Requests for new languages/Wikipedia Lombard

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This is an archived version of this page, as edited by Jorgengb (talk | contribs) at 00:04, 15 October 2005 (→‎Lombard (7)). It may differ significantly from the current version.

Lombard (7)

  • People interested [if native speaker, please mark (N)]: N; clamengh;
    • Proposer's user account in Meta and other wikis:jorgengb, Jorgengb
    • User accounts of others who are willing to work on the proposed wiki: - clamengh (alas, not immediately, 31/08/2005; however I would like to start with a paper about complex numbers: when it is ready, I shall place it in my site)
  • ISO code : SIL code (= proposed ISO 639-3 code): LMO
  • proposed domain: lmo.wikipedia.org, wlm.wikipedia.org
  • Relevant infos: There is no universally accepted written standard or variety, but there is nevertheless a considerable amount of literature and a certain tradition sufficient as a base for a common standard (intelligible to practically all speakers) that could be used in this Wikipedia. For more information please see the articles on Lombard in en:Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lombard_language) and in Ethnologue (http://www.ethnologue.com/show_language.asp?code=lmo).
Lombard is heading towards becoming a moribund language. The development of media in Lombard would be a major step to counter this tendency, and to give Lombard a better status. A common misunderstanding (that linguists will recognize from similar issues concerning other laguages) is that "you can't discuss serious matters in Lombard"). Wikipedia articles in Lombard would prove the contrary and contribute to establish a standard orthography.
  • As an example of this fact you can see e.g. a scientific short paper written down in Poschiavino, a quite conservative western Lombard dialect: http://www.ilbernina.ch/article.php3?id_article=833 Note that children still speak Poschiavino, thus this is not yet an endangered language; notwithstanding, it has a limited number of speakers. I possess also some papers appeared in 'Il Grigioni Italiano', but this is copyrighted material.--clamengh 11:30, 29 Sept 2005 (Milan)
  • Link to article on the language in an existing Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lombard_language
  • Link to request on a mailing list:
  • Comments:
    • Considering the facts you mentioned above, I'm wondering if a Wiktionary might be more beneficial in this case. While I agree with most of what you are writing I don't think an encyclopedia will prove to be helpful in establishing a generally accepted orthography and inventory of words. The lack thereof could in the worst case even hamper the goal of writing a Wikipedia (because people would spend a lot of time and energy on language instead of content issues). A dictionary however could be a useful first step towards filtering out widely accepted spellings. Thus, a Wikipedia could be set up more easily at a later stage. Arbeo 14:40, 12 Jun 2005 (UTC)
      • Arbeo, you're very wrong about that. There are at least two Wikipedias operating with no single standardised orthography: Sicilian (scn:, over 1100 articles) and Breton (br:, over 400 articles). The Breton Wikipedia is in a sort of state of confusion; the Sicilian Wikipedia is an island of orthographic calm in the middle of a sea of Sicilian confusion -- everybody agreed on basic rules for writing on Wikipedia, but can't agree for anywhere else... yet --Node ue 16:49, 17 Jun 2005 (UTC)
        • Thank you for informing me about those cases. Maybe my assessment was a little too pessimistic. My intention was only to assure possible ostacles are paid attention to at an early stage. Arbeo 16:11, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)
    • I agree that a Wikipedia should be developed before a Wiktionary; however, I recomend we should avoid to imitate the choice of its name made by the Italian Wikipedia, which is etymologically bad. I propose some names, each one based on different motivations, which we could discuss further: Wikzionari, Wiczionari, Wicziunari and of course simply ...Wiktionary. --clamengh 11:41, 29 Sept 2005.
      • As a native speaker (among other languages) also of a Lombard variety rather close to the Western Lombard koiné, I don't think it would be a major problem to write articles in Lombard. Even if there is no established orthograhy, there are nevertheless some writing conventions accepted by all those who write in Lombard (and historically dating back at least a few centuries). Examples of such accepted conventions are: 1. that word-final [k] is written -ch while word-final [tS] is written -c, and 2. that the shortness of vowels in word-final stressed syllables is shown by doubling the following consonant in simplex codas, e.g. cass "crates", gatt "cat, cats". There is general agreement in how consonants should be written. For the vowels, the main issue might be whether to write front rounded vowels the "French" way (oeu, u) or the "German" way (ö, ü). Apart from the strong tradition for the former solution in Milanese, the latter seems to be the most widespread nowadays, cf. also the 9,5 kg heavy dictionary (LSI) published last year by CDE (Bellinzona, Tessin, Switzerland). All in all, there is probably a much larger degree of agreement than I may have given the impression of when writing this proposal.--Jorgengb 00:02, 23 Jun 2005 (UTC)
    • I suggest to start with three major ortographic standards: classical, phonetic and etymological: as to the first one, things are almost clear. Nevertheless, there should be some adaptations for dialects other than Milanese: for instance, I suggest that the indeterminate article should be always written 'un/una', whilst the northern determinate one should take the form 'ul'. Etymological final /u/ should be written -u as well, e.g. libru, altru = book, other. Perhaps, even the infinittive's -r or -er should be written even if not pronounced. As far as phonetic ortography is concerned, everything is clear, but this would definitively exclude some varieties: for instance, writing 'staziun' (= eng. 'station') would not be acceptable for those dialects whose speakers pronounce /sta'tsion/ (nasal or velar n). In my knowledge, this prononciation exists at least in Gerenzano (VA), near Saronno, and in Poschiavo valley (GR-CH). At last, G.Hull's etymological solution should not be discarded (in fact it is my preferred one), even if I am afraid I must admit that it is not completely realistic by a socio-linguistic point of view. I will place here some more reference in the near future. You could see some interesting examples at http://www.shlrc.mq.edu.au/~leccles/. --clamengh 11:41, 01 Sept 2005. An intersting paper by G.Hull about the linguistic unity of northern Italy and Rhaetia is now reproduced on my site: this clearly concerns also Lombard tongue. Please see http://cf.geocities.com/clamengh/hull.rtf . Please note that the site is under construction.--clamengh 12:43, 24 Sept 2005; slightly modified on 27 September 2005 20:39 Milan

(Please also see below at the 'ortography' discussion)--clamengh 16:49, 14 Oct. 2005;

    • In any case it will be practically impossible to represent all varieties when defining a written standard. To some (not too large) extent some orthographic devices might help; in some other cases it will be necessary to make other kind of choices (1. choose the form represented in the majority of varieties; 2. choose the form represented in the most widespread variety(-ies); 3. choose the form represented in the most conservative variety(-ies); 4. make a choice based on etymology; 5. if the form A is less represented than the form B, but A is judged to be more acceptable by users of B than B by users of A, choose A; etc.) Cf. what has been done with Rumantsch grischun.
An issue similar to the /Sta'tsiuN/~/Sta'tsioN/ question is that of unstressed /a/ vs. /e/. Cf. me, te 'me, you (obj, unstressed)'; vündes 'eleven'; per 'for' (Milan, Lècch/Lecco, Còmm/Como, etc.) vs. ma,ta; vündas; par (Varées/Varese, Tessin). This vowel could be written with a letter of its own (ë or ə) to be pronounced [a] or [e] according to the variety spoken by the reader. A kind of "supradialectal grapheme", if you see what I mean. A couple of such graphemes are to live with, but not more (many people will find it difficult to "swallow" even an orthography with only a single such grapheme...).--Jorgengb 12:35, 2 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]
    • SIMPLE PAST- I propose to consider carefully the question if the disappearing of simple past is to be considered one of the signals of the incoming death of Lombard (as in Hagège, Halte à la morte des langues, éd. Odile Jacob, 21 octobre 2000) or rather a natural syntactical evolution. In both cases, I wonder about which solution should be adopted for the narrative register, and, to a lesser extent, for the scientific one. At present, I think that simple past should be reconstructed from existing documents. --clamengh 11:51, 05 Sept 2005, slightly modified 26/09/05 11:32
    • SIMPLE PAST - reply - Catalan (not Valencian) has almost completely lost its simple past (Past Simple Indicative (Pretèrit Perfet Simple de Indicatiu)), but nevertheless is by no means a dying language. Cf. http://www.orbilat.com/Languages/Catalan/Grammar/Catalan-Verb-Tenses_Simple.htm#Past_Simple_Indicative
"Except for Valencian, this tense is used in the written language only. In the speech it is replaced by the periphrastic construction anar + infinitive:
vaig cantar, vas cantar, va cantar;
va(re)m cantar, va(re)u cantar, van cantar."
--Jorgengb 11:13, 2 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • AGAIN SIMPLE PAST Yes, I was indeed posing the matter of written language: what is to be done within a novel? --clamengh 18:18, 10 October 2005 (UTC) I will try to be more precise: if we agree that simple past is needed for narrative register, then losing the former amounts to losing the latter (or maybe vice versa); and losing a register could be regarded as a signal of death. What you affirm about Catalan is de facto true about French as well: there is no simple past in spoken langauge, and, of course, French is not a dying language. Nevertheless, simple past is preserved in written documents.I think that a similar situation should be reconstructed for Lombard as well, but this is not an urgent matter to be solved to set up a Wikipedia--clamengh 18:05, 11 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support. A language with 9 million speakers needs a wikipedia. If there's agreement on orthography, I think a test-wikipedia should be set up in the near future. Chamdarae 09:59, 28 July 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • I do agree with Chamdarae that this should be done in the nearest future. The issue is not so much a formal one (are we entitled to start a Lombard Wikipedia or not), but rather "how long will it take to put together a group of writers, and how many ?". --Jorgengb 19:55, 2 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strong support. --Node
  • Strong support. --clamengh
  • Strong support. Perhaps down the track, scn.wiki and lmo.wiki could collaborate on projects relating to the various siculo-gallic dialects to be found in Sicily, which not only exist to this day in their own right (but in ever declining numbers) but which also contributed so much in the way of vocabulary and grammatical forms to the Sicilian language. --pippudoz - (waarom? jus'b'coz!) 02:21, 2 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]
    • This is a quite interisting issue: I suggest we could start by translating Fedro's 'Lupus et Agnus' in Lombard: this poses several challenging problems. For Gallo-Siculo translations see http://www.iti-itas.com/galloitalico/favola.htm --clamengh 10:25, 27 September 2005 (Milan)
  • Strong support almost native --Marco Bonavoglia 11:34, 25 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support--Harvzsf 18:01, 29 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support--Katimawan2005 03:15, 4 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]
    • Am I correct in understanding that both Jorgenb and Clamengh are native speakers of some variety of Lombard? If that is the case then I think it meets the conditions listed here, as there is clearly general support for this wiki. --Chamdarae 17:59, 15 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
      • Dear Chamdarae, I am afraid not to be a native speaker of Milanese. This fact can be simply explained by my age (38). I have learnt this tongue at the age of approximately 10 years by some friends of my parents. Then I have studied it both by grammars and other written texts. Moreover, one of my friends (61 years old), a former teacher of Italian language in a high school of Milan, is Milanese mother tongue and accepts to talk with me, alas only... depending on his mood. Thus, I have a discrete ability to write in Lombard, but I am far from being spontaneous when talking, condition which native speakers generally require to be fulfilled. All in all, I could be considered something like a 'native writer', since there is not a sharp difference from the first time I encountered written Italian (6 years old) and written Milanese (about 10 years old). Finally, as to the 'N' preceeding my name, I have found it when placing my name among those of interested people, so I have leaved it unchanged. I propose these considerations to be evaluated with suitable criticism. --clamengh 11:57, 26 September 2005 (Milan)
      • As far as I'm concerned, I'm functionally plurilingual in three languages, one of which is Lombard (some kind of Ticinese/Western Lombard "koiné").--Jorgengb 10:45, 2 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose. 1) The lombard is an aggregation of different languages and dialects. Which of these will be used? 2) The Lombard spoken in Tessin is a dialect (like the english article declare), 3) the Ethnologue source is not authoritative source. --Ilario 17:20, 26 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • A reply. Dear Ilario, as to 1) I suggest you should carefully read G. Hull's PhD thesis 'The linguistic unity of Northern Italy and Rhaetia' (but Rohlf's Italian grammar should also work); or simply consider the situation of the languages which are not related to a political power, such as occitan, which is, following your words, 'an aggregation of different languages and dialects'; in this case, the most conservative dialecte (lengadocian) has been taken into account as a 'standard'; but a different dialect (Provençal) has expressed a Nobel Prize for literature. Consider HochDeutsche too: the situation of German dialects was initially quite similar, but the raise of a central political power lead to a linguistic synthesis. So, in fact, there is not yet an answer to 1), but I suggest something as above, taking into account all most conservative forms (e.g. 'libru' and not 'liber' for 'book', but Hull's 'libre' would be perhaps a better choice). As far as 2) is concerned, I hope not to be too assertive (and in this case I beg your pardon), but it seems to me that to be an irrelevant objection. It is also a little bit misleading, since we could also think that Ticinese (or Poschiavino as well) could be adopted as a standard due to its vitality, though this does not completely agree with a conservation criterion. '3)' lacks a little bit in motivations, so discussion about it seems to deserve to be postponed. Thank you for your contribution to this discussion, --clamengh 9:35, 27 September 2005, slightly modified at 20:43 (Milan) et on 29 Sept.2005 11:10
  • Also a reply. Dear Ilario: 1. that Lombard is an aggregation of different varieties is correct (linguists prefer nowadays to use the neutral term "(language) variety", since it is not easy to define univocally what is a language and what is a dialect (someone has said that "a language is a dialect with an army and a navy"; a more modern and technological version is "a language is a dialect with an army, a navy and a system for speech synthesis & recognition"). The answer to the question "Which of these should be used?" is not an easy one, but since there is de facto a kind of koiné (koiné ticinese, very close to the dialects of Milan, Lecco, Varese, Brianza, etc. on the Italian side of the border), this might be the variety to be chosen. 2. The Lombard spoken in Tessin/Ticino/Tisín is not a particular dialect, but a group of dialects. The dialects of southern Tessin are much more similar to the ones of the Italian areas just across the border than -- say -- to the dialects of the Leventina in northern Tessin. 3. Ethnologue does contain errors (as is the case when Ticinese is described as a "Lombard dialect spoken in Italy"), but nevertheless it is de facto becoming more and more an authoritative source that many serious scholars (not only linguists) refer to. The language codes defined by Ethnologue are to be implemented in the ISO 639-3 standard.--Jorgengb 21:20, 30 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Thank you to all of you for contributing to this discussion, and special thanks to all the supporters of the Lombard Wikipedia project! If Lombard is to survive in some form into the 3rd millennium, it will have to develop some kind of written standard.--Jorgengb 21:31, 30 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support--Skafa 01 October 2005 (UTC)
  • Support--livmand N, Milanese native speaker 14 October 2005 (UTC)
  • Support Paulin 12 October 2005 (UTC)
  • Expanding the vocabulary The following two important issues will be encountered at a very early stage when and if the Lombard Wikipedia project takes off:
* orthography
* expanding the vocabulary
Orthography: more "phonetic" or more "lexical/etymological" ? Personally (after all I'm a phonetician ;-) ) I am for different reasons in favour of a more phonetic choice, but I am aware of the problems connected with this alternative and can also see the advantages of other alternatives.
Vocabulary: keeping constantly an eye on Romansh, Ladin, Friulian and Catalan will help indeed.
--Jorgengb 11:29, 2 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Again about orthography: I think that a synthesis between the two choices is not irrealistic to be pursued: for example, 'un-una', 'libru', 'altru' etc. are both phonetic and etymological choices.--clamengh 18:31, 10 October 2005 (UTC); Hull's UPO (unified Padanian Ortography) is now available in my site at http://cf.geocities.com/clamengh/upo.pdf .--clamengh 16:44, 14 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • I think there would need to be more support from native speakers for a wikipedia to be approved, but since there seems to be consensus on setting one up, starting a test-wiki may help. As for orthography, I would recommend not being too innovative - it would be better to stick with the most suitable existing form than to create something new (IMO). --Chamdarae 19:31, 3 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Getting started Since the Lombard project has been approved, the whole issue has become a practical rather then a formal one. In other words:
who is going to write?
in which variety is she/he going to write?
which orthography/orthographies are to be adopted?
My experience tells me that most speakers of 'good' (conservative, non-urban, non-italianized) Lombard in most cases neither surf on the Internet nor browse the Wikipedia...
In any case, I don't think it would be a problem -- at least to start with -- if different contributors wrote each in her/his own variety, as long as they try to normalize their most local traits in the direction of the koiné. The orthograpy, on the other hand, should be the same for all contributors. --Jorgengb 23:44, 14 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]
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