2018-02-27 13:42 GMT+02:00 Vi to <[email protected]>: > I see Amir's points, which are pretty reasonable, but I fear this would > suit languages with a significant presence on the web. > > Among them I agree with points 1, 3 and 4 while I'm not sure about #2 > "creating > basic encyclopedic terminology and style in that language", if we want to > preserve a language we shouldn't create a thing. > > By the way I was wondering my concerns about cultural colonization may be > addressed -for wikis which has some contents (let's say at least 1000 > articles)- by starting expanding existing articles instead of translating > new ones. This would solve the problem of choosing what to translate though > would leave problems about the perspective contents are created. > > Vito >
It's a very common mistake to think that the purpose of Wikipedias in "small" languages is language preservation or revitalization. Sometimes it is, but there is something much bigger: There are many languages that 1. are alive in speech (and possibly in writing) 2. are not in danger of extinction 3. have a large number of monolingual speakers (let's say 100,000+) If there is no substantial Wikipedia in such a language, these people can't read Wikipedia in *any language* because they are monolingual. Most likely they cannot read any any encyclopedia in any language. They need a Wikipedia not in order to preserve the language, but to have access to *any* encyclopedic knowledge. I speak a revitalized language, and I'm very well aware of its history. Language preservation and revitalization are lovely things. But it's not the main point of what Wikimedia does. -- Amir Elisha Aharoni · אָמִיר אֱלִישָׁע אַהֲרוֹנִי http://aharoni.wordpress.com “We're living in pieces, I want to live in peace.” – T. Moore _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia-l New messages to: [email protected] Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, <mailto:[email protected]?subject=unsubscribe>
