talk) 09:39, 12 November 2009 (UTC)

[edit] Exceptional language acquisition

I don't know enough about the topic to know if this article should be expanded or deleted, but either way I can tell it needs help. Can someone familiar with the topic take a look at it? Thanks, Pdcook (talk) 02:26, 16 November 2009 (UTC)

[edit] Deletion discussion for voseo

Voseo has been nominated for deletion. Please contribute to the discussion at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Voseo and help find a consensus. Thanks! +Angr 06:46, 16 November 2009 (UTC)

[edit] Linguistics Wikibooks

Not sure if this is the right place to ask, but I'm looking for assistance in writing the Linguistics Wikibook, and I had heard that Wikipedia might be the best place to ask at. The book looks promising, but I don't feel like I have the time or knowledge to work with more than the first few chapters. Mo-Al (talk) 06:56, 16 November 2009 (UTC)

[edit] Cantonese

Cantonese is up for renaming again. This time, the request is to move Canton dialect to Cantonese and move the dab page that is sitting there now to Cantonese (disambiguation). (A few months ago, the issue was the unrequested move of Cantonese to Yue, which now sits at Cantonese (Yue)... so this move would replace one kind of Cantonese (moved away earlier this year) with another kind of Cantonese (the current request), both linguistically based, and not the same concept).

The discussion is occurring at Talk:Canton dialect

76.66.197.2 (talk) 06:17, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

[edit] Suggestion

Hello Wikipedia users, I wanted to suggest something that would be very useful in language related articles: use sound. I was reading the article on Korean Language (Korean_language) and I found that:

"The IPA symbol <◌͈> (a subscript double straight quotation mark, shown here with a placeholder circle) is used to denote the tensed consonants /p͈/, /t͈/, /k͈/, /t͡ɕ͈/, /s͈/. Its official use in the Extensions to the IPA is for 'strong' articulation, but is used in the literature for faucalized voice. The Korean consonants also have elements of stiff voice, but it is not yet known how typical this is of faucalized consonants. They are produced with a partially constricted glottis and additional subglottal pressure in addition to tense vocal tract walls, laryngeal lowering, or other expansion of the larynx."

Ok, this paragraph could have been written in Korean, and it wouldn't matter at all. Why? Because only a linguistics expert understands what it means. So I follow the link to "Faucalized voice":

"Faucalized voice, also called hollow or yawny voice, is the production of speech sounds with an expanded laryngeal cavity. It contrasts with harsh voice, in which the larynx is compressed."

Again, it is worthless. If I know what's the sound resulting from an "expanded laryngeal cavity" then there's nothing new for me. If I don't know what's a laryngeal cavity; then I don't understand it. So if you want to make the article useful, then you should include pronunciation .oggs in order to let common people understand. I hope this gnu philosophy input can help. 201.253.139.95 (talk) 17:52, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

We do try to include sound files as much as we can, but we don't have free sound files for everything yet, and not everyone can even make "faucalized voice" (I can't, and I have a Ph.D. in phonology). However, if an article's writing is too technical to be understood, a sound file won't help. If you don't know what the resulting from an expanded laryngeal cavity is because you don't know what "expanded laryngeal cavity" even means, then hearing someone produce that sound still won't help you understand the article. +Angr 18:37, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

[edit] Automatic archiving

So Werdnabot is no longer running. Do we still want automatic archiving of this talk page? If so, MiszaBot II does archiving in the "Wikipedia talk:" namespace, so we could use it instead. See User:MiszaBot/Archive HowTo. +Angr 18:51, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

In principle, another bot would be welcome. I would prefer archieves consisting of threads not used for 90 or 120 days instead of 60 days. G Purevdorj (talk) 00:37, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

[edit] Political languages

Is there currently any objective standard that Wikipedia uses to decide whether a "language" should be labeled as a separate language or simply as a dialect?

In the Valencian language article it makes it pretty clear that Valencian is a dialect of Catalan, but that people simply give it a different label for political reasons. For example, it states: "All universities teaching Romance languages, and virtually all linguists, consider Valencian and Catalan linguistic variants of the same language (as is the case with Canadian French and Metropolitan French, as well as Romanian's relationship with Moldovan)."

The Moldovan language article takes an even stronger stand, stating that "The language spoken in Moldova is identical to Romanian, sharing the same literary standard,[3] but for political reasons both names Moldovan and Romanian are used inside the country."

But when it comes to Serbo-Croatian, Wikipedia seems to lean more towards agreeing that it is in fact three or four separate languages. For example, the Serbo-Croatian language article speaks of Serbo-Croation in the past tense and matter-of-factly states that "With the breakup of Yugoslavia in the 1990s, its languages followed suit and Croatian, Serbian, and Bosnian became separate standard languages (Ausbausprachen); see differences between standard Bosnian, Croatian and Serbian. Currently, there is a movement to create a Montenegrin language, separating it from Serbian." And the articles for each of these new alleged languages seem to declare that they are separate languages.

Now I don't speak Serbo-Croatian, but everyone who I've spoken with who does - inclucing Serbs, Croats, and Bosniaks, have told me that it is one language and that they have no difficulty what-so-ever understanding anyone from what are now the four countries of Bosnia, Montenegro, Serbia, and Croatia. So if a government, out of nationalism, declares that the language of its country is different, should Wikipedia simply accept that it is?...

My understanding is that the degree to which there's differences between the various dialects of Serbo-Croatian, they're not any greater than the differences between say American and British English. We pronounce some words differently, and a few words are completely different - eg "zucchini" and "courgette," or "aubergine" and "eggplant," but generally Brits and Americans have no difficulty understanding each other.

So let's say that (for whatever reason) great hostility develops between the States and the UK, and Washington declares "we no longer speak English; our official language is now known as 'American,' and it's a separate language from English." Would that in and of itself make "American" a separate language? Would Wikipedia recognize it as such?...

I think that it would be best for Wikipedia to have an even and objective standard for all such cases. The best approach in my opinion is the one taken by the Valencian language article - where it states that it's often called a separate language, largely for political reasons, but that from an objective, non-partisan linguistic point of view there's no reason to see it as a separate language. Helvetica (talk) 07:54, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

There is an often quoted bonmot that "a language is a dialect with an army and a navy" - I don't even remember who said it first. This certainly applies to some of the cases you have cited in your question. In fact, Wikipedia is trying to follow some kind of objective standard, and this is the so called Ethnologue, which is a semi-official list of all languages of the world. Now many people don't like the Ethnologue for various reasons, and mostly because they question some of the decisions the editors of the Ethnologue have made - lumping varieties into one language where others say they are different languages, or splitting languages where others say they are the same. The problem with all this is that there are different and sometimes conflicting criteria about what constitutes a language or a dialect. There are strictly linguistic criteria, like shared vocabulary, phonology or grammar, or more fuzzy criteria, like mutual intelligibility, or sociolinguistic criteria, or even political criteria, as you state them. The editors are aware of the problem, and discuss it here[1]. So if they find it difficult to come up with objective criteria, Wikipedia will not fare any better - in some cases whatever decision you come up with will subject you to criticism, and sometimes those which don't are often disregarding all linguistic facts. So I guess Wikipedia editors will be doing well to continue using the Ethnologue standard, and note all evidence to the contrary on the respective pages of each language or dialect. Does that help? Landroving Linguist (talk) 08:35, 23 November 2009 (UTC)