Talk:Astur-Leonese language

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Contents 1 Leonese 2 Not very plausible 3 Article title and mirandese inclusion 4 Proposed rename and merge 5 Opinion from Salamanca 6 Neutrality (please share your thoughts) 7 What the heck does this even mean? 8 Language basics 9 Interwikis

[edit] Leonese

What is the relation with the Leonese language? Is it the same or not? Belgian man 11:12, 20 Nov 2004 (UTC)

That depends on when a language becomes a language group. There are several related Astur-Leonese dialects from East Asturias to Extremadura. There is an Academy working for an Asturian standard. I don't know if there is some attention to Leonese features. -- Error 01:09, 21 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Thanks! Belgian man 18:48, 23 October 2005 (UTC)

The connection with the article on Mirandese might be compared, with mutual advantage. --Wetman 06:14, 31 May 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Not very plausible

I commented this out:

"Speakers are prevented from using it in its daily life because neither the administration nor private institutions will accept documents written in Asturian and usually do not pay attention to people trying to deal with them in Asturian."

I've grown up with a minority language not used by administration or (large) private institutions, though this never kept anyone from using the language in daily life... Guaka 00:56, 18 Jun 2005 (UTC)

No one in León speaks the Leonese language, it is largely an invention of those who seek greater political autonomy for León and to break away from Castile. I believe this article gives the false impression that it is a genuine spoken language.

The language is NOT an invention. It exists, and has been spoken for a very limited extent during centuries, specially in the mountain regions of León. Now it's true that Leonese autonomists have greatly exaggerated the importance of Leonese and to a certain extent distorted history: I'm a Leonese and Leonese language is not my heritage, the language of my ancestors for generations has been Castillian. But Leonese IS a genuine language, if quite almost dead. (UNSIGNED)

I'd also like to add that while many do not pay attention to the claims of those seeking greater political autonomy for the province/city, there is an increasing impact on youth.--eleuthero 06:08, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Article title and mirandese inclusion

The article doesn't directly define the title. Asturian is one of the languages in the Asturian-Leonese branch, as well as Mirandese. Saying that Asturian is official in Portugal under the name Mirandese makes as much sense as saying that Mirandese is unnoficial in Spain and known under the name Asturian. The correct would be to either name this article Asturo-Leonese/Leonese or erasing/adapting the Mirandese and Leonese parts of it.

Leonese is NOT an invention and it is NOT almost dead as some of you say. Still some leonese writers publish books in the leonese langauge. In some part of the north of Leon, where I come from, even young people learn and speak daily the leonese lanaguage even though most of them do not even release or do it constantly. My parents spoke leonese which then they tough me and that is the same way I will teach my sons. A recent study of the language in the north of Leon done by the Asturian Language Academy states that still about 30.000 people use leonese daily and even a bigger amount use it mixed with castillian.

Well, 30,000 speakers out of well over a million, that's what I call almost dead. Unoffensive text or character 09:42, 30 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Proposed rename and merge

I propose to (a) merge Mirandese language here, as a sub-section of a new "Dialects" section; and then (b) move this article to "Astur-Leonese language".

Rationale: This article is called "Asturian language" but apparently covers "Astur-Leonese", including Leonese and Mirandese. The differences between the three languages seem to be small, and many sources consider them dialects of the same language.

There is a Mirandese language article that claims significant differences from Asturian, but judging from Talk:Mirandese language the evidence is hard to come by.

The Leonese language article was just a stub with no significant info, so I already made it into a redirect to the present article.

The merge would concentrate the scarce edit efforts, reduce duplication of information, and give readers a better view of the whole branch. Also, it seems unlikely that separate Mirandese and Leonese articles will grow to a size comparable to that of Asturian any time soon.

Given its present contents, and assuming Mirandese language is merged into it, the name "Astur-Leonese language" is more accurate than "Asturian language".

No Mirandese is an officialy recognised language of Portual. Astur-Leonese is not a language it is a language group. No matter how small the differences in your 'opinion' one is an officialy recognised language, the other is not.

Maybe. If an english-speaking country stops legally recognizing english, that doesn't magically make the local english dialect not english. Furthermore, if you look on the Asturian wikipedia, you can see at the top that it includes Mirandese. From this and the opinions/research of others, I believe Mirandese should be considered a dialect.

However, there are examples on our own Wikipedia where the same language is listed differently for political reasons. The example I'm thinking of is Romanian language and Moldovan language (they're the same language!!!) The Moldovan language page explicitly states that fact, however. Here's what I suggest. Either:

• Merge the two, if the combined article is not too long and is unlikely to become too long.
• Keep them separate, and explicitly state that Mirandese is a dialect of the Asturian language, recognized differently for political reasons.

Those are my thoughts. Grandmasterka 16:36, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

• No, keep seperate. Considering that I decided that I should come back after seeing this discussion, it's odd that I'd forget about it. The Ethnologue counts Mirandese and Asturian as two seperate languages, but Moldovan as an alternate name for Romanian. They don't even count Serbian and Croatian as seperate languages, so there must be a reason for counting Mirandese as seperate. And considering the history Spain, I think I can see it. The gradual Reconquista brought the Christian settlers into the valleys slowly over time, with a number of petty states in the mountains. Mountain regions historically, though not always, tend to isolate by valley, as happened with the five original spanish dialects as they were brought south.--Quintucket 00:57, 24 March 2006 (UTC)
• That's not exactly true. Ethnologue has a separate section for Mirandese, but says that there are asturian-speakers in Portugal, in Miranda do Douro. Actually, looking at Portugal section, you could think that both Portuguese, Asturian and Mirandese are different languages spoken in Miranda do Douro, what is obviously a mistake of the Ethnologue Base. Anyway, it could be interesting to maintain a separate article for Mirandese, as some speakers think this is, for political and historical reasons, a separate language from Asturian (this doesn't occur with Leonese). But that's only because of political and ortographical reasons, and is not the opinion of the majority of philological studies. This case is similar to Galician and Portuguese one, but in a different historical stadium. However, Asturian speakers feel Mirandese as the same language and probably some Mirandese speakers do the same (in fact, Asturian and Mirandese wikipedia is the same one), so it would be important to give a global view in both articles, if both are kept. Guestia 15:56, 24 March 2006 (UTC)
• No. Mirandese is co-official (by law) in that small region of northern Portugal and the article must be kept separate because it is specific to Portugal. I must also remember that the language is known there as Mirandese, not Asturian.
• No. I agree with Quintucket. If Mirandese is mostly considered a separate language, it must to be kept in a separate article. Thanks. --Dpc01 19:37, 15 April 2006 (UTC)
• Yes. Hello, I am Portuguese. I hope I'm not too late to the conversation. First, some information, for those who can read Portuguese: here is the piece of legislation which recognized Mirandese as a language in Portugal. It does not say anything about it being an official language, but allows the teaching and the promotion of Mirandese in the regions where it is spoken, as well as its use in public offices (does this make it official?...) It also says nothing at all about the relation between Mirandese and Asturo-Leonese. Now for my opinion: I am in favour of a merger. It is true that the situation of Mirandese and Asturo-Mirandese is similar to the relation between Galician and Portuguese, but there are also important differences:
  • With Portuguese and Galician, you have a language that is official in a state, and another that is regional in another state. But Asturo-Leonese is not recongized at all by the Spanish state, I believe.
  • Portuguese and Galician have official institutions that set their orthography, their vocabulary, etc., and which, in the case of Galician, define the two as separate languages. Asturo-Leonese and Mirandese do not. Although a committee of linguists has come up with an orthography for Mirandese when it was recognized, I don't think they have any official authority. As far as I know, no institution has officially declared that Asturo-Leonese and Mirandese are separate languages.
  • Mirandese is very clearly related to Asturo-Leonese, and is spoken in a very small area. Asturo-Leonese itself is spoken in a modest area. It saves space to discuss them together. Needless to say, the merged article should have separate sections for each. FilipeS 15:54, 28 April 2006 (UTC)

NOMirandese language requires a sepearte entity as it is a recognized minority language of Portugal216.95.23.169 19:39, 30 April 2006 (UTC)

NO I am a Mirandese, and I am planing to further improve the article on Mirandese soon. I would agree to a merge in some kind of Astur-leonese article. Mirandese, like Asturian, can be seen as one of the dialects in Astur-leonese. Not as an Asturian sub-dialect. I have been countless times in Asturias and the differences to their dialects are quite big. There's often no mutual inter-comprehension, and even if that's not a decisive characteristic when defining languages' areas, it just proves how wrong it would be to include Mirandese in the Asturian branch of Astur-leonese dialects. To FilipeS, Mirandese is recognized as an official language, even if its use is given a geographical limit. The 1st article in the 7/99 law reads as: "This diploma means to recognize and promote the Mirandese language". I really cannot see how this could be abiguous. Either way, when people mention Mirandese they are never reffering to a wider group of astur-leonese dialects: "mirandese" is itself a denomination that isolates the Astur-leonese dialects spoken in Portugal (and never the Asturian dialects). Further connection with a page about Astur-leonese dialects would be welcomed though.

[edit] Opinion from Salamanca

Well, my father was born in Cáceres (Extremadura) and my mother is from a Zamora family and was born here in a village in the province of Salamanca. I'm from Salamanca and I haven't used this language in my entire life :).

It was used a lot of time ago but, at least in the entire province in Salamanca is not used anymore. Maybe a little in the northern provinces of Spain, and the Castile-León community.

Be careful with some opinions. They could be only for politicals purposals (there is a political party that claims for a "Païs Llionés" but of course here in Salamanca they cannot say that, nobody would understand them :)). They only are a product of the secesionist and leftist movements in Spain. A pity.

PD: And of course Salamanca is a very good place -one of the best- to learn and talk in Spanish ;).

Emilio.

Well, that you haven't used it don't mean that it doesn't exist ok? i haven't used Mandarin in my life but don't think that in China the people speaks German. You don't understand them obviously because you are Castilian, and they not. I'm Asturian and i speak in Asturian, and i have heard in Llion some people talking it too...wait, i'm a leftist and all this is a pity. Good point.

I am from a village in the Salamanca province, near to the Portuguese border and I DO SPEAK LEONESE. You cannot hear it in the city but in my region yes. Please let's separate politics from linguistics. In some regions of Salamanca Leonese is spoken, and since the language belongs to its speakers don't mess things and let us speak our language.

[edit] Neutrality (please share your thoughts)

This article is entirely written from the perspective of asturian language champions.

Sources are not provided, but given the list of links suggested, everything seems to

come from organizations with an agenda on the subject. These organizations have direct

interests (political and economic) in portraying the asturian language in a certain way

and therefore their views should be balanced.

As it is, this article is not informative, but propaganda. To point out a few things:

• The 100000 and 450000 figures must come from thin air, they are extraordinary high.

Unless you are willing to admit that if 450000 can speak/understand asturian is because it is nothing but a dialect very similar to spanish.

Data from Etnologue: 100000 and 450000 [1]. Guestia 12:04, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

Ok, this figure comes from F.F. Botas, who I asume is(was) a jesuit priest very involved in the promotion of asturian. Don´t know if he was a linguist but he is hardly an unbiased source.Elartistamadridista 15:51, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

Being involved in Asturian promotion doesn't mean to be POV. This is only true if you don't work with scientific method (and yes, linguistics it's a science, and many times a pretty exact one). However, I didn't choose Etnologue as a source because of its bibliography, but because it's very used in Wikipedia (although it has a lot of errors, because of its enormous database) to take information on languages, especially on small ones. And yes, Etnologue's source it's Federico Fierro Botas (who was a jesuist priest involved in asturian language promotion) but that's not the primary source. They're taken from Llera Ramo, F. (1994) Los Asturianos y la Lengua Asturiana: Estudio Sociolingüístico para Asturias-1991. Oviedo: Consejería de Educación y Cultura del Principado de Asturias, a book with the results of a sociolinguistic study made by Asturian Administration (yes, Llera Ramo too is involved in Asturian language promotion, but he's also the director of Euskobarometro, a basque public institution of social studies). There's a more recent study, organized too by the Asturian government, Llera, Francisco J. y San Martín, Pablo (2003) Segundo Estudio Sociolingüístico de Asturias, Uviéu, Academia de la Llingua Asturiana, but I haven't got it here to consult. If you have the data of this study, we can put more recent data. But these numbers of 1991 seems to be the more accepted ones, not only by those "involved in the promotion of asturian" but also by recognised international institutions. Besides the Etnologue database, some examples are Mercator Education [2] (part of a european network on information of minoritized languages, directed by the Fryske Akademy in the Netherlands) or Euromosaic [3] (a project of the European Comission). However, I can accept, quoting the last web, that "these data has to be interpreted with care: the diglossic condition of Asturian generates different situations which are difficult to fit into a survey". But there's no POV with no other data of such acceptability in specialized studies. If you find one, we could (we should) put both. Guestia 21:45, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

• "The denial of recognition of Asturian or Leonese as an official language has driven Asturian and Leonese to an apparent dead end." Says who?

Wurm, Stephen A. (ed) (2001) Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger of Disappearing. Unesco. Page 55 (Puts Leonese as a "Seriously endangered language, i.e: the youngest speakers have reached or passed middle age" and Asturian as a "Endangered language, i.e: the youngest speakers are young adults" Guestia 12:04, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

But who says it is because it is unofficial?Elartistamadridista 15:51, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

I don't really like how this paragraph it's written. But I must say it is because it's unofficial (not only, but this is one of the causes). Danger of disappearing is a situation where languages ends because of its minorization. That's produced because an unequal relation of power, not only because of laws, but also politics, economics and some other. Almost all sociolinguistic studies would agree on that (I only will give one reference, being brief and avoiding to talk of catalan sociolinguistics: Calvet, Louis Jean (1974) Linguistique et colonialisme. Petit traité de glottophagie, Paris, Payot). Being unofficial it's clearly for Asturian language a situation of minorization if the Language A (i.e: Spanish) it's official and has a bigger use in Administration (almost all the use of Administration). However, I don't like the sentence because, really, to be official wouldn't mean for Asturian language to survive. There are a lot of other factors and those should be considered, too. Guestia 21:45, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

• "(...)intellectual groups and politically active Asturians and Leonese proud of their regional identity." Such as the author(s) of this article.

"Proud of their regional identity" is clearly POV, you can feel free to supress it. Guestia 12:04, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

Just trying to point out who seems to have wrote this article.Elartistamadridista 15:51, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

Several authors had wrote this, like all the articles in Wikipedia. Looking to article's history, I can count pretty more than 100 different ones. Even when some are minor changes, I can presume not all of them were involved in Asturian promotion. But the argument shouldn't be who wrote this, but if there's some statements who are not NPOV. Let's look for those supposed statements and not for the supposed ideology of the authors. Guestia 21:45, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

The problem to obtain a NPOV here is that there is a group of people who cares very

much about the subject but there isn´t a counterpart to balance it. Since I am not a linguist I won´t correct anything for the moment.

I would like to hear comments about what (if anything) should be done about this

article.Elartistamadridista 10:36, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

PS: Sorry about the clumsy paragraphs I am still learning.

Anyway, the article needs more information and many sources. I really don't like it much. If I'll have time, I would reform it completely and add sources, but I didn't have time to yet. And only to be honest, I'm involved in Asturian language defense, but I'm also a linguist, and I have always tried to made a good work in my field of study. Guestia 21:45, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

This is intended to be a general response to Guestia. I respect the science of linguistics, but my concern is that people involved in the promotion of Asturian may have a personal interest in the subject. I am not saying this is your case, but certain groups of Asturian advocates stand to gain a lot if, for example, it is made official: lots of public jobs (translators, teachers...) and money would have to be allocated. Politically, it would also be good for nationalism/regionalism. Of course, that does not mean there is nothing wrong in defending Asturian, but it could interfere with an honest exposition of the subject.

I am glad to see that this article has at least been checked by a linguist, because I had doubts about it. I may be wrong and this article may be portraying the subject in a neutral way, that is why I wanted to hear some thoughts about it. Thank you for your time.Elartistamadridista 07:39, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] What the heck does this even mean?

"is disputed the fact of speaking a dialect of Spanish Language or a variety of Astur-Leonese."

What does this mean in English? I would be bold and correct it but I haven't the least idea whatsoever what it means. Is the writer trying to say,

"There is a dispute as to whether Cantabrian is a dialect of Astur-Leonese or simply a dialect of Spanish."

OR does it mean,

"There is a dispute as to whether Cantabrian and Extramaduran are dialects of Astur-Leonese or simply dialects of Spanish."

OR something else I haven't thought of.

You'll notice that the two sentences above have completely different meanings, and to be honest the way it's written right now I don't know which is right. At any rate, that phrase shouldn't be tacked on to the back of the sentence like a caboose. --Charlene 23:27, 23 October 2006 (UTC)

I don't quite understand it either. I have changed the term "speech" for "idiom", which is more neutral in English following the WP article dialect: <<The term Idiom is used by some linguists instead of language or dialect when there is no need to commit oneself to any decision on the status with respect to this distinction.>> I hope this helps for the future correction of this very sentence :-) Max-hu 19:08, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Language basics

The paragraph (or rather sentence) on language basics is, excuse me, pure nonsense. Or is this basically castellano?

El Llïonés ye una llingua que carez de reconocencia oficial nenguna y qu’apenas tien tan siquiera reconocencia llegal cona eseición de Miranda del Douru (estáu pertués) onde tien un rangu de cooficialidá al empar que’l pertués. Menos entovía posibilidá de deprendizax nas escuelas ou cualquier outra istitución académica pública, al pesiare de los informes de la Unesco, Unión Europea y milentos chamamientos d’espertos llinguistas de mediu mundu del sou inminente riesgu de desapaición polas presiones d’outras llinguas comu’l gallegu-pertués y el castellán, qu’invaden selemente’l dominu llinguísticu llïonés.

Though I am not familiar with the current linguistic situation (from what I read, Asturo-Leones is on its way to extinction), I can assure you that the language that used to be spoken by peasants in Asturias and Leon in the first half of the 20th century was very much distinct from Castellano.Unoffensive text or character 09:28, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Interwikis

Most interwikis are wrong. Only these are correct:

• ca:Asturlleonès
• es:Asturleonés
• eu:Asturleonera
• gl:Asturleonés
• pt:Asturo-leonês

The others do not separate the linguistic group from asturian language, which is just one of the languages that belongs to Astur-leonese group.

Note: I do not want to put the asturian interwiki ast:Dominiu llingüísticu astur because of its doubtful credibility. --Galician 14:55, 21 March 2007 (UTC)