Talk:Mutual intelligibility

Spanish and Portuguese

I think pretty much every single speaker of both languages can understand the other without much trouble, especially in a written way. In fact, in writing I'd challenge any non-trained non-speaker to tell the difference between them both. In Latin America sometimes products are labelled in both Portuguese and Spanish (as I believe happens in Spain and Portugal) and as a native speaker you can read the other language all the way until you find something a bit different and realise you've been reading the other text... A little example of a sentence:

Portuguese: Vi estas notas de português para comentar antes de ir á casa de José, mas como estamos irritados nunca nos vimos.

Spanish: Vi estas notas de portugués para comentar antes de ir a casa de José, mas como estamos irritados nunca nos vimos.

Try and spot the difference!!!!!!! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 189.217.177.159 (talk • contribs) 06:42, 22 April 2010

Bring a source; this article is not a repository for peoples' opinions. Regardless of your opinion, it seems that the issue of mutual intelligibility of these languages is controversial; see, for instance, [1]. rʨanaɢ (talk) 06:53, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

Oh I'm sorry, I thought the article was for FACTS with SOURCES, while the part of DISCUSSIONS was a repository for OPINIONS, you see. And as any native speaker of Portuguese or Spanish can tell you, I provided not source but proof, with two identical sentences belonging to both languages. Meanwhile, the article you mention was written (oh surprise) by an English speaker. If you spoke either language, you'd see that in both the Spanish and the Portuguese Wikipedia these languages are classified as mutually intelligible. But sure, what do we poor speakers know about our understanding each other? You English speakers must know better, for sure... —Preceding unsigned comment added by 189.216.78.100 (talk) 02:55, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

You seem to misunderstand something. Neither your brain nor your abilities are reliable sources. Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 ^{> haneʼ} 04:51, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

And anyway, constructing one sentence that happens to be spelled the same in both languages doesn't prove anything. I can do that for English and Afrikaans too:

• English: My hand is warm.
• Afrikaans: My hand is warm.

Wow, English and Afrikaans must be mutually intelligible, huh? Now go to af:Japan and see how much you understand. +Angr 05:31, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

Honey, can you count up to four? OK, so my1 hand2 is3 warm4. Now, try hard and count this "Vi estas notas de portugués para comentar antes de ir a casa de José, mas como estamos irritados nunca nos vimos."

Once again, your ignorance is astonishing. 21 words out of hundreds of thousands is still just a tiny fraction. +Angr 06:16, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

Mutual intelligibility is a very problematic concept anyway. That may be the reason why it is hard to find any reliable sources on that topic. Whether you understand a foreign language depends very much on your individual abilities and background. A person from Vigo (even if he does not speak Gallego) will be much more exposed to Portuguese, both in spoken and in written form, than a person from Alicante. Thus, he will probably think Portuguese and Spanish are mutually intelligible and will be much surprised when the person from Alicante tells him he cannot understand a single word of spoken Portuguese, as the two languages are worlds apart, phonetically. Unoffensive text or character (talk) 08:50, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

Go ahead and stick to your view, we Spanish and Portuguese speakers know better...

This isn't "our view", it's the view of published researchers who have investigated it. You know, people who make studying linguistics their profession and actually know what they're talking about. +Angr 06:16, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

Dutch and Afrikaans

Are Dutch and Afrikaans mutualy intelligible? In writing I don't have much difficulty understanding Afrikaans being a Dutch speaker myself. In speach I don't know yet. Ofcourse I am no expert but is there an expert that thinks alike? Quintinohthree (talk) 17:01, 19 May 2010 (UTC)

Thus far, no-one has brought a reliable source to back it up, that's the point. Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 ^{> haneʼ} 20:49, 19 May 2010 (UTC)

I re-added Afrikaans and Dutch, with some sources. Some of them do emphasise that comprehension may be assymetric (i.e. it is easier for Dutch-speakers to understand Afrikaans than the other way round) and that it is easier to understand the written language than the spoken language (without saying that the spoken language is not mutually intelligible). --Hooiwind (talk) 02:47, 20 May 2010 (UTC)

Congratulations... this is the first time someone actually brings some academic sources for this... *sigh* :P Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 ^{> haneʼ} 02:53, 20 May 2010 (UTC)

Some of the sources do not support the claim of mutual intelligibility. I will finish poring over them tonight. rʨanaɢ (talk) 02:56, 20 May 2010 (UTC)

I honestly think all of them support the claim.--Hooiwind (talk) 03:09, 20 May 2010 (UTC) Please check your respective tps, you can find the page numbers in the syntax codes of the citings.--Hooiwind (talk) 03:17, 20 May 2010 (UTC)

Page 232 is should be accessible here.--Hooiwind (talk) 03:21, 20 May 2010 (UTC)

It is not accessible for me. As I said in the edit summary, when a source is not available online you can provide a quotation of the relevant part. rʨanaɢ (talk) 03:34, 20 May 2010 (UTC)

That's weird... I can't seem to be able to copy-paste text from the page though. But we have enough other sources I guess.--Hooiwind (talk) 03:41, 20 May 2010 (UTC)

Turkish and azeri

They are both mutually intelligible, therefore they should be added to the list