Talk:Ogiek language

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[edit] Okiek > Ogiek ?

Suggestion:

change spelling "Okiek" throughout to "Ogiek".

Reason: the author here follows an older ethnographic tradition (vide Roderic Blackburn 1982), still retained e.g. by Corinne Kratz, one of the few Western scholars treating this people and their language since the late 1970s. However, the spelling question has been resolved by the Ogiek themselves, who now uniformly write "Ogiek" (sg. Ogiot) in all self-references (including their two organization websites, and their journal). This has become common standard.

Also, the spoken pronounciation of the two consonants "g" and "k" in the word is clearly different, when emitted by a native speaker; at least this is true for the Mau Ogiek, whom I have been familiar with.

Alexander Eichener

A fair point. I'm in two minds. Wikipedia's naming conventions prescribe use of the most common term, which is not necessarily the most correct term. I don't know where said older ethnographic tradition originated (though it was before Blackburn's Okiek history, cf. Heine 1972), but it has been used widely — which would make 'Okiek' the preferred term to use while at the same time pointing out the correct spelling. On the other hand, I would want Wikipedia to reflect the most current state of knowledge. Do you have a reference to the Ogiek practice?

I'm taking the safe side here for now by adding the updated spelling. Hope to hear back from you! — mark ✎ 17:48, 6 August 2005 (UTC)

Dear Mark: you asked for references, reasonably enough. The easiest reference would be to point you to the two own Ogiek organization websites, namely http://www.ogiek.org and http://www.orip.or.ke .

As to printed sources, I should like to refer to the Ogiek quarterly journal "Oasis" (in English), and to Joseph Towett's recent book on Ogiek land cases (published 2004 via the Ogiek Welfare Council). These sources express both the use of the community itself and of the Kenyan (Kiswahili- and English-speaking) public, which I believe should be standard for Wikipedia as well. All three Kenyan newspapers use the spelling "Ogiek" (though they hardly know the singular "Ogiot", as I note with some amusement).

Best regards, and excuse my delay, Alexander Eichener 19th November 2005

Don't worry about the delay, thanks for checking back. As you note, 'Ogiek' seems to be coming into wider use; I have added that to the article, I have changed the native name in the language table to the right. I'm still a bit in doubt (in the database of the Leiden African Studies Center, for example, there aren't any instances of 'Ogiek' yet, and I consider that quite a good measure for use in ethnographic and linguistic circles), but the high internet presence of Ogiek vs. Okiek indicates that Ogiek is really catching on, so I'll move the article.

On a sidenote: ever thought about contributing yourself? We don't have an article on the Ogiek themselves yet, for example... — mark ✎ 20:17, 19 November 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Article removed from Wikipedia:Good articles

This article was formerly listed as a good article, but was removed from the listing because it seems very short. With 5 references listed I wonder if there's not enough information to expand it by a few paragraphs? What's there is great though. Worldtraveller 23:29, 25 February 2006 (UTC)