I fully agree with Tim here. Wikipedia's aim is to become an encyclopedia like the "Britannica or better". Editions in Volapük or Pali are plainly counterproductive here. Like I mentioned earlier I attach the same value to each and every single language in the world. And I'm not opposed to any constructed languages as many are great creative works. Furthermore, I fully approve all efforts to preserve and foster minority languages for they are all part of the world's cultural heritage.
However, I think it's finally time to realize that not every language is suitable for a wikipedia. Matter of fact, from a realistic perspective we have more Wikipedias that aren't working than ones that are. The moment we focus on what an encyclopedia is really about (i. e. collecting and transfering information, not language which only serves as a vehicle) we'll see more clearly that e. g. languages with no native speakers will not serve our principal aim.
Boris
wikipedia-l@Wikimedia.org schrieb am 08.07.05 01:18:16:
As far as I'm concerned, Lojban and Gothic are in the same category, they both have a very small speaker population with 100% bilingualism, and Esperanto and English are in the same category, they both have a speaker population larger than the native language of many people. I'd like to see a focus on effective information transfer rather than language preservation, restoration and construction, but I think I'm fighting a losing battle.
-- Tim Starling
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On Sat, Jul 09, 2005 at 01:37:50PM +0200, Boris Lohnzweiger wrote:
However, I think it's finally time to realize that not every language is suitable for a wikipedia. Matter of fact, from a realistic perspective we have more Wikipedias that aren't working than ones that are.
You lost historical perspective. I remember times when German Wikipedia had so friggin awesome 1200 articles (mostly stubs, by today's standards), and we tried to get over 500 on the Polish Wikipedia. It wasn't such a long time ago. Now the German Wikipedia seems like the best German-language encyclopedia ever made, and the Polish Wikipedia is likely to reach similar status in a year or two.
On the other hand Kashubian Wikipedia has now 661 articles and so many people consider it a hopeless effort that can't possibly work.
Not all of the currently small Wikipedias will grow, but it's very likely that most of them will get to into "useful" (10k+ articles) range in just a few years, and by then we will have a lot of new small Wikipedias that people will keep whining about, how hopeless their efforts supposedly are.
I, for one, believe the Kashubian Wikipedia and others like it have future.
Tomasz Wegrzanowski wrote:
On Sat, Jul 09, 2005 at 01:37:50PM +0200, Boris Lohnzweiger wrote:
However, I think it's finally time to realize that not every language is suitable for a wikipedia. Matter of fact, from a realistic perspective we have more Wikipedias that aren't working than ones that are.
You lost historical perspective. I remember times when German Wikipedia had so friggin awesome 1200 articles (mostly stubs, by today's standards), and we tried to get over 500 on the Polish Wikipedia. It wasn't such a long time ago. Now the German Wikipedia seems like the best German-language encyclopedia ever made, and the Polish Wikipedia is likely to reach similar status in a year or two.
I don't think he's the one losing perspective. You can hardly compare two languages based on the number of articles in their Wikipedia editions. We currently have only 195 articles in Urdu, and I'll do whatever is necessary to support its growth into the hundreds of thousands. But a Wikipedia written in Klingon is a complete waste of time whether it has 100 articles or 100,000. You may as well write it in ROT13-encoded English. The measure of success should be information transfer, not information content.
-- Tim Starling
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: RIPEMD160
Tim Starling wrote:
I don't think he's the one losing perspective. You can hardly compare two languages based on the number of articles in their Wikipedia editions. We currently have only 195 articles in Urdu, and I'll do whatever is necessary to support its growth into the hundreds of thousands. But a Wikipedia written in Klingon is a complete waste of time whether it has 100 articles or 100,000. You may as well write it in ROT13-encoded English. The measure of success should be information transfer, not information content.
Xyvatba vf n pbafgehpgrq ynathntr sebz gur gryrivfvba fubj Fgne Gerx, juvpu unf rawblrq rabhtu cbchynevgl nzbatfg snaf gb trg Xyvatba yvfgrq nf na "bssvpvny" ynathntr, va zhpu gur fnzr jnl nf Fgne Jnef snaf unir nggrzcgrq gb unir "Wrqv" yvfgrq nf na bssvpvny eryvtvba.
Guvf cbfg unf ab cbvag jungfbrire. Vs lbh unir qrpbqrq guvf, tbbq sbe lbh. Abj fgbc nethvat, gur ybg bs lbh!
- -- Alphax OpenPGP key: 0xF874C613 - http://tinyurl.com/cc9up http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Alphax There are two kinds of people: those who say to God, 'Thy will be done,' and those to whom God says, 'All right, then, have it your way.' - C. S. Lewis
-> "Klingon is a constructed language from the television show Star Trek, which has enjoyed enough popularity amongst fans to get Klingon listed as an "official" language, in much the same way as Star Wars fans have attempted to have "Jedi" listed as an official religion.
This post has no point whatsoever. If you have decoded this, good for you. Now stop arguing, the lot of you!"
Trrm Nycunk, jung n jnfgr bs gvzr! V jbaqre ubj znal crbcyr jrag naq qrpbqrq gung, bayl gb svaq lbhe zrffntr jnfa'g irel... jryy... funyy V fnl, "eryrinag"?
Vg'f crbcyr yvxr lbh jub znxr yvsr fb [vafreg nqwrpgvir urer].
Va pnfr lbh pbhyqa'g gryy, V'z xvqqvat. Nyy va tbbq sha.
Vs lbh'ir qrpbqrq guvf, pbatenghyngvbaf. Lbh jnfgrq rira zber gvzr!
Znex
On 09/07/05, Alphax alphasigmax@gmail.com wrote:
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: RIPEMD160
Tim Starling wrote:
I don't think he's the one losing perspective. You can hardly compare two languages based on the number of articles in their Wikipedia editions. We currently have only 195 articles in Urdu, and I'll do whatever is necessary to support its growth into the hundreds of thousands. But a Wikipedia written in Klingon is a complete waste of time whether it has 100 articles or 100,000. You may as well write it in ROT13-encoded English. The measure of success should be information transfer, not information content.
Xyvatba vf n pbafgehpgrq ynathntr sebz gur gryrivfvba fubj Fgne Gerx, juvpu unf rawblrq rabhtu cbchynevgl nzbatfg snaf gb trg Xyvatba yvfgrq nf na "bssvpvny" ynathntr, va zhpu gur fnzr jnl nf Fgne Jnef snaf unir nggrzcgrq gb unir "Wrqv" yvfgrq nf na bssvpvny eryvtvba.
Guvf cbfg unf ab cbvag jungfbrire. Vs lbh unir qrpbqrq guvf, tbbq sbe lbh. Abj fgbc nethvat, gur ybg bs lbh!
Alphax OpenPGP key: 0xF874C613 - http://tinyurl.com/cc9up http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Alphax There are two kinds of people: those who say to God, 'Thy will be done,' and those to whom God says, 'All right, then, have it your way.' - C. S. Lewis -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1.4.1 (MingW32) Comment: Using GnuPG with Thunderbird - http://enigmail.mozdev.org
iD8DBQFCz/TG/RxM5Ph0xhMRAxX7AJ423MhOezezV3436jDr3Eom96vaagCgmz4g PiAlpgUCNzIDSLfC+pwNxqc= =QFJb -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- _______________________________________________ Wikipedia-l mailing list Wikipedia-l@Wikimedia.org http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
Si-si, y na mi za va úna Wiki i mia sivovai-leto, dei arúyoni comprena, y da essa la discusciono prei di-ésii oferora... Di essa molto nialei commúnicera i úna leta dei vi-túto ne comprena muahaha!
Nice eh writing in incomprehensible texts? :p
Servien!
2005/7/10, Mark Williamson node.ue@gmail.com:
-> "Klingon is a constructed language from the television show Star Trek, which has enjoyed enough popularity amongst fans to get Klingon listed as an "official" language, in much the same way as Star Wars fans have attempted to have "Jedi" listed as an official religion.
This post has no point whatsoever. If you have decoded this, good for you. Now stop arguing, the lot of you!"
Trrm Nycunk, jung n jnfgr bs gvzr! V jbaqre ubj znal crbcyr jrag naq qrpbqrq gung, bayl gb svaq lbhe zrffntr jnfa'g irel... jryy... funyy V fnl, "eryrinag"?
Vg'f crbcyr yvxr lbh jub znxr yvsr fb [vafreg nqwrpgvir urer].
Va pnfr lbh pbhyqa'g gryy, V'z xvqqvat. Nyy va tbbq sha.
Vs lbh'ir qrpbqrq guvf, pbatenghyngvbaf. Lbh jnfgrq rira zber gvzr!
Znex
On 09/07/05, Alphax alphasigmax@gmail.com wrote:
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: RIPEMD160
Tim Starling wrote:
I don't think he's the one losing perspective. You can hardly compare two languages based on the number of articles in their Wikipedia editions. We currently have only 195 articles in Urdu, and I'll do whatever is necessary to support its growth into the hundreds of thousands. But a Wikipedia written in Klingon is a complete waste of time whether it has 100 articles or 100,000. You may as well write it in ROT13-encoded English. The measure of success should be information transfer, not information content.
Xyvatba vf n pbafgehpgrq ynathntr sebz gur gryrivfvba fubj Fgne Gerx, juvpu unf rawblrq rabhtu cbchynevgl nzbatfg snaf gb trg Xyvatba yvfgrq nf na "bssvpvny" ynathntr, va zhpu gur fnzr jnl nf Fgne Jnef snaf unir nggrzcgrq gb unir "Wrqv" yvfgrq nf na bssvpvny eryvtvba.
Guvf cbfg unf ab cbvag jungfbrire. Vs lbh unir qrpbqrq guvf, tbbq sbe lbh. Abj fgbc nethvat, gur ybg bs lbh!
Alphax OpenPGP key: 0xF874C613 - http://tinyurl.com/cc9up http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Alphax There are two kinds of people: those who say to God, 'Thy will be done,' and those to whom God says, 'All right, then, have it your way.' - C. S. Lewis -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1.4.1 (MingW32) Comment: Using GnuPG with Thunderbird - http://enigmail.mozdev.org
iD8DBQFCz/TG/RxM5Ph0xhMRAxX7AJ423MhOezezV3436jDr3Eom96vaagCgmz4g PiAlpgUCNzIDSLfC+pwNxqc= =QFJb -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- _______________________________________________ Wikipedia-l mailing list Wikipedia-l@Wikimedia.org http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
-- SI HOC LEGERE SCIS NIMIVM ERVDITIONIS HABES QVANTVM MATERIAE MATERIETVR MARMOTA MONAX SI MARMOTA MONAX MATERIAM POSSIT MATERIARI ESTNE VOLVMEN IN TOGA AN SOLVM TIBI LIBET ME VIDERE _______________________________________________ Wikipedia-l mailing list Wikipedia-l@Wikimedia.org http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
From: Tim Starling t.starling@physics.unimelb.edu.au I don't think he's the one losing perspective. You can hardly compare two languages based on the number of articles in their Wikipedia editions. We currently have only 195 articles in Urdu, and I'll do whatever is necessary to support its growth into the hundreds of thousands. But a Wikipedia written in Klingon is a complete waste of time whether it has 100 articles or 100,000. You may as well write it in ROT13-encoded English. The measure of success should be information transfer, not information content.
Strongly disagreed. That point of view would make most Wikipedias wastes of time. Everyone speaking Limburgic can read Dutch better. Virtually everyone speaking Welsh, Navajo, and Maori can read English better. Everyone able to read Bambara is supposed to read French as well. Wikipedias contribute to the status of a language and the community it is spoken by. The fact that Klingon is (probably) noone's native language makes a difference, but not entirely a substantial one: it is a nice thing to have, and it can and will benefit the Klingon speaking communities which often meet and use the language quite prominently. It becomes a diiferent story when noone reads it, even when reaching a high number of articles.
Wouter
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Wouter Steenbeek wrote:
Strongly disagreed. That point of view would make most Wikipedias wastes of time. Everyone speaking Limburgic can read Dutch better. Virtually everyone speaking Welsh, Navajo, and Maori can read English better. Everyone able to read Bambara is supposed to read French as well. Wikipedias contribute to the status of a language and the community it is spoken by. The fact that Klingon is (probably) noone's native language makes a difference, but not entirely a substantial one: it is a nice thing to have, and it can and will benefit the Klingon speaking communities which often meet and use the language quite prominently. It becomes a diiferent story when noone reads it, even when reaching a high number of articles.
I have trouble relating to this. What do you think Wikipedia's goals are (or should be)? Why do you contribute to Wikipedia?
-- Tim Starling
From: Tim Starling t.starling@physics.unimelb.edu.au
Wouter Steenbeek wrote:
Strongly disagreed. That point of view would make most Wikipedias wastes of time. Everyone speaking Limburgic can read Dutch better. Virtually everyone speaking Welsh, Navajo, and Maori can read English better. Everyone able to read Bambara is supposed to read French as well. Wikipedias contribute to the status of a language and the community it is spoken by. The fact that Klingon is (probably) noone's native language makes a difference, but not entirely a substantial one: it is a nice thing to have, and it can and will benefit the Klingon speaking communities which often meet and use the language quite prominently. It becomes a diiferent story when noone reads it, even when reaching a high number of articles.
I have trouble relating to this. What do you think Wikipedia's goals are (or should be)? Why do you contribute to Wikipedia?
Do you mean I should withdraw from Wikipedia because I am wasting time?
Wouter
_________________________________________________________________ Nieuw: Download nu MSN Messenger 7.0 http://messenger.msn.nl/
Wouter Steenbeek wrote:
I have trouble relating to this. What do you think Wikipedia's goals are (or should be)? Why do you contribute to Wikipedia?
Do you mean I should withdraw from Wikipedia because I am wasting time?
No, I mean that I have trouble relating to it, and I'm wondering why you contribute to Wikipedia. I'm waiting with curiosity and an open mind. Don't be ashamed of your beliefs.
-- Tim Starling
From: Tim Starling t.starling@physics.unimelb.edu.au
Wouter Steenbeek wrote:
I have trouble relating to this. What do you think Wikipedia's goals
are
(or should be)? Why do you contribute to Wikipedia?
Do you mean I should withdraw from Wikipedia because I am wasting time?
No, I mean that I have trouble relating to it, and I'm wondering why you contribute to Wikipedia. I'm waiting with curiosity and an open mind. Don't be ashamed of your beliefs.
I agree with you that Wikipedia's /main/ goal is still to spread as much information as possible to the world's population, in their native language wherever possible. When Wikipedias are too small to provide full information to the reader, he can enhance this information with bigger Wikipedias.
Besides, I think the Wikipedia phaenomenon is a tool to make languages emancipate and being used aside. A language is one of the most important culture bearers there are, and fictional languages are culture bearers as well, even more so than IALs, and as real and existant as the latter group. Though you might think an encyclopaedia in a language noone speaks is no use, in my opinion it is, when someone reads it. Klingon and possibly Quenya and Sindarin Wikipedia(s) will never make out more than only a small part of the whole collection of Wikipedias, so I think we should view it/them as (a) side project(s), secondary or even tertiary, but in no way useless, that is, if it/they ever grow(s) to a considerable magnitude.
Wouter
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I agree with Wouter, of course WP is meant to distribute information but it helps to "emancipate" a language like for example Limburgish and Low Saxon (and if Dutch-Low Saxon is created than the community will also benefit greatly)
If you just write in the national language of a country lets say Dutch or German, then people won't be bothered to write it in that language but if you give them the opportunity to have their own Wiki and let them write in their own (regional) language I think Wikipedia would certainly gain some respect from the user... may be this is difficult for a English person to understand (I'm not sure) since everything in the world is in English from alarm clocks to faxes and the label "Made in China".
So I also think that Klingon and Quenya should be allowed even if they're not natural languages, neither is Esperanto and the same goes for the extint languages but if people prefer that to English, Dutch, German or French or what ever I think it's a good thing, not a negative point.
Servien
P.S.: Off-topic: I added the test-wp for Dutch-Low Saxon on http://meta.wikipedia.org/wiki/Test-wp/nds-nl/
2005/7/9, Wouter Steenbeek musiqolog@hotmail.com:
From: Tim Starling t.starling@physics.unimelb.edu.au
Wouter Steenbeek wrote:
I have trouble relating to this. What do you think Wikipedia's goals
are
(or should be)? Why do you contribute to Wikipedia?
Do you mean I should withdraw from Wikipedia because I am wasting time?
No, I mean that I have trouble relating to it, and I'm wondering why you contribute to Wikipedia. I'm waiting with curiosity and an open mind. Don't be ashamed of your beliefs.
I agree with you that Wikipedia's /main/ goal is still to spread as much information as possible to the world's population, in their native language wherever possible. When Wikipedias are too small to provide full information to the reader, he can enhance this information with bigger Wikipedias.
Besides, I think the Wikipedia phaenomenon is a tool to make languages emancipate and being used aside. A language is one of the most important culture bearers there are, and fictional languages are culture bearers as well, even more so than IALs, and as real and existant as the latter group. Though you might think an encyclopaedia in a language noone speaks is no use, in my opinion it is, when someone reads it. Klingon and possibly Quenya and Sindarin Wikipedia(s) will never make out more than only a small part of the whole collection of Wikipedias, so I think we should view it/them as (a) side project(s), secondary or even tertiary, but in no way useless, that is, if it/they ever grow(s) to a considerable magnitude.
Wouter
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Wikipedia-l mailing list Wikipedia-l@Wikimedia.org http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
Tim, it is my belief that Wikipedia's goal is, or if it isn't taht it should be, to provide a free, neutral, and hopefully accurate for every person on earth in "their own language".
Jimbo claimed that when he said something to that effect, "own language" meant simply some language they understand. However, as Anthere made very clear when saying that English is NOT her "own language" even though she is obviously quite fluent, one's "own language" is the language of their hearth.
A man born and raised with Nuorese Sardinian, but who at the age of 18 moved to Rome and has since lived and worked among almost exclusively non-Sardinian-speakers for the last 30 or even 50 years, his "own language" is still Nuorese.
In Shigeru Kayano's world, there aren't many people with whom he can converse in his native Ainu tongue anymore. When he was a member of the diet (Japanese parliament), obviously all motions, new laws, and everything else was done in Japanese, with an occasional translation into English being published as an afterthought.
All the radio interviews he did, the vast majority of the people he met, probably 99% of letters he got from his constituents, his utility bills, and nearly everything else about his life was conducted exclusively in Japanese. Yet he will tell you firmly that "his own language" is Ainu.
He is fluent in Japanese, and has been since a relatively young age. But his comprehension level is still better in Ainu, the language in which he forms thoughts, the language in which he dreams.
He said in an interview once that everything he says, he formulates in Ainu and translates it into Japanese before saying it.
His final speech before the Diet, he made in Ainu. In many countries, he couldn'tve done this, as they have rules restricting the languages you can use to make speeches before government bodies. But since Japan hadn't ever had it come up before, he was free to do so, and he wore traditional Ainu dress when he did so. (afterwards he wrote a book called "ainugoga kokkaini hibiku", meaning roughly "the ainu language resounds through the diet")
It isn't known how many native speakers of Ainu remain. One problem which is shared with many other "endangered languages" is that of who can and cannot be classified as a native speaker.
One woman learnt Ainu natively, but at a very young age her exposure to Ainu was cut off completely. She could speak Ainu relatively fluently, but only to talk about her childhood (I believe she's passed on now). Other people can speak a great deal of Ainu, but pepper it with Japanese words and expressions. Some people can understand even very complex constructions in Ainu, but can't speak it. Some can only speak it to certain people (I met somebody once who could speak O'odham fluently, but only to their grandparents).
Many, or even most of these people, could "recover" their native language with a little bit of effort. Until recently, they preferred to hide it away, and one woman whose sister was a prized orator revealed upon her sister's death that she was actually a very fluent speaker. She said that when her sister died, she realised that she was hiding an important cultural asset, and that she should be proud of it and share it with others rather than just pretending she doesn't know the language.
All speakers of Ainu are fluent in Japanese, just as all speakers of Klingon are fluent in English. The difference between them is that with Klingon, it is for none of its speakers a language they can call their "own language".
--------------
In response to what Boris has said, all Wikipedias must at some point be inactive. When br.wiki was first created, it lay dormant and empty and open to vandalism for a while. Somebody came then, added 50 or so pages, and then just left again. Now, a few months ago, all of a sudden 3 native speakers descended on the Wikipedia and started adding pages slowly. Then, another new person came, and he added long, quality, new pages at lightning speed (a few a day). Now, the Breton Wikipedia is growing quickly.
The Georgian and Armenian Wikipedias are also good examples. For a long time, they were empty, dormant, and frequently vandalised. And then, all of a sudden, from nowhere, came native speakers who improved these projects. ka.wiki (georgian) now has over 1000 articles.
The Limburgish Wikipedia is an even better example. It had basically no content, and Elian proposed it to be locked. I added a table of contents, tried to translate it into what poor Limburgish I could muster, and tried to make the mainpage look inviting. I sent e-mails to people, but got no response.
Then, a couple of months later, it was discovered by Kasper ("Guaka") and another guy (forgot his name), who began to add content. (actually, I think Kasper already knew but forgot about it or something). It grew very slowly until Wouter Steenbeek ("HaafLimbo", "Caesarion", etc etc) arrived, and he added new pages - long, good, detailed ones - at a rate of a few per day. He did slow down a little by now, and the Wikipedia doesn't grow as fast, but it is still growing at a considerable rate and is fast approaching 1000 articles.
As the founding members of ja: can attest, initially it was a wasteland with even some vandalism. And they made it better.
It's so amazing, from my point of view. I monitor a list of recent changes on inactive Wikipedias. I am always very excited when I get to remove a Wikipedia from the list. So far, I have removed perhaps 10... Aragonese, Limburgish, Georgian, Armenian, Sicilian, Kashmiri, Scots Gaelic, I don't remember them all... I will remove the Breton Wikipedia when somebody translates the interface, although I no longer actually _monitor_ it since it has usually around 100 new changes each day.
Bengali and Telugu may go in the near future as well, but there are still some minor outstanding issues with them.
Most of the people who make these Wikipedias active are newbies. They've never heard of Wikipedia before, or they've at least never visited it prior to that.
Most of these people would not have the courage to request tht their Wikipedia be unlocked.
Mark
On 09/07/05, Tim Starling t.starling@physics.unimelb.edu.au wrote:
Wouter Steenbeek wrote:
Strongly disagreed. That point of view would make most Wikipedias wastes of time. Everyone speaking Limburgic can read Dutch better. Virtually everyone speaking Welsh, Navajo, and Maori can read English better. Everyone able to read Bambara is supposed to read French as well. Wikipedias contribute to the status of a language and the community it is spoken by. The fact that Klingon is (probably) noone's native language makes a difference, but not entirely a substantial one: it is a nice thing to have, and it can and will benefit the Klingon speaking communities which often meet and use the language quite prominently. It becomes a diiferent story when noone reads it, even when reaching a high number of articles.
I have trouble relating to this. What do you think Wikipedia's goals are (or should be)? Why do you contribute to Wikipedia?
-- Tim Starling
Wikipedia-l mailing list Wikipedia-l@Wikimedia.org http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
Mark Williamson wrote:
Jimbo claimed that when he said something to that effect, "own language" meant simply some language they understand. However, as Anthere made very clear when saying that English is NOT her "own language" even though she is obviously quite fluent, one's "own language" is the language of their hearth.
In that particular exchange, Anthere was more right than I was.
I think that there are many different levels of fluency in languages, and that we can take interest in providing Wikipedias for all of them. But my overall point is that the goals of providing an encyclopedia to everyone on the planet is different from the goal of providing encyclopedias for reasons of language preservation, etc.
A man born and raised with Nuorese Sardinian, but who at the age of 18 moved to Rome and has since lived and worked among almost exclusively non-Sardinian-speakers for the last 30 or even 50 years, his "own language" is still Nuorese.
And we should view our goal from at least two simultaneous perspectives. If we have gotten him his free encyclopedia in standard Italian, and he understands it, so that he can look up anything he's interested in, then we've succeeded at one level. If we've gotten him that *plus* the free encyclopedia in Nuorese Sardinian, then we've done something more.
--Jimbo
Jimmy Wales wrote:
A man born and raised with Nuorese Sardinian, but who at the age of 18 moved to Rome and has since lived and worked among almost exclusively non-Sardinian-speakers for the last 30 or even 50 years, his "own language" is still Nuorese.
And we should view our goal from at least two simultaneous perspectives. If we have gotten him his free encyclopedia in standard Italian, and he understands it, so that he can look up anything he's interested in, then we've succeeded at one level. If we've gotten him that *plus* the free encyclopedia in Nuorese Sardinian, then we've done something more.
I suppose whether we've done "something more" depends on your personal viewpoints on language and politics.
In this case, there is very little written in Nuorese Sardinian---most educated Sardinians will be able to read and understand standard Italian, and most of their reading (beyond perhaps a local newspaper) will be done in standard Italian. For example, if a Sardinian were interested in reading an in-depth biography of Aristotle, he would be most likely to purchase one written in standard Italian. From that perspective, providing an encyclopedia article about Aristotle in standard Italian provides the information in the language it's expected to be in. Providing it in Nuorese Sardinian may be interesting, but I'm not sure what benefits it has beyond meta-benefits like language perservation and curiosity---it certainly doesn't provide any additional benefit to the primary goal of an encyclopedia article about Aristotle, which is to convey information about Aristotle.
-Mark
But it does provide an added benefit.
Regardless of the fact that he has been exposed to Italian since he was a child, Nuorese is still his first language.
Anyone who becomes extremely fluent in a second language is still never capable of the understanding and information absorption that they can get with their native language -- someone whose native language is German, but speaks flawless English without an accent and has lived in an English-speaking region for 15 years, will still be able to understand something in German at a deeper level.
It's no different for minority languages than the German/English example above. A person whose first language is Navajo but is fluent in English will still have a better comprehension of texts in Navajo.
This has been shown by test scores.
I once read an article with dozens of quotes from Navajo children where even basic mathematics (ie, addition, subtraction, multiplication, even problems like "10 x 4") was confusing to them in English, yet when asked in the native language they were able to come up with the correct answer very easily. This is despite their supposed fluency in English -- they could carry on English conversations with great fluency.
Mark
On 22/07/05, Delirium delirium@hackish.org wrote:
Jimmy Wales wrote:
A man born and raised with Nuorese Sardinian, but who at the age of 18 moved to Rome and has since lived and worked among almost exclusively non-Sardinian-speakers for the last 30 or even 50 years, his "own language" is still Nuorese.
And we should view our goal from at least two simultaneous perspectives. If we have gotten him his free encyclopedia in standard Italian, and he understands it, so that he can look up anything he's interested in, then we've succeeded at one level. If we've gotten him that *plus* the free encyclopedia in Nuorese Sardinian, then we've done something more.
I suppose whether we've done "something more" depends on your personal viewpoints on language and politics.
In this case, there is very little written in Nuorese Sardinian---most educated Sardinians will be able to read and understand standard Italian, and most of their reading (beyond perhaps a local newspaper) will be done in standard Italian. For example, if a Sardinian were interested in reading an in-depth biography of Aristotle, he would be most likely to purchase one written in standard Italian. From that perspective, providing an encyclopedia article about Aristotle in standard Italian provides the information in the language it's expected to be in. Providing it in Nuorese Sardinian may be interesting, but I'm not sure what benefits it has beyond meta-benefits like language perservation and curiosity---it certainly doesn't provide any additional benefit to the primary goal of an encyclopedia article about Aristotle, which is to convey information about Aristotle.
-Mark
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Mark Williamson wrote:
But it does provide an added benefit.
Regardless of the fact that he has been exposed to Italian since he was a child, Nuorese is still his first language.
Anyone who becomes extremely fluent in a second language is still never capable of the understanding and information absorption that they can get with their native language -- someone whose native language is German, but speaks flawless English without an accent and has lived in an English-speaking region for 15 years, will still be able to understand something in German at a deeper level.
Well that is true upto a point. When you have been abroad for any length of time like I have, when you return to your homecountry you do notice that your mother tongue has changed and you find that certain jokes things to do with language are not as easy as you think they are. So if you live in abroad it changes your language. I know a Dutch person who lived in the UK for 25 years, she has an accent and her Dutch is not as facile as someone who stayed in the Netherlands.
Thanks, Gerard
Mark Williamson wrote:
But it does provide an added benefit.
Regardless of the fact that he has been exposed to Italian since he was a child, Nuorese is still his first language.
Anyone who becomes extremely fluent in a second language is still never capable of the understanding and information absorption that they can get with their native language -- someone whose native language is German, but speaks flawless English without an accent and has lived in an English-speaking region for 15 years, will still be able to understand something in German at a deeper level.
It depends on the level and timing of exposure. If someone is simultaneously exposed to two languages from birth, they could both be said to be native languages. In my case, I learned Greek at around 1-2 years of age, and English at around 3. My English is much, much better than my Greek, despite Greek being my "native language" and the primary language I used at home through most of my childhood. English my "second language", but since I do nearly all my reading in English and attended school exclusively in English, I find reading information in English to be more natural. I don't even read Greek very fluently (though I speak it fluently), and don't have the vocabulary to read about philosophy or math or whatever in Greek, since all my schooling has been in English. So for me, an English encyclopedia is orders of magnitude more useful than a Greek encyclopedia.
This seems to be similar with a lot of minority languages we're discussing---languages primarily spoken rather than written, and spoken primarily in non-academic contexts, and whose speakers do most of their schooling, reading, and writing in some other language.
-Mark
wikipedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org