On Feb 3, 2005, at 12:41 PM, Alex Kwan wrote:
Hello,
Stirling Newberry wrote:
I thought the question is what the *readers*
want.
We don't have the resources to find out (I mean, do we do an Internet
poll to find out, what?), so we'll probably have to stick with what
the writers are willing to contribute.
I don't think an argument from ignorance works here. Is there a large
body of readers who want wikipedias in vernaculars that diverge from
Mandrin? This should be something which is documentable. Are there
schools being set up to teach written vernaculars as opposed to
standard Mandrin, are there novels, dictionaries etc. being published
in large numbers, is there a movement. In short, has someone shown a
notable and documentable desire to separate dialects from Chinese? My
research (posted some time ago) found a case, but not an overwhelming
one, for some degree of linguistic separationism in progress. However,
a stronger case could be made for a desire to incorporate vernacular
idioms into standard mandrin, or as an important cultural dialect
within the whole, as there are many culturally significant dialects in
English which, never the less, are not under going the process of
linguistic separation.
This resource is here to provide readers with information, those of us
who write for it have our own motivations, of course, but it must be
the readers interest, to the extent we can document it, which ought to
be the final criterion for making decisions.
Instead of arguing with each other about what "we" would like, it seems
better to spend time finding out what the readers want, and then
finding a means to provide that.