Hi all,
It is proposed that Kurdish (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurdish_language) wikipedia (ku.wikipedia) be renamed to Kurmanji wikipedia (kmr.wikipedia) as currently ku.wikipedia predominantly hosts a single dialect which is Kurmanji dialect of Kurdish. Local community oppose the proposal so far.
I'd like to explain some background behind the proposal. Kurdish wikipedia had been hosting multiple dialects since its creation. The three main dialects (in terms of article count) have been Zazaki (1.5–2.5 million speakers), Sorani (5 million speakers) and Kurmanji (9 million speakers). Zazaki is only mentioned here because it was hosted by Kurdish wikipedia at some point. Zazaki's language family is controversial as some sources put it as a dialect of Kurdish while others disagree with this. While details surrounding the linguistic properties are irrelevant for this proposal, the controversy itself is relevant.
Kurdish as a language has no standard from and the ISO considers ku (kur) to be a language code for a macro-language for multiple dialects. Furthermore said dialects are mutually unintelligible (per first Google hit: http://www.thefellowship.info/Missions/Global-Missions/People-Groups/Kurds) with multiple different types of scripts such as Sorani using rtl Arabic script and Kurmanji using ltr latin script and are different in both grammar and vocabulary. In addition Sorani is the only dialect used officially in north of Iraq by the Kurdistan Regional Government and is not the most common dialect of Kurdish (according to Wikipedia anyways).
- Zazaki dialect separated from Kurdish Wikipedia on 5 January 2007 with http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Requests_for_new_languages/Wikipedia_Zazaki and had been steadily having an increase in article count and will seemingly overtake ku.wikipedia soon enough. - Sorani dialect has seperated from Kurdish wikipedia on 14 November 2010 with http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Requests_for_new_languages/Wikipedia_Kurdish_...) and has steady contribution despite being a very recently created wiki. - Minor dialects (in terms of article count) hosted by Kurdish wikipedia already have their relevant incubator pages with Southern Kurdish created on 29 October 2009 (http://incubator.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wp/sdh) and Kirmanjki created on 30 July 2008 ( http://incubator.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wp/kiu).
Currently ku.wikipedia has very few tagged articles in non-Kurmanji dialects:
- http://ku.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taybet:WhatLinksHere/%C5%9Eablon:Soran%C3%AE6 Sorani uses - There is a Sorani wikipedia - http://ku.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taybet:WhatLinksHere/%C5%9Eablon:Bi_kurdiya_ba%... Southern Kurdish uses - There is an incubator entry for Southern Kurdish - http://ku.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Taybet:WhatLinksHere/%C5%9Eablon:Z... Zazaki uses - There is a Zazaki wikipedia
By keeping ku.wikipedia with its ku language code we are:
- Implying Kurmanji as the "official" dialect of Kurdish with the Kurdish macro-language code - Implying Sorani as the lesser dialect when in fact it is the only official one. - Implying Zazaki to be a Kurdish dialect which Zazaki community opposes fiercely as evident in closed language proposal of Zazaki of 2007. - Confusing the reader whom visits ku.wikipedia only to find Kurdish articles they cannot read unless they use Kurmanji dialect (only half of Kurdish speakers know Kurmanji if you add up the numbers for all other dialects). - I'd like to highlight one remark from Sorani wiki proposal page: "Even though both "Kurmanj" and "Sorani" are subgroups (accent) of Kurdish language, they can cause of misunderstanding and misinterpretation for people who speak the language with these accents to each other. This can happen in different situations. For instance during regular conversations, or reading/understanding complex and professional contents.In general, "Kurmanj" and "Sorani" are not useful to each other since misinterpretation is so high while they are used in different places. --Marmzok 11 April 2009" - This is the problem the reader deals on an article by article basis unless they know the existence of Sorani wikipedia.
Relevant meta discussion is here: http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Proposals_for_closing_projects/Closure_of_Kur...
Might I remind that "The committee does not consider political differences, since the Wikimedia Foundation's goal is to give every single person free, unbiased access to the sum of all human knowledge, rather than information from the viewpoint of individual political communities." ( http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Meta:Language_proposal_policy#Requisites). Therefore political arguments including the ones in the meta discussion are irrelevant.
- とある白い猫 (To Aru Shiroi Neko)
Hoi, The argument for or against using ku.wikipedia.org are interesting but at this time rather irrelevant.There is a long list of pending name changes waiting to happen. Also we are quite happy to keep codes that are in fact representing macro languages like ar or Arabic. Thanks, GerardM
2011/9/16 とある白い猫 to.aru.shiroi.neko@gmail.com
Hi all,
It is proposed that Kurdish (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurdish_language ) wikipedia (ku.wikipedia) be renamed to Kurmanji wikipedia (kmr.wikipedia) as currently ku.wikipedia predominantly hosts a single dialect which is Kurmanji dialect of Kurdish. Local community oppose the proposal so far.
I'd like to explain some background behind the proposal. Kurdish wikipedia had been hosting multiple dialects since its creation. The three main dialects (in terms of article count) have been Zazaki (1.5–2.5 million speakers), Sorani (5 million speakers) and Kurmanji (9 million speakers). Zazaki is only mentioned here because it was hosted by Kurdish wikipedia at some point. Zazaki's language family is controversial as some sources put it as a dialect of Kurdish while others disagree with this. While details surrounding the linguistic properties are irrelevant for this proposal, the controversy itself is relevant.
Kurdish as a language has no standard from and the ISO considers ku (kur) to be a language code for a macro-language for multiple dialects. Furthermore said dialects are mutually unintelligible (per first Google hit: http://www.thefellowship.info/Missions/Global-Missions/People-Groups/Kurds ) with multiple different types of scripts such as Sorani using rtl Arabic script and Kurmanji using ltr latin script and are different in both grammar and vocabulary. In addition Sorani is the only dialect used officially in north of Iraq by the Kurdistan Regional Government and is not the most common dialect of Kurdish (according to Wikipedia anyways).
- Zazaki dialect separated from Kurdish Wikipedia on 5 January 2007 with
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Requests_for_new_languages/Wikipedia_Zazaki and had been steadily having an increase in article count and will seemingly overtake ku.wikipedia soon enough.
- Sorani dialect has seperated from Kurdish wikipedia on 14 November
2010 with
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Requests_for_new_languages/Wikipedia_Kurdish_...) and has steady contribution despite being a very recently created wiki.
- Minor dialects (in terms of article count) hosted by Kurdish wikipedia
already have their relevant incubator pages with Southern Kurdish created on 29 October 2009 (http://incubator.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wp/sdh) and Kirmanjki created on 30 July 2008 ( http://incubator.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wp/kiu).
Currently ku.wikipedia has very few tagged articles in non-Kurmanji dialects:
http://ku.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taybet:WhatLinksHere/%C5%9Eablon:Soran%C3%AE6 Sorani uses - There is a Sorani wikipedia
http://ku.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taybet:WhatLinksHere/%C5%9Eablon:Bi_kurdiya_ba%... Southern Kurdish uses - There is an incubator entry for Southern Kurdish
http://ku.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Taybet:WhatLinksHere/%C5%9Eablon:Z... Zazaki uses - There is a Zazaki wikipedia
By keeping ku.wikipedia with its ku language code we are:
- Implying Kurmanji as the "official" dialect of Kurdish with the Kurdish
macro-language code
- Implying Sorani as the lesser dialect when in fact it is the only
official one.
- Implying Zazaki to be a Kurdish dialect which Zazaki community
opposes fiercely as evident in closed language proposal of Zazaki of 2007.
- Confusing the reader whom visits ku.wikipedia only to find Kurdish
articles they cannot read unless they use Kurmanji dialect (only half of Kurdish speakers know Kurmanji if you add up the numbers for all other dialects).
- I'd like to highlight one remark from Sorani wiki proposal page: "Even
though both "Kurmanj" and "Sorani" are subgroups (accent) of Kurdish language, they can cause of misunderstanding and misinterpretation for people who speak the language with these accents to each other. This can happen in different situations. For instance during regular conversations, or reading/understanding complex and professional contents.In general, "Kurmanj" and "Sorani" are not useful to each other since misinterpretation is so high while they are used in different places. --Marmzok 11 April 2009"
- This is the problem the reader deals on an article by article basis
unless they know the existence of Sorani wikipedia.
Relevant meta discussion is here:
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Proposals_for_closing_projects/Closure_of_Kur...
Might I remind that "The committee does not consider political differences, since the Wikimedia Foundation's goal is to give every single person free, unbiased access to the sum of all human knowledge, rather than information from the viewpoint of individual political communities." ( http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Meta:Language_proposal_policy#Requisites). Therefore political arguments including the ones in the meta discussion are irrelevant.
- とある白い猫 (To Aru Shiroi Neko)
foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
It's not irrelevant because if approved, it could be added to list of pending name changes.
As far as codes representing macrolanguages, ku: is clearly a different situation than ar.wp. Arabic is a group of languages with a single unifying "macro" standard, which speakers of all Arabic languages learn in school. Every speaker of any Arabic language - Iraqi, Egyptian, Lebanese, Moroccan, etc. - will readily agree that Modern Standard Arabic is part of their cultural and linguistic tradition. For this reason, the situation makes sense.
This is decidedly not the case with ku. Unlike with ar.wp, there are 5 different languages with more or less equal status. There is no "Modern Standard Kurdish". Imagine if Modern Standard Arabic didn't exist, and Moroccan Arabic Wikipedia was housed at http://ar.wikipedia.org/ domain. This would be unfair to other Arabic languages, would it not? Well, this is the situation with Kurdish languages at the moment.
http://ku.wikipedia.org/ : interface and mainpage and almost all content in Kurmanji language http://ckb.wikipedia.org/ : interface and mainpage and all content in Sorani language http://diq.wikipedia.org/ : interface and mainpage and all content in Zazaki language (which may or may not be a Kurdish language) http://incubator.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wp/sdh : Southern Kurdish http://incubator.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wp/kiu : Kirmanjki
Now, as White Cat already mentioned, it is simply not neutral for us to imply, by housing the Kurmanji Wikipedia at the language code for "Kurdish", that Kurmanji is the 'default' Kurdish, when this is not the case. In fact, Sorani is the only variety of Kurdish that has official status in any country, being the co-official language of Iraq. Also, in comparison with your case (re:Arabic), Modern Standard Arabic (used at ar.wp) *is* the 'default' Arabic. So this is not a parallel situation and should not be treated as such, and a technical backlog is no reason to ignore it.
2011/9/16 Gerard Meijssen gerard.meijssen@gmail.com
Hoi, The argument for or against using ku.wikipedia.org are interesting but at this time rather irrelevant.There is a long list of pending name changes waiting to happen. Also we are quite happy to keep codes that are in fact representing macro languages like ar or Arabic. Thanks, GerardM
2011/9/16 とある白い猫 to.aru.shiroi.neko@gmail.com
Hi all,
It is proposed that Kurdish (
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurdish_language
) wikipedia (ku.wikipedia) be renamed to Kurmanji wikipedia (kmr.wikipedia) as currently ku.wikipedia predominantly hosts a single dialect which is Kurmanji dialect of Kurdish. Local community oppose the proposal so far.
I'd like to explain some background behind the proposal. Kurdish
wikipedia
had been hosting multiple dialects since its creation. The three main dialects (in terms of article count) have been Zazaki (1.5-2.5 million speakers), Sorani (5 million speakers) and Kurmanji (9 million speakers). Zazaki is only mentioned here because it was hosted by Kurdish wikipedia
at
some point. Zazaki's language family is controversial as some sources put it as a dialect of Kurdish while others disagree with this. While details surrounding the linguistic properties are irrelevant for this proposal, the controversy itself is relevant.
Kurdish as a language has no standard from and the ISO considers ku (kur) to be a language code for a macro-language for multiple dialects.
Furthermore
said dialects are mutually unintelligible (per first Google hit:
http://www.thefellowship.info/Missions/Global-Missions/People-Groups/Kurds
) with multiple different types of scripts such as Sorani using rtl Arabic script and Kurmanji using ltr latin script and are different in both grammar and vocabulary. In addition Sorani is the only dialect used officially in north of Iraq by the Kurdistan Regional Government and is not the most common dialect of Kurdish (according to Wikipedia anyways).
- Zazaki dialect separated from Kurdish Wikipedia on 5 January 2007
with
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Requests_for_new_languages/Wikipedia_Zazaki
and had been steadily having an increase in article count and will
seemingly
overtake ku.wikipedia soon enough.
- Sorani dialect has seperated from Kurdish wikipedia on 14 November
2010 with
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Requests_for_new_languages/Wikipedia_Kurdish_...)
and has steady contribution despite being a very recently created wiki.
- Minor dialects (in terms of article count) hosted by Kurdish
wikipedia
already have their relevant incubator pages with Southern Kurdish
created
on 29 October 2009 (http://incubator.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wp/sdh) and Kirmanjki created on 30 July 2008 ( http://incubator.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wp/kiu).
Currently ku.wikipedia has very few tagged articles in non-Kurmanji dialects:
http://ku.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taybet:WhatLinksHere/%C5%9Eablon:Soran%C3%AE6
Sorani uses - There is a Sorani wikipedia
http://ku.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taybet:WhatLinksHere/%C5%9Eablon:Bi_kurdiya_ba%...
Southern Kurdish uses - There is an incubator entry for Southern Kurdish
http://ku.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Taybet:WhatLinksHere/%C5%9Eablon:Z...
Zazaki uses - There is a Zazaki wikipedia
By keeping ku.wikipedia with its ku language code we are:
- Implying Kurmanji as the "official" dialect of Kurdish with the
Kurdish
macro-language code
- Implying Sorani as the lesser dialect when in fact it is the only
official one.
- Implying Zazaki to be a Kurdish dialect which Zazaki community
opposes fiercely as evident in closed language proposal of Zazaki of 2007.
- Confusing the reader whom visits ku.wikipedia only to find Kurdish
articles they cannot read unless they use Kurmanji dialect (only half
of
Kurdish speakers know Kurmanji if you add up the numbers for all other dialects).
- I'd like to highlight one remark from Sorani wiki proposal page:
"Even
though both "Kurmanj" and "Sorani" are subgroups (accent) of Kurdish language, they can cause of misunderstanding and misinterpretation for people who speak the language with these accents to each other. This
can
happen in different situations. For instance during regular conversations, or reading/understanding complex and professional contents.In general, "Kurmanj" and "Sorani" are not useful to each other since misinterpretation is so high while they are used in different places. --Marmzok 11 April 2009"
- This is the problem the reader deals on an article by article basis
unless they know the existence of Sorani wikipedia.
Relevant meta discussion is here:
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Proposals_for_closing_projects/Closure_of_Kur...
Might I remind that "The committee does not consider political
differences,
since the Wikimedia Foundation's goal is to give every single person
free,
unbiased access to the sum of all human knowledge, rather than
information
from the viewpoint of individual political communities." ( http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Meta:Language_proposal_policy#Requisites
).
Therefore political arguments including the ones in the meta discussion
are
irrelevant.
- とある白い猫 (To Aru Shiroi Neko)
foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
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2011/9/16 M. Williamson node.ue@gmail.com:
It's not irrelevant because if approved, it could be added to list of pending name changes.
The problem with the request is that it's not in the scope of Language committee. Renaming "zh-min-nan" into "nan" is in the scope, as it deals with simple code change. Renaming "als" into "<whatever>" is also inside of the LangCom scope, as "als" is not proper code. At the other side, stability requires that "fa" stays as "fa", as "fa" is implicitly Farsi (besides being "macrolanguage" Persian).
However, requiring that one project doesn't include texts written in other language and/or requiring that one project doesn't promote itself as the home project for other languages which have their Wikimedia projects -- that's the task for community and/or WMF; likely for GRC. If we want to solve the problem properly. LangCom should be consulted in this case, but it's not LangCom's which should deal with dispute resolution among couple of communities.
I think there is a misunderstanding with regards to the scope of the request. Both Kurmanji and Sorani Wikipedias actually currently are labelled in interwiki links and bills itself sometimes as "Kurdish Wikipedia". These are both local issues and this request is not asking them to stop that. The only thing this request is for, is to change the language code of ku.wp. It is improper to use a macrolanguage code for a Wikipedia that is not written in a "unifying variety" (= fa.wp is written in official Farsi, ar.wp is written in Modern Standard Arabic, zh.wp is written in standard written Chinese, but there is no "Standard Kurdish" and ku.wp is just written in a regular Kurdish variety which should be treated as equal to all other Kurdish varieties). I am not talking about how the Wikipedia presents itself, I am talking about how we present it, by housing it at the URI http://ku.wikipedia.org/
In this case, I do not think anything local changed by langcom, the foundation, or anybody else unless it creates legal problems. The only thing this request covers is the code itself, which is currently wrong since "ku" is a macrolanguage code but ku.wp is not truly a macrolanguage wiki.
2011/9/16 Milos Rancic millosh@gmail.com
2011/9/16 M. Williamson node.ue@gmail.com:
It's not irrelevant because if approved, it could be added to list of pending name changes.
The problem with the request is that it's not in the scope of Language committee. Renaming "zh-min-nan" into "nan" is in the scope, as it deals with simple code change. Renaming "als" into "<whatever>" is also inside of the LangCom scope, as "als" is not proper code. At the other side, stability requires that "fa" stays as "fa", as "fa" is implicitly Farsi (besides being "macrolanguage" Persian).
However, requiring that one project doesn't include texts written in other language and/or requiring that one project doesn't promote itself as the home project for other languages which have their Wikimedia projects -- that's the task for community and/or WMF; likely for GRC. If we want to solve the problem properly. LangCom should be consulted in this case, but it's not LangCom's which should deal with dispute resolution among couple of communities.
foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
On Fri, Sep 16, 2011 at 19:35, M. Williamson node.ue@gmail.com wrote:
In this case, I do not think anything local changed by langcom, the foundation, or anybody else unless it creates legal problems. The only thing this request covers is the code itself, which is currently wrong since "ku" is a macrolanguage code but ku.wp is not truly a macrolanguage wiki.
That's likely outcome and it's likely that it would be LangCom's suggestion (but, cf. Gerard's comment about priorities), but LangCom doesn't have legitimacy to decide against the will of 100% of one community if it's not about pure technical or linguistic issues. The issue is clearly of political nature and LangCom is not the body which solves such problems.
While opposition comments of the local community may be full of irrelevant political and controversial references, the arguments in support of the rename aren't anything of the sort. It may be difficult to follow the meta page as there is so much irrelevant posts by the ku.wiki community and that is drowning arguments in support of the move. It is a lame attempt to filibuster IMHO. LangCom shouldn't give in to filibuster attempts. I would like to point out that it is most definitely a political decision to leave everything as is. LangCom unintentionally created this problem by allowing the creation of Zazaki and Sorani wikipedias. By not changing it the language committee and/or the foundation is essentially declaring Kurmanji as the default Kurdish. In that sense, renaming it is the only politically correct decision.
Of course politics is irrelevant when it comes to LangCom's operation. Linguistically it makes no sense to leave ku.wiki on its macrolanguage code when the content is just one dialect (regardless of the claims of the local community). Why did LangCom allow the creation of Zazaki and Sorani wikipedias? Because these dialects are distinct enough from Kurmanji dialect that they are seperate language editions of wikipedia. In terms of linguistic and technical reasons, the local community so far provided nothing tangible for LangCom's consideration. The opposition by ku.wiki community is entirely political without any linguistic or technical reason.
While LangCom lacks procedures for rename requests, this shouldn't be an excuse to ignore rename requests. Also, no one expects the rename to happen tomorrow, the only expectation is that if approved the request is added to the backlog.
-- とある白い猫 (To Aru Shiroi Neko)
On Fri, Sep 16, 2011 at 19:50, Milos Rancic millosh@gmail.com wrote:
On Fri, Sep 16, 2011 at 19:35, M. Williamson node.ue@gmail.com wrote:
In this case, I do not think anything local changed by langcom, the foundation, or anybody else unless it creates legal problems. The only
thing
this request covers is the code itself, which is currently wrong since
"ku"
is a macrolanguage code but ku.wp is not truly a macrolanguage wiki.
That's likely outcome and it's likely that it would be LangCom's suggestion (but, cf. Gerard's comment about priorities), but LangCom doesn't have legitimacy to decide against the will of 100% of one community if it's not about pure technical or linguistic issues. The issue is clearly of political nature and LangCom is not the body which solves such problems.
foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
If there's along list, then it can get longer. :-)
And I'm not sure ar: is a parallel - ar: is generally MSA its relation to arz: is more like Received English's relation to other dialects a member of the same family, rather than the language family as a whole which kur: is. The situation is more as if the articles at ar: were almost all in arz:
And clearly we do not want inaccurately labelled wikis.
On 16/09/2011 15:23, Gerard Meijssen wrote:
Hoi, The argument for or against using ku.wikipedia.org are interesting but at this time rather irrelevant.There is a long list of pending name changes waiting to happen. Also we are quite happy to keep codes that are in fact representing macro languages like ar or Arabic. Thanks, GerardM
2011/9/16 とある白い猫to.aru.shiroi.neko@gmail.com
Hi all,
It is proposed that Kurdish (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurdish_language ) wikipedia (ku.wikipedia) be renamed to Kurmanji wikipedia (kmr.wikipedia) as currently ku.wikipedia predominantly hosts a single dialect which is Kurmanji dialect of Kurdish. Local community oppose the proposal so far.
I'd like to explain some background behind the proposal. Kurdish wikipedia had been hosting multiple dialects since its creation. The three main dialects (in terms of article count) have been Zazaki (1.5–2.5 million speakers), Sorani (5 million speakers) and Kurmanji (9 million speakers). Zazaki is only mentioned here because it was hosted by Kurdish wikipedia at some point. Zazaki's language family is controversial as some sources put it as a dialect of Kurdish while others disagree with this. While details surrounding the linguistic properties are irrelevant for this proposal, the controversy itself is relevant.
Kurdish as a language has no standard from and the ISO considers ku (kur) to be a language code for a macro-language for multiple dialects. Furthermore said dialects are mutually unintelligible (per first Google hit: http://www.thefellowship.info/Missions/Global-Missions/People-Groups/Kurds ) with multiple different types of scripts such as Sorani using rtl Arabic script and Kurmanji using ltr latin script and are different in both grammar and vocabulary. In addition Sorani is the only dialect used officially in north of Iraq by the Kurdistan Regional Government and is not the most common dialect of Kurdish (according to Wikipedia anyways).
- Zazaki dialect separated from Kurdish Wikipedia on 5 January 2007 with
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Requests_for_new_languages/Wikipedia_Zazaki and had been steadily having an increase in article count and will seemingly overtake ku.wikipedia soon enough.
- Sorani dialect has seperated from Kurdish wikipedia on 14 November
2010 with
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Requests_for_new_languages/Wikipedia_Kurdish_...) and has steady contribution despite being a very recently created wiki.
- Minor dialects (in terms of article count) hosted by Kurdish wikipedia
already have their relevant incubator pages with Southern Kurdish created on 29 October 2009 (http://incubator.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wp/sdh) and Kirmanjki created on 30 July 2008 ( http://incubator.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wp/kiu).
Currently ku.wikipedia has very few tagged articles in non-Kurmanji dialects:
http://ku.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taybet:WhatLinksHere/%C5%9Eablon:Soran%C3%AE6 Sorani uses - There is a Sorani wikipedia
http://ku.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taybet:WhatLinksHere/%C5%9Eablon:Bi_kurdiya_ba%... Southern Kurdish uses - There is an incubator entry for Southern Kurdish
http://ku.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Taybet:WhatLinksHere/%C5%9Eablon:Z... Zazaki uses - There is a Zazaki wikipedia
By keeping ku.wikipedia with its ku language code we are:
- Implying Kurmanji as the "official" dialect of Kurdish with the Kurdish
macro-language code
- Implying Sorani as the lesser dialect when in fact it is the only
official one.
- Implying Zazaki to be a Kurdish dialect which Zazaki community
opposes fiercely as evident in closed language proposal of Zazaki of 2007.
- Confusing the reader whom visits ku.wikipedia only to find Kurdish
articles they cannot read unless they use Kurmanji dialect (only half of Kurdish speakers know Kurmanji if you add up the numbers for all other dialects).
- I'd like to highlight one remark from Sorani wiki proposal page: "Even
though both "Kurmanj" and "Sorani" are subgroups (accent) of Kurdish language, they can cause of misunderstanding and misinterpretation for people who speak the language with these accents to each other. This can happen in different situations. For instance during regular conversations, or reading/understanding complex and professional contents.In general, "Kurmanj" and "Sorani" are not useful to each other since misinterpretation is so high while they are used in different places. --Marmzok 11 April 2009"
- This is the problem the reader deals on an article by article basis
unless they know the existence of Sorani wikipedia.
Relevant meta discussion is here:
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Proposals_for_closing_projects/Closure_of_Kur...
Might I remind that "The committee does not consider political differences, since the Wikimedia Foundation's goal is to give every single person free, unbiased access to the sum of all human knowledge, rather than information from the viewpoint of individual political communities." ( http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Meta:Language_proposal_policy#Requisites). Therefore political arguments including the ones in the meta discussion are irrelevant.
- とある白い猫 (To Aru Shiroi Neko)
foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
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On 16/09/11 14:37, とある白い猫 wrote:
It is proposed that Kurdish (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurdish_language) wikipedia (ku.wikipedia) be renamed to Kurmanji wikipedia (kmr.wikipedia)
Please note that we are not doing wiki renames yet for technical reasons. Nothing really preventing it, but we need the resources to write the process, review it & test it.
I don't think White_Cat's nomination is purely without ulterior motive, unfortunately. As some editors from ku.wp have alluded to, the issue of the name and designation of the "Kurdish Wikipedia" has ethnic and nationalist ramifications on both sides of the debate. Several of the ku.wp editors are on one side of that debate, and White_Cat (who is Turkish) is traditionally on the other.
~Nathan
Any proof of this? I don't seem to see anywhere that it says that White_Cat's nationality is Turkish. Also, that holds little relevance. I agree with him and I am certainly not Turkish.
2011/9/16 Nathan nawrich@gmail.com
I don't think White_Cat's nomination is purely without ulterior motive, unfortunately. As some editors from ku.wp have alluded to, the issue of the name and designation of the "Kurdish Wikipedia" has ethnic and nationalist ramifications on both sides of the debate. Several of the ku.wp editors are on one side of that debate, and White_Cat (who is Turkish) is traditionally on the other.
~Nathan _______________________________________________ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
On Fri, Sep 16, 2011 at 7:33 PM, M. Williamson node.ue@gmail.com wrote:
Any proof of this? I don't seem to see anywhere that it says that White_Cat's nationality is Turkish. Also, that holds little relevance. I agree with him and I am certainly not Turkish.
You may not find it relevant, which is fine. Others might think differently. If it's not relevant to you, then I suppose proof is unnecessary.
Let me add to this that some of the same people compared my actions, in supporting a technical move to change the ISO code of a Wikipedia, to those of a group of Turkish soldiers who attempted to murder Kurdish women and children. This game of nationalism and accusations is nothing new on Wikipedia. I have been called a Russian, a Soviet, a Jew, a Kurdish nationalist and many other things.
I was even told once that I was an official enemy of the Romanian people and that my name and face had been stored in a secret Romanian government database of enemies of the Romanian nation and that I would be targeted for elimination. So please, let's keep nationality out of this. I am not Turkish but I am a linguist and a geek and this move makes linguistic and technical sense. I am more a supporter of the aspirations of peoples to be independent, but I'd rather not take sides in every single geopolitical conflict because this does not need to be tied to that. It is a simple technical and linguistic issue with two options for a solution that should be chosen based on common sense, not nationalist sentiments or loyalties, and I have chosen my side without those unnecessary influences.
2011/9/16 Nathan nawrich@gmail.com
I don't think White_Cat's nomination is purely without ulterior motive, unfortunately. As some editors from ku.wp have alluded to, the issue of the name and designation of the "Kurdish Wikipedia" has ethnic and nationalist ramifications on both sides of the debate. Several of the ku.wp editors are on one side of that debate, and White_Cat (who is Turkish) is traditionally on the other.
~Nathan _______________________________________________ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
On Fri, Sep 16, 2011 at 7:45 PM, M. Williamson node.ue@gmail.com wrote:
Let me add to this that some of the same people compared my actions, in supporting a technical move to change the ISO code of a Wikipedia, to those of a group of Turkish soldiers who attempted to murder Kurdish women and children. This game of nationalism and accusations is nothing new on Wikipedia. I have been called a Russian, a Soviet, a Jew, a Kurdish nationalist and many other things.
I was even told once that I was an official enemy of the Romanian people and that my name and face had been stored in a secret Romanian government database of enemies of the Romanian nation and that I would be targeted for elimination. So please, let's keep nationality out of this. I am not Turkish but I am a linguist and a geek and this move makes linguistic and technical sense. I am more a supporter of the aspirations of peoples to be independent, but I'd rather not take sides in every single geopolitical conflict because this does not need to be tied to that. It is a simple technical and linguistic issue with two options for a solution that should be chosen based on common sense, not nationalist sentiments or loyalties, and I have chosen my side without those unnecessary influences.
Mark, your objections would make sense if I had only said "Oh by the way, he's Turkish." I didn't. As a matter of fact, White Cat has an extensive history of being subject to dispute resolution, editing restrictions, blocks etc. for disruptive editing with a Turkish nationalist point of view. While I do understand that you may disagree, I personally think that strongly held biases in the matter at hand are relevant to the decision he asks the community to make.
Nathan
And if I were to ask the community to make it? I would be perfectly willing to do the same thing. This should not be relevant in Wikimedia. If a pedophile says "We should put a picture of a naked child on every page of Wikipedia!", we should refute his idea on its merits, not based on the fact that he's a pedophile. I have been thinking for a long time now that ku.wp should be moved to kmr.wp, I am just not a big fan of all of the bureaucracy and so avoided doing it myself. Now someone else has done it, and I support it.
So it really bothers me that you're judging a proposal based on the (supposed) ethnicity of the person who suggested it, especially since the proposal has always had merit and I could've easily been the proposer myself. If an argument has no merit, then say so based on the argument. Ad hominem is never right, and that's actually exactly what you've done here.
2011/9/16 Nathan nawrich@gmail.com
On Fri, Sep 16, 2011 at 7:45 PM, M. Williamson node.ue@gmail.com wrote:
Let me add to this that some of the same people compared my actions, in supporting a technical move to change the ISO code of a Wikipedia, to
those
of a group of Turkish soldiers who attempted to murder Kurdish women and children. This game of nationalism and accusations is nothing new on Wikipedia. I have been called a Russian, a Soviet, a Jew, a Kurdish nationalist and many other things.
I was even told once that I was an official enemy of the Romanian people
and
that my name and face had been stored in a secret Romanian government database of enemies of the Romanian nation and that I would be targeted
for
elimination. So please, let's keep nationality out of this. I am not
Turkish
but I am a linguist and a geek and this move makes linguistic and
technical
sense. I am more a supporter of the aspirations of peoples to be independent, but I'd rather not take sides in every single geopolitical conflict because this does not need to be tied to that. It is a simple technical and linguistic issue with two options for a solution that
should
be chosen based on common sense, not nationalist sentiments or loyalties, and I have chosen my side without those unnecessary influences.
Mark, your objections would make sense if I had only said "Oh by the way, he's Turkish." I didn't. As a matter of fact, White Cat has an extensive history of being subject to dispute resolution, editing restrictions, blocks etc. for disruptive editing with a Turkish nationalist point of view. While I do understand that you may disagree, I personally think that strongly held biases in the matter at hand are relevant to the decision he asks the community to make.
Nathan
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On Fri, Sep 16, 2011 at 11:49 PM, M. Williamson node.ue@gmail.com wrote:
And if I were to ask the community to make it? I would be perfectly willing to do the same thing. This should not be relevant in Wikimedia. If a pedophile says "We should put a picture of a naked child on every page of Wikipedia!", we should refute his idea on its merits, not based on the fact that he's a pedophile. I have been thinking for a long time now that ku.wp should be moved to kmr.wp, I am just not a big fan of all of the bureaucracy and so avoided doing it myself. Now someone else has done it, and I support it.
So it really bothers me that you're judging a proposal based on the (supposed) ethnicity of the person who suggested it, especially since the proposal has always had merit and I could've easily been the proposer myself. If an argument has no merit, then say so based on the argument. Ad hominem is never right, and that's actually exactly what you've done here.
You are, again, jumping to conclusions unsupported by what I actually wrote. I didn't "judge the proposal" based on his ethnicity. If you can't be bothered to read what I've posted, then please refrain from further replies.
--- Millosh wrote:
If White Cat has pro-Turkish bias, he wouldn't support Sorani speakers, as they are "on PKK's side" and PKK is the archenemy of Turkey. However, much more relevant factor in inter-Kurdish disputes are personal and political feuds, not ethnic tension. ---
Here's a situation where there may be unknown ramifications to the action requested. In a period of ethnic and political conflict between two groups, even minor and seemingly apolitical maneuvers may have larger significance not apparent to outsiders. Since we don't have all the details, it can be helpful to understand the background of the people involved in a dispute - in this case, virtually all of the Kurdish editors are against the proposed rename, while White Cat (who has an amply documented history of pro-Turkish editing which should not be doubted) is in favor. If, as you say, it's a purely logical and reasonable argument, then the nature of the two sides is an interesting coincidence. Perhaps the Kurdish editors prefer having a "Kurdish Wikipedia" as an emblem of their unified ethnic identity, or perhaps there are other factors at play.
Nathan
Nathan, what about the fact that all the "Kurdish editors" are speakers of Kurmanji? White Cat solicited opinions from the Sorani and Zazaki Wikipedias but nobody from there has commented yet. It should be noted that ku.wp users have a history of reacting angrily to the creation of Wikipedias for Kurdish languages like Sorani, and languages that they believe to be Kurdish like Zazaki. Gomada was seen around Meta complaining recently about the fact that Zazaki has lots of new stub articles... why, if Gomada has never edited the Zazaki Wikipedia before? Well, it's obvious: he doesn't want any "dialect" Wikipedia to overtake the Kurmanji Wikipedia in number of articles.
If all Kurdish editors had been in favor of having a "Kurdish Wikipedia" as an "emblem of their unified ethnic identity", as you claim, then there would never have been a separate Sorani Wikipedia.
2011/9/17 Nathan nawrich@gmail.com
On Fri, Sep 16, 2011 at 11:49 PM, M. Williamson node.ue@gmail.com wrote:
And if I were to ask the community to make it? I would be perfectly
willing
to do the same thing. This should not be relevant in Wikimedia. If a pedophile says "We should put a picture of a naked child on every page of Wikipedia!", we should refute his idea on its merits, not based on the
fact
that he's a pedophile. I have been thinking for a long time now that
ku.wp
should be moved to kmr.wp, I am just not a big fan of all of the
bureaucracy
and so avoided doing it myself. Now someone else has done it, and I
support
it.
So it really bothers me that you're judging a proposal based on the (supposed) ethnicity of the person who suggested it, especially since the proposal has always had merit and I could've easily been the proposer myself. If an argument has no merit, then say so based on the argument.
Ad
hominem is never right, and that's actually exactly what you've done
here.
You are, again, jumping to conclusions unsupported by what I actually wrote. I didn't "judge the proposal" based on his ethnicity. If you can't be bothered to read what I've posted, then please refrain from further replies.
Millosh wrote:
If White Cat has pro-Turkish bias, he wouldn't support Sorani speakers, as they are "on PKK's side" and PKK is the archenemy of Turkey. However, much more relevant factor in inter-Kurdish disputes are personal and political feuds, not ethnic tension.
Here's a situation where there may be unknown ramifications to the action requested. In a period of ethnic and political conflict between two groups, even minor and seemingly apolitical maneuvers may have larger significance not apparent to outsiders. Since we don't have all the details, it can be helpful to understand the background of the people involved in a dispute - in this case, virtually all of the Kurdish editors are against the proposed rename, while White Cat (who has an amply documented history of pro-Turkish editing which should not be doubted) is in favor. If, as you say, it's a purely logical and reasonable argument, then the nature of the two sides is an interesting coincidence. Perhaps the Kurdish editors prefer having a "Kurdish Wikipedia" as an emblem of their unified ethnic identity, or perhaps there are other factors at play.
Nathan
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On Sat, Sep 17, 2011 at 18:35, M. Williamson node.ue@gmail.com wrote:
If all Kurdish editors had been in favor of having a "Kurdish Wikipedia" as an "emblem of their unified ethnic identity", as you claim, then there would never have been a separate Sorani Wikipedia.
That's true. For example, we have just one Azerbaijani Wikipedia with significant admin pool from Iran and South Azerbaijani Wikipedia proposal doesn't have any support. (South Azerbaijani, spoken in Iran, is written in Arabic script.)
Azeri/Azerbaijani Wikipedia is a good example of a Wikipedia that is truly available to users in both varieties, 10% of pages on the Wiki are in a different variety and it is also featured prominently on the main page. ku.wp users have been trying to make the case that they are the same, but the comparison falls flat: 99% of content on ku.wp is in Kurmanji; all content in Sorani except for 6 pages was deleted/transwikied when Sorani Wikipedia was created, and mainpage is only available in Kurmanji, as is the interface itself. It is clearly not a useful site to people who do not speak Kurmanji, so there is no reason it should be located at anywhere except the code for Kurmanji, which is kmr.
2011/9/17 Milos Rancic millosh@gmail.com
On Sat, Sep 17, 2011 at 18:35, M. Williamson node.ue@gmail.com wrote:
If all Kurdish editors had been in favor of having a "Kurdish Wikipedia"
as
an "emblem of their unified ethnic identity", as you claim, then there
would
never have been a separate Sorani Wikipedia.
That's true. For example, we have just one Azerbaijani Wikipedia with significant admin pool from Iran and South Azerbaijani Wikipedia proposal doesn't have any support. (South Azerbaijani, spoken in Iran, is written in Arabic script.)
foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
az.wikipedia hosts content for both dialects of Azerbaijani language. As long as a wiki is willing to host multiple dialects under a macro-language banner and said dialects are willing to be hosted under that banner there is no problem for us to fix. However, if one of the two az.wiki dialects decided to form a separate wiki, I would request the remaining wiki to be renamed as well. Azerbaijani dialects:
- az – Macrolanguage - azj – North Azerbaijani - azb – South Azerbaijani
This is not the same situation with Kurdish as we only have one dialect left at ku.wiki and other already separated with the support of the relevant communities. The only remaining dialect is Kurmanji.
Nathan, I am sorry but it is neither the purpose nor business of LangCom, Wikipedia projects or even the Foundation to take political sides. This is even present at the language proposal policy: http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Meta:Language_proposal_policy Requisites #3. LangCom (or Foundation-l) is *NOT* the place to address complex ethnic issues. I do not know what Nathan hopes to achieve but he seems to have a one sided personal feud with me rather than actual objections in a linguistic or technical manner and seems to be more politically motivated.
-- とある白い猫 (To Aru Shiroi Neko)
On Sat, Sep 17, 2011 at 18:39, Milos Rancic millosh@gmail.com wrote:
On Sat, Sep 17, 2011 at 18:35, M. Williamson node.ue@gmail.com wrote:
If all Kurdish editors had been in favor of having a "Kurdish Wikipedia"
as
an "emblem of their unified ethnic identity", as you claim, then there
would
never have been a separate Sorani Wikipedia.
That's true. For example, we have just one Azerbaijani Wikipedia with significant admin pool from Iran and South Azerbaijani Wikipedia proposal doesn't have any support. (South Azerbaijani, spoken in Iran, is written in Arabic script.)
foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
I am sorry but how is renaming ku.wikipedia to kmr.wikipedia a "Turkish Nationalistic View"? Have you even read the proposal before assuming bad faith? Do you understand how little the proposal intends to change?
- The interwiki link for Sorani wikipedia is "کوردی" which means "Kurdi" or Kuridsh in Sorani dialect (this should perhaps include "سۆرانی" which means "Sorani"). - Interwiki links for ku.wikipedia currently is Kurdî in latin script instead of dual Latin/Arabic script as Kurdish can be written in multiple scripts if we are referring to the macro-language Kurdish and not the Kurmanji dialect. - Interwiki links for kmr would probably be something like "Kurdî" or "Kurdî (Kurmancî)" as already discussed on the meta page.
In other words from the perspective of interwiki links we may at most include the dialect name in parenthesis to include the dialect of Kurdish.
So in sum I proposed the macrolanguage code ku to be replaced with kmr to properly represent the dialect the wiki covers with possible modification of interwiki links label to specify the dialect. What motive could I have for this (in your words "biassed") request?
-- とある白い猫 (To Aru Shiroi Neko)
On Sat, Sep 17, 2011 at 01:55, Nathan nawrich@gmail.com wrote:
On Fri, Sep 16, 2011 at 7:45 PM, M. Williamson node.ue@gmail.com wrote:
Let me add to this that some of the same people compared my actions, in supporting a technical move to change the ISO code of a Wikipedia, to
those
of a group of Turkish soldiers who attempted to murder Kurdish women and children. This game of nationalism and accusations is nothing new on Wikipedia. I have been called a Russian, a Soviet, a Jew, a Kurdish nationalist and many other things.
I was even told once that I was an official enemy of the Romanian people
and
that my name and face had been stored in a secret Romanian government database of enemies of the Romanian nation and that I would be targeted
for
elimination. So please, let's keep nationality out of this. I am not
Turkish
but I am a linguist and a geek and this move makes linguistic and
technical
sense. I am more a supporter of the aspirations of peoples to be independent, but I'd rather not take sides in every single geopolitical conflict because this does not need to be tied to that. It is a simple technical and linguistic issue with two options for a solution that
should
be chosen based on common sense, not nationalist sentiments or loyalties, and I have chosen my side without those unnecessary influences.
Mark, your objections would make sense if I had only said "Oh by the way, he's Turkish." I didn't. As a matter of fact, White Cat has an extensive history of being subject to dispute resolution, editing restrictions, blocks etc. for disruptive editing with a Turkish nationalist point of view. While I do understand that you may disagree, I personally think that strongly held biases in the matter at hand are relevant to the decision he asks the community to make.
Nathan
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On Sat, Sep 17, 2011 at 00:38, Nathan nawrich@gmail.com wrote:
I don't think White_Cat's nomination is purely without ulterior motive, unfortunately. As some editors from ku.wp have alluded to, the issue of the name and designation of the "Kurdish Wikipedia" has ethnic and nationalist ramifications on both sides of the debate. Several of the ku.wp editors are on one side of that debate, and White_Cat (who is Turkish) is traditionally on the other.
The proposal is definitely a good faith one.
I've read relevant articles about Kurdish political disputes and there is no [relevant] political dispute on the ethnolinguistic lines. Actually, Sorani area [1] in Iraq is actually held [2] by Patriotic Union of Kurdistan [3], which is supported by Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) [4]. Northern area in Iraq is controlled by Kurdistan Democratic Party [5], supported by Turkey in Iraqi Kurdish Civil War [6].
If White Cat has pro-Turkish bias, he wouldn't support Sorani speakers, as they are "on PKK's side" and PKK is the archenemy of Turkey. However, much more relevant factor in inter-Kurdish disputes are personal and political feuds, not ethnic tension.
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Dialects.jpg [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Iraq_kurdish_areas_2003_vector.svg [3] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patriotic_Union_of_Kurdistan [4] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurdistan_Workers%27_Party [5] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurdistan_Democratic_Party [6] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraqi_Kurdish_Civil_War
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