Talk:Linguistic purism in Icelandic

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[edit] Neutrality

If the neutrality of this article is in dispute, where is the discussion about it. You don't just slap a tag like that on an article without saying a word about it. Dispute means - well, precisely that. There is no dispute here. Cheers Io 03:27, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

That's true. The problem with the article is that it is written as an advocacy of linguistic purism than a description of the phenomenon. In fact, the heading of the article was Preservation of Icelandic, i.e. the official language ideology and terminology about language purism. The article was moved to the present heading, but nothing else changed. The word "preservation" or phrases as "maintain the language’s purity" are used time and again. Just to take it literally, making new words in Icelandic for things inexistent in Old Norse to replace loanwords is not preservation by any means. In fact, the article is repeating the arguments of the official pamphlet of the Icelandic government Icelandic - at once ancient and modern. --Michkalas 11:13, 27 April 2007 (UTC)
As this is an emotionally laden subject, I don't think "preservation" and words like that should be thought of as weasel-words in this context. The concept of "preservation" (definitions may vary) is subjective. Having said that, I agree that the article could do with some polishing. Also, I was not aware of that Icelandic has ever been made an official language of Iceland. It is de facto, but de jure the country doesn't have one. The need for an official language has never arisen. Cheers Io 12:09, 27 April 2007 (UTC)
For the official language thing check, Talk:Iceland#Icelandic only de facto ?. Anyway, this emphasis to explain everywhere and all the time that it is not in the constitution is just because of the English-only movement in the US, which wants to ban education and services for immigrants in any other language than English. Otherwise, the whole thing is a legal detail. --Michkalas 12:31, 27 April 2007 (UTC)
I did not have the USA in mind, when I wrote the reply. It was meant as a reminder that some countries, France being a prime example, have codified an official language or languages in their constitutions or laws (often to the detriment of their respective minorities, see France again for an example), but Iceland and many others have not. The thing is legal detail, I'll admit that, since the practise of law also admits the power of precedent. Anyway, this is really nothing to split hairs about, and if there are legal hairs to be split after all, I'd rather leave that to the lawyers, although I suspect you'll get a variety of opininions from them as well. Cheers Io 14:03, 27 April 2007 (UTC)
PS: I had already read the discussion you referred me to and I disagree with the conclusion. Cheers Io 14:10, 27 April 2007 (UTC)
PPS: If you take two attested Old Icelandic stems and combine them into a new word, what is that other than preservation? In my opinion at least, it doesn't matter in that respect, whether the ancients were familiar with the new concept. Cheers Io 14:14, 27 April 2007 (UTC)
Unfortunately, the least I can say, creating new words this way is not considered a "preservation". This phenomenon is known in sociolinguistics and language policy as linguistic purism and it is not of course present only in Icelandic. For the speakers, the government and the schools is of course "preservation". The whole thing is about looking like archaic and old, but this does not mean that it really is archaic and old. Anyway, I will try to make some changes in the article and we can discuss any possible problems. --Michkalas 14:43, 27 April 2007 (UTC)
In that case there is considerable overlap between linguistic purism and preservation. To refer to the all to often cited word sími (originally síma), that word had totally fallen out of use, but was resurrected. The same can be said about teiti, which noone had used for a very long time except in poetry until it turned up again in the late 20. century, probably originally as a conscious archaism among high school students. The defininitions of sociolinguistics are neither the beginning nor end of all. In fact, most subjects starting with socio- (my prejudice) have their definitions muddled to some degree. If you coin a new word out of two archaic and old parts, the meaning is probably new, but its constituent parts are archaic and old and that makes the whole construction archaic if not old. That may also mean preservation of either or both stems, if one or the other has ceased to be used. And, as I said earlier, beauty is in this case in the eye of the beholder, so the opinion of those who understand the subject matter is what counts - not some general definition of sociolinguists, who may have a general grasp of their subject, but don't necessarily understand the languages they are dealing with. What I mean by that is, that you mostly see the same examples from taken from Icelandic, when the subject matter is e.g. language purism, often with the same errors repeated - one author copying another's mistakes. We have, then, resurrection, pure preservation, calques and neologisms, all of which may labelled preservation to varying degrees, if all parts are old. But I think we are straying from the original subject. Cheers Io 18:41, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Norwegian instead of Danish

I knew about the Norwegian option (a former class-mate did just that), just forgot to mention it, but now that it has been mentioned, doesn't this apply to Swedish as well? Cheers Io 17:31, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] German article

I have requested translation of the German article to provide us with more information, if anyone can help it would be appreciated. Max Naylor 10:16, 29 May 2007 (UTC)