On 01/06/2003 06:05:32 AM Håvard Hjulstad wrote:

>On 2002-10-30 I sent out a number of messages relating to requests from
>Susan Summer to register alpha-3 identifiers for the following languages:
>Mordvin, Udmurt, Adygei, Kabardian, Ingush, Dargwa, Karachay-Balkar,
Crimean
>Tatar, Nogai, Altai, and Kalmyk.
>
>There has not been very much discussion, except about Kalmyk, and in
>particular its relation to Oirat.

Some comments on requests other than Kalmyk:

Udmurt, Adygei, Kabardian, Ingush, Dargwa, Crimean Tatar, Nogai: Ethnologue
lists these as individual languages, hence we would consider them to be
appropriate for encoding as a distinct, individual languages.

Mordvin: Our position is to concur with Michael: there are two distinct
languages: Moksha and Erzya. The alternative would be to encode a
collective identifier for "Mordvinic languages", but we received outside
input (via Havard) discouraging the idea of doing just that alone. Our
recommendation would be to encode two individual languages; encoding of a
collective could be considered later if there is such a user request.

Karachay-Balkar: Michael mentioned two alphabets. The research behind the
Ethnologue has not thus far (that I know of) demonstrated that there are
two distinct languages. Our recommendation would be to encode as a single
language at this time.

Altai: We would recommend encoding "Southern Altai".



- Peter


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Peter Constable

Non-Roman Script Initiative, SIL International
7500 W. Camp Wisdom Rd., Dallas, TX 75236, USA
Tel: +1 972 708 7485