Talk:Catalan language

[valensiˈa]? Really?

Is the pronunciation [valensiˈa] accurate? Full [i], not [j]? Also, placement of the stress implies syllabification [i.ˈa], whereas [.ˈsja] seems more likely. Any phonologists or phoneticians here to check this out? Barefoot through the chollas (talk) 15:10, 7 June 2020 (UTC)

Barefoot through the chollas, a reliable secondary source would be in order here. Elizium23 (talk) 15:11, 7 June 2020 (UTC)

Agreed. That's why I called out for help from a phonologist or phonetician. Either one experienced in Catalan/Valencian would be able to confirm or correct [valensiˈa] immediately and supply a solid secondary source easily. In search of the latter, I've checked the online Catalan and Valencian dictionaries, and they seem to be of no help -- syllabification is missing, and though they use [ ], it appears that they're not really interested in giving actual phonetic renditions in IPA. Barefoot through the chollas (talk) 16:03, 7 June 2020 (UTC)

In the Valencian language (or Valencian dialect of Catalan, as some insist it should be called) the name of the city and region is València [vaˈlensia] and the name of the language is valencià [valensiˈa]. Both words have four distinct syllables, begin with a labiodental fricative and contain a fairly close e. Although written Valencian is very similar to standard Catalan, the spoken language sounds very different from the Catalan spoken in Barcelona. LynwoodF (talk) 19:50, 7 June 2020 (UTC)

Thanks. Now, a source is needed. The expectation, in light of items like [kunˈsjɛnsjə] (and general Romance phonology not necessarily Catalan/Valencian) would be a genuine phonetic rendition [valenˈsja]. Thanks in advance for supplying a trustworthy reference. Barefoot through the chollas (talk) 20:15, 7 June 2020 (UTC)

Sorry, I cannot find one. That is original research, but I just wanted to assure you that whoever put that pronunciation there was not far off the mark. I am not too sure how common the fairly close e is; I should expect a more open sound, as Catalan distinguishes open and close e and o. However, the i is not pronounced as [j] in Valencia itself. LynwoodF (talk) 21:22, 7 June 2020 (UTC)

I came across a source which claims that in Catalan in general an i before a vowel is pronounced as a non-syllabic close i ([i̯]), not as [j]. Personally, I am hearing four syllables in the place name València, but maybe this is peculiar to Valencian. I am not aware whether the source is reliable. See Omniglot on Catalan. LynwoodF (talk) 17:18, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

I think you've struck gold. The source you found seems serious and well-intentioned, but leaves lacunae: how to represent Cat. iogurt, hiena, feia if [j] corresponds only to graphemic y? What's helpful is non-syllabic [i̯], which may be what's been driving me loony in the first few slower-speech renditions of valencià in a youtube video, in which I hear "not syllabic, yet almost [i]" at first, then [j] once she speeds up a bit (a quadrilingual -- Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, English -- friend with a good ear claims to hear only [j]; that may be constructed on expectations, but it's perhaps another nail in the coffin of syllabic [i]):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NjnDEgE7-Y8

Non-syllabic [i̯] may be what is actually intended below for high registers in L'estàndard oral valencià, but not necessarily so; the description of [i] being only for very formal registers, i.e. unnatural or verging on unnatural, takes care of it:

2.3. ELS GRUPS VOCÀLICS 2.3.1. Són pròpies del valencià estàndard les realitzacions fonètiques següents: a) La pronunciació com a diftong o com a hiat (pròpia només de registres molt formals) dels grups vocàlics formats per una i o per una u àtones seguides de vocal, en paraules com ara història [istÓRia] o [istÓRja], gràcia [gRásia] o [gRásja], continuament [kontínuament] o [kontínwament]. (https://www.avl.gva.es/documents/35882/40728/Oral.pdf/97c04880-4477-48b2-a314-00e626f43674 p. LXVII)

Given the non-syllabic description, the almost explicit mention of [j] as being normal for Valencian, and similar, although with different stress pattern, in Catalan (Alex Alsina, p. 368 in The Oxford Guide to the Romance Languages, eds. Ledgeway and Maiden: [duˈsɛnsjə] docència, [teuˈkrasjə] teocràcia), it seems quite legitimate to present [valenˈsja] or [valenˈsi̯a] in the text. I'd opt for [valenˈsja], since it seems to be normal, but I wouldn't object to [valenˈsi̯a] (/valenˈsia/ would solve the representation problem, but not serve as a pronunciation guide even for readers who understand the phoneme/phonetics distinction). As for the stressed vowel, I sustain. It's supposedly [e] in València; I hear [ɛ] in valencià in the video. Barefoot through the chollas (talk) 20:26, 13 June 2020 (UTC)

I have been doing some more listening and reading and have come to the conclusion that we are both right up to a point.

I listened repeatedly to the vlogger and watched her lips. After a nasal she seemed to using a labiodental plosive for the initial v and this sounded very much like a b. In the second syllable she was using a mid e, commonly used in standard Castilian. This is consistent with what AVL says about unstressed vowels. I was not hearing yod for the i, but I was hearing four distinct syllables, even when she became very animated.

Looking again at the Omniglot page, I scrolled further down and found some recordings, one by someone from Barcelona (typical East Catalan) and another by someone from Valencia. In both I heard five distinct syllables in consciència and no hint of yod. Strangely, the same person from Valencia made a recording in standard Castilian of the equivalent piece on the Spanish page. In this I heard three syllables and two yods.

In none of all this did I hear a non-syllabic i. Also, whoever put that on the Omniglot page seems to have no supporters. Rising diphthongs start with [j] or [w] in Spanish and this seems to be true of Catalan as well. So I dug out all the textbooks from my days studying under Paul Russell-Gebbett, still remembered in Catalonian linguistic circles nearly three decades after his death. I thought there might be something about the development of Latin i into the various Catalan dialects in Moll, Francisco de B. 1952 Gramática histórica catalana. Madrid: Gredos, but I found nothing useful. I looked in Pompeu Fabra's Gramàtica Catalana, but this has a chapter on spelling, but nothing on pronunciation, as it was aimed at a Catalan-speaking readership. Third time lucky, I found his French version of his grammar and this does cover pronunciation. He deals at length with i followed by a vowel and this is quite complex:

First of all he mentions i between two vowels. It is rendered as yod, and so this solves one of your problems.

Next he deals with initial i followed by a vowel. This is also rendered as yod.

Then he deals with i preceded by a consonant and followed by a vowel. He says that the i and the following vowel are pronounced as two syllables and he gives the examples diari, orient and unió. He goes on to point out that in everyday speech one often hears rising diphthongs with yod in words of more than two syllables. His tone suggests that he regards this as a variant from a norm, and decades later AVL is still giving both and the hiatus forms still seem to be alive and well, alongside the forms with yod. So, as I said above, we are both right!

LynwoodF (talk) 17:13, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

I didn't give formal details of the book. It is:

Fabra, Pompeu: Grammaire Catalane, 1946, Paris - page 5

Incidentally, until I found Fabra's explanation, I was beginning to wonder whether my attitude to non-syllabic vowels was being coloured by the Romanian diphthong ea. If you are interested, go to the article on Curtea de Argeș and listen to a voice speaking the name. That non-syllabic e is so brief that English speakers have difficulty perceiving it. LynwoodF (talk) 19:22, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

Brief, indeed! (And not only for anglophones.) The Valencian yod/i seems to have sorted itself out, though, which is good. AVL's [i] described as pròpia només de registres molt formals (bold mine) suggests a status more like on life support than alive and well, and it chimes with Fabra's report of common yod (he was, after all, born in [ˈgrasja] ;-) ), as well as his implication that it's a variant from a norm. Therein the rub: which/whose norm? Apparently not normal native speakers, as the Atles lingüístic del domini català makes very clear: [j] is almost the sole response for valencià, including in Valencia itself (point 163; [katalˈa] etc. on the map show that they're not syllabifying in the transcription, alas, but marking stress immediately before the stressed vowel).https://aldc.espais.iec.cat/files/2013/06/Mapa-VIII.pdf Badia, writing in 1973, corroborates for Catalan in general that this is normal, and offers insight into the motivation for rejecting that normality: "...les diphtongues tenues pour incorrectes [ə-mu-syó] (emoció), [pa-syɛn-syə] (paciència), etc., sont aujourd'hui très répandues parmi les catalanophones. J'ai même constaté que de nombreux Catalans sont surpris quand on leur dit que la prononciation [ə-mu-syó] est une façon de castillaniser le langage." (Badia i Margarit, A.M. 1988. Sons i fonemes de la llengua catalana. Barcelona: Publicacions de la Universitat de Barcelona, p. 22).

Anyone who has hung around a bit in the linguistically engaged social sectors of Catalunya will have encountered this bugaboo: a select few features that in the natural evolution of Latin > Romance turn out to be common to Castilian and Catalan are to be rejected if an alternative is available. So... Just as a Tuscan can hold natural phonology in abeyance to issue a highly stilted [si.ˈɛː.na] rather than normal standard [ˈsjɛːna], a Catalan can finish off, e.g., emoció with [si.ˈo] rather than the usual [ˈsjo]. But with an advantage over the Italian's [si.ˈɛː.na]: in the (perfectly understandable, even laudable) effort to minimize seepage of Castilian into Catalan, less natural [si.ˈo] is embraced (by some). Et voilà, in the Estàndart Oral Valencià (acordat per la Secció de Llengua i Lliteratura Valencianes de la RACV per a l’us de l’idioma valencià), a time-honored principle at work: prescriptivists don't bother to ban what people don't do. And, whether factual or not, a convincing local-pride reason not to do it:

La i no deu pronunciar-se com a semiconsonant en paraules com tendència, ciència, preposició, Valéncia, fet que es considera un castellanisme fonètic. Pronunciarem (ten-dèn-ci-a, ci-èn-ci-a…), igualment pronunciarem els seus plurals (ten-dèn-ci-es, ci-èn-ci-es, pre-po-si-ci-ons…) https://www.llenguavalenciana.com/documents/ortografia/estandart_oral_valencia#vocals_atones

Bref, all the evidence (the Atles being crucial) seems to add up to yod as normal, hiatus as normatiu -- in this case, minoritarian at best. Who wins? The majority of speakers or prescriptivists apparently applying what someone once called "the dead hand of standardization"? Neither, I suppose. In spite of its unpopularity, [valensiˈa] does presumably exist in registres molt formals (or simply slow, deliberate speech), while the more expected [valenˈsja] is attested repeatedly by the Atles and indirectly by AVL's descriptive honesty as well as by remarks variously regretting the dipththong generally. The solution seems to be to have both in the text, either simply as variants, or labeled somehow, perhaps high register [valensiˈa], colloquial [valenˈsja]. Barefoot through the chollas (talk) 17:24, 16 June 2020 (UTC)

Given that Fabra observed the phenomenon three quarters of a century ago and that the AVL is giving both pronunciations, I think you have a point. The more natural pronunciation type seems to have made progress over the decades, and so I have no objection to your adding something to the text. I rather like the idea of distinguishing between high register and colloquial.

I notice that on some other pages the high-register pronunciations are given for the place name and the language. The ones I have found are Valencia, Valencian Community, Province of Valencia and Valencian language. I had wondered whether the stressed e in València represented an open e, but according to the AVL it does not. See https://web.archive.org/web/20160303182252/http://www.avl.gva.es/va/documents-normatius/minidestacado/01/document/Gentilici.pdf and scroll down to page 89. LynwoodF (talk) 16:45, 17 June 2020 (UTC)

Hey, I realize that the discussion is a few months old now and there is no doubt that people pronounce it differently, but there is an official source (Diccionari Català-Valencià-Balear, by Institute for Catalan Studies) where the pronunciation with full [i] is the only one shown. Here, you can also see that the stressed e in València, previously mentioned, is represented as an open or closed e, depending on the dialect and both are considered "official" or "correct". Saugch (talk) 10:35, 4 November 2020 (UTC)

Thank you, Saugch. I am inclined to go with this. The original discussion touched on whether it was appropriate to take the official line or to recognize the erosion of the pronunciation with full [i], which seems to be in progress. As far as I can see, no articles have been altered as a result of this discussion. LynwoodF (talk) 12:45, 4 November 2020 (UTC)

The original point/question was to try to establish the genuine pronunciation of the third syllable (or third and fourth) of valencià rather than innocently report what may be prescriptivist wishful thinking. The evidence available at a distance leans in the direction of ['sja] as most normal, with [si'a] available for deliberate, slow, or formal registers. Barefoot through the chollas (talk) 13:53, 4 November 2020 (UTC)

Stress-timed?

This article has been added to the category "Stress-timed languages". I regard this classification as questionable. I suggest that the editor concerned read this paper. LynwoodF (talk) 09:49, 29 June 2020 (UTC)

In the Valencian Community, Spanish and Valencian are the official languages. Catalan is not.

The article is wrong. In the Valencian Community the only official languages ​​are Spanish and Valencian. In the Spanish Constitution it is written. It is also written in the Statute of Autonomy of the Valencian Community.

In Spanish: Artículo sexto

    1. La lengua propia de la Comunitat Valenciana es el valenciano.

    2. El idioma valenciano es el oficial en la Comunitat Valenciana, al igual que lo es el castellano, que es el idioma oficial del Estado. Todos tienen derecho a conocerlos y a usarlos y a recibir la enseñanza del, y en, idioma valenciano.

In English:

Article Six

    1. The own language of the Valencian Community is Valencian.

    2. The Valencian language is the official language in the Valencian Community, as is Spanish, which is the official language of the State. Everyone has the right to know and use them and to receive instruction in the Valencian language.

That is why I ask that you withdraw from the article the statement that Catalan is official in the Valencian Community. That is false. In the Valencian Community the official languages ​​are Spanish and Valencian. Valencian is a language totally independent from Catalan. Even its origin is older.
--Kipsde (talk) 01:19, 30 June 2020 (UTC)

The Statute speaks about a language called Valencian. However, most people think that the language called Valencian is also called Catalan. Different names, rather than different languages. And if they are so different, how come do I understand everything they say when I visit the Valencian Community? --Jotamar (talk) 21:22, 30 June 2020 (UTC)

@Kipsde:, you are going to have to give a source that Valencian is totally different from Catalan. I'm tempted to use @Jotamar:'s argument because I can understand people from Valencia just fine, but I would rather you source it. I would also like to see a source on how it is older then Catalan. TheKaloo (talk) 00:06, 9 August 2020 (UTC)

Also, the article mentions Valencia around 110 times, including in the first sentence and in the Infobox. TheKaloo (talk) 19:10, 9 August 2020 (UTC)

FWIW, an "origin is older than" claim is specious both factually and conceptually. All Romance languages are, by definition, continuations of Latin. Barefoot through the chollas (talk) 01:01, 9 August 2020 (UTC)

Very true, I didn't think of mentioning that. The whole paragraph was just wrong in the first place, anyway. Especially without a source. TheKaloo (talk) 18:07, 9 August 2020 (UTC)

@Jxlarb and Barefoot through the chollas: Saying that Valencian is older than Catalan is like saying that American English is older than British English, or that Italian is older than Latin. One of the "arguments" used by the proponents of this "theory" is that Valencia was a kingdom, but Catalonia was only a principality. Ridiculous. As to Catalan and Valencian being "totally different", just read the first pages of the Spanish constitution in Catalan and Valencian. Taurus Littrow (talk) 21:40, 26 October 2020 (UTC)

The point is that all Romance languages are continuations of Latin. One can't be older than the other. Barefoot through the chollas (talk) 00:17, 29 October 2020 (UTC)

@Barefoot through the chollas: Yes, their origin is the same. What I meant is that the Catalan language was brought to Valencia by the settlers from Catalonia, so it's ridiculous to claim that Valencian is older than Catalan. It's like saying that the Americans taught the British to speak English. Taurus Littrow (talk) 19:39, 1 November 2020 (UTC)

@Taurus Littrow: Yep, you're right. TheKaloo (Talk to me) 01:14, 29 October 2020 (UTC)

Catalan speaker video

The video of the catalan speaker, is a video of the majorcan variety. I think that it would be better if it said catalan speaker (majorcan) or something like that, because that's not the standard variety. Markus2801 (talk) 21:25, 22 October 2020 (UTC)

Good point, done. Taurus Littrow (talk) 20:19, 26 October 2020 (UTC)

Perfect! Markus2801 (talk) 21:37, 29 October 2020 (UTC)

Hot/warm: cognation vs. meaning

@Taurus Littrow: In response to your edit summary from where you undid my expansion of "hot" to "hot/warm" in the language relationships table: I'm well aware that "hot" and "warm" are different words, but nitpicking about that is beside the point. Are you sufficiently versed in linguistics to be aware of semantic shift and that languages don't bear a strict one-to-one correspondence between words?

The stated purpose of the table is not to serve as a precision dictionary but to demonstrate language relationships. The concepts denoted by "hot" and "warm" in English lie on a continuum and overlap. There isn't a lockstep correspondence between the distinctions English makes among words denoting degrees of heat (e.g., "torrid", "hot", "warm", "lukewarm', "cool", "cold", "frigid") and the distinctions other languages make among their words denoting degrees of heat. The other words in the "hot" row don't all correspond strictly to "hot": "caliente" in Spanish and "quente" in Portuguese can be used both for situations where English would use "hot" and situations where English would use "warm".

Romanian has a cognate word that is in the ballpark. What purpose is served by insisting that each row match one English word, and one English word only, such that for Romanian we must jettison a perfectly good cognate that falls in the same semantic category as the other words in the row and make it look like Romanian is an exception that doesn't have one? What reason is there to avoid denoting, as "hot/warm", the general category that the listed words relate to so that the cognate relationship can be shown to hold for Romanian as it does for the other languages?Largoplazo (talk) 19:39, 5 November 2020 (UTC)

Well, that's not a nitpicking. Every other row has only one English word. Why make an exception for this one? Anyway, if you add "warm" to the English column, you must add its equivalent in all the other languages, and the table will become a mess. I insist that "warm" and "hot" are two clearly different words with different meanings, at least in English, Romanian and Catalan; if you don't see it, something is wrong with you. Generally, it seems to me that the person who filled the Romanian part of the table didn't know this language very well: he/she added words which sound similar to those in the other languages, but have a totally different meaning: "a prinde" could not possibly mean "to take", and "a cerceta" could not mean "to search". Now, if the purpose of the table is to reflect the cognation of words rather than their actual meaning (which I doubt), it must be clearly specified. Oh well, let's see what others says. @Barefoot through the chollas, TheKaloo, Markus2801, Saugch, and LynwoodF: Taurus Littrow (talk) 20:53, 5 November 2020 (UTC)

P.S. Were that table to reflect the cognation, like you claim, rather than the meaning, there wouldn't be a second table below saying "Catalan and Spanish cognates with different meanings". It obviously implies that the words in the first table must have the same meaning. Taurus Littrow (talk) 21:00, 5 November 2020 (UTC)

Your very first question, "why make an exception?", is the essence of a nitpick (an insistence that everything be just so, with no deviation, despite the benefit that would be derived from admitting some flexibility), especially in light of the fact that I already answered it exhaustively, only for you to re-ask the very question that I had just gotten through answering.

"I insist that "warm" and "hot" are two clearly different words with different meanings, at least in English, Romanian and Catalan; if you don't see it, something is wrong with you. Since I also said that and proceeded to address it thoroughly, shall I say blatantly that "something is wrong with you"? Or shall I refer you to WP:CIVIL and engage in respectful discourse when communicating with other editors on Wikipedia talk pages?

I'm not even bothering to read the rest of your response since the pattern you established in the part I read is to ask questions I've already answered and to make observations, as though they were new arguments, that I already stated myself—and then elaborated on and dispensed with; and doing those things all while insulting me. This doesn't fill me with the expectation that the remainder is any more constructive than that. I will just wait for others to comment. Largoplazo (talk) 21:17, 5 November 2020 (UTC)

Sorry, I didn't want to insult you: that claim was more a rhetorical one. It's been a long day (I'm closely following the US election) and I'm quite tired; also, your comment is quite long, so I didn't read it very carefully at first. Anyway, we must clearly mention in the article whether we put the emphasis on the cognation or on the meaning. One way or another, these things must be decided by consensus, you can't just change the clearly established pattern (one row - one English word) without asking what others think. This is why I reverted your edit in the first place. Taurus Littrow (talk) 21:29, 5 November 2020 (UTC)

You should still read what I said in the postscript; that's important: Were that table to reflect the cognation, like you claim, rather than the meaning, there wouldn't be a second table below saying "Catalan and Spanish cognates with different meanings". It obviously implies that the words in the first table must have the same meaning. Taurus Littrow (talk) 21:31, 5 November 2020 (UTC)

Okay, I'll comment. Even ignoring that "Yuma's a bit too warm for me in June" can communicate Yuma's extreme heat effectively, the issue is that the rigidly immutable monosemy of "I insist that "warm" and "hot" are two clearly different words with different meanings" defeats the point of the list, which is shared lexicon. Can is not the first term that comes to mind in Spanish for 'dog', but it's legitimate and informative to note in the context of the lexical comparison that it very much exists. Ditto if there has been some degree of semantic shift that hasn't taken it out of the semantic field shared by the lexeme in the other languages (such as warm/hot). Order and formatting can easily indicate primary/secondary terms. Barefoot through the chollas (talk) 21:32, 5 November 2020 (UTC)

>> Can is not the first term that comes to mind in Spanish for 'dog'. // Well, "can" it's not the first term in the Spanish column; it comes after "perro". Btw, why do "mujer/muller" belong to the second table, one with "different meanings"? It should be in the large table if we were to follow your logic. (I'm not saying your logic is wrong; just asking). Taurus Littrow (talk) 21:42, 5 November 2020 (UTC)

By the way, why is the English column at the beginning? Logically, the Catalan column should be there, since this is an article on the Catalan language, and we compare the other languages with Catalan rather than English. That would also solve the issue we're having here. And I still insist that the first column (be it the English or the Catalan) should have one word to avoid the mess and confusion. Taurus Littrow (talk) 22:14, 5 November 2020 (UTC)

I mentioned can/perro solely to illustrate that supplying more than one term can be informative. (IMO mujer/muller do not belong to the 'different meanings' list. And I have no idea why English is first. More informative might be the etymon, then Catalan.) Re the large table, I wonder of the comparison needs to include so many languages; the table resembles more something that would be useful in a Romance Languages article than an article on any single language. Though I'm a fan of le lingue sarde, and the Campidanese list is not without interest (although why Campidenese is selected of the various varieties isn't clear), it doesn't reveal much about Catalan. Deleting Campidanese might leave enough room for glossing shifts within semantic field, such as Romanian cald, or clarifying meanings in general, such as Spanish prender or parlar, Romanian a prinde, a cerceta. Barefoot through the chollas (talk) 22:52, 5 November 2020 (UTC)

Yes, the Campidanese language can definitely be "sacrificed", agreed. And we must clearly indicate what that table is about and what we want to show with it. As to the Romanian "cald", it's very similar to the Catalan "càlid"; the meaning is the same, too: warm. There are many other cognates in Catalan and Romanian (with the same meaning): ou, nou, bou, viu, mort, nascut/născut, camp/câmp, explicar/a explica, escoltar/a asculta, etc. As to a prinde and a cerceta, their meaning is quite different in Romanian, I'm afraid, although the origin is obviously the same. Taurus Littrow (talk) 23:14, 5 November 2020 (UTC)

Fully agreed that the table needs a brief intro re purpose. A candid one, and the purpose should not be rooted in Catalan political-linguistic cheerleading. And yes, as continuations of the same language, it would be odd if any two modern Romance varieties didn't share a lot of basic lexicon (although obvious Latinisms such as explicar should be excluded -- somewhat less obvious than French expliquer, but still no way EX+PLICARE could have come through the grinder of Catalan historical phonology all but unscathed). A little bit of poking around reveals no small amount of overlap in Catalan and Romanian reflexes of PRE(H)ENDERE, as would be expected. Less so in the case of CIRCARE, but some. See Largoplazo's explanations above -- the point here is not to direct non-natives to precise usage, but to illustrate shared cognates. Glossing Romanian cerceta as something like 'investigate' would seem to work fine, show that it's taken a narrowing specializing shift. Barefoot through the chollas (talk) 16:27, 6 November 2020 (UTC)

"Glossing Romanian cerceta as something like 'investigate' would seem to work fine." // I'd go with "to research", just like I mentioned in the edit history. The Romanian analogy for "to investigate" would be "a investiga". I'm from Moldova, so I fluently speak Romanian, although my native language is Russian. Agreed with the rest. Thanks. Taurus Littrow (talk) 16:43, 6 November 2020 (UTC)

Excellent. You be the judge and jury, then. If these examples below are genuine, research is too narrow. Investigate or examine work reasonably well with them.

• Încercam să-ți dau timp să poți cerceta camera. - I was trying to give you enough time so that you could search her room.
• Acest studiu va cerceta Scripturile în legătură cu subiectul originii răului. - In this lesson, we will search the Scriptures to find the origin of evil.
• Armata va cerceta Laputa cu ajutorul Sheetei. - The army will investigate Laputa with Sheeta's help.
• Ceea ce caut cu adevărat e un mandat de percheziție baban, să pot cerceta toate ungherele întunecate. - OK, look, what I'm really looking for is one of those big, fat warrants so I can investigate all dark corners of that place.
• Cu mare bucurie voi cerceta acest caz, superintendențe. - I will look into this for you, Superintendent, with great joy.
• Pot cerceta mai departe, dacă dorești. = I can look into it further, if you like.
• Cel puțin dă-mi motive pentru a-i cerceta telefonul. - At least give me grounds to search his phone.

Cheers. Barefoot through the chollas (talk) 17:17, 6 November 2020 (UTC)

Thanks. I'm afraid that the range of meanings of "a cerceta" in these examples is quite narrow, and the translations as such are quite free and not very good, to put it mildly. Each of the above sentences can be translated in several different (and better) ways. "A cerceta camera", "a cerceta telefonul" - I wonder where these examples were taken from. They don't sound naturally. "Laputa", "Sheeta" - what (or who) is that? The word "baban" is very rare, too. "Superintendențe" is a mistake or a typo; it should be "superintendente". Oh well, I'd still go with "to research", as I said; this would be the first choice in most of cases. Obviously, such a widespread word can be translated in dozens of ways, but the most popular translation would be "to research", by a great margin.

P.S. "Investigate" and "examine" work well indeed, but they wouldn't be the first choice, and they have equivalents in Romanian: "a investiga" and "a examina".

P.P.S. "Voi cerceta acest caz" - The verbatim translation would be "I will study/examine this case". But again, "to study" has an equivalent in Romanian, "a studia". Taurus Littrow (talk) 18:47, 6 November 2020 (UTC)

At first I had written this: Rarety of baban, who Laputa and Sheeta might be, are irrelevant, as also any typos. I can read the examples, but I have no judgement of idiomatic accuracy. I do of English, though, and 'research' is way out on the periphery of possibilities for most of them. 'Examine' fits best. But if you say 'search/examine his telephone', 'search/examine her room', 'investigate Laputa' wouldn't normally admit cerceta, I accept your judgment.

In light of your post scripts, I'll withdraw that acceptance somewhat. Your repetition of the notion that cognates are equivalents, accompanied by what seems to be reluctance to accept 'I'll study/examine this case' as equivalent of Voi cerceta acest caz because cognates of study and examine exist in Romanian -- and this in a context in which you've argued that cognates (e.g. reflexes of PRE(H)ENDERE) are not equivalents in spite of their contextual overlap -- leaves this discussion without moorings. Two friendly suggestions. 1) Conduct an experiment with a minimum of 5 bilinguals (or near-bilinguals), Russian and Moldovan should work well. Five sentences presented in one language, using a common non-specific (i.e. not swim, write, dig...) lexical verb in slightly different ways. The task is to translate into the other language, normal register, neither excessively formal nor excessively informal. Best if the translation is requested in the native or dominant language. Compare the results. 2) Do some exploration of lexical and cognitive semantics. Barefoot through the chollas (talk) 20:36, 6 November 2020 (UTC)

Well, I've been doing translations for many years, from and into many languages (Russian, Romanian and English for the most part), so I have a very large practice in this regard (I'm not very well versed in theory, though). Frankly, this discussion, although very interesting, has quite gone beyond the subject of this article, which is the Catalan language. I don't have much time for discussing this stuff, either. So I say, after you redo the table, I could take a look at it and come up with some suggestions and commentaries. But for now I guess I shall take my leave. Cheers. P.S. You can give me a text and ask me to translate it; I could do it. But discussing all that theoretical stuff is quite beyond my competence and knowledge, sorry. Taurus Littrow (talk) 21:03, 6 November 2020 (UTC)

Whoooossshhhh.... Point of the translation experiment missed entirely: different people will translate differently. I'm not going to re-do the table. I may tinker with it now and then, or repair some types of damage that may be done to it. Barefoot through the chollas (talk) 21:34, 6 November 2020 (UTC)

"Point of the translation experiment missed entirely: different people will translate differently." - Well, you should have told it so from the start. I'm fully aware of that, of course. As I said above, those sentences can be translated in many different ways, and that is basically true of any text. Different people can translate a text differently. This is hardly a revelation for any translator. Why, even the same person can translate a certain text differently: above, I translated "voi cerceta acest caz" in two different ways. And both translations are valid. Taurus Littrow (talk) 21:48, 6 November 2020 (UTC)

Barefoot, if you're looking for examples when "cerceta" means "research", take a look here: https://context.reverso.net/translation/romanian-english/a+cerceta Out of 9 visible examples, 6 are translated as "research" and 3 as "investigate":

• a cerceta pustiul Pluto - to investigate desolate Pluto;
• a cerceta situația - to investigate the matter;
• colectam gene ale criminalilor... pentru a cerceta - we collected genes from murderers... to research;
• a cerceta falsul - to research the forgery;
• a cerceta câteva legende urbane locale - of researching some urban legends around;
• a cerceta utilizările lemnului - to research the uses of wood;
• a cerceta și verifica afirmațiile - to research and verify... claims;
• a cerceta ceva despre moarte - researching something to [on the] death;
• a cerceta o furtună - to investigate a storm.

Now this is what I'd call good examples, taken from real life. Taurus Littrow (talk) 21:41, 6 November 2020 (UTC)

I'm familiar with journals such as Studii și cercetări lingvistice and Cercetări de lingvistică, and aware that both the noun and the verb often mean 'research'. That's not in question. Barefoot through the chollas (talk) 01:04, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

Not a language but a dialect

I'm shocked to see that the english wikipedia is so biased to consider catalan a language and not what it is, a dialect of spanish. You can ask it to anyone in the world and will tell you the same, only catalan separatists will say its a language. Therefore i ask for the wikipedia to redo this article or at least put on the banner of lack of neutrality,