[Wikipedia-l] nn (Norw. Nynorsk) wikipedia

[Neil Harris]

Olve Utne wrote:

> Hello,
>
> In Wikipedia-l Digest, Vol 14, Issue 5, brion vibber wrote:
>
>> There's a bug in the new wiki creation script which allows zh-tw, zh-cn,
>> nn, and perhaps other language codes which are defined but had been
>> intended as aliases to be automatically created as separate wikis. Such
>> accidentally created wikis are not supported and may get closed down
>> when noticed and someone gets around to backing up their content.
>
>
> Tim Starling replied:
>
>> I've altered it now so that languages have to be listed in both langlist
>> and languages/Names.php before they can be created. So this sort of
>> thing shouldn't happen anymore.
>
>
> I see that nn (Nynorsk) is on your list of undesired entities.
> Nynorsk is *an official written language* (not dialect) of Norway
> beside the separate written language Bokmål (nb or bm).
> Please note the following factors:
>
> * Nynorsk and Bokmål are not "merely one language in different
>   alphabets" (such as can be argued for Chinese trad. / simplified,
>   Serbian / Croatian/Bosnian or Hindi / Urdu),
> * They are not merely a slight orthographic variation
>   of one language within different political entities
>   (such as UK/US English and European/Brazilian Portuguese).
> * They have a significant number of different basic terms,
>   as well as significant differences in orthography,
>   morphology and syntax.
> * The current no.wikipedia is predominantly Bokmål,
>   with only a small minority of the articles being written in Nynorsk
> * There are only three registered Nynorsk users on bm.wikipedia,
>   and there is consensus amongst these three (see below) that the
>   development of nn.wikipedia should be worked on now -- partially
>   because of the greater ease in finding Nynorsk writers for a Nynorsk
>   wikipedia than for a Bokmål wikpedia with occasional Nynorsk articles.
>   We also believe as a group (on nn.wikipedia) that Nynorsk writers
>   joining the project will join the no.wikipedia project as well --
>   thus hoping to strengthen the Norwegian wikipedia project as a whole.
> * The participation in more than one wikipedia project is the norm rather
>   than the exception amongst Scandinavian "wikipedians" in general.
>   I participate actively on nn, no/bm, sv and en.
> * Our "slogan" on the nn.wikipedia.org main page is:
>   "Samhald gjev styrke og mangfald gjev rikdom!"
>   This translates, with  as:
>   "Samhold gir styrke og mangfold gir rikdom!" (Bokmål)
>   "Sammenhold giver styrke og mangfold giver rigdom!" (Danish)
>   "Gemenskap ger styrka och mångfall ger rikedom!" (Swedish)
>   (In English, roughly:)
>   "Cooperation gives strength and diversity gives wealth!"
>
I was told by a Norwegian that the Scandanavian languages are all so 
closely related that they are effectively one language -- if you want to 
look at it that way; or all quite different -- if you want to look at it 
the other way. If that's true, it's certainly inconsistent to accept  
"Norwegian" and Swedish as different languages, but regard Nynorsk as 
merely a dialect of "Norwegian".

Perhaps the nearest equivalent might be "Scots" vs. "English". Read 
http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/vli/language/scots/index.htm to get a 
flavor of Scots, which is an official language of the Scottish Parliament.

-- Neil