Variant subtag proposal: Høgnorsk variety of Norwegian

Thorgeir Holm thorgeirholm at yahoo.no
Mon Dec 21 00:29:29 CET 2009


<hermer Michael Everson frå 20.12.2009 21:47>
> On 20 Dec 2009, at 20:37, John Cowan wrote:
> 
>> Michael Everson scripsit:
>>> I wonder if aasen would be better than hgnor in this case.
>> I think we should reflect the name currently in use for the  
>> orthography.
> 
> "Also known as 'Aasen-mål'..."
> 
> Hvad tænker du, Thorgeir?

I think the subtag should be robust, i.e. include all subsets that would
be possible of this variant. "Høgnorsk" is perceived as an umbrella term
of all varieties adhering to Aasen's principles, where Aasen's 1864/1873
codification can be viewed as a historical variety of this. So the
problem with using 'aasen' is that this might be perceived as the
historical variety, and not as the modern forms (for which this subtag
mostly will be applied, I guess). Maybe this consideration is overkill?

I was also considering the subtag 'norskt', meaning "Norwegian (adj,n)"
(which is what users usually call their language among themselves),
seeing that the other Norwegians (nn and nb) spell this "norsk", and so
the spelling would identify this particular variant. But this is not
very illuminating for non-users.

A full 'hognorsk' (with o for ø, instead of deleting it) is also
possible. It has the disadvantage of not being properly spelled, and is
prone to a soft joke or two (for those who know the language), but this
is maybe not very important. If non-users should be given priority,
making it more understandable for them, maybe this full form is better.

The abbreviated form 'hgnor' is better e.g. when it comes to making URLs
shorter, say, nn-hgnor.wikipedia.org instead of nn-hognorsk.wikipedia.org

Which consideration carries more weight?

Thorgeir



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