Requests for new languages/Wikipedia Silbo Gomero
Silbo Gomero Wikipedia[edit]
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This proposal has been closed as part of a reform of the request process. This request has not necessarily been rejected, and new requests are welcome. This decision was taken by the language committee in accordance with the Language proposal policy. The closing committee member provided the following comment: This discussion was created before the implementation of the Language proposal policy, and it is incompatible with the policy. Please open a new proposal in the format this page has been converted to (see the instructions). Do not copy discussion wholesale, although you are free to link to it or summarise it (feel free to copy your own comments over). —{admin} Pathoschild 01:03:56, 18 March 2007 (UTC) |
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- Information: Silbo is a "whistled language" spoken in the Canary islands, more specifically on the island of La Gomera, by a dwindling population.
- Notes/comments:
- Silbo is a language spoken on La Gomera. NazismIsntCool 10:05, 7 May 2005 (UTC)
- It is important cultural heritage, surely, but how do you want to write it down? Caesarion 10:22, 7 May 2005 (UTC)
- What about en:International maritime signal flags, en:smoke signals or a Morse code Wikipedia? Come on now, this page is not for parody. Arbeo 13:12, 9 May 2005 (UTC)
- Arbeo, perhaps you do not know much about el silbo gomera. It is an independent language, not an alternative mode of expressing an existing language like all the examples you give. --Node ue 03:35, 10 May 2005 (UTC)
- You're right Node, but still you can't write it down. Caesarion 08:12, 10 May 2005 (UTC)
- Just because it isn't often written down doesn't mean it's impossible. Until the 1970s most people would've said it's impossible to write signed languages. Navajo was not written very much until perhaps the 1930s, and even now most people over 30 can't read it (though those under 30 often can as it is now taught in schools). Silbo Gomera (as in, el silbo de La Gomera) has been written before in scholarly publications. If a fluent speaker so desired, it would be quite easy to write a whole book in Silbo. Materials that were handed out at the first international conference on whistled languages used different transcription systems depending on the author, but they were all quite easy to understand. The transcriptions at the conference were much preferred to audio samples because you can look at a transcription and add to it or cross parts out or analyse it for a whole hour, but with an audio sample it is more difficult to edit and if you want to analyse it you have to listen to it over and over. Whether the actual speakers of Silbo would be able to read a transcription system without first being taught it is debatable, but regardless of that it would be easy to write a program to synthesize Silbo from transcriptions (just as, say, Navajo can be converted from text-to-speech, or American Sign language, etc) --Node ue 21:22, 16 May 2005 (UTC)
- That sounds like a good idea, having somebody write down Silbo. But which script, Latin or Cyrillic? NazismIsntCool 05:46, 26 May 2005 (UTC)
- Latin. Nobody wants to write silbo in Cyrillic, because silbo isn't Russian. Scott Gall 05:50, 26 May 2005 (UTC)
- That sounds like a good idea, having somebody write down Silbo. But which script, Latin or Cyrillic? NazismIsntCool 05:46, 26 May 2005 (UTC)
- Why would I request one in maritime signal flags, smoke signals, or Morse code, or even sign language or Braille? You can write down Morse code or Braille, but Braille is actually read by blind people using their fingers and running them over a series of raised dots. NazismIsntCool 04:22, 11 May 2005 (UTC)
- Just because it isn't often written down doesn't mean it's impossible. Until the 1970s most people would've said it's impossible to write signed languages. Navajo was not written very much until perhaps the 1930s, and even now most people over 30 can't read it (though those under 30 often can as it is now taught in schools). Silbo Gomera (as in, el silbo de La Gomera) has been written before in scholarly publications. If a fluent speaker so desired, it would be quite easy to write a whole book in Silbo. Materials that were handed out at the first international conference on whistled languages used different transcription systems depending on the author, but they were all quite easy to understand. The transcriptions at the conference were much preferred to audio samples because you can look at a transcription and add to it or cross parts out or analyse it for a whole hour, but with an audio sample it is more difficult to edit and if you want to analyse it you have to listen to it over and over. Whether the actual speakers of Silbo would be able to read a transcription system without first being taught it is debatable, but regardless of that it would be easy to write a program to synthesize Silbo from transcriptions (just as, say, Navajo can be converted from text-to-speech, or American Sign language, etc) --Node ue 21:22, 16 May 2005 (UTC)
- You're right Node, but still you can't write it down. Caesarion 08:12, 10 May 2005 (UTC)
- Node ue, perhaps I know more about it than the user who proposed it as a language for Wikipedia. Matter of fact, he even mispelled the name (and so did you), for it should read "el silbo gomero" (Spanish masculine adjective). You're right, it is an independent language. I don`t question that. But still you can`t _write_ an encyclopedia using it. That`s what I was trying to point out by using the above examples. Then again, maybe NazismIsntCool can prove me wrong by writing down just one sample sentence in silbo (I'm sure he must have thought about that matter before requesting a new wikipedia).Arbeo 14:07, 12 May 2005 (UTC)
- It depends whether it is intended as an adjective or not . I am well aware of Spanish grammatical gender, and it was not a 'mistake'. It was intended as a contraction of "el sistemo lingüístico del silbo de la isla que se llaman La Gomera". As I noted above there is no reason one cannot write Silbo. It isn't often done, but it is very possible, and you could write any sort of literature in it from a particle physics textbook to a romance novel to an e-mail to the woman who lives at the base of the mountain on top of which you yourself live. But the only reason anybody has had so far to write it is for research purposes. In ideal conditions it can be heard from more than 1km away, and if you wanted to write a newspaper or public notice it can be done in Spanish (or if you are mentally insane or historically inclined, Guanche). --Node ue 21:22, 16 May 2005 (UTC)
- Everyone, or nearly everyone, that uses silbo speaks Spanish as well. Scott Gall 00:27, 15 May 2005 (UTC)
- Nearly everyone who speaks Welsh speaks English as well. Nearly everyone who speaks Catalan speaks Castillian (ie "Spanish") as well. Everybody who speaks Haida speaks English as well. But these facts alone are no reason to not hvae Wikipedias in these languages. --Node ue 21:22, 16 May 2005 (UTC)
- Don't forget most of the Polynesian, Native American, and Celtic languages - nearly everyone who speaks them also speaks the majority language (English in most cases.) Welsh speakers who can't understand English can be found in the Chubut Valley of Argentina, where most Welsh speakers there speak Spanish. The fact that most users of minority languages also understand the majority language is definitely no reason to close down or not open up wikis in those tongues. (Note that I used most instead of all.) Scott Gall 07:46, 12 Jun 2005 (UTC)
- Nearly everyone who speaks Welsh speaks English as well. Nearly everyone who speaks Catalan speaks Castillian (ie "Spanish") as well. Everybody who speaks Haida speaks English as well. But these facts alone are no reason to not hvae Wikipedias in these languages. --Node ue 21:22, 16 May 2005 (UTC)
- Arbeo, perhaps you do not know much about el silbo gomera. It is an independent language, not an alternative mode of expressing an existing language like all the examples you give. --Node ue 03:35, 10 May 2005 (UTC)
- Silbo is a language spoken on La Gomera. NazismIsntCool 10:05, 7 May 2005 (UTC)
- Oppose Impossible write in this silbing language.--Taichi - (?!) 22:04, 29 April 2006 (UTC)