Criteria for languages?

[Mark Davis ☕]

The proposed changes raise a number of questions.

A. What are the criteria for distinguishing "languages". As far as I recall
from my few years in Switzerland, Walliserdeutsch is definitely harder to
understand than the other Swiss German dialects. But does that difference
rise to the level of detaching it from the other Swiss dialects?

See, for example, http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walliserdeutsch

B. The criteria for macrolanguages are also very murky to me. Take the two
cases:

a. Latvian was changed to a macrolanguage, and what was formerly considered
Latvian is titled Standard Latvian

b. Swiss German was not changed to a macrolanguage; instead, Walliserdeutsch
is no longer considered Swiss German.

Could someone clarify why the choice is made one way in one case, and
another way in the other case?

===

What I worry about is that inconsistent treatment across languages makes the
structure hard to understand, hard to deploy (in software), and
unpredictable in terms of predicting what will happen in the future. Take a
concrete illustration:

   1. When someone requests that Scottish Standard English be a language,
   will that be granted, because it is as different from Mississippi English as
   Walliserdeutsch from Berndeutsch? And if not, then why?
   2. And in that case, would English change into a macro language with
   Scottish Standard English being a sublanguage? And if not, then why?
   3. Or would Scottish Standard English just no longer be considered
   English? And if not, then why?

The answers to these particular questions are not, of course, as important
as the criteria for deciding what the answers are.

Mark


On Fri, Nov 20, 2009 at 14:45, CE Whitehead <cewcathar at hotmail.com> wrote:

>
>
>
> Thanks Philip and Joan for your replies!  At this point, I have to withdraw
> my objection to [wts]--I will try to do further research at some point, but
> for now I am satisfied.
> Philip Newton philip.newton at gmail.com
> Wed Nov 18 08:12:26 CET 2009
> > 2009/11/18 CE Whitehead <cewcathar at hotmail.com>:
> >
> >> Should we instead tackle both Walser and Walliser German together at
> this time?  And should the code [wae] be used?  Or two separate codes?  (It
> depends for me on how close these two languages are to each other.)
> > At first, I thought they were two names for the same thing, but
> > apparently, "Walliser" is used for the language of those still living
> > in Canton Wallis, while "Walser" is used for the language spoken by
> > those whose ancestors settled in various other areas from Canton
> > Wallis.
> > German Wikipedia has this to say on the difference (s.v.
> >
> http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walliserdeutsch#Walliserdeutsch_und_Walserdeutsch
> > ):
> > """
> > Rein linguistisch gesehen gibt es keine klaren Unterschiede zwischen
> > den Dialekten im deutschsprachigen Wallis und in den Siedlungen der
> > Walser, welche im 13. und 14. Jahrhundert aus dem Wallis auswanderten
> und an zahlreichen Orten im Alpenraum Siedlungen gründeten. Die
> Unterschiede beruhen eher auf aussersprachlichen Kriterien, nämlich
> dass der Kanton Wallis eine politische Einheit bildet, während die
> Walsersiedlungen untereinander wenig Kontakt haben.
> > Die Dialekte der Walsersiedlungen lassen sich ebenfalls denselben
> > Gruppen Ost und West zuordnen, in die man die Dialekte des
> > deutschsprachigen Wallis einteilt, so dass beispielsweise ein Dialekt
> > einer Walsersiedlung aus der Gruppe Ost mehr Gemeinsamkeiten haben
> > kann mit einem Deutschwalliser Dialekt aus derselben Gruppe als mit
> > einem Walsersiedlung-Dialekt aus der Gruppe West.
> Hmm, so maybe these two languages/dialects should be considered as a group.
> But I read on.
> > Unterschiede zwischen den wal(li)serdeutschen Dialekten gibt es je
> > nachdem, was für Sprachkontakte in bestimmten Regionen gewirkt haben.
> > In isolierten Regionen haben sich ursprünglichere Sprachformen besser
> > erhalten als in verkehrsoffenen Gebieten. Dies erlaubt jedoch keine
> > Unterscheidung zwischen den Dialekten des Deutschwallis und der
> > Walsersiedlungen, denn beide werden sowohl in isolierteren als auch in
> > verkehrsoffeneren Regionen gesprochen. Die typischsten Beispiele für
> > isolierte Regionen sind die Walsersiedlungen auf der südlichen
> > Alpenseite in italienischsprachiger Umgebung, jedoch auch im Kanton
> > Wallis gibt es sehr isolierte Talschaften, beispielsweise das
> > Lötschental, wenn auch seit der zweiten Hälfte des 20. Jahrhunderts
> > die Verkehrsverbindungen sich sehr verbessert haben.
> > Am deutlichsten von den übrigen wal(li)serdeutschen Dialekten weichen
> > diejenigen ab, die umgeben sind von anderen deutschen Dialekten, also
> > Dialekte in Walsersiedlungen in Teilen Graubündens, in Liechtenstein
> > oder in Vorarlberg.
> > """
> Thus, mabe these two dialects are distinct enough to tag separately after
> all?  Although they seem to be closely related.
> As the requester does not wish to distinguish the various finely grained
> distinctions in dialect but only Walliser German from other varieties of
> German, including Walser German; if the subtag [wts] is fine for his needs,
> fine. I do not know enough about these two varieties at present to argue
> otherwise in any case (it will take some research on my part to go further).
> > Or in English:
> Thanks for the superb translation Philip; my ability to read German is weak
> so I appreciate this!
> Best,
> C. E. Whitehead
> cewcathar at hotmail.com
> > """
> > Speaking purely linguistically, there are no clear differences between
> > the dialects in the German-speaking part of Wallis and those in
> > settlements of Walsers who emigrated from the Wallis in the 13th and
> > 14th centuries and who settled in numerous places in the Alp. The
> > differences lie more in extra-linguistic criteria, namely that the
> > Canton Wallis forms a political entity, while the Walser settlements
> > have little contact amongst themselves.
> > The dialects in Walser settlements can be assigned to the same groups
> > "east" and "west" that the dialects in the German-speaking part of
> > Wallis are divided up in; in this way, a dialect of a Walser
> > settlement belonging to the group "east" will show more similarities
> > with a German-Wallis dialect from the same group than with a Walser
> > settlement dialect from group "west".
> > The differences in Wal(li)ser German dialects depend on the linguistic
> > contacts present in variuos regions. In isolated regions, original
> > linguistic forms have been preserved better than in areas which are
> > open to travel. However, this does not enable us to distinguish
> > between the dialects of the German-speaking part of Wallis on the one
> > hand and those of the Walser settlements on the other, since both
> > groups of dialects are spoken both in isolated areas and in areas
> > which are more open to travel. The most typical examples for isolated
> > regions are the Walser settlements on the south side of the Alps in an
> > Italian-speaking surrounding; however, even in Canton Wallis there are
> > very isolated valleys, such as the Lötschental, though the means of
> > travel there have improved considerably since the second half of the
> > 20th century.
> > The Wal(li)ser German dialects that differ most from the remainder are
> > those that are surrounded by other German dialects; that is, dialects
> > in Walser settlements in parts of Graubünden, in Liechtenstein, or in
> > Vorarlberg.
> > """
> > Cheers,
> > Philip
> > --
> > Philip Newton <philip.newton at gmail.com>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Ietf-languages mailing list
> Ietf-languages at alvestrand.no
> http://www.alvestrand.no/mailman/listinfo/ietf-languages
>
>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://www.alvestrand.no/pipermail/ietf-languages/attachments/20091121/c9751ff5/attachment.htm