User talk:A R King

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Contents 1 Welcome to Wikipedia fellow linguist 2 welcome from a linguist-wannabe 3 Central American languages 4 Basque Portal? 5 Atlacatl 6 Basque Polysynthetic? 7 Endangered South American languages 8 Endangered languages/language revitalization 9 Basque language/Swadesh list 10 Pleased to meet you 11 Abiento 12 the Template:Languages of South America 13 Basque people 14 Articles you might like to edit, from SuggestBot 15 A human suggestion/request 16 Request for Copyedit help

[edit] Welcome to Wikipedia fellow linguist

Welcome to wikipedia. I am happy to see another linguist working with Aztecan languages joining us. We already have some good heads here (e.g. Lavintzin and Yours truly have also done some work) but we always need more to keep up. So welcome. And see my response on the Talk:Pipil page. Maunus 19:05, 14 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] welcome from a linguist-wannabe

Hi A R King,

I skimmed your comments on Wikipedia:Requests for feedback. I'm a linguistics PhD student. If you have questions about Wikipedia etc. drop me a line. I'll either help or point you to someone who can. --Ling.Nut 03:03, 31 October 2006 (UTC)

Thanks, Ling.Nut --A R King 10:47, 31 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Central American languages

Gidday Alan. Yes, I think it would be useful to set up a category for Central American languages, per the geopolitical definition (ie ex-Mexico & the Caribbean Is). There are already categories by Cent.Am. country (eg category:Languages of El Salvador), so firstly should just be a matter of bringing these together, followed by some further refinements. I'll make a start on it in the next day or two. Like everything else around here, category schemes are constant works in progress, and there's always room for improvement and modification.

The overlapping of Mesoamerica & Central America should not be an issue, I see these as independent terms. Where geographically these coincide then a lang. can appear in both. I note that presently the term "Caribbean" as used here includes also the Atlantic coast of Cent.Am., & that languages such as Miskito Coastal Creole are in category:Languages of the Caribbean (in which case it would be in cat:langs of Central America also). Archaeologically, "Mesoamerica" is often defined as extending down into portions of Nicaragua and Costa Rica, excluding perhaps the Mosquito Coast & some other Atlantic/Caribbean regions.

Keep up the great work, and cheers.--cjllw | TALK 00:34, 1 November 2006 (UTC)

Hi Alan, category:Languages of Central America is now created, presently little more than a super-category of cat:Languages of <Central American country> categories (wikipedia has a bit of a fetish about categorising things by country, which to my mind is not always the most appropriate), but can be further refined. Regards, --cjllw | TALK 23:42, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

Good morning, cjllw! Good work. Would it be possible to put the languages in question in a single list, though? Is this something I could do (if you tell me how)? It's not fair to give you all the work, but I do think that would be more appropriate.

I suppose the Wikipedia "fetish" really boils down to (only) recognising official states at some level of its representation of reality. A very "mainstream" political attitude which will need to be questioned at some future time, IMHO - at least when (if ever) widespread public opinion becomes sufficiently sensitive to stateless identity issues. In the meantime, we may at least gnaw away at the mainstream view by reminding the informed public of the existence of other meaningful human groupings.

But there are also more "academic" arguments for avoiding classification by states on matters that have little or nothing to do with states (and which the states in question may have little or no interest in supporting, moreover!), if such are needed. For the Miskito language to be split into two pseudo-items (Miskito of Nicaragua, Miskito of Honduras) is silly, confusing and annoying; but it is also potentially misleading, given that we also have Lenca of Honduras and Lenca of El Salvador, which, it turns out, are actually different (though related) languages sharing a common language name.

Anyway, I've wandered slightly off topic there - sorry. Back to my original question: can we have all Central American languages in one alphabetical list? --A R King 09:05, 3 November 2006 (UTC)

I do rather agree with your insightful comments about the inappropriate and arbitrary practice of identifying entities and concepts by political divisions willy-nilly, without due regard to whether those divisions have anything to do with the item at hand- too often it is a case of jingoism or at least inattentiveness.

But that as you say is a deeper issue to resolve, for another day. Re being able to "see" all the central am. langs. in a single view, there are a couple of ways to accomplish this:

1. The Cat:Languages of Central America category can be added directly to each article in question, which you would do by editing the article and adding [[Category:Languages of Central America]] to it at the bottom of the article (by convention); it will then show up in the category. Unfortunately one cannot directly edit the category itself so that articles appear in it, the software works the other way around. Be advised however, that there are a number of folks around here of the view that articles should only appear in the most "specific" categories, and not directly in a "parent" category - not a view I share in all circumstances, but others are of that opinion and may "correct" things that way if they see it. But I would say go ahead in any case, on the basis that "Central America" is not equal to only the sum of the modern political states, but has a regional reality too.
2. The other way, which could be complementary, is to develop a "List of..." article and add the languages to that. Lists on wikipedia have advantages that (unlike categories) one can add other useful information to them, and can be ordered in other meaningful ways than the alphabetical. Both categories and lists are useful navigational tools in their own way, so there's no reason why both can't be in place, as they frequently are.

Regards, --cjllw | TALK 09:33, 3 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Basque Portal?

Kaixo, I'm contacting you because you figure in Category:User eu, meaning that you speak some Basque. You must therefore be Basque yourself or have an intense connection with the Basque Country.

I am thinking that maybe was a good idea to create a Portal (or maybe a Wikiproject? or both?) on the Basque theme but I feel such kind of project requires more than just one person.

If you are interested, please comment in my talk page.

Enjoy, --Sugaar 10:06, 4 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Atlacatl

Note: I have moved this discussion to the Atlacatl talk page. --A R King 14:55, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Basque Polysynthetic?

Hi Alan I wanted to ask someone who knew both about basque and about Polysynthesis. In the article on Polysynthetic language Basque is given as an example of a Polysynthetic language - while there are certainly better examples of Polysynthesis than Basque I don't know if there is any support to the claim at all. Are there any reliable sources calling basque Polysynthetic? t would bee great if you would participate in thee discussion at Talk:Polysynthetic language.Maunus 08:57, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

Hi Maunus. I've done so. --A R King 17:12, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Endangered South American languages

Am starting a table for list of endangered languages, based on the UNESCO Red Book. Of course many things need to be done; but would like initial comments:

User:Ling.Nut/ELSA

Thanks, --Ling.Nut 23:52, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

Hi Ling.Nut, I can't help you very much there, I'm afraid, as I don't have much knowledge of the area. I do have a suggestion, though. It would seem that nearly all native languages of South America are endangered (in other words, the number of non-endangered native languages of SA is small). Therefore a list of ALL native languages of South America would to a large extent coincide with this one. Now it seems to me that while there may be some people who are interested in having a list of endangeres langs. of SA, it would probably be more useful to others (perhaps myself) to have a list of all SA native languages, which could include an indication of which ones are particularly endangered (or not). The latter list would be easy to develop out of the structure you have already created; you'd only need to include the non-endangered ones in their corresponding cases in the country lists, and perhaps create an additional narrow column for a symbol meaning "endangered". As I say, it's just a suggestion. I have recently been thinking about doing something similar for Central American languages (but then started to think it might be too much work). See the discussion on CA languages higher up on this page. If you decide to do a list of this kind, I think it might be helpful to some people if the list also had a column in which to indicate each the genetic affiliation (i.e. language family) of each language on the list. --A R King 06:46, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

Thanks! Those are good points... not sure where I'd get a list of all SA languages to populate the tables with... if you know a place, let me know. Thanks again.

I do plan to do CA endangered languages, too.. in fact, the whole world (those that I can find, anyhow) .. --Ling.Nut 07:25, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

I don't know, unfortunately. The upshot of my discussion (above) with cjllw was that given the way articles in this field have been structured in Wikipedia, one way would be to go country by country and start from the lists of languages of each country. There I guess you will need to decide whether to take existing information (and lists) in Wikipedia as your starting point (and expand out from there by gradually adding any languages not already covered), or start from some comprehensive list in an external source and work in the other direction, so to speak. In the latter case, how about using Ethnologue as the starting point? It sounds like an awfully large amount of work though! --A R King 08:54, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Endangered languages/language revitalization

(continuation of preceding discussion)

• Funny you should mention the lack of coordination among the articles. Actually, the eventual goal is Wikipedia:WikiProject endangered languages and language revitalization; the tables are just a part of that. They are meant to be like mini-portals to help point out where effort is needed. Eventually they'll be moved into the main namespace.
• The plan/hope for the WikiProject is to be a focal point/clearinghouse for all such articles, to bring order out of chaos, and to focus effort onto a single point. A mouthful, I know. Comments and suggestions are very welcome.
• --Ling.Nut 13:17, 10 November 2006 (UTC)
• PS The skeleton of the WikiProject is here --Ling.Nut 13:42, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

My first reaction, Ling.Nut, is that it sounds like an uncomfortably broad area to be subsumed in one project (but I repeat, this is a first reaction, so don't take me too seriously yet). These are areas I am intensely interested in. (When I said at the start of the South American discussion above that "I don't have much knowledge of the area", I should clarify that I was talking about South American languages in particular.) I am very happy that there should be a WikiProject on language endangerment, and equally pleased that there should be one on language recovery (my own preferred concept) or revitalization. There is a great need for work of every kind on both of these areas. Nor can it be denied that there is an important, even essential connection between the two areas. Nevertheless, I perceive them as fundamentally different (though related) subjects, and I feel that it might be more helpful to be able to concentrate on them one at a time. That might enable us to find just the right (or best) way of developing each. There is a well-known Spanish saying: "Quien mucho abarca poco aprieta", which might be very freely translated as: If you try to push a very large cart along, you won't be able to push it very far. (It's usually translated as "Don't bite off more than you can chew", but chewing doesn't seem to have much to do with this...)

That is just my immediate reaction, I will say for the third and last time; something to think about maybe. Even if you take my suggestion, it may not mean a no to your proposed project; instead one might consider, for instance, taking on the general project but subdividing it at a lower level into thematic areas, one of which would, I hope, be language revitalization/recovery.

Whatever. In any case, please count on me to support and contribute to work in this area if at all possible. --A R King 15:20, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

• Thanks! Chip in any time you like at WikiProject endangered languages and language revitalization. I'm making a header bar with links to the two proto-tables and redlinks to future wishes. :-)
• In my mind, the "language revitalization" bit is a "placeholder" or wish and a promise, and probably will be for months to come (perhaps several months). I just do not believe there will be a large enough core of supporters to carry/support a separate "language revitalization" project (now or ever, in fact). However, if it exists as a little corner room of a larger "endangered languages" project, maybe people will visit it and straighten the pictures once in a while. In fact, if wishes and dreams come true and it gets big, it can be spun off. (?) But honestly, I doubt that would happen. Maybe I'm wrong.
• So the goal is to work on the endangered languages, and have the other half as an empty room waiting to be filled. For a while. The long-term goal is to turn my attention to the revitalization topic as well.
• We can revisit the "revitalization" vs. "recovery" topic at a later date. :-) Everything is a work in progress.
• Cheers! --Ling.Nut 15:45, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

Okay. Feel free to contact me again whenever you like! --A R King 16:01, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

Quick Q: How does "WikiProject biolinguistic diversity" grab you? --Ling.Nut 18:17, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

Well, I think that maybe what we should be discussing first is what we want the content of the project to be, and then make the name fit the content, rather than the other way around. My personal reaction to "biolinguistic diversity", though, is that it sounds very PC, but not terribly specific considering that we are talking about an encyclopedia. And aren't we getting vaguer all the time?

I would like to make a proposal in the light of the foregoing discussion: what would you say to just calling it either "Endangered languages" or "Language endangerment" for the time being, since you say that is what we will want to concentrate on for the first few months. As for the other "empty room waiting to be filled" of language vitalization, if and when we start to fill it, if we still think we want to do that as part of the same project rather than as a separate one, then we can consider changing the project name at that point to reflect the new direction taken by its content. That way we do not need to decide yet on the issues raised above about the project's (future) scope, and the present name of the project will reflect its present scope, leaving the future for the future.

As for what you say about not expecting there to be many people ready to work on the issue of language revitalization (now or in the future), all I can say is I hope you are wrong! But time will tell. Cheers, --A R King 19:10, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Basque language/Swadesh list

I think this is more of your interest than mine: I just found that Swadesh lists have been agreed to delete AND transwiki (to Wikitionary). Yet the one on Basque language (and maybe others) has been deleted without transwikiing it before. I asked for deletion review (Wikipedia:Deletion review/Content review) but I think it's more proper for a linguist like you to keep an eye on this issue and make the proper corrections. Regards, --Sugaar 17:48, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

Kaixo Sugaar. Okay, I'll look into it, but first we should give someone a chance to respond to your comment, so I'll wait. Was the Swadesh list in a separate page by itself, or part of the Basque language page, or what? --A R King 18:00, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

It seems it was correctly transwikied. Just that I could not find it and the corresponding link in the Basque people article was dead.

The page was a subpage of Basque people. No idea who created it but it's odd. It seems there were many others like that.

For more info check in my user page: User talk:Sugaar#Basque Swadesh list. --Sugaar 00:49, 24 November 2006 (UTC)

I don't know when the first Basque Swadesh list was produced, or who did it, but I believe there was one included in: Mario Saltarelli, Basque (Croom Helm Descriptive Grammar Series), 1988. There was also an ethnolinguistic survey (a sort of language atlas) produced by Elhuyar in the 1980s which included a Swadesh list (for each village), I think. Anyway, I'm glad we found it again! --A R King 06:18, 24 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Pleased to meet you

Replied on my user talk page. - Jmabel | Talk 05:51, 26 November 2006 (UTC)

Wow, Basque and Welsh? If you add Hungarian it will be a Trifecta. - Jmabel | Talk 05:53, 26 November 2006 (UTC)

Sorry, I never got my teeth into Hungarian (er, the language, I mean, not the person). So far, that is... ;-) --A R King 07:45, 26 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Abiento

Muitas grazias! Eskerrik asko! ya he meso a etimolochía en l'articlo d'abiento d'o Biquizionario. Saludos --Willtron (?) 12:54, 27 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] the Template:Languages of South America

What do y ou think we should do about this extremely incomplete and misleading template that someone has started putting on all pages relating to languages of south america?Maunus 10:33, 29 November 2006 (UTC)

I placed a note on Qrc2006's user talk page and a briefer one on the template's talk page. I agree with you. --A R King 12:31, 29 November 2006 (UTC)

You forgot to sign your comments ;-) --Ling.Nut 14:08, 29 November 2006 (UTC)

Did I? Sorry about that. --A R King 15:51, 29 November 2006 (UTC)

• this is a CC of the message i left manusus

"I did the official langauges copying the official languges of Europe template or maybe EU, perhaps it should be official languges of the OAS instead, but both can exist no? Why 1,000 languages, since the languages with less than 1,000 speakers are soooo many, i thought maybe it should be broken it up 1000+, -1000, and extinct languages of south america, maybe even less than 100, 100-1000, 1000-10000, 100,000+ but more than 1,000 seemed to be a managable number, while including every language with 2 or 77 speakers would have overly cluttered it. Why south america, not that that its any of your business but i dont mind sharing, becauase this is wikipedia and you edit what you like, what your interested in, im not gonna run and start editing the heavy metal article or barbara streasand greatest hits templates bcuz those dont really interest me. i didnt participate in any discussion bcuz it didnt occur to me, no one asked me to, and theyre really really really (3 reallys dude) hard to find the relevant ones or even where the hell they are. if im asked id be happy to put my input in any discussion. and if anyone needs help with a template im happy to do it. its mostly just cut and paste of some other similar template really. have i answered all your questions? got any more? hit me back and one final thing, in life and especially wikipedia i find people tend to pompously critizise other peoples work but at the end of the day, they are only willying to condemn you and if you stop they wont pick it up where you left off, nor will they care, its just a bunch of loud noise and its very unhelpfulQrc2006 19:57, 1 December 2006 (UTC)"

and to answer your question, i really am frustrated, where do you get off suggesting that maybe i should be editing the articles of your preferance rather than making a template or two, that really bothered me. i edit what i please. if you want help with somthing just ask. but its rude to suggest my choices are less important. plus you went on a tangent on my talk page. later.Qrc2006 20:02, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Basque people

(cross-posted to Sugaar's talk as well) Hi,

I put a note on jmabel's talk page about this, but he may not be online. I know nothing of the Basques except that they are the descendants of people either driven from their lands or assimilated by the Indo-European speakers [so they are the Taiwanese aborigines of Europe, or more likely vice versa, since the Basques were booted out of their lands before the Taiwanese aborigines were theirs].

I don't have time to participate in the discussion. I'm sorry.

--Ling.Nut 03:46, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

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[edit] A human suggestion/request

Hi, A.R. Before you get entangled with all those SuggestBot succulent ideas, I have another one:

It would be good idea to have a documented historical map of Basque language recession. I don't really have good bibliography on that, and that's why I'm requesting your help.

I'm not sure how good you are with images, so I let you to choose: either you can do it yourself or you can just give me the data and I will take care of the image as such, giving credit to both. Of course you can choose the third option of ignoring this request (no hard feelings). But I bet you will be interested in the idea.

Enjoy, --Sugaar 12:28, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

Kaixo. Actually my response is "none of the above". I'm not ignoring your request, but I do not have expert knowledge on the subject (plus I am not good with images, either). So I suggest you do the map first, and I will look at it afterwards and we can discuss it if you like. Or also, if you have specific points to discuss in the process, I'm always available. Alan --A R King 13:26, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

Ok. I just hoped you had the source material handy, beaing a linguist living in EH. All I have around is quite limited (an old map from the old edition of the BI MILA dictionay, can't recall the actual name, and a map with an unclear legend from M. Sorauren's historical work) but I'll see what I can find. I'm working in other issues, so I don't know when I'll have something to start but I'll consult with you anyhow.

Maybe I'll post a request in the WikiProject, though guess it can be lying around for months.

Well, thanks anyhow. --Sugaar 16:00, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

Well, you see, it's not the kind of thing most "linguists" are concerned about, and I am not the kind of linguist who specialises in such things (I am more interested in grammar and present-day usage). What kind of sources did you need? If there's something I can help you with let me know. For example, I have a copy of Trask's The history of Basque, a good English-language reference, in front of me; do you want me to look and see if he provides useful information? Alan --A R King 16:10, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Request for Copyedit help

Hi Alan. If you have some spare time I would apprciate it greatly if you could brush up the content and style of Mayan languages I have worked on it for some time now and I want it to become a WP:GA before long. I would appreciate additions to both content and style, unfortunately I have difficulties not being sloppy. Change anything you want. Thanks Maunus 21:35, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

Hi Maunus. Okay, subject to my available time. I'll put it on my list of things to do, and I'll be glad to help. But I've just starting cleaning up the Basque people article, so it'll be after that. Cheers, Alan --A R King 22:23, 4 December 2006 (UTC)