Oho! What's this I see?
Servien is not a native speaker either? Who here _is_ a native speaker?
Although Ron isn't subscribed to this list, so far as far as I can
tell he's the only native speaker who has even contributed to this
discussion. So Walter was wrong when he was saying that native
speakers had told me things... hmm.
Heiko said, "For me wikipedia (and KDE op Platt) are a means to spread
knowledge about Plattdüütsch. My goal is to create a Low Saxon
wikipedia that people with little to none Low Saxon background can use
to relearn an almost forgotten language."
Well Heiko, the Wikimedia foundation DISAGREES with you. The goal of
ANY Wikipedia should be primarily to spread knowledge about
EVERYTHING, *in* that language.
You should not simplify your language or use grammar of a more
widely-spoken language (-> Patentplatt/Fernsehplatt), nor should it be
your goal that people relearn a language from Wikipedia. If they want
to relearn Platt, you can write a Wikibook at
called "Relearning Plattdeutsch".
For teaching and learning languages, you go to Wikibooks. For learning
and writing about ANYTHING, just using language as a medium, you go to
Wikipedia.
Mark
On 10/07/05, Heiko Evermann <heiko.evermann(a)gmx.de> wrote:
Hi Servien,
The reason why I don't post is because that
Wiki doesn't "support" my
dialect... You are very wrong in saying (at least I think so) that in
Germany are the most "important" dialects of Low Saxon... on the Nds
Wiki you just ignore those Dutch dialects with about 1.8 million
speakers...
That is a problem that several minority languages share all over the
world.
Due to the lack of a common written language, the language has fragmented
into regional dialects long ago.
The reason why Dutch speakers don't
contribute is because
the writing system is completely incomprehensible!
We are talking about a
wikipedia, so I would like to remind you of the NPOV
policy: it is completely incomprehensible to *them*. It is perfectly readable
for people from this side of the border.
I think you look a
bit narrow minded at this subject... the guy who wrote the book was
most likely German (at least I presume!) and he did not invent the
spelling for international use, just as in Holland we didn't invent
the spelling for international use.
In fact it was designed that way. The idea was
to make it easy for people with
a High-German background to recognize the words as much as possible.
Therefore e.g. special characters like a with the little o above were not
used.
If you want to use it for a
international purpose than you have to adapt the writing system (as
you mentioned it's spoking in every continent except the Antarctic).
Unfortunately there is no writing system for Low Saxon that is universally
accepted. There is one on this side of the border that you do not understand,
one on your side of the border that we do not understand. Plus a proposal for
a common spelling by R.F. Hahn that might be interesting, but unfortunately
it is incomprehensible on both sides of the border. So which way do you want
to go?
If I post on Nds, they complain that they
don't understand the writing
and change it to German-based spelling... I'm not German so why would
I have my messages in German-based spelling?!
Wikipedia articles tend to be
written in a collaborate manner. Someone starts
a page, someone else adds something. Yet someone else corrects something etc.
Unfortunately your spelling and our spelling are mutually exclusive. And
frankly, I do not want to have an article that changes orthography each time
the paragraph changes. This might work for Portuguese and Brazilian
Portuguese, but not for writing systems that are way apart.
"Johannes Sass" didn't invent a very good orthography to my opinion,
he should have a least looked at both major-LS speaking countries and
made a compromise of both writing systems, or better yet look at the
Old LS writing system when it used to be a official language in 1500!
Whether or
not it was a good orthography is not for us but for history to
decide. I think we are not the ones to fix it. Over time the Sass orthography
has gained more and more popularity in Germany. And we need such a unity to
protect what is left of Low Saxon in Germany, which oftentimes is very
little. For me wikipedia (and KDE op Platt) are a means to spread knowledge
about Plattdüütsch. My goal is to create a Low Saxon wikipedia that people
with little to none Low Saxon background can use to relearn an almost
forgotten language. Besides: that is precicely the reason why I am very much
opposed to any linguistic experiments like the allgemeyne schrievwies by
Hahn. We came to the same conclusion for KDE op Platt. Again: the Sass-based
spelling is a common ground on this side of the border.
If Plattdüütsch is the name for the dialects in
Germany then why is it
called that, you're not the only LS speakers in the world as mentioned
almost every continent! Why not make the ISO code PT than?
1) the common name for
Low Saxon on German is not "Nedersaksisch", but
"Plattdüütsch". If you ask people about Plattdüütsch, they know what you are
talking about. If you ask them about Niedersächsisch, they won't understand
what language you are talking about. Please have a look at
http://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nedersaksisch:
"Het begrip
Het begrip "Nedersaksisch" werd tot in de jaren '90 van de 20e eeuw alleen
door historisch taalkundigen gehanteerd. Sprekers van de Nedersaksische
variëteiten refereerden aan hun dialect met de naam van een plaats of streek
(Achterhoeks, Drents, Veluws, Elspeets enz.), of met de aanduiding Plat (ook
Plat, Platduits). Onder invloed van diverse streektaalbewegingen heeft de
politiek het begrip overgenomen en uiteindelijk als streektaal erkend. Een
uniforme cultuurtaal zit er nog lang niet in, mede doordat iedere poging van
uniformering (spelling en woordenschat) als wezensvreemd voor de grote
variëteit aan voornamelijk mondelinge dialecten wordt afgewezen."
From this I conclude that
* the term "Platduits" is well-known also on your side of the border
* The term "Nedersaksisch" is very recent in Dutch, it is only 15 years old.
2) It is not up to us or to you to invent ISO-Codes. The ISO code for our
language is nds. Please look it up on
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO_639.
It stands for "German, Low; Low German; Saxon, Low; Low Saxon". Now we have
the following options:
* either we share this ISO code somehow, or (if you do not like that)
* *YOU* sort it out with the ISO-committee and *YOU* get yourself a new one,
because we are legitimate users of this ISO code.
The best way to go in my opinion is to start
nds-nl.wikipedia.org. If you do
not like us to continue as
nds.wikipedia.org we can move it to
nds-de.wikipedia.org and make a common portal page on
nds.wikipedia.org to
direct users to the new address. Besides: If you had been the first to go and
would have written an
nds.wikipedia.org in Dutch spelling, I would have voted
to start an
nds-de.wikipedia.org.
As I said quite some time ago: both variants of the language do not mix. And
it is not just the spelling. Modern Low Saxon lacks quite a number of words
for modern things and ideas and on our side of the border we have the
tendency to fill in the gaps with High German words (or with words that we
"plattify") and on your border you are doing the same thing. A perfect
example for this your proposed main page on
http://nds.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bruker:Servien/Heufdbladsyde. Some examples
* chemistry: Scheikunde: this happens to be exactly the Dutch word. In
Germany we say "Chemie" and I doubt that there is an original LS word.
* medicine: Geneeskunde: this happens to be exactly the Dutch word. In
Germany we say "Medizin" and this happens to be the High-German word.
* religion: "Religie": happens to be exactly the Dutch word. For latin-based
words on "-ion" we retain the ending "-ion" in our variants of Low
Saxon,
which happens to be the way it is done in High-German.
* Kleunruumte ("talk room"): Kleun can be a variant of our spelling
"klöön",
but ruumte sounds very much like Dutch "ruimte". On our side of the border we
have "ruum", which is very close to High-German "raum".
* suggestion: "suggesties": First of all we have a non-latin word for that:
Vörslag. And concerning latin imports on "-tion" we have the ending
"-tschoon" and you use "-tie", which happens to be exacly like the
Dutch
system.
So my conclusion is very simple: you claim to do everything better, but your
own proposal is just a proof that your own Low Saxon has a heavy Dutch bias.
Or should I conclude from this that you too are not a native speaker? (In
fact this is the case as can be seen from
http://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gebruiker:Servien)
The only way to go on from here is to accept that it is time for you to go
your way and for us to go our way. Then both nds wikipedias can flourish.
Otherwise we would just go on quarreling over words. Why is that so difficult
to see?
Besides you got your 5 signatures that you wanted to have. So why don't you
just start
nds-nl.wikipedia.org.
Kind regards,
Heiko Evermann
Servien
_______________________________________________
Wikipedia-l mailing list
Wikipedia-l(a)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