Re: [OT] Re: the Ethnologue

From: Marion Gunn (mgunn@egt.ie)
Date: Thu Sep 21 2000 - 11:42:53 EDT


Arsa Antoine Leca:

> <CITE>
> Hindi, Hindustani, Urdu could be considered co-dialects, but have important
> sociolinguistic differences. Hindi uses the Devanagari writing system, and
> formal vocabulary is borrowed from Sanskrit, de-Persianized, de-Arabicized.
> Literary Hindi, or Hindi-Urdu, has four varieties: Hindi (High Hindi, Nagari
> Hindi, Literary Hindi, Standard Hindi)...
> </CITE>
> from the online Ethnologue database, 13th ed.
> <URL:http://www.sil.org/ethnologue/countries/Inda.html#HND>
>

Mm. Maybe a more polite (more PC) turn of phrase might be found than "could be
considered co-dialects", which more than implies, it postulates the existence of a
standard language referent of which the above "could" be considered dialects.

Someone this week, I think it might have been on this list, spoke of languages as
being "allied" to each other. I rather like that. Would it be acceptable to
suggest replacing "co-dialects" with "allied languages"?
mg

>
> Of course, Peter and many people here know that I am taking the worst possible
> example. Perhaps one may also fill reports to make clearer that most if not all
> of these different entries are mutually intelligible (at least to the extend
> that the language I am speaking when speaking of linguistics or of Unicode is
> intelligible to the average French-speaking person).
>
> Antoine

--
Marion Gunn
Everson Gunn Teoranta
<http://www.egt.ie>



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