Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Lake dialect

This page is an archive of the discussion about the proposed deletion of the article below. This page is no longer live. Further comments should be made on the article's talk page rather than here so that this page is preserved as an historic record.
The result of the debate was delete. -- AllyUnion (talk) 09:16, 21 Feb 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Lake dialect

A web search yielded no information on this so-called "dialect". I am therefore inclined to believe it is made up. A request for sources I made on the contributor's talk page has gone unheeded. Taco Deposit | Talk-o to Taco 15:19, Feb 10, 2005 (UTC)

Update: This obituary [1] seems to confirm there is an Italian-American neighborhood in Newton known colloquially as "The Lake", and that some residents there have created their own dialect. I still don't believe an article on the "Lake dialect" is warranted, though. Taco Deposit | Talk-o to Taco 15:52, Feb 10, 2005 (UTC)

• Delete, unintelligible local dialects are not inherently encyclopedic. Wyss 19:14, 10 Feb 2005 (UTC)
• Comment, we in the linguistic community call "unintelligible dialects" languages, and languages, I believe, are inherently notable. I'd like to see some verification that this actually exists though. — Ливай | ☺ 21:55, 10 Feb 2005 (UTC)

I'm sorry to tell you this, but you're deeply mistaken and might wish to consult any standard reference text for a quick refresher on the difference between a language and a dialect. Further, my use of the word intelligible was a reference to its use in the article, as an example of (and commentary on) its unencyclopedic tone. Wyss 04:48, 11 Feb 2005 (UTC)

I'm quite familiar with the debate over what is a "language" and what is a "dialect" and some political/cultural factors often factor into people's decision over whether to call something a language or a dialect, but current usage of what constitutes a language in a purely linguistic sense seems to be based on mutual intelligibility, which is admittedly hardly a straightforward criterion, and many continuums and varying degrees of intelligibility exist that cloud the issue, e.g. Dutch/German, Danish/Norwegian/Swedish, Hindi/Urdu, etc. If it is a mixture of Italian and New England English, this could mean many things from a full-fledged pidgin (unlikely but such things are known to happen) to English with some Italian words and a heavy accent, and if the mutual intelligibility of this speech with American English is in question I think we should keep the content to see if we can further investigate the matter rather than simply deleting it. — Ливай | ☺ 08:14, 11 Feb 2005 (UTC)

So, keep for now. — Ливай | ☺ 08:16, 11 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Huh? This has nothing to do with any political debate over some spoken dialect with characteristics of a discreet language and I guess I should repeat, my use of the term intelligible was meant as a comment on the article's tone, not the characteristics of the dialect. The question addressed by this VfD is whether or not this specific local neighbourhood dialect is encyclopedic (there are thousands of these around the world, they're a natural phenomenon of language). Wyss 17:04, 11 Feb 2005 (UTC)

• • Concur. Keep for now (the obit above seems a decent citation); hope to get some solid expansion on this, possible move if it turns out there is a better name. -- Jmabel | Talk 02:09, Feb 11, 2005 (UTC)
• Delete, local minor dialect, article does not establish notability. Megan1967 02:42, 11 Feb 2005 (UTC)
• With all due respect to Ливай, this article doesn't establish that the "Lake dialect" even exists. I say, the creator(s) have five days' grace period in which to establish the encyclopedicity of this dialect. If they haven't by then, delete. (P.S. If I typed in "Lake dialect" into Wikipedia's search box, I'd probably expect to find something on the dialect of the Lake District in England.) --Angr 10:00, 12 Feb 2005 (UTC)
• Delete. Newton is a close suburb of Boston with a population of about 90,000 in all, and 12% of the population is of Italian ancestry. Nonantum (The Lake) is one of 14 "villages" within Newton, and is predominantly Italian-American. Newton is a cosmopolitan, quite wealthy, suburb and it is hard to believe that any neighborhood of it would be isolated enough to develop a distinctive and enduring dialect beyond a few minor vocabulary variations. The obituary referenced above says the dialect was created by "a few old-timers" who blended Italian, English, and Romany (Gypsy). That doesn't sound very notable, but if it has some linguistic or social characteristics that have made it of interest to scholars, I'll change my vote. --BM 14:32, 12 Feb 2005 (UTC)
• Delete. Probably a joke; article has no evidence there is any such dialect. Cut the link from lake (disambiguation) when this one goes. Wile E. Heresiarch 07:18, 13 Feb 2005 (UTC)

This page is now preserved as an archive of the debate and, like some other VfD subpages, is no longer 'live'. Subsequent comments on the issue, the deletion, or the decision-making process should be placed on the relevant 'live' pages. Please do not edit this page.