Zompist Bboard Again

Ryusenshi wrote: ↑Sat May 23, 2020 3:58 pm If we're talking about wide-ranging changes: I suggest we change all language names that come from a country's name. If the country has several languages, it gives undue prominence to the one that has the same name ("Spanish" is only one of the languages spoken in Spain, so we'd better call it "Castilian"[%]). On the other hand, if the language is spoken in several countries, it gives undue prominence to one country (Portugal has no special claim on "Portuguese" compared to Brazil or even Angola). Plus, we could stop using stupid redundant expressions such as "English English" or "French French".

[%] Wait, does that name give undue prominence to the region of Castile?? Hum, this reform is going to be more complex than I thought...

bradrn wrote: ↑Sat May 23, 2020 7:44 pmIsn’t it already called Castillian?

Ryusenshi wrote: ↑Sat May 23, 2020 3:58 pm Wait, does that name give undue prominence to the region of Castile?? Hum, this reform is going to be more complex than I thought...

Ryusenshi wrote: ↑Sat May 23, 2020 3:58 pm If we're talking about wide-ranging changes: I suggest we change all language names that come from a country's name. If the country has several languages, it gives undue prominence to the one that has the same name ("Spanish" is only one of the languages spoken in Spain, so we'd better call it "Castilian"[%]). On the other hand, if the language is spoken in several countries, it gives undue prominence to one country (Portugal has no special claim on "Portuguese" compared to Brazil or even Angola). Plus, we could stop using stupid redundant expressions such as "English English" or "French French".

[%] Wait, does that name give undue prominence to the region of Castile?? Hum, this reform is going to be more complex than I thought...

Yalensky wrote: ↑Sat May 23, 2020 10:45 pm

Ryusenshi wrote: ↑Sat May 23, 2020 3:58 pm If we're talking about wide-ranging changes: I suggest we change all language names that come from a country's name. If the country has several languages, it gives undue prominence to the one that has the same name ("Spanish" is only one of the languages spoken in Spain, so we'd better call it "Castilian"[%]). On the other hand, if the language is spoken in several countries, it gives undue prominence to one country (Portugal has no special claim on "Portuguese" compared to Brazil or even Angola). Plus, we could stop using stupid redundant expressions such as "English English" or "French French".

[%] Wait, does that name give undue prominence to the region of Castile?? Hum, this reform is going to be more complex than I thought...

One idea that I find poetic: replacing geographic names with names derived from the qualities that speakers ascribe to those languages. Already existing examples would be Sanskrit "well-made" and Nahuatl "clear". Likewise the "common speech" spoken in countless fantasy worlds. Bonus points for deriving the name from some famous quote about the language.

Spanish > limpiado, fijado, or espléndido (which keeps the ISO 639-1 code es) from the motto of the Real Academia Española "limpia, fija, y da esplendor". It also happens to be the motto of the Academia's Mexican counterpart as well, which helps keep it less Spain-centric.
French > le immortel, along similar lines as Spanish.
Russian > velikomoguchiy, from Turgenev's famous description of Russian as the "great and mighty" language that is his sole comfort while thinking about depressing national affairs.
English > the only famous quotations about English that come to mind is the one about English rifling through other langs' pockets for loanwords and the cliche that English is "three languages in a trenchcoat". "Pickpocket-speech" will have to do until we think of something suitably sublime.

zompist wrote: ↑Sat May 23, 2020 9:22 pmRuin a language name by changing one letter

Tropylium wrote: ↑Sun May 24, 2020 3:54 pm

zompist wrote: ↑Sat May 23, 2020 9:22 pmRuin a language name by changing one letter

Think got me thinking how much is it possible to move between language names just by changing one letter. Probably a fair amount between simple CVCV and CVC names, other examples are going to be rarer.
– Romanian ↔ Aromanian (possibly should be considered trivial)
– Lycian ↔ Lydian ↔ Ludian ↔ Luwian (one of these is unlike the others)
– Hindi ↔ Tindi

Any substantially longer language name is however probably going to be an edit distance of more like half a dozen away from the closest name. Even cases like Tadaksahak ↔ Tabassaran (edit distance 4, or 1 per syllable) already seem closeish really.

• Jarawa (from the Andaman Islands) vs Jarawa (from Nigeria) vs Jarawara (from South America)
• Arawan (South American language family, contains Jarawara) vs Arawakan (another South American language family)
• Marawan vs Marawá (both Arawakan)
• Kabyle (Algeria) vs Kabiye (Togo) vs Kabie (Sino-Tibetan)
• Wampar (Lower Markham) vs Wampur (Upper Markham)
• Mari (Upper Markham) vs Mari (Uralic)
• Quechuan (South American language family) vs Quechan (Yuman language from Arizona)
• Mande (West African language families) vs Manda (Dravidian) vs Mandaic (a variety of Aramaic)

Yalensky wrote: ↑Sat May 23, 2020 3:57 amThis does show one of the problems with naming related languages after a cognate set: you get a lot of very very similar names!

Yalensky wrote: ↑Sat May 23, 2020 3:57 amThis does show one of the problems with naming related languages after a cognate set: you get a lot of very very similar names!

flicky wrote: ↑Sat Apr 03, 2021 8:20 am

Yalensky wrote: ↑Sat May 23, 2020 3:57 amThis does show one of the problems with naming related languages after a cognate set: you get a lot of very very similar names!

This comment made me think - how about you name each language after a word where that language famously uses a completely different word from most other languages? My first thought for English was "pineapple".