Talk:Montenegrin language

Obsolete webpages

All the URL's given in the last section Examples of terminology are OBSOLETE (as of 07.09.2010). noychoH (talk) 12:08, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

Pushing POV history section

There is no place in a language article for the extensive POV history section that is being pushed by an anonymous IP. A few well-sourced facts directly related to the language are relevant, but three paragraphs on the history of Montenegro's relations with Serbia are not linguistically relevant. --Taivo (talk) 04:37, 26 January 2011 (UTC)

He's been trying to add it since 2008, I think. This talk page is littered with useless dismissal of that crap, he just inserts it again. Just revert, block, ignore. No such user (talk) 07:29, 26 January 2011 (UTC)

Opression

"Some people may compare the situation with Montenegrin to the positions of Croatian and Bosnian, becouse all of these languages were being oppressed by the pro-serb regime in former Yugoslavia" I think this sentence is POV. As I recall, in communist Yugoslavia, 20-30 years ago, Serbian cyrillic was deliberately supressed, Serbian language was called "Serbo-Croatian", and latin script was used in Serbia as well as in Croatia and other parts of former Yugoslavia (except FYROM, then called "Makedonia"). That regime was everything but "pro-serb". I'm Serbian, and I was a child in that time, but I remember well. So, I removed this sentence from the article, because it does not reflect the true conditions in that time.178.223.40.83 (talk) 20:11, 28 September 2011 (UTC)

Do note that it says "former Yugoslavia". Yugoslavia existed in various forms for almost a century. It is not limited to the period of "communist Yugoslavia, 20-30 years ago". Also, even if Serbian language was suppressed in some form, that does not necessarily mean that the other languages were not, nor that the regime was not pro-serb. 幾何學家 (talk) 22:19, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

Language Self-Identification

Self-identification of what language one speaks is not truly reliable linguistic information. I can give you examples around the world where you ask, "What language do you speak?" and the speaker gives you the linguistically incorrect answer either knowingly or unknowlingly for a wide variety of reasons. Especially in this case, where the question "What language do you speak" carries a multitude of political and ethnic pressures that are unrelated to the language being spoken. In reality, nearly all Montenegrins speak a variety of the Serbo-Croatian language. "Montenegrin" is not a language. "Serbian" is not a language. They are mutually intelligible so they are varieties of a single language, not separate languages. Speaker self-identification in these cases is totally unreliable. If you asked me whether I spoke "French" or "English", my answer would be more reliable because these are different languages. But asking a Montenegrin whether they speak "Montenegrin" or "Serbian" is more akin to asking a New Yorker whether they speak with a Brooklyn accent or a Queens accent. The answer may vary on any given day depending on whether the Brooklyn or Queens accents are considered "good", "bad", "economically advantaged", "political correct", etc. It is a meaningless question in the end. Such assessments of dialect usage can only be conducted by qualified linguists and not by asking the uneducated speakers themselves. In this case you can say, "The majority of Montengrins claim they speak Serbian", but you cannot categorically state that the majority of Montenegrins speak the Serbian dialect of Serbo-Croatian, because there are too many non-linguistic factors involved in the question. --Taivo (talk) 02:13, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

I agree to a great extent, but note that qualified linguists have said, among other things, that "the distinction between languages and dialects is usually made more on social and political grounds than on purely linguistic ones", meaning that it is the uneducated speakers who decide what's what (in general). By the same argument as you have given, "Czech" and "Slovak" are not languages, yet their articles state that they are. Linguists study language, they don't decide how we (the people) speak and what we mean by what we speak. Since this is "an encyclopedia for the public" and not "a linguistic encyclopedia", the articles should be written in "the language of the uneducated speakers" not in the language of linguists. Everything stated here should be stated with understanding of all the implications, linguistic or otherwise.幾何學家 (talk) 19:22, 14 December 2011 (UTC)

And those implications would be...? --biblbroks (talk) 19:46, 14 December 2011 (UTC)

For example, am I right if I conclude that 43% of Montenegro considers SANU and Matica Srpska the ultimate authorities on their language? Or that their language is closer to Serbo-Croatian as spoken in Serbia (Serbian) than to Serbo-Croatian as spoken in Montenegro (Montenegrin)? If articles such as "The Mountain Wreath" state that it was written in Serbian and that it is a masterpiece of Serbian literature, am I right if I conclude that the mentioned authorities show respect and admiration for the minority that speaks the same language today and concern over the status of the language? 幾何學家 (talk) 00:05, 15 December 2011 (UTC)

Speaks which language? --biblbroks (talk) 04:51, 15 December 2011 (UTC)

This language http://www.guskova.ru/~mladich/Njegosh/facsimile/img/gv-102.jpg 幾何學家 (talk) 22:43, 19 December 2011 (UTC)

Which one is that? --biblbroks (talk) 23:18, 19 December 2011 (UTC)

Copyright problems

A new map was loaded into this page, but there appear to be copyright issues. Read the WikiCommons page very, very carefully. The image is not unlimited use, but certain rights were reserved. If you want to use the image on this page, then you must adhere to the copyright issues on that WikiCommons page. You cannot simply insert that image into this article without comment or attribution. Read the reserved rights carefully and adhere to them. --Taivo (talk) 18:19, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

But the attribution is given on the image itself: Author: Ivan Vukicevic and Аутор: Иван Вукићевић. --biblbroks (talk) 21:03, 1 January 2012 (UTC)

It doesn't matter at all that the author and poster are the same. Read the rights box and you will that he posted it with restrictions. Until you meet those restrictions, this map is a violation of WP:COPYRIGHT. --Taivo (talk) 22:14, 1 January 2012 (UTC)

What I found is this:

• Permission (Reusing this file) CC-BY-SA-3.0-RS; GFDL-NO-DISCLAIMERS.

and this

• attribution – You must attribute the work in the manner specified by the author or licensor (but not in any way that suggests that they endorse you or your use of the work).

I really don't understand what restrictions should be met. Would you care to clarify, since the inclusion of this map can add to the article's content. --biblbroks (talk) 15:28, 3 January 2012 (UTC)

Please actually read what you wrote. It's right there in front of you: "You must attribute the work in the manner specified by the author or licensor (but not in any way that suggests that they endorse you or your use of the work)". In other words, if you post this, you must include in the caption the author of the work and that fact that they do not necessarily endorse its use in this article. --Taivo (talk) 17:51, 3 January 2012 (UTC)

Ok. Thanks for explanation and sorry for the trouble. --biblbroks (talk) 21:05, 3 January 2012 (UTC)