I think it is important that we know exactly what the new constitution
states. Does anyone have a copy of the original that can be consulted?
I will try to find one also.
Milicent Wewerka, Library of Congress
>>> Joan Spanne <[log in to unmask]> 10/23/07 12:10 PM >>>
While linguistically, the situation of Montenegrin and Serbian possibly
parallels that of Valencian and Catalan, politically they do not.
Montenegrin has been declared to be an official national language
distinct
(though hard to distinguish!) from Serbian. (My primary grounds for not
encoding Valencian separately was the clear unity of the language in
statements from governmental bodies and their designated academies.) It
seems to me the closer parallel is with Romanian [ron]/[rum/[ro] and
Moldavian [mol]/[mo]. I was in favor of merging Moldavian into
Romanian,
but apart from Peter, it seemed no one else on the JAC supported that
(discussion, if any, predated my participation on the JAC).
But following the Valencian logic, another option could be considered:
should Montenegrin be included as another name for [srp]/[scc]/[sr]
Serbian? (I had nearly suggested this last week). I do not think
Montenegrin has any place next to (as another name for) Serbo-Croatian,
the macrolanguage in 639-3. At issue: is Montenegrin =now= any more
closely aligned with (or more similar to) Serbian than is Croatian or
Bosnian and what will its development be? Without ethnic, religious,
and
major script usage issues at play (as with Bosnian and Croatian), the
grounds for separation seem much less certain (and the separations
between
the other three are already uncertain enough). The practical
orthography
seems to be the area in which Montenegin proponents are working, to
standardize the writing of the ijekavian dialect as distinct from the
ekavian dialect of Serbia.
The latest update to the Wikipedia article is of interest, updated last
Friday (and surprisingly well documented, though likely biased);
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Montenegrin_language
I also found this discussion of help:
http://www.esiweb.org/index.php?lang=en&id=271
This last one, though, highlights the parallel between Montenegrin and
Croatian and Bosnian. IF we were to take a position that placed
Montenegrin and Serbian together, and subsequently the languages
diverge
(as there is movement to do, though no telling at this point what
progress
it will make over time), then we will be faced with a need to split
Serbian/Montenegrin. Part 2 does not handle splits gracefully. (In
fact,
if this were strictly a 639-3 code element, I would possibly be
considering this even now as a split of Serbian, as everyone seems to
acknowledge that Montenegrin is a "dialect" of Serbian.)
This link from the Permanent Committee on Geographical Names (UK) gives
great background on the linguistic side, though it was written late in
2006.
http://www.pcgn.org.uk/Montenegro2.pdf
It seems we have three possibilities:
take no action (in effect, reject the request, perhaps subject to
subsequent development)
create a separate code element for Montenegrin (I presume it would not
be
handled as a Serbian split)
add Montenegrin as a name to be used with [srp]/[scc]/[sr]
Are there any others? Personally, I prefer 1, but the JAC pattern seems
to
be more along the lines of 2, and it is difficult to argue against any
form of inclusion for a recognized national language.
-Joan
Peter Constable <[log in to unmask]>
Sent by: ISO 639 Joint Advisory Committee <[log in to unmask]>
2007-10-23 09:17 AM
Please respond to
ISO 639 Joint Advisory Committee <[log in to unmask]>
To
[log in to unmask]
cc
Subject
Re: Proposition for coding a new language name "Montenegrin" inside ISO
639-1 "me" (and deprecation of "sh" Serbo-Croatian) and ISO 639-2 "mno"
(fwd)
In spite of the B/C/S mess, there isn’t anybody for whom this makes
sense
n terms of technical merits. Nobody gains, and everybody loses.
These IDs don’t exist simply for the sake of some documentarian
wanting to
record that some language identity exists. They exist for practical use
in
information systems. Creating a new identifier for Montenegrin will
only
create problems in practical applications. Librarians and other
catalogers
will have to make the decision Is this record in Montenegrin or
Serbian?
which in principle has no answer – arbitrariness is avoided only if
the
source is identifiably within one of these two countries, and very
often
that will not be the case or the information will not be available.
Terminologists, localizers and others maintaining language resources
would
need to manage redundant content.
I realize that there’s more involved than purely technical concerns,
but I
would push back on this request until we have very strong indication of
necessity. Simply because someone reports that some body declares their
language to be called “Montenegrin” (or “Valencian”) is not
enough to rush
to make changes.
Peter
From: ISO 639 Joint Advisory Committee [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On
Behalf
Of Joan Spanne
Sent: Wednesday, October 17, 2007 10:17 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Proposition for coding a new language name "Montenegrin"
inside ISO 639-1 "me" (and deprecation of "sh" Serbo-Croatian) and ISO
639-2 "mno" (fwd)
Having recognized Bosnian, Croatian and Serbian separately, it would
seem
that there is no line of defense against a separate Montenegrin, but it
should also make a 4th in the Serbo-Croatian macrolanguage, with regard
to
639-3. Serbo-Croatian [sh] is already deprecated in 639-1, so we should
not have to revisit that discussion. However, the point does beg the
question: where would one discover that [sh] is part of 639-1 but is
deprecated, apart from the ISO 639-3 website (which only recently has
noted the fact of its deprecation), since there is no list of ISO 639-1
codes on the 639-1/RA website, and it is not listed anywhere on the ISO
639-2 RA's site (since it is not encoded in Part 2, and the LoC site
has
no separate alpha-2 code list)?
-Joan
"Rebecca S. Guenther" <[log in to unmask]>
Sent by: ISO 639 Joint Advisory Committee <[log in to unmask]>
2007-10-16 03:23 PM
Please respond to
ISO 639 Joint Advisory Committee <[log in to unmask]>
To
[log in to unmask]
cc
Subject
Re: Proposition for coding a new language name "Montenegrin" inside ISO
639-1 "me" (and deprecation of "sh" Serbo-Croatian) and ISO 639-2 "mno"
(fwd)
Dear ISO 639 JAC members:
See the below. I did receive the submission back in March, and thought
I
sent it on to Havard, but am not certain. I do not seem to have it
electronically anymore, but Mr. Lang did fax me the submission. He says
the
same in the submitted form as he says below.
This should be a controversial issue. I do realize that the code "mno"
is
already taken-- we would suggest another one if there is merit to this
request.
Rebecca
---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Mon, 15 Oct 2007 08:33:37 +0200
From: "[iso-8859-1] Lang Gérard" <[log in to unmask]>
To: "[iso-8859-1] Håvard Hjulstad" <[log in to unmask]>,
[log in to unmask]
Cc: [log in to unmask], "[iso-8859-1] Lang Gérard" <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: RE: Proposition for coding a new language name "Montenegrin"
inside ISO 639-1 "me" (and deprecation of "sh" Serbo-Croatian) and
ISO
639-2 "mno"
Dear Havard,
I thank you for your answer.
I must insist that my proposal has effectively been proposed
electronically, using the form on the ISO 639 JAC web site
http://www.loc.gov/standards/iso639-2jac.html on Monday 03/09/2007 at
12:28, just before issuing my linked message for you and
[log in to unmask] the same day at 12:30. I have a copy of my electronic
propposition to the web site
http://www.loc.gov/standards/iso639-2/php/iso639-2form.php .
Bien cordialement.
Gérard LANG
________________________________
De : Håvard Hjulstad [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
Envoyé : dimanche 14 octobre 2007 14:04
À : Lang Gérard; [log in to unmask]
Objet : SV: Proposition for coding a new language name
"Montenegrin" inside ISO 639-1 "me" (and deprecation of "sh"
Serbo-Croatian) and ISO 639-2 "mno"
Dear Gérard,
Any proposals to change the alpha-2 og alpha-3 language
code of ISO 639-1 and -2 needs to be submitted electronically, using
the
form on the ISO 639 JAC web site:
http://www.loc.gov/standards/iso639-2/iso639jac.html.
Best regards,
Håvard Hjulstad
[correct email address for work-related communication
is
[log in to unmask]]
________________________________
Fra: Lang Gérard [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
Sendt: 12. oktober 2007 15:39
Til: Lang Gérard; [log in to unmask]
Kopi: [log in to unmask]
Emne: RE: Proposition for coding a new language name
"Montenegrin" inside ISO 639-1 "me" (and deprecation of "sh"
Serbo-Croatian) and ISO 639-2 "mno"
Dear All,
Do you have taken any decision concerning my
proposition
relative
to the language name "Montenegrin" ?
Regards.
Gérard LANG
_____________________________________________
De : Lang Gérard
Envoyé : lundi 3 septembre 2007
12:30
À : [log in to unmask]
Cc : [log in to unmask]; Lang
Gérard
Objet : Proposition for coding a new
language name "Montenegrin" inside ISO 639-1 "me" (and deprecation of
"sh"
Serbo-Croatian) and ISO 639-2 "mno"
Dear All,
Considering that the article 12 of the
soon-to-be future
new Constitution of the Republic of Montenegro writes:
"In Montenegro, Montenegrin shall be
the
language in
official use. Cyrillic and Latin alphabets shall be deemed to be
equal."
I propose to insert a new language
name
"Montenegrin"
inside ISO 639-1 (code element "me") and ISO 639-2 (code element
"mno").
Moreover, as it appears that
"Montenegrin" is only a new
name for the same language, whose another old name has been
"Serbo-Croatian" that is being coded inside ISO 639-1 (code element
"sh"),
but not inside ISO 639-2 (in contrariety with the promise in the
common
phrase written inside the introductions of ISO 639-1 and of ISO 639-2
that:
"The languages listed in ISO 639-1 are
a
subset of the
languages listed in this part of ISO 639; every language code in the
two
letters code set has has a corresponding language code in the alpha-3
list, but not necessarily vice-versa",
I also propose to deprecate the old
code
element "sh", so
that the promise can be filled !
Gérard LANG
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