Talk:Language committee

Language committee (contact page about requests)

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Notifications from Langcom about proposed approvals

Rakhine Wikipedia

The Language Committee intends to approve Requests for new languages/Wikipedia Rakhine. If you have any objections to that based on the Language Proposal Policy, please tell us here on this page in the next 7 days. Meanwhile, the community is asked to check (and if necessary, complete) the wiki settings as indicated on the request page. --MF-W 19:46, 2 October 2024 (UTC)

For the record: Still trying to obtain verification of the content. --MF-W 18:19, 13 October 2024 (UTC)

...but it is going on! --MF-W 09:29, 21 October 2024 (UTC)

Any update? --ꠢꠣꠍꠘ ꠞꠣꠎꠣ (talk) 06:14, 20 November 2024 (UTC)

Indonesian Wikivoyage

Tracked in Phabricator:
Task T380726

The Language Committee intends to approve Requests for new languages/Wikivoyage Indonesian. If you have any objections to that based on the Language Proposal Policy, please tell us here on this page in the next 7 days. Meanwhile, the community is asked to check (and if necessary, complete) the wiki settings as indicated on the request page. --MF-W 23:09, 10 November 2024 (UTC)

@MF-Warburg It's been one week, and the wiki setting is already set. Does this project ready to be released? Veracious (talk) 04:24, 19 November 2024 (UTC)

hello, @MF-Warburg how about this wikivoyage, are there any problems in the process of leaving the incubator? IHLubis (talk) 19:06, 24 November 2024 (UTC)

 This section is resolved and can be archived. If you disagree, replace this template with your comment. MF-W 11:24, 25 November 2024 (UTC)

Discussions

Request for Approval of Wikisource in the Philippine languages

Hello Language Committee, the Bikol Sentral Wikisource project has been active for 4 months and the community would like the project to be approved. The request for the approval has been made here. Thank you. --Filipinayzd (talk) 08:11, 4 September 2024 (UTC)

@MF-Warburg Filipinayzd (talk) 15:07, 6 September 2024 (UTC)

Please remind me on 12 September, if nobody gets to this before me. --MF-W 00:10, 7 September 2024 (UTC)

Hi @MF-Warburg, aside from the Bikol Wikisource, our community is also working on the following projects as part of the Wikisource Loves Manuscripts program in the Philippinesː

1. Ilokano Wikisource project which has been active for 4 months
2. Cebuano Wikisource now on its 4th consecutive months 6 consecutive months
3. Waray Wikisource is also on its 4th consecutive months of activity

--Filipinayzd (talk) 04:24, 12 September 2024 (UTC)

Is there a page that informs about the Wikisource Loves Manuscripts program in the Philippines? --MF-W 11:18, 12 September 2024 (UTC)

Please see Bikol Wikisource Training of Trainers, Wiki Rescue and Category:Wikisource Loves Manuscripts in the Philippines. -Filipinayzd (talk) 14:36, 12 September 2024 (UTC)

Thank you, that is very interesting. We are moving forward and will probably post the notification about approval of Central Bikol Wikisource soon. -- MF-W 19:51, 16 September 2024 (UTC)

Amazing! Looking forward to it. --Filipinayzd (talk) 03:30, 18 September 2024 (UTC)

Comment From some practices, I have some concerns about Cebuano and Waray tests, do we know that whether both are having contributions that were initialized by Lsjbot? Liuxinyu970226 (talk) 01:44, 19 October 2024 (UTC)

Lsjbot is only active in the local Wikipedias and not in the Wikisource project. The contributors in the local Wikisource projects are real people. --Filipinayzd (talk) 09:07, 24 October 2024 (UTC)

4. Tagalog Wikisource project has been active for 4 months now as well

5. Kapampangan Wikisource project is also on its 4th consecutive months 5th consecutive months of activity

--Filipinayzd (talk) 03:26, 25 October 2024 (UTC)

Sylheti Wikipedia

Hello Language Committee, I recently received an email from a community member in the Wikimedia Incubator inquiring about the status of the approval for the Sylheti Wikipedia. I share the same question and would appreciate any updates you can provide regarding this matter. -- ꠢꠣꠍꠘ ꠞꠣꠎꠣ (talk) 05:47, 18 September 2024 (UTC)

Comment This question has accounted by [1], but still has some issues to be answered by linguistics. Liuxinyu970226 (talk) 01:51, 19 October 2024 (UTC)

I heard that a request has been sent out for advice from linguists on this. I hope this issue will be resolved soon so that your community can have a wiki. --Sotiale (talk) 13:30, 21 October 2024 (UTC)

Thanks. Any update? --ꠢꠣꠍꠘ ꠞꠣꠎꠣ (talk) 11:03, 18 November 2024 (UTC)

Classical languages

Respected Sirs/Madams,

I would like to propose a change or rather a clarification of the current Language proposal policy. As of now, languages can be classified as “living”, “ancient”, “historical” or “artificial”. I’d like a fifth category to be made explicit, that is “classical” languages.

Indeed, classical languages are not mere historical languages: rather, they are somewhere in between historical and artificial languages, since they have continued to be used for thousands of years even after losing native speakers. Typically, classical languages serve as vehicular languages: for instance, less than 0.01% of the Latin corpus has been produced by native speakers (J. Leonhardt, Latin: Story of a World Language, Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press, 2013, p. 2). Their evolution is not completely compatible with that of natural languages, being usually slower, more measured and meditated. For instance, when Newton coined the Latin neologism “gravitātiō” (“to have weight”, “gravitation”), or when aviation pioneer Joseph Pline repurposed the Classical Greek word “ἀερόπλανος”, (āeróplanos, “wandering in the air”, “airplane”), or when inventor Philipp Reis coined the Greek neologism “τηλέφωνος” (tēléphōnos, “speaking from afar”, “telephone”), these were thoughtful processes rather than natural linguistic changes. These conventional words were created in Latin or Classical Greek to be instantly adopted by all European languages.

I propose the following definition of “classical language” (mostly based on the Concise Oxford Companion to the English Language):

“A prestigious, often ancient language. Such a language is usually learned formally, and is often a yardstick against which other languages are measured. Classical languages have traditionally provided models for successor or dependent languages. They have a body of literature, usually organized into a canon.
Generally, a classical language dominates a cultural area in which vernaculars are used. Because of this, elements of its vocabulary may be absorbed into a subordinate tongue, to form a more or less distinct ‘high’ stratum within it. Both learning the classical language and using its extension into a vernacular are often associated with prestigious systems of education in certain societies, such as Latinity in the public schools of England.
Because of centuries of standardization of literary usage, a classical language or a classicized variety of a language may split off from everyday use. It is instead perpetuated in script, print, and formal instruction.
Until the 19th century, classical languages were commonly used for the purpose of international scientific communication. Still today, they retain a high prestige because of their influence on the development of modern languages and of their employment in the creation of scientific neologisms. E.g., according to a calculation, 29% of English vocabulary has its origin in Latin and 6% of it in Ancient Greek.”

I am advancing this request because I am a contributor to the Classical Greek Wikipedia, a project which is as of now frozen, since the Language proposal policy of Wikipedia currently states:

“

Ancient or historical languages
Only Wikisource wikis in ancient or historical languages are accepted […].
Artificial languages
Yes, there can be wikis in artificial languages. There are already wikis available in Esperanto, Ido, Interlingua, Interlingue, Lojban, Volapük, Novial and Lingua Franca Nova.

”

The current policy doesn’t mention classical languages explicitly. However, Latin, Classical Greek, Sanskrit and Classical Chinese are typified as “historical languages” by SIL. This piece of information (“language type”), however, is called “non-normative” by SIL itself. Moreover, Ethnologue, a publication by SIL that provides information on the living languages of the world, classifies Latin, Classical Greek, Sanskrit and Classical Chinese as “endangered” rather than “extinct” languages. On the one hand, this clearly indicates that “classical languages” elude the simplified classification system developed by SIL. On the other hand, this is also a roundabout way used by SIL to state that Latin and Ancient Greek are classical languages, without complicating their existing, simplified classification framework.

To solve this issue, I propose that the current Language proposal policy be clarified in the following way:

“

Ancient and historical languages
Only Wikisource wikis in ancient or historical languages are accepted […].
Artificial and classical languages
Yes, there can be wikis in artificial and classical languages. There are already wikis available in Esperanto, Ido, Interlingua, Interlingue, Lojban, Volapük, Novial and Lingua Franca Nova, as well as in Latin, Classical Greek, Sanskrit and Classical Chinese.

”

I thank you very much!
Yours faithfully,
Riccardo Radici

P.S.: If I have to follow a different procedure to submit this request, please let me know! Thanks. Anaxicrates (talk) 18:54, 11 October 2024 (UTC)

Responding on behalf of myself; this doesn't necessarily represent the whole Language committee.

According to the definition you wrote, classical languages are about canon and prestige, and not about everyday use. Prestige is impossible to measure, and it doesn't matter anyway because that is not what Wikimedia is supposed to do. Canon is pretty well-defined, and it is very useful, but the place for it is Wikisource and not Wikipedia. And Wikipedia and Wiktionary should be in a language of everyday use.

The "everyday use" argument could also be used against artificial languages. I'd support making the criteria stricter for them, too, but that would be a separate discussion. Amir E. Aharoni (talk) 12:29, 12 October 2024 (UTC)

Were this before the 20th century, I might agree. I might accept Latin if that were an issue even today. One of my problems with Ancient Greek is that I've been told the incubator is not good Ancient Greek, and that at least according to the translator for Harry Potter in Ancient Greek, it's missing words like "train" which he had to invent for his translation. But to say that anyone actually uses the Latin Wikipedia is a bit of a farce, and Ancient Greek doesn't have nearly the amount of use over a large area, nor the current use Latin does. And I'm afraid about things like Classical Chinese and Ottoman Turkish; does anyone know these languages who don't also know Mandarin or Turkish, respectively? Those seem to be a lot more about "prestige" than the theoretical potential of a bunch of classicists coming together in a common language to produce a Wikipedia.

For me, Latin, Sanskrit and Ancient Greek are the three languages that could possibly support a classical language Wikipedia. We have two of them, and I'm personally concerned about how marginal Ancient Greek is relative to Latin and that we might be releasing a Wikipedia full of bad Ancient Greek. I don't see anything else I would even think of opening the door for.--Prosfilaes (talk) 20:21, 12 October 2024 (UTC)

Thank you very much for your answers, @Amire80: and @Prosfilaes: I would like to point out that "canon and prestige" are not completely impossible to measure. A criterion for this could be the one I mentioned earlier: when a language is classified as "historical" in the ISO 639-3 by SIL, yet Ethnologue by SIL acknowledges that it has not gone extinct — meaning it's false that "the language is no longer used and no one retains a sense of ethnic identity associated with the language" — this is a clear indication that the language retains significant prestige and is canonical enough to be studied extensively.

Although any comparison has its own severe limitations, you may be helped to better grasp my point by considering one of Amir's native tongues, Hebrew, a language of extraordinary prestige and associated with ethnic identity. A century ago, Hebrew could have been considered an historical language among many others; however, people of better judgement considered it a classical language, and its potential and vitality have been demonstrated further by subsequent developments.

It's also inaccurate to say that classical languages are not in everyday use by anyone, though I acknowledge they are not used in the same way as modern languages. Many classicists engage with these languages daily, particularly through reading, but not exclusively. These are the same people who could build, and who would read this encyclopedia. There are also a few people on Wikipedia who declare Classical Greek as their native language, even if this should be verified, as it could be possible only within families who opted for an exceptionally classical education. Historically, it's famous the case of Michel de Montaigne, whose native language was not French, but Latin.

It’s also incorrect to claim that there wouldn’t be a large enough user base to sustain the project. Currently, around one million people worldwide (approximately 0.5 million in Greece and 0.27 million in Italy) study Classical Greek. The fact that the Ancient Greek Wikipedia project remains marginal is clearly due to other factors, likely a lack of visibility, limited prospects within the current Wikimedia policy, and the consequent absence of an overall project. On the other hand, it's true that some articles in the Incubator are not written in good Classical Greek. This can be fixed, however: individual mistakes can be corrected, and very bad articles can be trashed altogether. I assure you this can be done without great difficulties. Furthermore, a change in the Language proposal policy would not imply that the project in the Incubator must be approved immediately: It would be very reasonable to polish it before publication. However, adjusting the policy would send a positive signal, attracting both new contributors and those who had become disillusioned, enabling us to refine the articles in the Incubator within a reasonable time frame.

Actually, it's false that the translator of Harry Potter in Ancient Greek had to invent a word for "train" for his translation. Instead, he looked and found it on a dictionary of Katharevousa Greek, i.e. almost a dictionary of modern Classical Greek (actually, "Katharevousa" is an umbrella term, including a wide range of Greek varieties, from Demotic Greek with just a slight archaizing patina all the way to modern Classical Greek). In the same way, I don't think it necessary to invent any new word to build a Classical Greek Wikipedia. All the modern terms that might be required in some contexts are already attested in Katharevousa Greek.

I also strongly disagree with the idea that the Latin Wikipedia is "a bit of a farce", or merely "about prestige": in fact, I started contributing to the Greek Wikipedia because I found the Latin version to be genuinely useful.

Having Wikipedia projects in classical languages expands access to information, particularly because these languages contain untranslated material, and the content would be created and read by people from different linguistic backgrounds. Furthermore, a Wikipedia in Classical Greek (unlike Wikisource) could quote ancient sources, organizing them around specific themes. Furthermore, it could offer valuable and unique content on ancient topics, etymologies, and cultural interests that are often overlooked by other editions. For example, the article I wrote about the revenues of Athens quoting classical sources has no equivalents in any other language. On the other hand, had I simply translated it into my native language, a classicist from Greece, for instance, would have found it difficult to consult it.

Finally, regarding your concern about Ottoman Turkish: it would not be admitted under my proposal, as it is considered an extinct language by SIL. Additionally, any new project in Classical Greek or Latin would still have to pass a rigorous quality control process before being approved. The key difference is that these projects wouldn’t be rejected categorically or a priori, unlike under the current policy. Anaxicrates (talk) 23:11, 12 October 2024 (UTC)

Hearing about prestige is a big negative for me. It makes it sound to me like you want to change the rules in a way to privilege your language over that of the common people. I'm concerned about the usefulness of a new Wikipedia, not privilege.

You compare Hebrew, but Hebrew had a literature in the 19th century. That's part of the issue I have with Ancient Greek, as lacking that literature. He took the word from Katharevousa Greek, a lect of Modern Greek, not Ancient Greek. It's quite convenient for Hebrew that we have a standardized modern language, and for Latin we at least have Vatican City publications with Latin vocabulary for the modern world, though I don't know if the Latin WP uses them.

That one million people study the language doesn't tell us much. My experience is that many people who took classes in a language gained almost no lasting knowledge. I'm guessing that the number who actually know Ancient Greek and might edit or read this Wikipedia is much smaller.

Had you translated that into English, it would have reached many more people, and likely many classicists from Greece would be able to read it.--Prosfilaes (talk) 22:14, 13 October 2024 (UTC)

Again, thank you very much, @Prosfilaes: for your precious comments and for your openness to this exchange of ideas.

I absolutely do not want to privilege classical languages over those of the common people! Rather, I desire to avoid discrimination against Classical Greek. The debate about "prestige" essentially started because the first word used by the Concise Oxford Companion to the English Language to describe "classical languages" is "prestigious". I hope you consider the objective meaning of this word: Please don't interpret it in a "gloomy" way: That is not the meaning I want to convey! Probably, a more neutral definition could be "extensively studied".

I'd like to close this paragraph with a quotation from the newly-elected Nobel Prize in Literature, Han Kang: "The European languages of today have passed through that long process, becoming less strict, less elaborate, less complicated. When reading Plato, one is able to appreciate the beauty of an ancient language that had arrived at its acme many thousands of years ago."

Someone once said about my regional language, which by the way is represented on Wikipedia, that "lacking a word for 'republic' is a sign of irremediable misery of a language". I don't agree: my regional dialect is also precious, representing the common people's perspectives, for instance. However, no one (never mind a Nobel laureate in Literature from the antipodes of the Earth) has ever said about Lombard something similar to what Han Kang has said about Classical Greek. That's to convey that I am not privileging "my language", which is evidently Lombard rather than Classical Greek: I am defending an objective fact. How can you maintain that such a language is not admissible in principle?

Classical Greek had a literature in the 19th century too. Just to provide a significant example, Konstantinos Mousouros translated Dante's Divine Comedy in Classical Greek ("Canon Greek" – Κεκανονισμένη Ἑλληνική – in his words) verses. C. G. also has a literature now. Let's disregard more frivolous literature: In recent years, Jan Křesadlo composed Astronautilia, a science fiction poem in Homeric verses. Here you can read Book 13, also provided with an English rendition. I admit, however, that Classical Greek is used less now than in the past centuries.

However, your objection about a presumed lack of words for modern concepts in Classical Greek is due to a lack of information. Firstly, let's clarify that, of course, the Latin Wikipedia uses words attested in modern Latin literature when necessary.

Classical Greek is a very rich language: for instance, the Rocci Greek-Italian vocabulary contains 150,000 entries. Also, many modern terms have been actually created in Classical Greek (in this sense, Classical Greek is more vital than many modern languages). Furthermore, Modern Greek, which is much different from Classical Greek in many aspects of phonology, syntax and morphology, is actually very similar in new word formation. Therefore, true Katharevousa Greek vocabulary is compatible with Classical Greek. I also repeat, Katharevousa is a generic term: It is simplistic to say that it is just "a lect of Modern Greek". Here, I am referring to the most classicizing variant of Katharevousa, which is the Greek equivalent of modern Latin. The same holds true for Greek as for Latin publications from the Vatican, with the difference that Katharevousa was also sponsored by the Greek state for a long time (rather than just by the Greek-Orthodox Church). You should not interpret the division of Greek by SIL into "Ancient (to 1453)" and "Modern (1453-)" as if there were no Classical Greek literature after 1453: this is a very conventional periodization, and its meaning is that, after the 15th century, the spoken Greek language had changed enough that it could be considered a new language. Reality is more subtle: evolution was much more gradual. To be even clearer, if SIL had provided similar conventional time frames for Latin languages, e.g. "Latin (to 1000)" and "Italian (1000-)", you should not interpret that to mean that Galileo's Sidereus Nuncius was written by definition in Italian rather than Latin, of course. The Greek language experienced significant continuity, even through the Dark Ages, thanks to the persistence of the Eastern Roman Empire. Greeks in the 19th and even in the 20th century debated if a new "Modern Greek" standard should be codified (these were the advocates of Demotic) or Classical Greek should be the only standard (these were the advocates of Katharevousa): however, any representative of either faction had their individual stance on the issue, and, in fact, there were many intermediate positions, leading to multiple interpretations of Katharevousa. Consequently, the term "modern" is ambiguous in this context, as Katharevousa is modern in time, but does not necessarily fit the definition of "Modern Greek" (in other words, "Modern Greek" is both the equivalent of "Modern Latin", and the equivalent of "Italian", "Spanish", etc., leading to ambiguity).

Regarding the number of users, it's clear that not all the people who study a language retain that knowledge over time. However, at least some retain that knowledge. Please also notice that one million is the number of people who are currently studying the language. If we added the number of people who have studied the language in the past, the total would probably be between 10 and 20 million people. I agree that to assume 20 million people are able to read Classical Greek would be very optimistic. On the other hand, assuming near zero is overwhelmingly pessimistic. You often authorize languages with a much smaller potential pool of readers than Classical Greek.

Of course, I could translate that article in English, and I will probably do that when I find the time. But again, my point was another one: it is not right to assume that all people know English, or language "x". Let us assume there is a person who can write an article in Classical Greek, and another person who is interested in reading that article. You are saying: they must write and read that article in English. That could imply a bit of imperialistic mentality, and might also be considered an obstruction to freedom of speech, but let's forget that. At the very least, you are implicitly assuming that both the writer and the reader can respectively write and read an article in English. But it could be that the writer can't write properly in English, his mother tongue being e.g. Korean, or that the reader doesn't speak English, his mother tongue being e.g. Greek. It could be that the only language they share is Classical Greek. So, by assuming that, you are essentially destroying bridges. If this is your position, you should proceed to erase all Wikipedias other than the English one, with inflexible logic. However, that would lead to an impoverishment of the English Wikipedia itself, paradoxically, because many articles first written in a language, and then translated into English, could no longer exist.

You should also consider the possibility that a classicist could prefer to read the text and the quotations directly in Greek, without continuously switching between languages or suffering the inevitable losses of meaning intrinsic in any translation. Actually, that is the guiding principle I have tried to establish for the Classical Greek Wikipedia in the last year, since I have started contributing to it: An increased focus on classical themes, where a Classical Greek Wikipedia can surely excel! Anaxicrates (talk) 03:06, 14 October 2024 (UTC)

@Anaxicrates You claim "Classical Greek" more than "Ancient Greek" (39 times > 24 times), but now, even you can claim "Classical Greek" is still living, there would still be a question that whether you can just use the grc code or not, see a rejection decision from SIL: Registration Authority decision on Change Request nos. 2006-084, 2009-060, and 2009-081:

“ ...While all three point to the need for subdividing Ancient Greek prior to 1453, each of them has a different proposal for a subdivision that is intermediate between Classical Greek and Modern Greek. But there is not yet a code element for Classical Greek in the standard... ”

Which means that "Classical Greek" isn't having a separate code, and by SIL's logical, grc refers only to such thing before 1453. Liuxinyu970226 (talk) 00:34, 4 November 2024 (UTC)

Let me clarify:

Ancient Greek is a generic term, and refers to a multitude of dialects (especially Ionic-Attic, Doric and Aeolic). The main of these dialects is Attic (the dialect of Athens), which became the "Common Greek language" ("Koine dialektos" in Greek), and from which Modern Greek descends. "Classical Greek" refers to this variant, and indeed it is classified on Ethnologue as a "dialect of Ancient Greek". However, the other dialects (Doric, Aeolic) are somewhat minor, attested only in inscriptions and some poetry (usually fragments). In practice, Ancient Greek is often used synonymously with Classical Greek, much as "computer" typically refers to an "electronic computer" (by synecdoche), even if the term could also mean "analog computer".

I often write Classical Greek to exclude Doric and Aeolic, and to refer to the canon of Attic "classics" on which its grammar is based.

GRC doesn't refer to Ancient Greek only for texts written before 1453. To reiterate: "You should not interpret the division of Greek by SIL into "Ancient (to 1453)" and "Modern (1453-)" as if there were no GRC literature after 1453: this is a very conventional periodization, and its meaning is that, after the 15th century, the spoken Greek language had changed enough that it could be considered a new language. To be even clearer, if SIL had provided similar conventional time frames for Latin languages, e.g. "Latin (to 1000)" and "Italian (1000-)", you should not interpret that as meaning that Galileo's Sidereus Nuncius was written by definition in Italian rather than Latin, of course."

SIL refused to detach Medieval, Ecclesiastical and Katharevousa Greek (the three Change Requests mentioned by SIL) from Ancient Greek. Those requests were problematic, e.g. because Katharevousa is not one single variety of Greek. I am okay with using GRC as a language code, rather than requesting a new, more specific "Classical Greek"/"Attic Greek" one, because there is no reason to fear that someone is going to write articles in Doric or Aeolic Greek (no one of the current 2,000 articles is in Doric or Aeolic), and I also want to avoid hyperclassicism ("any term that was not used by Xenophon, Plato or Demosthenes must be rejected"). On the other hand, sometimes it happens that someone writes articles in forms of Katharevousa not suitable for a GRC Wikipedia (I mean forms of Katharevousa contaminated with Modern Greek grammar). So, it is a task of the GRC language community to prevent the proliferation of such articles. Anaxicrates (talk) 08:22, 4 November 2024 (UTC)

Sadly, I'm  Opposeing without any kind of prejudices, whether you're demonstrating its benefits from your practices, it's the WMF's policy, not only langcom's policy, to not allow any kinds of non-living languages anymore, not allow for ancient, not allow for extinct, and not allow for historical. Unless for the very lower possibility, the WMF as a whole entity changes their situations on this question, such proposals are not going to be successful in any circumstances. For details of WMF official situation, you may want to see foundation:Contact us, for else, I don't see anyway and anyhow this can be adopted. If you don't against, then I'd love to start finding a replacement website to serve the de facto grc test project, and finally, they will eventually be deleted. --Liuxinyu970226 (talk) 01:12, 16 October 2024 (UTC)

What do you mean by "it's the WMF's policy, not only langcom's policy"? Amir E. Aharoni (talk) 02:19, 16 October 2024 (UTC)

@Amire80 and Anaxicrates: In [2]: Wp/grc: It is not a living language, and not eligible to have a wiki. Liuxinyu970226 (talk) 02:40, 16 October 2024 (UTC)

That is not a policy. That is a page that is based on Language committee policy. Please try to be more precise when you talk about policy. Amir E. Aharoni (talk) 02:46, 16 October 2024 (UTC)

@Amire80: Thank you very much for explaining! I was astounded by @Liuxinyu970226:'s reply, and I was already sketching an e-mail to be sent to Wikimedia. Thanks for clarifying I am speaking with the only people entrusted with determining the language policy.

If the criterion is to be a "living language", Classical Greek should not be excluded, even if it is classical. Why shouldn't all living languages listed on Ethnologue be admissible? Classical Greek is clearly considered as "living". If you download LanguageCodes.tab from their website, "Greek, Ancient" is classified as L (living) rather than X (extinct). It is also counted by them among the 7,164 living languages of the world. Anaxicrates (talk) 04:20, 16 October 2024 (UTC)

The Language committee doesn't use that file to make decisions.

That file also classifies Ancient Hebrew (hbo) as "living", which is obviously not true. Ancient Hebrew is widely studied, but if you consider it separately from (modern) Hebrew (he/heb), then it's easy to see that one of them is living in speech and writing, both casual and professionally-edited, and the other is not. It's quite strange that Ethnologue classify grc and hbo like that, and it's even stranger that they didn't include Ottoman Turkish (ota) in the same list at all, even though it is also widely-studied. Amir E. Aharoni (talk) 13:25, 16 October 2024 (UTC)

Indeed, there are standardization different regarding a random language is living or not, that file looks just like the code itself is "living", means that that file can claim Middle English (enm) is also "living" (the historical language with not only RFLs rejected for five times, but also Incubator test project migrated). Believe me, that's why I started incubator:Talk:Wp/grc/Κυρία Δέλτος#Consider a new website for serving these contents? rather than RFD it, as I also believe that there are very well contents. Liuxinyu970226 (talk) 14:58, 16 October 2024 (UTC)

@Amire80: and @Liuxinyu970226:: Firstly, that file does NOT claim that Middle English is also "living". That file was created by the same people responsible for the ISO. On what basis do you affirm that Classical Greek is not "living"? If your answer is: "ISO by SIL classifies GRC as historic", I'd like to point out that the definition of "historic" does not imply "not living": SIL states clearly that "a language is listed as historic when it is considered to be distinct from any modern languages that are descended from it". This can be true even for a language that is still living, and they classify Classical Greek as living.

They also classify in this way Sanskrit, Classical Chinese and Ancient Hebrew, other classical languages. Obviously, these languages are described as "endangered" rather than "institutional": this is an important difference.

I do not know Hebrew. If Modern Hebrew were to follow the same grammar standard of Ancient Hebrew, and to simply include more words and meanings, then it would make sense that no modern text is written in Ancient Hebrew (in the same way as all new Latin texts are written in Modern Latin rather than Ancient Latin). This is not the case for Ancient Greek, where the grammar standard is different, and it is possible to write a modern text in this archaizing and classical version of Greek. Anaxicrates (talk) 15:45, 16 October 2024 (UTC)

@Liuxinyu970226: I want to clarify, since I have just noticed your speculation that "living" might refer to the code rather than the language itself. That is not correct: The word you are looking for is "active" (referred to the code). "Living" is referred to the language itself: SIL lists classical languages as "living". Anaxicrates (talk) 02:57, 28 October 2024 (UTC)

@Amire80: When you say that you do not use that file, do you mean that you use this file instead, or that you make your own choice, regardless of the standard set by SIL? Anaxicrates (talk) 20:19, 26 October 2024 (UTC)

The relevant information is generally available on the usual web pages of Ethnologue and ISO 639, and those complicated data files are simply not necessary, especially given that they have some strange and obviously misleading information about some languages.

Now that we have Wikipedia in more than 300 languages and MediaWiki localization in more than 400, we're getting into languages getting information about which is becoming difficult because they are less well documented. For example, it's hard to decide whether Hijazi Arabic or Makassar Malay are unique enough according to the Language Proposal Policy just based on Ethnologue, so we'll probably have to consult experts about them. It's not the case with Ancient Greek, though. Amir E. Aharoni (talk) 21:34, 26 October 2024 (UTC)

I don't understand why you contrast the official data files, presumably containing "misleading information", with the corresponding web pages, presumably containing "the relevant information". The information is in fact the same: Ancient Greek is classified on the "usual web page" as "endangered" and as "only used by non-native speakers", and in the file it is classified as "living", because "endangered" falls under "living". SIL classifies languages as "extinct" only if they have no speakers. Anaxicrates (talk) 00:38, 27 October 2024 (UTC)

Both are misleading. Ancient Greek is neither living nor endangered in any way. Its status is completely different from Udmurt, for example, but both are identically marked as "endangered". I haven't even noticed this till today because it's so obvious that Ancient Greek is extinct and not living (and no, the fact that it's studied by many people who want to read ancient texts doesn't make it living). I've written to Ethnologue about this and I hope that they clarify this. Amir E. Aharoni (talk) 15:26, 27 October 2024 (UTC)

It's true that the status of Ancient Greek and Udmurt is very different. I also agree that the "endangered" label is misleading. The problem arises from the simplified classification system developed by SIL. They mean "not extinct", with "endangered" being the closest available label. So, why don't they consider Ancient Greek as "extinct"? Because it falls under the category of "classical" and "dormant" languages rather than "extinct" ones: indeed, it is false that "the language is no longer used and no one retains a sense of ethnic identity associated with the language" (SIL's definition of "extinct language").

It is also reductive to claim that Ancient Greek is studied solely "to read ancient texts". While this is certainly one motivation, the language is also studied to create scientific neologisms and for reasons of cultural identity. Even when the goal is only to read ancient texts, using the language actively is necessary to acquire fluency, which in turn inspires its use in both writing and speech. This active engagement has led to a body of creative works, enabling classicists today to read Ancient Greek newspapers (even online), to attend conferences conducted in the language (even online), and to enjoy modern Classical Greek poetry, for instance. Anaxicrates (talk) 01:59, 28 October 2024 (UTC)

What I will propose is "Projects in any language with no native speaker (including constructed languages other than Esperanto, most classical languages and extinct/ancient languages) must require explicit consensus to create this specific project before creation". I will oppose any proposal to include or exclude any predetermined lists of languages.--GZWDer (talk) 07:39, 26 October 2024 (UTC)

Thanks for your contribution, @GZWDer: That's also a sensible proposal: I appreciate that it is not rigid, and it doesn't force reality into a Procrustean bed. The current deterministic policy prevents people from thinking, leading to paradoxes like approving Kotava while rejecting Ancient Greek. On the other hand, yours encourages reasoning. Anaxicrates (talk) 19:49, 26 October 2024 (UTC)

Should this On hold request be eligible or not?

Requests for new languages/Wikipedia Hainanese 2, after several years of lacking ISO code, in 9 Sep a code hnm has granted following 2021-045 (partially adopted), are there any remain problems on its eligibility? Liuxinyu970226 (talk) 00:32, 8 November 2024 (UTC)

Request for Approval for Nupe Wikipedia

Hello Language Committee, the https://incubator.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:PrefixIndex/Wp/nup/project has been active and the community would like the project to be approved. The request for the approval has been made https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Requests_for_new_languages/Wikipedia_Nupe. Thank you. 787IYO (talk) 19:31, 10 November 2024 (UTC)

Of course, I am not a member of the language committee and nothing depends on me, but it seems to me that you are rushing things, the project was only recently recognized as eligible. 85.249.174.246 19:40, 10 November 2024 (UTC)

Please log in with your username. Off course it's recently verified, that indicates the commitment of the Nupe language editors community 787IYO (talk) 20:31, 11 November 2024 (UTC)

Verification of open proposals

I am submitting a request to verify the following language project proposals. The projects meet the required criteria as outlined. In addition, three of the language projects were previously active for more than three consecutive months, but no action was taken. We have confirmed that the projects do not already exist (as per the existing list). An appropriate ISO 639 code is available. The language is sufficiently unique and specific and would not conflict with a more general wiki. There is a sufficient number of native editors available to support an edition in this language. I kindly request that you verify the following projects and review these to proceed with the process.

• Requests for new languages/Wikibooks Sylheti
• Requests for new languages/Wikiqoute Sylheti
• Requests for new languages/Wikivoyage Sylheti

Note: The following projects are relatively new and less discoverable, as they are not hosted within the Incubator. They also require separate logins across different domains, which can make them less accessible. As a result, they have attracted fewer users compared to projects within the Incubator. It is also evident that users with less technical experience may find these projects more challenging to navigate.

• Requests for new languages/Wikisource Sylheti
• Requests for new languages/Wikiversity Sylheti

ꠢꠣꠍꠘ ꠞꠣꠎꠣ (talk) 11:51, 11 November 2024 (UTC)

Request for Approval of Hausa Wikiquote

Hello, The Hausa Wikiquote was created for the past 2 years (since August 2022) and we have up to hundred native speakers whom have made significant contributions of more 2,200 articles.

Kindly review and approve Hausa Wikiquote as a Project. https://incubator.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wq/ha/Babban_shafi

Best, Uncle Bash007 (talk) 09:34, 18 November 2024 (UTC)

Find request page https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Requests_for_new_languages/Wikiquote_Hausa Uncle Bash007 (talk) 09:40, 18 November 2024 (UTC)

Request for Approval of Bikol Wikibooks

Hello Language Committee, the Bikol Sentral Wikibooks project has been active for 5 months and the community would be grateful if the project is approved. --Filipinayzd (talk) 22:25, 19 November 2024 (UTC)