Re: [Wikipedia-l] Re: An honorable compromise and no: or nb: for Bokmål?

[Lars Alvik]

På 12. nov. 2004 kl. 11.55 skrev Lars Aronsson:

> In a previous posting, I wrote:
>> Sorry, your Microsoft analogy doesn't help.
>
> I should clarify this.  While Microsoft has a dominating position in
> the desktop computing software market, this situation is too far from
> the language situation in Norway to be a useful analogy.  Microsoft is
> a single vendor with a marketing department, and there is no
> corresponding agency (or conspiracy) behind the majority language in
> Norway.
>
> Bokmål is today the name for the dominating written language in
> Norway, but this name was not invented by the users of the same.
> They themselves called it Norwegian, because they contrasted their
> spelling to Danish, starting in the 1840s.  Only in the late 19th
> century when Ivar Aasen's Landsmål (country language, a synthesis of
> dialects) had entered the scene, did the need arise for a name for the
> other version, and in 1899 it was officially named Riksmål (nation
> language, as opposed to country language).  In 1929, Riksmål was
> renamed to Bokmål (book language) and Landsmål to Nynorsk (new
> Norwegian), and today's Riksmål is a classic form of Bokmål.
>
> It is estimated that 85 percent of Norwegians use Bokmål today, and
> the old popular movement for Landsmål, once filled with hopes of
> democratization and progress and higher education available to all,
> appears somewhat like Esperanto.  I'm a great admirer of the Esperanto
> movement, and they might have a better chance on the Internet than
> anytime before.  But I write this message in English, because that way
> I will reach more readers.  To most Bokmål contributors to no:, it
> has felt natural simply to call it "the Norwegian Wikipedia", because
> it is neither in English nor Danish.  It might be a good idea to call
> it "norsk (bokmål)", but I'm surprised by the strong sentiments that
> met me when I suggest the renaming of no: to nb: would be unnecessary.
>
> There is an oppression component here, where the mere number of people
> who prefer Bokmål creates a problem for the brave Nynorsk minority.
> For example, parents trying to teach their children Nynorsk might find
> fewer choices of spelling training software for Nynorsk, or a daily
> newspaper in Nynorsk might not be available for your town.  This
> situation is similar to women entering professions with a male
> dominance or for ethanol car owners trying to find a gas [sic!]
> station where they can fill up ethanol.  Political correctness or
> affirmative action can lead to titles such as "mailman" being changed
> to "letter carrier" (a translation of the German/Scandinavian
> Briefträger/brevbärare), but as far as I know gas/petrol stations
> have not (yet) been renamed to fuel stations.
>
> But this kind of perceived oppression is not a conspiracy.  Most
> mailmen didn't chose a profession based on a desire to suppress women,
> most gasoline drivers didn't actively chose to avoid ethanol or
> diesel, and the majority of Norwegians don't hate Ivar Aasen, even
> though they prefer to read and write in a language that resembles that
> of the former Danish regime.
>
>
> -- 
>   Lars Aronsson (lars at aronsson.se)
>   Aronsson Datateknik - http://aronsson.se
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Hear! Hear! That's probably the best mail i've read in this debate.


mvh.

Lars Alvik