Hoi iedereen / Hi all,
I've been reading your e-mails on Ahirani Wikipedia creation. And I wanted to raise questions about the Berber Wikipedia project: *Wp/ber*
The proposal for a Berber Wikipedia (with the code: *ber*, *ISO 639-2 and ISO 639-5*) was rejected a while ago because Berber doesn't have an ISO 639-3 code. Although, it does have ISO 639-2 and ISO 639-5.
The Wikipedia board argued that Berber "is not a language but is a language group".
The fact is: it is both.
The Wikipedia board advised to start multiple Berber Wikipedias for the dozen of Berber dialects which do have ISO 639-3 codes (like Wp/rif, Wp/shi, Wp/kab, and Wp/tzm). Some call them "languages" because they have the ISO codes and thus have the status of "language".
But the motivation is low for the Berber dialects. Now the Berber language (in its unified standard form) is official in the Moroccan constitution and is recognized as a national language in Algeria's constitution, and is taught in both countries' schools, there is a solid basis for considering it a language (not just a scholarly group of languages/dialects).
So my questions are:
-How do we convince the Wikipedia board to reconsider the Wp/ber project and approve it?
-What about the option of "macro-language"?
For example, the Arabic Wikipedia (which is written in a standard Arabic language that nobody really speaks in daily life) is based on the "macro-language" approach, eventhough there are tens of Arabic dialects (Egyptian Arabic, Iraqi Arabic, Saudi Arabic...), each one with its own ISO 639-3 language code.
There is a lot of motivation and enthusiasm for the unified Berber language on Facebook and elsewhere.
I personally know at least 5 people who can contribute to the Wp/ber project on a regular basis.
The only thing that hinders them is the rejection of Wp/ber
The Berber language is written using the Latin alphabet in Algeria and the Tifinagh (indigenous) alphabet in Morocco.
I think it could be a double-alphabet Wikipedia like the Kurdish Wikipedia or the Serbian Wikipedia, where the same content is automatically and identically available in two alphabets.
This is the link for the Wp/ber project:
http://incubator.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wp/ber/Tasna_Tamezwarut
In the following PDF link, you'll find an example of a standard pan-Berber specialized dictionary (published by Moroccan and French linguistic institutes):
http://www.ircam.ma/doc/publica/vocabulaire_grammatical.pdf
It's a Berber - English - French - Arabic dictionary of linguistics terminology.
Best regards,
Moubarik Belkasim https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l