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A dead languages challenge? | ||
Tags: Dead Languages | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log |  | |
| Josquin Heptaglot Senior Member Germany Joined 4633 days ago 2266 posts - 3992 votes  Speaks: German*, English, French, Latin, Italian, Russian, Swedish Studies: Japanese, Irish, Portuguese, Persian | Message 49 of 75 15 February 2014 at 1:30pm | IP Logged | |||||
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This sounds like a sensible solution to the problem. Thanks a lot, emk!
I also think it's good to allow annotated texts. In some classical languages, especially in poetry, you simply don't get along without some help. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Serpent Octoglot Senior Member Russian Federation serpent-849.livejour Joined 6386 days ago 9753 posts - 15779 votes 4 sounds Speaks: Russian*, English, FinnishC1, Latin, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese Studies: Danish, Romanian, Polish, Belarusian, Ukrainian, Croatian, Slovenian, Catalan, Czech, Galician, Dutch, Swedish | Message 50 of 75 15 February 2014 at 2:27pm | IP Logged | |||||
1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
 emk Diglot Moderator United States Joined 5321 days ago 2615 posts - 8806 votes Speaks: English*, FrenchB2 Studies: Spanish, Ancient Egyptian Personal Language Map | Message 51 of 75 15 February 2014 at 4:02pm | IP Logged | |||||
This was intended as a restatement of my original rules, not a change. Sorry to have misled you. :-) Languages like Sanskrit can be included in the main challenge as classical languages, despite showing a few very modest signs of life, because they were once great languages of scholarship and religion, and I don't want to rule them out because of a few villages. If somebody finds another language like this, it can go in the main challenge, too. I don't know much about Karelian. According to Wikipedia, it has maybe 5,000 speakers in Finland, mostly elderly, and they don't really speak on a day-to-day basis. So Finish Karelian would probably qualify as "dead" by the playground test. But it also sounds like there are another 100,000 speakers in Russia, and they actually have Karelian-language elementary schools. If this is true, then Karelian doesn't qualify as "dead." So based on my limited knowledge, it doesn't seem like Karelian really qualifies as a "dead" or "classic" language. But like I said, if that's the case, then you're still welcome to use the main tracker for Karelian as an honorary "life-support" language. And the "life-support" folks can make their own challenge rules, because they'll probably have different issues and concerns. Dates. The challenge will run through September 1st. This is for everybody who asked for a summer challenge, and because I know that even a half-page of hieroglyphs per day represents a real time commitment. I haven't decided on an official start date yet, and in any case, I probably won't be able to build the tracker for another month or so. But I intend to err on the side of a long challenge, despite the low page count, because when you have people considering Classical Chinese and Classical Tibetan, even "extensive" reading may get pretty intensive at times. There will be an option for people who want to read more than 100 pages, or who want sign up in multiple dead languages. Don't let us slowpokes hold you back. :-) 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Serpent Octoglot Senior Member Russian Federation serpent-849.livejour Joined 6386 days ago 9753 posts - 15779 votes 4 sounds Speaks: Russian*, English, FinnishC1, Latin, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese Studies: Danish, Romanian, Polish, Belarusian, Ukrainian, Croatian, Slovenian, Catalan, Czech, Galician, Dutch, Swedish | Message 52 of 75 15 February 2014 at 6:22pm | IP Logged | |||||
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It's taught in schools, but the children are non-natives and afaiu it's not used for regular subjects like maths. Also I now found an article that explicitly says there are no villages where it remains the main language of communication :(
The 100k number is old too, according to the 2010 census it's more like 33k total/26k in Russia/12k natives :( And even this is dubious, since apparently for many it's a question of ethnical identity and they can barely communicate in the language. According to the same census, my mum speaks fluent English... UNESCO classifies two dialects as definitely endangered and one as severely endangered. That said, if there's enough interest, I'd be happy to lead the "living" part of the challenge. Although I think the concerns are largely the same. Maybe audio could be an optional part where available. Interestingly, Maltese is considered safe and Belarusian vulnerable. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
 Iversen Super Polyglot Moderator Denmark berejst.dk Joined 6492 days ago 9078 posts - 16473 votes Speaks: Danish*, French, English, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, Swedish, Esperanto, Romanian, Catalan Studies: Afrikaans, Greek, Norwegian, Russian, Serbian, Icelandic, Latin, Irish, Lowland Scots, Indonesian, Polish, Croatian Personal Language Map | Message 53 of 75 15 February 2014 at 10:30pm | IP Logged | |||||
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While you sort out the definitions I have had a look at my book shelves, and here I found the anthology "Oldnordisk Læsebog" by Ludwig Wimmer. I have read the first 40 pages during a train trip today, and I'm going to write a few words about the content in my log thread in a moment. But let me say that it isn't totally uncharted territory - the stories are wellknown in Denmark and sometimes beyond, and I have worked my way through at least some of them earlier as an extension of my study of Modern Icelandic - but not recently, and this time I'll read the book through from A to Z. So according to my own understanding of the challenge I'm through 40% of the scheduled 100 pages, and now I only lack the last 95 pages - given that the comments (which I skip) and the wordlist (which I have ignored so far) fill up more than half of this book. And then I may take on Saxo later. Edited by Iversen on 15 February 2014 at 10:33pm 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| emk Diglot Moderator United States Joined 5321 days ago 2615 posts - 8806 votes Speaks: English*, FrenchB2 Studies: Spanish, Ancient Egyptian Personal Language Map | Message 54 of 75 15 February 2014 at 11:07pm | IP Logged | |||||
Well, yes, this challenge may be a bit on the easy side for Iceland speakers reading Old Norse. :-) Or for English speakers reading The Canterbury Tales, for that matter:
So when I put the challenge tracker online, I'll make sure that it keeps counting after the first 100 pages, for those who wish to do more. But meanwhile I shall be girding myself for battle just to finish all 1,000-odd words of Peter Rabbit and log my first 4 pages. :-) In my spare time, I've been retyping the text and doing an intensive read-through: 
Once I finish my first pass, I hope to re-reread it extensively for the challenge. I'm really hoping this will get a lot easier after 20 full-sized pages or so! Edited by emk on 15 February 2014 at 11:09pm 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Iversen Super Polyglot Moderator Denmark berejst.dk Joined 6492 days ago 9078 posts - 16473 votes Speaks: Danish*, French, English, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, Swedish, Esperanto, Romanian, Catalan Studies: Afrikaans, Greek, Norwegian, Russian, Serbian, Icelandic, Latin, Irish, Lowland Scots, Indonesian, Polish, Croatian Personal Language Map | Message 55 of 75 16 February 2014 at 10:48pm | IP Logged | |||||
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I got through the rest of the texts in Wimmer today - apart from some 10 pages which I skipped because I found them boring. As emk stresses it isn't hard to read Old Norse if you can read Icelandic, but maybe I should point out that Icelandic still isn't on the list of languages I claim to speak.
Edited by Iversen on 16 February 2014 at 10:51pm 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| akkadboy Triglot Senior Member France Joined 5197 days ago 264 posts - 497 votes Speaks: French*, English, Yiddish Studies: Latin, Ancient Egyptian, Welsh | Message 56 of 75 17 February 2014 at 9:51am | IP Logged | |||||
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Great, things are beginning to take shape.
Emk, when do you think will be the official launching of the challenge, 1st of March ? Will there be a common log or does each participant have to create his own ? Or maybe pairing up "related" languages (Latin/Ancient Greek, Gothic/Old Norse/Old English...) could be nice as it may help people to keep motivated. Just a thought... I "read" (i. e. translated) a couple of Classical Tibetan pages this week-end and clearly this is going to be quite a challenge. Lack of vocabulary means I'm spending much of my time looking up words. Sort of reminds me of my early Latin days. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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