User talk:Mahagaja/Archive 45

Goidelc etc

Not a major issue but i dont think the fact that the article is English is really an overwhelming reason not to have the native names for the various historical stages of Gaelic stated alongside the english Exonyms - and i think its reasonably interesting and worthwhile to to allow people to see the progresion, and consistency, in the names of the language throught history and within it's three modern dialects. As for Primitive Irish i did nothing more than take what was to be found on that page so if it's incorrect you should delete "Goidelc" from there as well. siarach (talk) 15:00, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

Well, I don't see much point in listing the names there. It's not like Germanic languages and Romance languages list the native name of every language listed either. Primitive Irish doesn't say anything about "Goidelc" or "Goídelc" (Old Irish does, though). —Angr 15:04, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

Merry New Year

Heri za Mwaka Mpya! Malangali (talk) 09:08, 9 January 2009 (UTC)

Thanks, and Athbhliain faoi shéan is faoi mhaise to you too! —Angr 11:15, 9 January 2009 (UTC)

Happy Angr's Day!

Angr has been identified as an Awesome Wikipedian, and therefore, I've officially declared today as Angr's day! For your brilliant parable about nonfree images and your work at the Language RefDesk, enjoy being the Star of the day, Angr! Cheers, bibliomaniac15 21:08, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

Gosh, thanks! —Angr 21:12, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

File:FlutieFlakes1.jpg

Hi, Angr. Can I ask you to undelete File:FlutieFlakes1.jpg? I believe I can write a valid fair-use rationale for the article Flutie Flakes. Thanks! Powers ^T 17:39, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

OK, I've undeleted it, but in addition to a rationale, it needs a source and it needs to be smaller (approx. 0.1 megapixels). —Angr 19:16, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

I can reduce the size of the image, but I have no idea what the original source was. I found a file (on a site I can't link because it's blacklisted) that matches, but I can't be sure who got the file from whom. Powers ^T 21:40, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

Is there a photo of the product on the manufacturer's website? After all, we don't have to use precisely this photo. —Angr 22:06, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

Yeah, that's here. It shows the current 10th-anniversary box instead of the "classic" box, but I don't think that's a problem. Go ahead and redelete the red one. Sorry for the trouble; I didn't know it had sourcing problems in addition to the missing fair use rationale. Powers ^T 23:38, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

Two issues

First, are you reading email? :) --millosh (talk (meta:)) 13:14, 13 January 2009 (UTC)

Second, I think that you should nominate yourself for stewardship because multilingual stewards are highly desirable. --millosh (talk (meta:)) 13:14, 13 January 2009 (UTC)

I haven't checked my e-mail yet today. I'll probably see it in four or five hours. And while I'm flattered by the suggestion and the trust it implies, I have no desire to be steward. —Angr 13:26, 13 January 2009 (UTC)

I sent to you an email about Language subcommittee issue the day before yesterday, which is more important than the issue related to stewardship. If you didn't get that email, please send me email to millosh@gmail.com. --millosh (talk (meta:)) 13:53, 13 January 2009 (UTC)

I'll double check, but I don't think I got it. It may have been mistaken for spam, though usually I notice when that happens. —Angr 13:55, 13 January 2009 (UTC)

I suggested that Miloš write you. -- Evertype·✆ 18:51, 14 January 2009 (UTC)

File:A boy with antisemetic sign.JPG

I don't know much about the legal use of images, but surely this must be breaking actual real world laws of well as wikipedia policies? From the image(and the associated images) itself to the caption(s), there must be alot very wrong with this. Please take a look and let me know, thanks. ʄ!•¿talk? 22:23, 15 January 2009 (UTC)

First of all, it's not illegal for the boy to be carrying the sign, because the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution guarantees him the right to free speech. Second, even if it were illegal for him to carry the sign, it's not illegal to take a photograph of someone doing something illegal or to upload that image to Wikimedia Commons. I understand if you find the image (or rather, the message on the sign depicted in the image) offensive, but not everything that is offensive is (or should be) illegal. —Angr 06:43, 16 January 2009 (UTC)

Yeah I do find the image offensive, declaring that "all jews are terrorists" is obviously uncalled for. But I was referring to the person that actually took the photograph. First of all, it's just a kid holding a sign, not an adult. Second of all he and his family may not be aware of the subtleties of the english language, and may have meant that "Jews can also be terrorists" not "all Jews are born terrorists". Lastly, surely it's all very unsubstanciated? The captions are pretty slanderous. Sorry I'm not trying to be awkward here just a family having there faces put all over wikipedia under these circumstances seems unfair, wrong, and down right dangerous. ʄ!•¿talk? 08:10, 16 January 2009 (UTC)

Again, I don't think any of those factors makes it illegal for the uploader to take the photo and upload it to Commons. As for the captions used in articles, you can change those yourself. At any rate, if you want to discuss the appropriateness of keeping the photo, I'd recommend starting a section at commons:Commons:Village pump about it. —Angr 08:47, 16 January 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for the pointer anyway. ʄ!•¿talk? 17:02, 16 January 2009 (UTC)

Pronunciation of Mall

Thank you for your answer, which is quite clear. In fact I supposed it to be the american pronunciation, which I always used also for the London Mall, but I wasn't completely sure. Regards, --Gabodon (talk) 12:00, 16 January 2009 (UTC)

Email

I've sent to you an email a couple of hours ago. If you don't get it again, please, send to me an email to millosh@gmail.com. --millosh (talk (meta:)) 19:28, 16 January 2009 (UTC)

In reply of your message about DBpedia

Hi Angr, yes you are right, but I still have a problem, which you are probably ideal to help me with. I'm from the DBpedia project (my workpage) and we are currently implementing a Live Extraction, i.e. the people from Wikipedia gave us the password to their update stream, which sends changes made on Wikipedia. As I can't control, what updates are made it is difficult to test, if our software works correct. This is why I made a change on the DBpedia page yesterday. I still need a page to test it and once we publish our efforts there will be a lot of users who want to try it. Do you think there is a way to have a real test page, which I and other DBpedia users can edit freely. (The sandbox is not updated over the stream). I could just create a page calling it DBpedia Live Extraction Test Page, but I want to respect the communtiy and not draw anger at us. As I don't know the rules (and don't want to learn them by trial and error), maybe you could help me and give me advice how to do it best. Thanks. (I also posted this on my user talk page, but I wasn't sure if you get notified, if I write it only there) SebastianHellmann (talk) 13:47, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

Culture

Hi, until a few days ago this article was a total trainwreck. I just did a major overhaul, although I believe I was pretty conservative: I cut all the redundancies, any material that was fringe or unrelated, and then tried to reorganize what was left so that distinct points of view or approaches were explicit. It still needs a lot of work (I explain all this in more detail on the article talk page, bottom). I created a section on "American Anthropology" but I am thinking perhaps that should be renamed "cultural anthropology." Because one thing I did not do - but which I believe is important - was to create a new section on "culture and language." But I am not qualified to write such a section. I am hoping you can, or at least make a start of it. I was thinking of a section that says something about how in human evolution culture and language coevolved; in what ways culture and language are related, and in what ways they are not, how linguists think of culture, maybe some basic stuff on ethnolinguistics and sociolinguistics with links to the real articles. Well, I hope you will consider it. Thanks, Slrubenstein | Talk 21:19, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

Sorry, I'm definitely not the one to write that section. Maybe someone at WP:WikiProject Linguistics can help. —Angr 21:28, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

If you could suggest a few or even one person I'd appreciate it - it is impossible looking at that list to tell who actually knows a lot about ethnolinguistics or sociolinguistics. I saw that you had done a lot of work on the Labov article, which is why I thought you would know a lot about sociolinguistics. Well, if you can suggest others, I'd appreciate it. Slrubenstein | Talk 21:34, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

I own Labov's Atlas of North American English, so I'm able to add info about the phonology of American accents. But I don't know anything about the relationship between culture and language. My interest in linguistics is more data-oriented and "science-y" than that! :-) —Angr 21:54, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

Ireland and the Republic

Hi, figures and statistics relating to the republic are just that. The official name of the state is "Ireland" which, although does not have governmental control over a whole island, does refer to the whole island (it is constitutional). The current jurisdiction (and of course the statistic of 3.8 million english speakers on the English language article) is specific to the republic. "Ireland", even in official naming, is the reference to the island which contains something in the region of 5.5-5.6 million english speakers. Also, for correctness, if you refer to the United Kingdom you should distinguish Ireland north and south as that is what the term UK does. When using the term "Ireland", the term "Great Britain" is correct. ~ R.T.G 09:12, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

Ref .desk

Hello there, I've asked something here (Wikipedia:Reference desk/Language#Intern). If you respond there, I shall be grateful for that.--202.168.229.245 (talk) 17:51, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

Re:Insular Germanic

Angr, search the term on google books. Whether it started out that way, the term is also plainly used to refer to non-Frisian "Anglo-Frisian" (i.e. English languages) ... clearly follows from analogy with Insular Celtic and you can bet your bottom dollar many of the people using it don't have the foggiest that Frisian exists. Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 06:50, 28 January 2009 (UTC)

Insular Celtic also includes a language spoken on the Continent, though, and I highly doubt that anyone using such an academic term as "Insular Germanic" would fail to know about Frisian. It's not like "the man in the street" goes around talking about "Insular Germanic languages". —Angr 06:54, 28 January 2009 (UTC)

While I'll assume having Frisian in the English category makes some linguistic sense, it doesn't make any historic sense. Historians who are looking for a word like Anglic but not as cringe-inducing are clearly here trying to find another term. You can see for yourself that a bunch of historians, Celticists and Anglo-Saxonists are using the term and that the inclusion of Frisian is made only in other heads and is thus in practice meaningless; it is doubtful the writers in question are aware of what part of what theory has a language that sounds and looks like Low German (i.e. Frisian) "in the English category", nor would it matter anyway. The difference between Breton and Frisian of course is that Frisians are not supposed to have come from England whereas Breton is supposed to have come from Britain (although it's just as probable it is the Armorican remnant of Gaulish). Anyway, these ain't men on the street. Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 07:09, 28 January 2009 (UTC)

In linguistics articles, decisions need to be made on the basis of what makes linguistic sense, not what makes historic sense. Historians don't get to decide linguistic terminology. You're right that Frisian didn't come from Britain, but the Frisian Islands are islands too. As for Breton, in fact it is not even remotely possible that it is "the Armorican remnant of Gaulish". That was a fantasy of Falc'hun's, who wanted Breton to be "more French than French" by claiming it had been in France longer than French had. But there is no credible linguistic evidence at all for the suggestion. —Angr 07:17, 28 January 2009 (UTC)

Terminology is terminology, who uses it doesn't matter to my mind. Regarding Breton, I've no idea about Falc'hun or who he was, but I think you over-estimate the strength of the evidence for languages in early medieval Europe. We have little evidence of what Armorican Gaulish looked like, so it doesn't make any sense to be so confident and the British origin of Breton derives from historical myths about migration, which of course 'may plausibly be based on something. But why would the totally unattested Celtic of Cornwall and Armorica of the late Roman period have diverged so fast before when diverged so slowly later? The historical evidence does not support the idea that they had diverged, as it is clear from such evidence that the people of northern France and southern England spoke the mutually intelligible languages in the first century AD. If there was any linguistic evidence this could be countered, but of course there isn't. Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 07:32, 28 January 2009 (UTC)

The question isn't who uses the terminology, but who determines what it refers to. François Falc'hun was a Breton linguist who proposed that Breton is a descendant of Gaulish, which is completely indefensible. A watered-down version of the theory, namely that Breton is a Brythonic language that has been influenced by Armorican Gaulish as some sort of substratum, is still around, because nothing is known about Armorican Gaulish so it can't be proved wrong. But Old Breton and Old Cornish are both attested and are for all practical purposes the same language. The British origin of Breton is not based on "historical myths about migration" but rather is based on linguistic evidence - Breton and Cornish have a number of sound changes from Proto-Brythonic in common that set them apart from Welsh. See Southwestern Brythonic protolanguage. —Angr 09:22, 28 January 2009 (UTC)

Not sure you're getting me. The point is since we don't know what Armorican "Gaulish" looks like we have no idea how it differs from Breton, nor do we known what late Antique "Cornish" or "Breton" look like. And if Cornwall and Armorica are speaking the same language in AD 1, and speaking the same language in AD 500, what exactly needs to change? It's dogmatic to place burdens of proof on either side and say "there's no evidence to the contrary" (which is something you can clearly do either way). Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 17:25, 28 January 2009 (UTC)

What gives you the idea Cornwall and Armorica were speaking the same language in AD 1? —Angr 17:42, 28 January 2009 (UTC)

Well, that's the impression Roman sources give. Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 18:57, 28 January 2009 (UTC)

I don't think Roman historians were particularly good at anthropological linguistics. —Angr 20:49, 28 January 2009 (UTC)

(personal attack removed)

this is not a personal attack, and I don't see how it can be construed as such. Please can I ask you to look over that again. Thanks. Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 17:20, 29 January 2009 (UTC)

Since I myself am a modern linguist, suggesting that the Romans, who were by necessity completely ignorant of a science that would not be known to Western Civilization for another 1700 years, had a better idea about comparative linguistics than modern linguists do is highly insulting, and I don't see how it can be construed otherwise. How do you suppose a physicist would feel if you said the Romans had a better idea about the theory of relativity than modern physicists do? Either that you were yourself profoundly ignorant about the history of his science, or that you were being intentionally snarky to insult him. I don't think you're profoundly ignorant about the history of my science, which leaves only the other option. —Angr 18:14, 29 January 2009 (UTC)

I'm sorry about that. You've got the wrong end of the stick, and I guess that's partly my fault. Funnily enough, even if that were what I meant I wouldn't have figured you the type to be bothered. But if you were, I'm sorry. All I meant when I said they had a better idea about linguistic similarities and differences than modern linguists was that they had a better information about Celtic dialects in southern Britain and Gaul. Obviously they did. I didn't mean they had a more sophisticated idea of language change or grasped better the concepts, methodologies and paradigms created by the modern field of linguistics. That, obviously, would be ridiculous. That doesn't mean all Romans had better ideas, but ones like Julius Caesar obviously knew more about Gaulish and British than modern linguists. This guy may not have known "Gallo-Brittonic" fluently, but he spent a significant portion of his life surrounded by people who did. It wouldn't be insulting to me if you'd said that Julius Caesar had a better idea that modern historians about Gaulish and British politics. It'd just be an obvious point of fact. Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 23:09, 29 January 2009 (UTC)

Remember that the Romans considered everything that wasn't Roman or Greek totally Barbarian. I cannot recall any mention of a Roman writer stating he spoke a third language. So Gaulish, British, Armorican, Pictish and whathaveyou to Roman writers for the most part was a case of all sound same. I must agree with Angr, no serious historical linguist buys the Gaulish (adstratum) thing these days. The thing is, all the evidence (linguistic or otherwise) that we do have points towards re settlement from Cornwall. The fact we *do not* have evidence of Armorican Gaulish is not enough to come up with the argument that because we don't we cannot safely assume that Cornwall > Brittany happened. It's like saying that all evidence pointing towards Irish being an insular Celtic language cannot be safely taken as fact because we don't have records of the pre-Goidelic languages spoken there. Akerbeltz (talk) 21:07, 28 January 2009 (UTC)

The Romans were a diverse people who ran Gaul and Britain for half a millennium; their high-profile arrogance doesn't mean they were all idiots, and they certainly weren't. Julius Caesar, for instance, who says the people of southern Britain were "Belgic immigrants" spent a significant portion of his life interacting with locals in Britain and Gaul and knew fine well what he was talking about on such matters. Anyway, I'm not trying to edit an article here. That there's a standard view means a lot in terms of wiki editing but nothing intellectually in and of itself. "Brythonic" and "Gaulish" are not contemporarily attested separate languages, but rather classifications made up in modern libraries and offices based purely upon modern expectations of geography and geo-politics, and conversely from the above there is no historical evidence that the English channel was a linguistic boundary at any time between the Celtic invasions (supposedly but unverifiabley around 500 BC) and the coming of the English 9 centuries later. The pre-Breton language of Armorica is thought to be Celtic, like in Britain ... obviously. So this is not like English and Chinese or anything. So the worst, very worst you'd expect would be a situation like Old English and Old Norse where both "languages" were close enough to "merge" in and out of each other. And if that were the case you can be sure the evidence being used would look the same. To the point, if the good scientific mind doesn't know, the good scientific mind says so instead of religiously embracing earlier scholars who embraced medieval origin tales (no longer embraced by specialists) as some default position which must be proved wrong. There is no substantial Welsh or Breton material until the High Middle Ages (saving some Welsh texts thought by some to be older), and saving Welsh nothing beyond charters, word lists and short annotations until the late middle ages/early modern period. Then you have "Gaulish", based on inscriptions often taken from southern Europe more than a millennium before, the representativeness of which is doubtful (the priests may have used a distinct form, as such castes often do and did) and is used for the basis of comparison. That out of this alone could come anything concrete surely demonstrates the pseudo-science so characteristic of so much historical linguistics. Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 01:14, 29 January 2009 (UTC)

I'm aware of the chronology and the meagre material available but you're missing my point. Maybe I wasn't clear on it. The point is, it's futile trying to base theories on non-existing material. In the absence of a full body of evidence, we have to go by what we have. Since we have *nothing* that tells us what the people of Brittany spoke before the British invasion, it is totally futile speculating on what it might have been and making deductions based on that. It might be a diverting excercise and perhaps suggest ideas for where we might look for evidence but it remains that, speculation. We might as well include Prof Vennemann's speculations on the Vasconic substratum in most European languages in the Brittany article ;) Akerbeltz (talk) 01:37, 29 January 2009 (UTC)

I wouldn't say it's futile, but I would say scholars shouldn't make declarations that really can't ever be proven. There are two explanations for Breton in Armorica: either 1) it got there by sea or 2) by land. I just said above one was as likely as the other, which is what your point here amounts to except you're adding misplaced certainty (probably social rather than intellectual) on one side. In actuality, there are good reasons why resettlement from Cornwall would be unlikely, as in for instance it's hard to see ecologically or socially how a backwater region Cornwall could produce the population or other advantage to overwhelm Armorica, nor if they could why they'd waste their efforts on a poor and thorny target like that instead of settling a wealthier and softer region like the Seine or Loire valleys. With all that in mind you know there was already a Celtic population there, so what a fruity coincidence it is that the most remote region of France, the place where it was furthest from German and Roman pressure, happens to preserve a Celtic language. Obviously it must come from Britain? Not quite. Though it is obviously why they'd be identified with Britain after northern Celtic got to such a small continental foothold. Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 01:52, 29 January 2009 (UTC)

I'm sorry, but it is simply untrue that the distinction between Gaulish and Brythonic is "based purely upon modern expectations of geography and geo-politics" or that the belief that Breton came from Britain is based on "medieval origin tales". Although the linguistic evidence is scanty, it's not non-existent, and the linguistic evidence shows (1) that the Brythonic languages have too much in common with the Goidelic languages for them to be anything but descendants of a common ancestor that must have been contemporaneous with and quite distinct from the Gaulish of the continent, and (2) that the language of 9th century Cornwall and 9th century Brittany were practically identical. It is simply beyond belief that that situation could arise if the language of 9th century Brittany were a direct descendant of the language of 1st century Armorica; and I don't have to know what language was spoken in 1st century Armorica to know that. Even if the language of 1st century Armorica wasn't Gaulish at all but rather Proto-Brythonic, it is unlikely that the Brythonic of Armorica would have developed hand in hand with the Brythonic of Cornwall for the next 800 years. It is linguistically impossible for Breton to be anything other than an extremely close relative of Cornish - closer even than either is to Welsh. Whether historians consider it likely that Cornish speakers could or would have populated Brittany is irrelevant; the linguistic evidence is clear. Historians have never managed to explain how a small tribe from Borneo reached and populated Madagascar either, but the linguistic evidence is clear on that, as well. —Angr 07:50, 29 January 2009 (UTC)

The medieval evidence for Cornish and Breton is very poor. That aside, you're ignoring the possibility of convergence and reconvergence through continual contact. That's where the pseudo-science comes into it. Languages don't change at a predicatable rate and branching is flawed since product forms can come from lots of different ancestors rather than one (as is almost always the case where the movement can be documented), and don't emerge on islands. If you were reconstructing a common language for the USA and England you'd have "cool dude", "pinkie" and "hollywood" in the proto-language (17th century English), which would clearly be nonsense. There was nothing like proto-Brythonic, just parts of a gradually emerging dialect continuum probably from different parts of Gaul. You see the features which happen to survive from one or some of these in later dialects that happen to get written down millenia later. The Borneo Madagascar parallel is, if you don't mind me saying, not workable. It is so overwhelming that a historian has to explain it, and doing so isn't hard (you're confusing this with the fact they wouldn't have known without the linguistic evidence). Austronesian languages there are not alleged to have replaced other closely related Austronesian languages from which they share only a few centuries of "separation"; nor is the historical explanation either as Borneo Austronesians were an agricultural people with boats, and that's all the explanation needed there. Anyway, fun though this is, I'm not sure either of us with to be going back on forth on this when no articles are at stake. All the best, Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 16:55, 29 January 2009 (UTC)

Incidentally, also backed up by genetic research... see [1] for example (just the abstract I know but there's scores of papers like that if you visit a uni library). Besides, wasn't this about Germanic originally? Akerbeltz (talk) 11:23, 29 January 2009 (UTC)

I didn't read all of that, but AFAIK we have historical records of the Bretons arrival. I'd once hoped that they might be remnants of Continental, but alas. As for Madagascar, the ships may have been Malay run & financed, but with Barito crews. kwami (talk) 11:32, 29 January 2009 (UTC)

Unsalt request

A user made a page at Tycho (music) that was marked for speedy deletion. I added the hangon tag and explained myself and the notability of the artist on its talk page. While I was editing the page to get it up to par, the page and talk page were deleted and salted without discussion before I could save my edit. I still have the new text saved to a subpage on my Userpage, so may I request unsalt so I can post it? Thanks either way! GreenRunner0 00:01, 31 January 2009 (UTC)

I assume that User:GreenRunner0/Humor is the page you're working on. The reason the page was salted is that attempts had been made in the past to have an article on Tycho, but none of them asserted notability in accordance with WP:MUSIC, and from what I've seen on your subpage, the current version doesn't either. It's probably best to get the article in good shape in your userspace first; be sure to include sources independent of the artist himself (i.e. not tychomusic.com). It may be necessary to wait until the untitled album that's expected in 2009 is actually released and has published reviews before notability can be convincingly established. —Angr 11:09, 31 January 2009 (UTC)

Alright, well, thanks anyways! GreenRunner0 17:57, 31 January 2009 (UTC)

Change in -oo- sound

Hi. I've just seen your edit to the Phonological history of the English language page. You're right on the Scottish English point, as you explained in your edit description; I accept that I was wrong there. Why did you also remove the part that said that the older /u:/ sound has been preserved more in words that end -ook? The Trudgill reference that I gave said this, which was why I worded it thus. (I know that personal experience shouldn't count, but I live in West Yorkshire and you do hear book, hook, look with an /u:/ but it's now unheard of for good or foot to have a long /u:/.) Perhaps you removed it just because it made the bullet point confusing. Just thought that I'd enquire.

Regards Epa101 (talk) 12:57, 31 January 2009 (UTC)

Huh? All I removed was "Scottish English, and". —Angr 13:27, 31 January 2009 (UTC)

Hmmm. Yes, you seem to be right. Not sure if I'm going mad or what's happened. Apologies! Epa101 (talk) 14:49, 31 January 2009 (UTC)