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Liars

Since when a good referenced source is denied? I mean the European Parliament rezolution to forbid the usage of notion "Moldovan language".--211.233.41.22 (talk) 17:45, 19 November 2007 (UTC)

This topic contains controversial issues, some of which have reached a consensus for approach and neutrality, and some of which may be disputed. Before making any potentially controversial changes to the article, please carefully read the discussion-page dialogue to see if the issue has been raised before, and ensure that your edit meets all of Misplaced Pages's policies and guidelines. Please also ensure you use an accurate and concise edit summary.

Archives

Talk:Moldovan language/archive01 (prior to 05:25, 14 November 2005 UTC) Talk:Moldovan language/archive02 (05:25, 14 November 2005 UTC to 22:43, 16 November 2005 UTC) Talk:Moldovan language/archive03 (22:43, 16 November 2005 UTC to 20:28, 18 November 2005 UTC) Talk:Moldovan language/archive04 (20:28, 18 November 2005 UTC to 18:07, 19 November 2005 UTC) Talk:Moldovan language/archive05 (18:07, 19 November 2005 UTC to 00:19, 20 November 2005 UTC) Talk:Moldovan language/archive06 (00:19, 19 November 2005 UTC to 08:42, 03 December 2005 UTC) Talk:Moldovan language/archive07 (08:42, 03 December 2005 UTC to 22:00, 04 December 2005 UTC) Talk:Moldovan language/archive08 (00:56, 05 December 2005 UTC to 21:57, 05 December 2005 UTC) Talk:Moldovan language/archive09 (19:17, 05 December 2005 UTC to 17:12, 07 December 2005 UTC) Talk:Moldovan language/archive10 (19:09, 07 December 2005 UTC to 11:31, 11 December 2005 UTC) Talk:Moldovan language/archive11 (11:37, 11 December 2005 UTC to 09:36, 4 January 2006 UTC) Talk:Moldovan language/archive12 (07:10, 8 January 2006 UTC to 01:33, 1 May 2006 UTC)

Now then

This article needs to change. Don't ask what I mean, or what parts I want to change, if you've ever edited this article before, you know very well which parts I am talking about. Bogdangiusca seems to think he has a monopoly on this page. He does not. He is not entitled to revert everybody else's edits as he wishes. He acts as if the current version is canon. It isn't.

Now, in the history of this article, it's clear that the current version was not formed by a consensus of opposing parties, but rather, a consensus of one side of the argument. --Node 06:36, 2 June 2006 (UTC)

There are no two parties. We have you vs. everyone else. bogdan 07:44, 2 June 2006 (UTC)

No -- we have me, vs Romanians. There are other parties (such as Oleg Alexandrov, Khoikhoi, Francis Tyers), but none of them have been involved as much as they would need to be to keep this from being a one-sided debate. --Node 00:24, 3 June 2006 (UTC)

Ummm, you can count me out, I don't mean to offend you or anything. The thing is, the whole reason "people" like Bonaparte came here in the first place is because of the conflict on this page. I suggest we just leave it as it is. —Khoikhoi 00:38, 3 June 2006 (UTC)

I don't think that's a good argument. Nobody said achieving NPOV would be easy, did they? But isn't that our ultimate goal? You seem to recognize that the currentversion isn't NPOV, but think we should leave it as it is so as not to attract trolls. I suppose it would make more sense to wait for more Moldovans so the fight can be Moldovans vs Moldovans rather than Romanians vs Node. --Node

If you want Moldovans, then here I am. Vox Populi (TSO) 01:11, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

That's "moldoveni", Tso1d. More than one. A horde. Fetch us a horde of Moldovans! --Node 05:15, 8 June 2006 (UTC)`

Well, there aren't that many on Misplaced Pages. In any case, I agree that we should not modify the article right now as that would only create another endless battle. TSO1D 13:37, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

Oh, Node goes again with "everybody who goes against me is certainly not from Republic of Moldova thingie ?", he just keeps forgetting... --Just a tag

You aren't a real Moldovan, colleague. You, little man, are just like like a transformer -- a robot in disguise. --Node 07:13, 22 June 2006 (UTC)

I now begin to wonder who's that mythical beast - the REAL moldovan, is it like Neo from the Matrix ? As for being like a bot, you know, some people call it living a life outside of computers and wikipedias, try pondering on that for a while ;) ---Just a tag 09:15, 22 June 2006 (UTC)

So who's the second "moldovan"? It seems to me that you are alone in Category:User_mo . Dpotop 17:50, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

Node you shouldn't say stuff like "No -- we have me, vs Romanians". This makes it look like you see this thing as a quest by you against the Romanians and it does not help your argument because it makes you seem very POV against Romanians and not an objective Wikipedian. But, like you said, maybe we should wait a little for some Moldovans to start getting themselves involved here - and I don't just mean people of mixed ancestry who grew up their whole lives in the USA and who cannot speak the language fluently (or in retrospect to be fair, Moldvoans from the Romanian part of Moldova who likewise do not know what things are like on the other side of the Pruth). This debate should be done by actual Moldovans from there, that have seen the situation on the ground there, and have lived there and know exactly what they are talking about - because as far as the rest of us goes we all have preconceived ideas of what this article should look like. As far as my personal experience goes, I have visited Moldova and I can tell you, Moldovans are as different from each other as they are from the rest of the world : you can find super-Romanians there and you can find the biggest Romanian-haters in that little country. Dapiks 00:13, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

When are you going to stop hating Moldovans? --Node 07:12, 22 June 2006 (UTC)

Nobody hates Moldovans buddy, just little immature brats ( I am not pointing fingers to anyone). Dapiks 20:44, 22 June 2006 (UTC)

That is a clear personal attack. Please retract it. --Node 02:26, 26 June 2006 (UTC)

Good to see things haven't changed much here. Winona Gone Shopping 03:23, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

Stati's interview

I was trying to find Vasile Stati's interview to read it again, and I see the external link to the interview is no longer listed in the article. Or did I miss it? Finally I found it on the internet here. If it's really missing from the article I suggest we link it again.

And the main question: In this interview Stati says that Romanian and Moldovan, in their literary forms, are identical. Why does the article say that Stati disputes this?

Stati's exact statement was: "Incontestabil, forma literară, cea mai elevată a limbii moldoveneşti, forma cultă, prelucrată de scriitori şi lingvişti, este identică cu forma literară a limbii româneşti." — AdiJapan ☎ 10:22, 23 June 2006 (UTC)

Moldovans wanted! :)

I'll give a barnstar to any person that points me to a native Moldovan language speaker on wikipedia. I'll also support him, were he/she wishing to become admin on the Moldovan wikipedia. Dpotop 09:00, 24 June 2006 (UTC)

Note: the previous offer is meant to show that no such thing as a "Moldovan" speaker exists on the whole wikipedia. Dpotop 09:02, 24 June 2006 (UTC)

Marcu Gabinschi

I never heard of him. Khoikhoi, do you have an exact citation of his affirmations? bogdan 21:33, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

According to this, he wrote a book called "Reconvergence of Moldavian towards Romanian", which inclines me to believe that he has the Moldovanist views on the language. I also found something in Romanian, from this PDF:

În cartea Limba şi politica în Republica Moldova articolele au fost publicate în ordinea cronologică a apariţei lor. Studiul Limba şi naţunea în Republica Moldova n-a fost publicat în original ci a fost trimis pentru editare la Chişinău, în traducerea lui Marcu Gabinschi. Articolul Limba şi literatura în Basarabia şi Transnistria a fost retipărit în traducerea lui Grigore Chiper în 1991 în trei numere ale Revistei de lingvistică şi ştiinţă literară. Articolul Eminescu în Republica Moldova este reprodus după textul apărut în trei numere ale revistei Limba română (Chişinău) din 1995, fără a se indica dacă acesta a fost sau nu publicat în limba germană în traducerea lui Florin Manolescu. Articolele Româna: Moldoveneasca şi Moldoveneasca sub semnul restructurării şi al publicaţei au fost traduse de Marcu Gabinschi.

I have a feeling, however, that the above might prove me wrong. If so, please don't laugh at me. :p —Khoikhoi 23:22, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

Hm... Well, that "Reconvergence of Moldavian towards Romanian" probably refers to the local spoken dialects, not the official language. You know, like how they had the word "curechi" for "cabbage" and now it's more commonly used "varză", from standard Romanian. bogdan 08:24, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

Bogdan, I cited this text before to you, it refers exactly to the official language. --Node 01:24, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

Ok, I'll do some more research. What did the Romanian text say? —Khoikhoi 08:35, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

Nothing much, it just lists the articles/books.

In the book "Language and politics in Rep. Mold.", the articles were published in chronological order. The study "Language and nation in Rep. Mold." was not published in its original form, but was sent for editing to Chişinău, in the translation of Marcu Gabinschi... etc.

bogdan 14:46, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

There are 11 Archives above. Don't open another war Khoikhoi. --Just a tag 2 20:16, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

Banned as impostor impersonating User:Just a tag. bogdan 20:25, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

Russianism

there is a new article created, Russianism. Please update it with examples from Moldovan langauge. `'mikka (t) 23:13, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

The current version of the article seems to be fair

I am a person who lives in Chisinau (the capital of Moldova); I speak Romanian, so I might be the guy "from Moldova who hangs out on Misplaced Pages" you were looking for.

My opinion is that the article is fair*, because it emphasizes that there is a lot of controversy on the topic. Perhaps this is the optimal solution that can be reached at this point. You need to understand that this is an tricky discussion point inside the country, and as long as there is no consensus in Moldova, it is likely that this Misplaced Pages discussion will keep consuming our valuable time in vain.

Why is it still a dispute after more than 10 years of independence? This is a consequence of Russia's aggressive 'rusification' policy.

Has anyone read Orwell's "1984"? If so, then you must be familiar with the strategy which involves the complete re-write of all printed material, so that it matches the new 'facts'. That's exactly what happened here throughout the years - the alphabete was changed, history books were altered, people were deported, etc. It takes time to recover from that, and it takes even longer if Russia's strong grip is still felt. Economically, Russia's decisions can have a negative impact on Moldova's stability, so we are still constrained in our freedom (political, military, economical).

As a Moldovan who is dedicated to his country, I would extend the article by making it more pro-Romanian; but that would of course bring life back into the zealots who are on the other side of the barricades, resulting in another holy war.

If anybody has doubts about my really being a citizen of Moldova, you can call a +373 number (this is our code) I can provide, or I can call you myself and hope that your caller ID works right.

I should also add that I speak Russian (it was my first language), I lived in Ukraine, Russia, Romania (and some other states which aren't in this area, so mentioning them is not relevant), and now I am a resident of Chisinau. I believe this allows me to see the big picture.

You might be interested why there aren't many 'authentic moldovans' contributing; I can't tell for sure, but my best guess is that others have problems to handle (get a job, get a decent education, etc), so spending time on the Internet is not something which directly contributes to these primary objectives. People have other priorities at the moment; if you take a look at Maslow's pyramid, you'll understand what I mean.

Gr8dude 22:45, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

Moldovan language doesn't exist

I also live in Chisinau, Moldova and speak Romainian as my native language. It's very sad to know that people want us to be considered as different nation from Romanians. You can call my number too, if you want to be sure that I'm telling the truth. 326 19:02, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

It does, as long as it is mentioned in the Moldavian consitution. IT_ERA_ZI 12:40, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

A Moldavian professor

Interesting info from POSTICA GHEORGHE: CIVILIZATIA MEDIEVALA TIMPURIE DIN SPATIUL PRUTO-NISTREAN (SECOLELE V-XIII) is found here. The first chapter has a lot of info which could be used on the Moldovan language article (e.g. the fact that, due to political reasons, as to expand their influence in Romania, the Soviets at actually supported the Moldovan-Romanian equality in the beggining, and only later, after WW2, they switched to the "Moldovan" theory instead...) Greier 11:45, 28 November 2006 (UTC)

ro.wp article

I was surprised, last time I checked the corresponding article at ro.wp, it actually seemed more neutral and more well-researched than the en.wp article. Granted, there is a little bit of bias, with a generalised Russophobic tilt, but it's pretty mild. I've made a loose adaptation here.

Two major ongoing issues are:

• How do we refer to Transnistria? We can use the pro-Moldavian phrasage "unrecognized territory" or "seperatist region", which hides the fact that it is de facto independent and excercises control over most (if not all) of the territory it claims, or we can use the pro-independence phraseage "de facto independent state" or "self-governing territory", which do not explicitly mention that it is not internationally recognised. We could of course mention that it is already de facto independent but is not internationally recognised de jure, but that is too wordy, after all this article is not about Transnistria. I personally favour "disputed region", but that does not acknowledge the challenges many people here have levelled against the authority or the relevance of the separatist government (although it is undeniable that they have the basic organs of statehood, and those organs operate fully, including a parliament, a constitutional court, and to the best of my knowledge, they tax their citizens and operate a police force)
• How do we refer to the Soviet period? Was it an occupation or not? Many sentimental unionists would like to demonize the USSR and call it an occupation, but it's not that clear-cut. --Node 23:43, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

For the discussion on Transnistria, we are having the same debate at Transnistria if you want to take a look, so I'm not sure what to say at this point. As for whether the term occupation is justified or not might, this may be challanged by the complex legal situation of the period, however it is still the best term to use for that period and most modern historical sources refer to it as such. TSO1D 00:03, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

That sounds indeed much better to me, though it lacks the description of the usage of cyrillic. Could someone read/translate that article aswell, to get all POVs? The German wikipedia has a nice neutral seeming article on topic. I'll translate it if anyone 'd ask!IT_ERA_ZI 13:45, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

To newcomers: I suggest not taking Node lightly. The guy may simply want to re-ignite the edit war here. For those who want to talk about WP:AGF, take a look at edits one year old. I presume the only way to switch this is to make a full parallel adit, and then, when everybody has agreed upon all details, replace it. Dpotop 19:28, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

Dpotop, that is a clear personal attack. I would RPA, but then I would be accused of censorship. If you think that I ever did anything just because I "enjoy edit warring", think again. No matter how crazy you think I have acted, it was all for the purpose of making this article better. --Node 20:16, 24 January 2007 (UTC)

Well, while you were absent, the article matured fairly well, in the exact direction proposed by moderated editors during the edit wars of a year ago. Dpotop 21:08, 24 January 2007 (UTC)

I'm not sure how that's relevant. By the way, the article barely changed at all since then, and lots of the poorly-researched text added by Bonaparte was still intact until very recently. --Node 17:17, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

Sources

I was browsing through this article and its sources and I found the following, the article says in the first paragraph that "some Moldovian officials and official bodies "; the source cited is Omniglot. Two issues: (a) Omniglot doesn't say that, and (b) Omniglot is citing Misplaced Pages as a source (for something else). If (a) was true, how reliable can you reasonably expect it to be after taking into account the caliber of sources Omniglot uses? I suppose that statement is true, can't a better source be found? I can't find anything, perhaps there is something in Romanian?--Domitius 00:13, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

Moldovan pronunciation questions

I get a daily news program ("Curier") from Moldova's NIT television on my cable TV system. Two questions:

• The main announcer consistently pronounces "2008" as "două mii uopt". Is "uopt" a Moldovan regionalism? In other contexts, as best I can tell, this announcer says "opt"; I've only heard the "uopt" pronunciation when she says "2008". She's said it very clearly, and on numerous separate occasions, so I'm confident that I wasn't just hearing things and that it wasn't just an accidental slip of the tongue on her part.

Yes, "uopt" is the regional way of pronouncing "opt" (it's still written "opt", though). It's specific to the whole Moldavia (Rep. of Moldova and the Romanian part), with varying degrees. What was funny when I visited Chisinau was that the peasants in the market spoke Romanian without accent. :) Dpotop 06:49, 27 June 2007 (UTC)

• Everyone on NIT pronounces the network's name as /ɛn.aɪ'ti/ — the way an English speaker would pronounce the letters. Any idea why they don't use the Romanian pronunciations of the initials?

In Moldova and in Romania it is often fashionable to have a name with an English or German sound. For instance, the brand "Orange" (the French-based cell phone operator) is pronounced as in English. I presume that the customers get an impression of seriousness (for the German brands) or power (for the American ones) out of this. And, as you know, brands are used today as a way of defining your self-image. It's stupid, but people work like this. Dpotop 06:49, 27 June 2007 (UTC)

Richwales 05:54, 27 June 2007 (UTC)

Rich, it would be interesting for you to find out how she pronounces the word două in the same 2008. If she says duouă then she probably does that in all instances of vowel /o/, at least when stressed (the vowel, not the announcer...). If not, she might be pronouncing that way only after vocalic sounds or at the word beginning. It is a known fact that, especially in Moldova (on both sides), vowel /o/ pronounced in certain situations more or less as /wo/ or /ʷo/. The same happens in all Romanian-speaking areas, but it can be less obvious. Here are some factors that contribute to the intensity of the effect:

• Region, with the strongest effect in Moldova and the weakest probably in Wallachia.
• The age of the word in Romanian. Old words such as om, ochi, os are usually pronounced with a stronger /w/, while neologisms like ohm, oftalmologie, osteoporoză tend to be pronounced with a rather pure /o/.
• Position in the word. Most affected are the initial positions, like in opt, compared to copt.
• Phonetic context. When it follows after another vowel, /o/ needs to be "insulated" with a /w/ to avoid confusion and to allow an easier pronunciation.
• Stress. Unstressed /o/ doesn't usually become a diphthong, instead it sometimes tends to close towards /u/. For example the word cocoş might be pronounced in Moldova as /ku'koʃ/.
• Speaker. Educated speakers avoid pronouncing /wo/, some of them only in neologisms, while others avoid it in all words. Uneducated speakers might pronounce /wo/ just about everywhere, including neologisms they may need to say.

Quite a similar effect is found in all vowels, actually. Even /a/ is heard sometimes as /a/. For more details and examples check out ro:Fonologia limbii române --- a work in progress though. The part you're looking for is the section "Alofonele vocalelor".

This information comes form Fonologia limbii române, by Emanuel Vasiliu (1965). I don't have access to newer works, but I am told that things haven't changed significantly since.

About NIT: I don't know what the acronym actually means. If the name is made up of English words, then that's it. Only in rare cases are English acronyms read with a Romanian pronunciation; an example is NATO, which is pronounced /'na.to/, not /'nej.tow/; but MTV, CNN, BBC follow the rule "English acronym - English pronunciation" and the same normally goes for other languages too: KGB in Russian, ZDF in German, UMP in French. If NIT comes from Romanian words then pronouncing it à l'anglaise is pure snobbery, as Dpotop pointed out. — AdiJapan ☎ 09:39, 27 June 2007 (UTC)

Thanks, Adi. I'll do some more careful listening to this announcer and see if I can identify how she pronounces "două" and other words with "o". She appears to be an educated native speaker in her 30's, and I haven't noticed any other deviations from "standard" pronunciation in her speech (though please remember that my command of Romanian is still at an elementary stage, and it doesn't help much that the news announcers all seem to talk as fast as humanly possible!). As for the abbreviation "NIT", my web searching suggests it stands for "Noile Idei Televizate" — I'll check the closing credits of the news broadcasts again and see if that phrase appears anywhere in the fine print. The opening title sequence of NIT's news program includes written phrases in Romanian, Russian, and English. Richwales 16:44, 27 June 2007 (UTC)

Another case, more impressive than "o" is "e". Try "mere" (apples) and "miere" (honey). When those that speak Moldovan dialect say "apples", those from Bucharest always understand "honey". Then the latter ask the former to say "honey", after which they make big eyes. A word for which you can see people fall is "el" (he), which obviously is a basic and often used word. Ask people to start a sentense with "El..." ("He..") and see the difference. If one knows to speak both dialects, one might be able to hide "el" in the quick sequence of words (sometimes they do it on purpose so that you won't recongnise the dialect!) But with the starting "El" - it becomes obvious.

About abreviations. In fact, it is just a matter of standards between Moldova and Romania, something like talking in km/miles. There is no official way in Moldova. Hence logically they should use the standard Romanian one. Yet, many people dislike to say "le", "me", "re", etc. Hence at every occasion, the jump to say it the other way around. Another observation: when children are taught geometry in secondary school, they do not say "le", "me", "re", but "el", "em", "er" etc, not only in Moldova, but even in Romania. And last observation: there is a rule in Romanian, to write and read as in the orriginal. Many (unlike you) don't even know what NIT stands for, they assume it is English! :Dc76 20:29, 28 June 2007 (UTC)

Note that the pronouns el, ea, ei, ele, and eu (except in philosophic contexts where it means the ego, the self), and the verbs este, era etc. are normally pronounced with an initial not only in Moldova, but by all Romanians. See DEX 1998, DOOM 2005, Dicţionarul ortografic 2002. It is true though that the quantity of that is different from speaker to speaker, and that it tends to be more audible in Moldovans' speech. But I wouldn't use it as a definite distinction between idioms. There are better ways to tell a Moldovan from a non-Moldovan (if that really is the purpose), and the pronunciation of mere is indeed one of them.

I must also point out that this page is not a good place for a phonetics subject, because the "Moldovan language" is not a linguistically recognized entity, it is only the official name of the Romanian language in the Republic of Moldova. This article is about politics. The Moldovan idiom does indeed exist as a regional speech of Romanian, but it is also found in the Romanian part of Moldova. — AdiJapan ☎ 03:26, 29 June 2007 (UTC)

True and true.:Dc76 15:36, 29 June 2007 (UTC)

Map

The only problem with the map that I see is a small one in Chernivtsi oblast (see the map in that article). Leave the other regions appart. :Dc76 18:00, 5 July 2007 (UTC)

now tell me really, do you think that nobody speaks in Covasna Romanian? or in Harghita? there are more than 15% Romanians, what are they speaking?--Tones benefit 18:02, 5 July 2007 (UTC)

There are 20% Romanians in Harghita and 35% in Covasna. But the map does not excludes all of these counties - northern Harghita is not, and so on. But if you blank all of it red or blue, it is like there are no Hunagrians at all there. Maybe one should make a more detailed map - village by village. That's a different story.:Dc76 18:57, 5 July 2007 (UTC)

Dc, do hungarian speak romanian or not? if they do what variant? all people speak Romanian better or less they do. There has to be no hole in the middle. That's ridiculous to have a hole even if there are like you said 35% Romanians.--Tones benefit 19:02, 5 July 2007 (UTC)

Look, people speak Romanian in America as well. I thought all here was about mother tongue. Ask more users, if they agree with you, I won't oppose. I only think is not wise to start an edit war b/c of this: the only thing you will achive at this point is to block yourself. You can edit other articles, and even this one, or you can get blocked and not edit even this map. You can not change overnight everything that you believe is not correct on WP. Better even, find a map in some sourse. I am sure that should be some maps online or in books.:Dc76 19:36, 5 July 2007 (UTC)

Actually this map has several problems. It is supposed to represent the Romanian idioms, wherever they are spoken. Even if Romanian speakers in Harghita and Covasna are few, the map should show what Romanian idiom is spoken there. A hole in the map means that Romanian is not spoken there at all, by anyone. Covering that region with blue or red doesn't say anything about Hungarian being spoken or not, because this is not a map of Hungarian distribution. Languages overlap, as you know, and this map is only supposed to show the Romanian layer. Also, separating the Romanian idioms in just two kinds is at least an oversimplification; nothing is mentioned about the criteria of distinguishing those two idioms. But the really big problem with this map is that the sources used for drawing it are not specified. It could very well be original research. — AdiJapan ☎ 03:11, 6 July 2007 (UTC)

That's exactly my point. Anyone willing to make it better or should I make it myself? --Tones benefit 10:24, 6 July 2007 (UTC)

Wow, AdiJapan! Yesterday I abstained from writing the exact same thing. We have had this discussion a long time ago (when the picture was first made). I didn't want to be called a Nationalist again. Dpotop 10:47, 6 July 2007 (UTC)

Now, that you said it, I'd like to point out another inconsistency of the map: It gives no color for Harghita and Covasna (because RO is a minority there), but gives a color for large regions in Serbia. However, the last time I looked into Serbian Vlachs, they are not an official majority, even on Timok Valley. I therefore feel that the current map is not meeting any standard. Dpotop 10:47, 6 July 2007 (UTC)

I do agree with you that we should have a map for all regions where Romanians/Moldovans/Vlachs are a historic presence. Majority or not, it's another map, or can be marked with another sign (for instance, using "hasurare"). But do you know how to make a map? Dpotop 10:47, 6 July 2007 (UTC)

Yes, I will do it. Anyway, another editor was just blocked because he had conflicts with Russians like Alaexis and Miika. His name is Sosomk.--Tones benefit 10:49, 6 July 2007 (UTC)

It has nothing to do with being Nationalist or not. If the purpose of this map is to show the idiom distribution of the Romanian language then it should have some color in every little village that is inhabited by Romanian speakers. Of course, there must be some threshold, such as 1% or 10% of the population, otherwise you'd have to put Japan on the map too...

The difficult problem, if one wants to remake the map, is not the numbers of Romanian speakers living in every region --- this is rather easy to get ---, but the idiom they speak. The term idiom itself is a rather fuzzy concept, because depending on the criteria you get different maps. For example I see the current map puts Sibiu and Braşov in the southern idiom (not sure if it was meant to be the Oltenian or the Muntenian), but there are parameters, such as the intonation, which set those two cities clearly in the Transylvanian group of idioms. Unfortunately I don't have access to such linguistic data and I have no idea where to look for them --- most probably they're still not on the internet. — AdiJapan ☎ 16:00, 6 July 2007 (UTC)

That's true. So, we need to eventually find a better sourse with a better map. :Dc76 17:07, 6 July 2007 (UTC)

Differences

Are there any lexical difference between Romanian and Moldovan (and not just Russianisms)? --AimLook 16:26, 15 October 2007 (UTC)

The Eu does not recognizes Moldovan as an official language

It seems that the EU is now recognizing Moldovan as an official language. The likes of *a** have won. We can also thank our Muntenian administration for fucking it up; and also a great thank you to that fucking idiot, Leonard Orban, who is supposed to be a linguist of some sort. So let us spare us the pain and remove all sources that refer to the Romanian language and give them their own language box. --Thus Spake Anittas 17:31, 16 October 2007 (UTC)

Well, don't be so fast in calling it Muntenian. Chiuaru, for instance, is from Iasi, and Orban is Transylvanian. It's just a simple case of all-Romanian incompetence. That said, it's quite unbelievable. Isn't the ministry supposed to have fool-proof procedures for specific cases (such as checking for "moldovan language" shit in all Moldova-related documents)? Dpotop 17:41, 16 October 2007 (UTC)

The EU probably recognized the name of the language as Moldovan, but that does not mean that they say that the two languages differ from one another, but it still pisses me off. That Orban idiot should be fired on the spot, as well as the other retards. --Thus Spake Anittas 19:40, 16 October 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, I agree. That said, I hate Basescu's populist and authoritarian approach even more. I really don't know what can be done at this point. Upto now the liberals seemed to be the better lot, but it seems it was just an impression. Dpotop 12:05, 18 October 2007 (UTC)

This is not Romania's fault, and neither is it the fault of Leonard Orban. The name of Moldova's official language is "Moldovan", and thus when the EU signs agreements with Moldova, it is normal that the copy in that country's official language is labelled "Moldovan". Of course, this will bring up a greater can of worms if Moldova joins the EU. Ronline ✉ 10:17, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

Of course it's the fault of the Romanian government and (among others) Orban. The Greeks even managed to force a country to change its name (FYROM). Not to mention Bulgaria (cf. http://www.ziua.ro/prt.php?id=228041&data=2007-10-16). Nobody forces us to accept more than the moldovan themselves (which talk about "the language of the state"). Dpotop 16:10, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

BTW, it was a problem, recognized by Orban himself (cf. http://www.gandul.info/actualitatea/orban-au-modificate-site-ul-referirile-limba-moldoveneasca.html?3927;962484). Dpotop 16:10, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

Yes, but I don't think Greece, Bulgaria and Poland are pursuing the right path. Bickering with the EU and appearing to be nationalistic for what are some very petty and symbolic reasons is not a good foreign policy move. Their inflexibility hasn't done any good to the image of those countries, and I don't think Romania should be heading down that path. Furthermore, Orban is not representing Romania in his role as Commissioner for Multilingualism; thus, he does not have to account to the Romanian public for his actions. Ronline ✉ 11:35, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

The EU is not here to fulfill the dreams of some civil rights activists. It is here to advance the interests of its member states and citizens, as perceived by them (and not as imagined by the aforementioned civil rights groups). This is why France, the UK, Poland, Greece, Bulgaria a.s.o. are all right in demanding and obtaining what they see as their due. Dpotop 14:03, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

As to image issues, I feel that Poles care more about practical advantages they get from the EU and the US than the lip service of the EU bureacracy. In the end, Poland will be more respected and feared, will get more votes w.r.t. its population (as it happened), a.s.o. And will not depend on the whim of some bureaucrat, as Romania does with all its political correctness. As a joke: Two years ago or so, there was in France a scare about the Polish plumber, that will get the work of the French. The Poles made fun of the French publicly, instead of playing it soft. In the end, they fare better and are better accepted. Maybe Romania should be more aggressive. Dpotop 14:03, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

To the list of inflexible countries you should also add France (agriculture) and the UK (everything), and I presume many other. BTW, it seems Poland and Italy got what they wanted. Dpotop 14:08, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

As to Orban: He is incompetent. Your defence would have worked, should he not have acknowledged publicly that something was not right. But he did. And by recognizing his mistake, he also answered to his constituancy (remember that he is there because he is Romanian). Dpotop 14:03, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

The "aggressive" negotiating stance with the EU would work, perhaps, for the more established members of the Union. However, in the case of countries such as Poland, the result is not that they are respected or feared as such, but rather that they are derided as being inflexible and stubborn. There is still somewhat of a negative perception of the new member states in the European Union. Conforming to that negative perception by portraying oneself as inflexible or insensitive, as Poland has done, will not do anything to improve image. And then people wonder why the "Eastern states" are looked down upon within the union. The solution for Romania is to behave professionally and in a way which shows insight, outward orientation and leadership, rather than inward orientation and provincialism (which it hasn't done so far, mind you). It's only in that way that it can gain the respect of the other EU members. Ronline ✉ 02:23, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

Again, Ronline: Do you think Poland cares for being "looked down upon"? My impression is that they get everything important they want. This is solid and concrete. Of course the others hate this success, but who cares? As for critics. 4 years ago Poland was looked down upon in the French press. This is no longer the case. Poland is now accepted as a hard player, and respected as such. Criticised for its clericalism and conservatism, but never whined upon. Dpotop 07:39, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

As for Romania: Romanians have a provincial complex and would accept any shit for some tap on the shoulder. You might have seen in the real world that hard work never gets you respect unless you're brilliant. Being a hard player does it. Dpotop 07:39, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

I'm not an expert on the EU, but if the more established countries don't work as a model for the other countries, and go as far as insulting them and as you say, looking down on them, then I don't think that the new countries will be motivated to stay content. Countries such as the Netherlands, England, and France have at one time or another, committed themselves to such tactics. If they didn't want the new countries joining the EU so soon--or at all, then they should have used their veto. The price of joining the EU shouldn't be to have to endure to be picked on and in politics, politicians also do what they think will make them more popular at home, so often you will see a politician standing up or criticizing the EU, to gain political favor at home. --Thus Spake Anittas 02:37, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

Legally, the name of Moldova's official language is presented in three different ways:

• "Moldovan" (article 13 of the 1994 Constitution)
• "Romanian" (1991 Declaration of Independence)
• "Moldovan, with the existence of a Moldo-Romanian linguistic identity" (1989 Law of Oddicial Language)

So, you need to label the language accordingly. Legally, you can not just say the way you like. Legally, you have to say: "This is a copy in English, this is a copy in Moldovan, Romanian, and Moldovan with the existence of a a Moldo-Romanian linguistic identity, and this is a copy I french." If you say otherwise, it is assumed that you abreviate, so still legally correct. But then Romania could ask that a certain way to do that abreviation be removed as Soviet propaganda. Orban did not oppose it, because it was an issue that mattered to Basescu, and he wanted to hurt him.:Dc76\ 00:08, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

Okay, enough with insulting Orban. Dahn loves the guy and we don't want to hurt Dahn's feelings, or he may hit us with links and reports. --Thus Spake Anittas 00:15, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

EU does not recognize Moldovan as language

http://www.adevarul.ro/articole/orban-a-eliminat-limba-moldoveneasca-de-pe-site-ul-comisiei-europene/329489

Orban a eliminat “limba moldovenească” de pe site-ul Comisiei Europene de Marius Vulpe (718 afisari, 2007-10-20) Referirile la limba moldovenească existente pe site-ul Comisiei Europene au fost modificate a declarat, ieri, comisarul european pentru multilingvism, Leonard Orban (foto). Pe viitor va avea loc un proces de monitorizare pentru a evita repetarea acestor situaţii, a mai precizat Orban.

Cu două zile înainte, comisarul european solicita omologilor săi să nu mai facă referire la sintagma „limba moldovenească" în documentele încheiate de UE cu R. Moldova. "Când scrie pe site limba moldovenească şi apare, de fapt, limba română este o problemă. Nu poate fi acceptat ca un document care apare cu altă titulatură să fie în limba română", a spus Orban.

În opinia sa, aceasta este o problemă care "vizează apărarea limbii române". El a arătat că există soluţii tehnice şi juridice pentru a evita să se mai facă referire la limba moldovenească, însă a adăugat că nu poate garanta că nu se vor mai înregistra astfel de cazuri. Orban a explicat că România ar putea imita metoda Greciei, care s-a opus la un moment dat denumirii statului Macedonia, care la ora actuală se numeşte FYROM.

Good news. I retract the things I said against Orban. --Thus Spake Anittas 14:14, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

But the Council of Europe apparently recognizes Moldovan. --PaxEquilibrium 20:57, 24 October 2007 (UTC)

Livezeanu Paragraph

I see that the paragraph by Livezeanu keeps being introduced in the history and politics section. That paragraph takes up half the space in that section and only deals with a minor issue (i.e. the history of the alphabet). Furthermore, that paragraph is rather one-sided and is not even representative of the general article that it is taken from. I removed the paragraph for now, but if you feel that it should stay in the article, please explain. TSO1D 17:39, 7 November 2007 (UTC)

Alphabet is hardly a minor political issue. Restored. If you think the p section is small, expand it, not make it smaller. The paragraph gives an opinion of a reputable historian about this political issue. Please feel free to turn the quotaiton into a summary, if you object its size. `'Míkka>t 05:45, 9 November 2007 (UTC)

P.S. The piece in question is not mine. I only sourced it and restored its persistent deletion. `'Míkka>t 05:45, 9 November 2007 (UTC)

There is a specific article Moldovan Cyrillic alphabet. Consider putting the info there. This article is about a political controversy, not a language. :Dc76\ 11:35, 9 November 2007 (UTC)

The problem though is that the way that paragraph is added just seems very out of place. There's no introduction, no logical sequence, after a brief paragraph about politics and history this large part appears. If you read the original article, you'll see what I mean. That article is about language politics of Moldova and it has a section about the alphabet where this paragraph is found. So taking that whole paragraph and putting it into the tiny summary section here is ridiculous because it is so out of scale. Basically, my point is that if the paragraph is to be added, it should be added to the subarticle, not the main one, because the issue is addressed there in detail. And even there, not the whole text should be added, but perhaps one or two sentences put in context. TSO1D 18:57, 9 November 2007 (UTC)

Română în Moldova

Cred că te referi la scrierea cu â şi î din câte am înţeles din mesajul tău. Aceasta este introducerea celui mai recent Dicţionar ortografic publicat de Academia de Ştiinţe A Moldovei (corespondentul DOOM-ului din România). Acesta anunţă că "în noua ediţie se aplică Hotărârea Adunării Generale a Academiei Române din 17 februarie 1993 privind revenirea la "â" şi "sunt" în limba română".

Totodată aici găseşti curriculumul la limba română pentru liceu (publicat în 2006). Între conţinuturile de lecţie recomandate pentru clasa a X-a (prima de liceu) se numără şi:

• Dicţionarul ortografic – operă lingvistică şi rezultat al evoluţiei unei limbi. Modificări în ortografia limbii române: DOOM – 2005. Inventarul semnelor ortografice aplicate în limba română. (v. pagina 13 jos)

Cu toate acestea în Moldova prea puţin se face caz din ortografie, o problemă mai stringentă este denumirea limbii, sau supremaţia limbii române. De aceea poţi să observi că în ciuda faptului că curriculumul vorbeşte despre modificarea ortografiei limbii române - şi recomandă la clasă ca elevilor să le fie aduse la cunoştinţă modificările, - el este scris cu grafia veche. --Danutz 18:17, 29 October 2007 (UTC)

"Dicţionarul ortografic al limbii române (ortopepic, morfologic, cu norme de punctuaţie)" (cel din care este scanata introducerea pe care ţi-am trimiso în comentariul anterior) este elaborat de Academia de Ştiinţe a Moldovei şi normal toate instituţiile din Republica Moldova trebuie să ţină cont de el când scriu în limba română. Şi la noi deciziile din DOOM 2005 sunt obligatorii în învăţământ şi actele oficiale. Aşa şi în Moldova. Deci decizia de folosire a literei â este natural obligatorie în învăţământ pentru că materia în şcoală se numeşte limba română şi nu moldovenească. În legislaţie situaţia e mai complicată, întrucât limba acolo este denumită moldovenească şi foarte rar română (într-adevăr sunt unele acte oficiale în care mai scapă denumirea de limbă română). Dar moldoveneasca nu este o limbă standardizată, ci este considerată de legislaţia republicii ca doar un nume pentru acelaşi fenomen lingvistic întâlnit şi în România: citat din legea privind concepţia naţională a Rep. Moldova: "Concepţia porneşte de la adevărul statornicit istoriceşte şi confirmat de tezaurul literar comun: poporul moldovenesc şi poporul român folosesc o formă literară comună . Avînd originea comună, dispunînd de un fond lexical de bază comun, limba naţională moldovenească şi limba naţională română îşi păstrează fiecare lingvonimul/glotonimul său ca însemn identificator al fiecărei naţiuni: moldovenească şi română"

Precizez că prin "limba naţională moldovenească" se înţelege în contextul legii limba naţională din Republica Moldova iar prin "limba naţională română" se înţelege limba naţională din România. Lingvonim/glotonim înseamnă denumirea limbii.

Deci, având în vedere că limba moldovenească este doar un nume, atunci ea are aceleaşi reguli ortografice ca limba română. Şi atunci, având în vedere dicţionarul academiei de la Chişinău, trebuie folosit â.--Danutz

Am citit doar pimele randuri si vreau sa reamintesc ca limba Moldoveneasca nu mai e oficiala, Romana este oficiala.

Move to Moldovan language (linguistics)

We should move the article to Moldovan language (linguistics). It's better this way. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 212.33.7.47 (talk) 19:19, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

And why is that? — AdiJapan ☎ 08:44, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

User/Administrator:Mikkalai is deleting every official statement about the non-existance of Moldovan language

EVEN IF THE STATEMENTS ARE REFERENCED!!! Furthermore, he gives no explanations to his deletions of referenced material (even from official sites). --Cezarika f. (talk) 13:37, 19 November 2007 (UTC)

Why is this referenced text being deleted again and again? The European Parliament has included in its documents the recommendations not to make references to the so-called "Moldovan language". Nergaal (talk) 18:20, 21 November 2007 (UTC)

www.europarl.europa.eu/sides/getDoc.do?pubRef=-//EP//NONSGML+REPORT+A6-2007-0427+0+DOC+WORD+V0//EN Romania reiterates that, according to the facts and scientific evidence, including the interpretatio —Preceding unsigned comment added by 151.204.42.155 (talk) 18:21, 21 November 2007 (UTC)

use this insead Romania underlines that its participation to the said agreements does not imply whatsoever any recognition or acknowledgement of the name of the language referred to as "Moldovan". Romania reiterates that, according to the facts and scientific evidence, including the interpretation of the Academy of Science of the Republic of Moldova (issued in September 1994), the correct name of the language is Romanian.(1) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Nergaal (talk • contribs) 18:34, 21 November 2007 (UTC)

Your edit states: "rv by user who has problem with the understanding of wikipedia's sourcing policies (like not using wiki as a source and fair presentation of the sources"

Please explain: 1)not using wiki as a source 2)fair presentation of the sources; in the context of this edit . Unless you prove your point, I will have to report your abusive, ignorant behavior. Thanks. Nergaal (talk) 00:00, 26 November 2007 (UTC)

You have been explained several times that one of the deleted statements quoted from a newspaper are false and misleading. The tto remaining political rants of Romaninan politicians have no place in the introduction to a linguistical article. `'Míkka>t 02:32, 26 November 2007 (UTC)

Anonimu vs Nergaal

1. uses wikipedia as a reference, so considering it a reference means considering wikipedia the reference. This is not allowed here.
2. states clear that "the facts and scientific evidence" are only Romania's opinion, that is allegedly also supported by a misterious 1994 interpretation of the Academy of Science of the Republic of Moldova , that may or may not be obsolete by now.
3. Also makes it clear that the rapporteur stated Romania's oppinon on the matter, and not that of the EP.

Please stop your insults. And please buy some glasses.

Anonimu (talk) 00:12, 26 November 2007 (UTC)

3) if you noticed, the referenced article is called "Parliament of Europe rejects Moldovan language". The first paragraph says "The Parliament of Europe passed yesterday the resolution to modify the EU-Moldovan Republic readmission agreements. The document includes the recommendations authored by rapporteur Jean Marin Marinescu, an EPP representative, denying the existence of the 'Moldovan language'." Regardless if it is Romania's opinion on the matter, European parlament adopted a resolution that includes the recommendations denying the existence of Moldovan language. 2) it is irrelevant weather it is obsolete or not now. the relevant part is that Romanian's opinion is based on this document AND that European Parlamend ENDORSED THIS OPINION BY ADOPTING THE RESOLUTION! we are not discussing weather the opinion of the EP is good or bad, and if it is based on verifiable facts, but that this is the EP's opinion Nergaal (talk) 02:09, 26 November 2007 (UTC)

This is false. As of NOvember 2007 the term "Moldoval language" is still in use in new EU documents. A politically biasewd newspaper cannot be a source of information about EU. Romanian political opinion has no place in the introduction of the article about official language of another state. `'Míkka>t 02:35, 26 November 2007 (UTC)

please bring references that state that Moldovan languge is still in unse in EU documents. Otherwise biasewd newspapers are still better than no reference at all.Nergaal (talk) 10:00, 26 November 2007 (UTC)

There is no disagreement in wikipedia that Moldovan is linguistically identical to Romanian. The current article says this clearly and there is no need in additional quotes political rants and threats of extremist Romanian politicians, who are not exprets in linguistics and hence have no say in this article per wikipedia rules. The Romanian political threat is a disgusting pressure applied to a souvereign state. `'Míkka>t 21:03, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

Answer to aggressive Romanian journalist lies

From November 17, 2007 interview with Leonard Orban, European Commissioner for Multilingualism:

• Rep.: Does the European Commission acknowledge the existence of the Moldovan language as official language or not? How do you comment on the fact that EU citizens are required to speak this language if they want to join the staff of the EU special representative to the Moldovan Republic?
• L.O.: It is not the European Commission who acknowledges one language or the other. I want to be very clear about it: it is a decision that belongs to every national state. When views are different, of course they have to be settled politically, not at the European Commission level, but by the states that have different views. As for the other thing you have mentioned, the fact that on the European Commission's website there is listed a requirement such as knowledge of the Moldovan language or of some documents with references to it, this is about a matter now tackled by the European Commission and Romanian authorities. As normal, a decision will be reached accordingly.

Case closed and sealed. `'Míkka>t 21:29, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

I am puzzled that nobody replied to this: LO and the European Commission express Points of View, not truths. And nobody can acknowledge a language. However, the EU is a reputable source and its POV is what's important here. The fact that some other scientist or country writes a document stating Moldovan =Romanian or Moldovan !=Romanian also expresses the POV of that individual or institution, not the Truth. Dpotop (talk) 19:51, 8 July 2008 (UTC)

other issues

• also Chernivtsi oblast is not in the east :), not rather north. :) anyway, this is super-minor.:Dc76\ 19:33, 24 February 2008 (UTC)

According to census data, Moldovan in mainly spoken in the eastern part of the oblast. Xasha (talk) 19:47, 24 February 2008 (UTC)

People from Noua Sulita district tend to call themselves Moldavians (just over half of them do so, and just under half-Romanians), while those from Herta, Storojinet, Adancata tend to call themselves Romanians. However, they all speak the same variety/dialect - Moldavian. Just as 4 million other people in Romania.

This article is not a linguistic issue, it is a political issue: can one call Romanian language Moldovan, at least in some instances, or can not? So, it makes more sense to separate the things: to talk in some sections(s) about linguistic issues (Moladavian variety, etc), and in other section(s) about political issues. And again, citing like this "X said that, Y considered that, Z claimed that" should be totally ok. We are not giving our weigh to things, but the credibility of X, Y, Z does. We only cite X, Y, Z.:Dc76\ 14:48, 25 February 2008 (UTC)

Sorry, the Romanian idosyncrasy about the unity of the Eastern Romance language doesn't hold much water. In other parts of the world, languages less different than Moldovan and Romanian are considered separated languages and nobody contest it. This is all about the expansionist policy of Romanians. I don't need anyone to tell me what I am and what language I speak.Xasha (talk) 18:21, 25 February 2008 (UTC)

What you are and what language you speak is your own business. I am not telling you what you are or speak. What holds water and what does not is for scholars to tell, not for us. We can only cite them. What is in other parts of the world is in other parts of the world. What happens in Madagascar is no precedent for Moldova. If nobody contests it there, then maybe they are separate. If so many contest here, then maybe they are not.

Just as you don't wish anyone to tell you what to think of yourself, please don't tell me that, either. I am Moldovan, and I am Romanian, and please don't dare call me expansionist in my own house. Please be specific: that Romanian, and call him/her by name, when you say someone is expansionist. I am not giving you arguments like "this is occupants' theory". Even if I think it is, I only say "this is X's theory", where X has a name. So, keep to yourself what you think, and please don't call anyone expansionist.

Even better, I'm ready to forget about "expansionist" and just focus on the issue. I repeat, "X said Y (source, citation), Z claims T (source, citation)." That's the only way it goes on WP. Your or my interpretation, while at heart to us, mean nothing to outsiders. They want to hear all claims, and have them sourced, they don't want to hear the conclusions we draw or our interpretations. :Dc76\ 18:50, 25 February 2008 (UTC)

Divine origins

The notion of a distinct Moldovan language, of ] origins

Xasha, can you please stop adding nonsense to this article? Thanks. bogdan (talk) 18:21, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

As nonsensical this may seem, this is much more true than the one presently in the article. (according to all major religions)Xasha (talk) 18:31, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

Moldovan language is the name of the Romanian language in Moldova. That's not an opinion, that's the consensus in linguistics, regardless of what politicians on either side say. bogdan (talk) 19:52, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

No, the thing that nobody can deny is that Moldovan is the official language in Moldova, and that Moldovan and Romanian share their literary form(with very minor lexical exceptions). The rest are just personal opinions.Xasha (talk) 19:56, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

Your logic is flawed. You have a problem when linguists consistently say "Moldovan is Romanian called under a different name", and never vice-versa. --Gutza 20:03, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

It's just the bias of the big entities. How often do you hear that "Romania united with Transylvania"?Xasha (talk) 20:07, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

You don't, because it never happened. That is, unless the government's in Alba Iulia or something. --Gutza 20:12, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

Romania kept its government, its laws, its structure, etc. Transylvania adopted the Romanian law and political administration (division into judeţe, etc), not the other way around. bogdan (talk) 20:43, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

Romanian Academy

It is stated that Romanian Academy is the regulating authority for Moldavian language. Is that really so, can somebody confirm?--Moldopodo 23:58, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

Moldovan is not formally regulated.Xasha (talk) 09:09, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

hmmm, not even by the Moldavian Academy of Sciences?--Moldopodo 14:48, 15 June 2008 (UTC) Anyway, big question, what has Romanian Academy of Sciences to do with regulation of Moldavian language in Moldavia?--Moldopodo 14:48, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

Moldopodo's edits

Moldopodo, First of all, this piece belongs to the articles History of the Moldovan language because it is not about the modern language. Second, Kantemir wrote "Valachiae et Transylvaniae incolis eadem est cum Moldavis lingua, pronunciatio tamen rudior, ut dziur, Vlachus proferet zur, jur, per z polonicum sive j gallicum; Dumnedzeu, Deus, val. Dumnezeu: akmu, nunc, val. akuma, aczela hic, val: ahela." I.e. by Kantemir, vallachians and transylvanians spoke the same language, only with different accent. And therefore it is a very philosophical question : isn't it Kantemir used the term "Moldavis lingua"/lingua moldavorum (language of Moldavians) in the meaning of what we call now Romanian language, rather than he spoke of separate Moldovan language. So this piece actually may be belongs to History of Romanian language. This question may be decided only by expert linguists, not by reference to Kantemir. Mukadderat (talk) 21:53, 16 June 2008 (UTC)

Cantemir speaks of Moldavian language spoken by Moldavians. Please, do check the last two chapters of Descriptio Moldaviae. This is quite clear and there is no ambiguity. However, he never mentions anything relating to Romania (poor Cantemir did not know this term would exist one day). As for the History section of Moldavian language, certainly it does belong to it. I have much more to develop on the History of Moldavian language article, and then we could make a nice summary to put on the main page of Moldavian language article. As for "Valachiae et Transylvaniae incolis eadem est cum Moldavis lingua, pronunciatio tamen rudior, ut dziur, Vlachus proferet zur, jur, per z polonicum sive j gallicum; Dumnedzeu, Deus, val. Dumnezeu: akmu, nunc, val. akuma, aczela hic, val: ahela." I. - where exactly did he write it? Thanks in advance for your answer. --Moldopodo 00:50, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

As for "Valachiae et Transylvaniae: I cut and pasted it from your reference (wikisource of Descriptio). Mukadderat (talk) 15:51, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

It doesn't matter what Cantemir said. You should not add your interpretations of primary sources to Misplaced Pages. If a modern linguist uses Cantemir's work when talking about Moldovan language, fine, use that, but don't do the interpretation yourself. bogdan (talk) 09:54, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

Oh yes, it does matter very much so. Let's put it clear. I have made no interpretation whatsoever, if I had interpreted, please provide an exact diff to prove exactly where and how and when. Now, when you say Cantemir spoke of anything else than Moldavians and Moldavian language you lie. It's easy as this. It's not even an interpretaion, it's a banal uncovered lie, and you have already tried different excuses, from "no it's not about Moldavian", "no, you don't know Latin", to "you are interpreting", and the most surprising "it's about Romanian" (Romanian is an absent word in the entire work of Cantemir).--Moldopodo 10:17, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

You're just trolling and I don't intend to waste my time with you. I'm just saying that it's absurd to claim that a 1716 work is not a primary source. bogdan (talk) 10:45, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

Please remain civil and stop lying (I am referring to your bad faith translation and intrepretation of Descriptio Moldaviae), or provide otherwise a diff to support your accusation of trolling. Descriptio Moldaviae - is THE primary source.--Moldopodo 12:04, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

Moldopodo, Yes, Cantemir called the language (in Latin) by name that may be today interpreted as "Moldovan language". But the exact meaning of the latin term is "language of Moldavians". Strange it may sound, but "language of Moldavians" in 17th century is not necessarily the same as what we call today Moldovan language. For example, there is Turkish language and there is Ottoman Turkish language. As you may know, languages evolve thru time. I don't know details about Moldovan/Romanian, but it is quite possible the language of Kantemir times may be called Old Moldovan language or Old Romanian language. Mukadderat (talk) 16:02, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

Mukadderat, No, Cantemir called the language Moldavian, not only it is based on my translation, but also on translation into other languages, as Russian or Moldavian for example. There is no need to look for interpretation, it is what it is - it is quite plain. NOTHING is mentioned eiher about Romanians or Romanan language there. And if you insist on this - this is a mere orignal research and POV interpretation, or in my simple straight words: it is a lie to say what the text does not say, either explicitely, nor implicitely. Cantemir had not described, nor mentioned the term because it was inexistent and had no practical applcation at that time. Neither Romania, nor Romanian language, nor Romanian nation existed back then. These "Romanian" notions certainly do exist today, but the scope of this article is not to describe their origins/history - so it is completely irrelevant here on the talk page about Moldavian language. You forgot to answer my question, which chapter was your quote from, which para? Thank you in advance. P.S.... about evolution of the language, do not know much about Turkish lanaguage, so I cannot understand your comprison. As for Moldavian, funny enough, as old as the Cantemir's chronicle may seem, the writings and analysis of Cantemir are perfectly valid today and are fully applicable to the Moldavian language of 21st century, with almost no modification at all (except the major one: the alphabet).--Moldopodo 19:53, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

• "You forgot to answer my question," - I answered, above. It is your own ref, wikisource:la:Descriptio Moldaviae; search for text string "Valachiae et Transylvaniae". Mukadderat (talk) 15:30, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

"Neither Romania, nor Romanian language, nor Romanian nation existed back then. "

See what Miron Costin says about this in 1675:

"Măcară dară că şi la istorii şi la graiul şi streinilor şi înde sine cu vréme, cu vacuri, cu primenéle au şi dobândescŭ şi alte numere, iară acela carile ieste vechiŭ nume stă întemeiat şi înrădăcinat: rumân. Cum vedem că, măcară că ne răspundem acum moldovéni, iară nu întrebăm: ştii moldovenéşte?, ce ştii românéşte? Stă dară numele cel vechiŭ ca un teméi neclătit, deşi adaog ori vrémile îndelungate, ori streini adaog şi alte numere, iară cela din rădăcină nu să mută. Şi aşa ieste acestor ţări şi ţărâi noastre, Moldovei şi Ţărâi Munteneşti numele cel direptŭ de moşie, ieste rumân, cum să răspundŭ şi acum toţi acéia din Ţările Ungureşti lăcuitori şi munténii ţara lor şi scriu şi răspundŭ cu graiul: Ţara Românească." wikisource:ro:De neamul moldovenilor

... Although we call ourselves Moldavians, we don't ask Do you know Moldavian?, but Do you know Romanian? ..

bogdan (talk) 20:05, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

Very interesting, and a mention about this surely has its place in the article, at least as anecdotal reference. The problem is that Cantemir clearly gives morphological and grammatical description of Moldavian language, whereas Costin (at least in this particular phrase you citedm I haven't read the entire work yet) simply tells us how Moldavians answer in his own view. Contrary to Cantemir, Costin's story really does sound as a fairy tale because there is no attempt to justify anything scientifically, as Cantemir did. He merely expresses his own opinion, not comparing it to any other or making any research whatsoever. Do you have a translation link somewhere, to modern Moldavian language I mean, or to English, or Russian or may be Ukrainian? Just to make sure certain terms are well understood and correctly translated --Moldopodo 15:46, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

Costin explicitly records that Moldavians called their language Romanian (românéşte) not Moldavian/Moldovan (moldovenéşte). I have never heard of any secondary source questioning Costin's honesty! There was no identity related controversy back in the 17th century, Costin had no reason to lie. And, yes, Cantemir calls the language Moldavian. Vasile Lupu (also 17th century), on the other hand, had the Carte româneascǎ de învăţătură ("Romanian book of learning") published; it was the first written code of laws of the Principality. However, I fail to see the impact that this has on an article about the official language of the modern Republic of Moldova. Plinul cel tanar (talk) 12:31, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

Catalan / Valencian precedent

The Romanian / Moldovan controversy is not unique. Here is the lead of the article on Valencian. Valencian (valencià) is the historical, traditional, and official name used in the Valencian Community of Spain to refer to the region's native language, known elsewhere as Catalan (català). Even Moldovan officials agree that the languages are identical. They merely claim that Moldovans have the right to call their language as they have always had. The article should stress this from the lead section, anything else would be giving undue weight to fringe theories. Plinul cel tanar (talk) 04:27, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

I think that none of the facts in the lead can be disputed: 1. that Moldovan is the official language of Moldova. 2. that Moldovan and Romanian have the same literary form. So I see no need to politicize it further. Xasha (talk) 08:12, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

Stating that Moldovan is an alternative name for the Romanian language is not a political statement, but a scientific one. The purpose of the article is not to reach compromise between a dominant scientific view and a fringe theory. It is perfectly legitimate for Moldovans (or Valencians) to call their own language as they wish. However, introducing the doubt about Moldovan beeing an altogether different language from Romanian (or Valencian from Catalan) is misleading the reader. Plinul cel tanar (talk) 11:07, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

Hmm, I am inclined to agree with Plinul - point 2 kinda does differentiate them more than it should. Perhaps the "Valencian" solution would be best (or at least, more neutral), with a further explanation that colloquial Moldovan differs from standard Romanian on a dialectal level (or something like that). --Illythr (talk) 14:06, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

We already have something about that : "There is no particular linguistic break at the Prut River, Moldovan and Romanian forming a dialect continuum." Xasha (talk) 18:27, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, but the war is centered on the first sentences of the lead section. Maybe it could be abated by applying this version without compromising NPOV. Sort of like 1. The official language of Moldova is (called) Moldovan. 2. It is essentially another name of Romanian. 3. The spoken colloquial form differs from the standard blablabla... --Illythr (talk) 19:08, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

If you or anyone else has a specific proposal, please post it below under a new header (on the talk page). You can omit the ref tags for the moment.Xasha (talk) 21:58, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

I'm confused as to which portion of Xasha's latest edit is a reversion of an "edit with deceptive summary, partly in an unidentified language". Xasha, could you please help us out with a more detailed explanation here? Thanks. Richwales (talk) 15:12, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

Deceptive since no RS was removed, as the summary claimed, as for the second part I didn't understand what he meant by "concensous"... now I see that it may have meant consensus, but at that time it seemed like something about a census.Xasha (talk) 15:28, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

I agree, no ref was removed. However, I fail to see how Minahan, for example, who states: The Moldovan language is Romanian, although the distinction between Moldovans and Romanians remains may be used to reference the statement: Its literary form is shared with the Romanian language as is the case in the current version of the article... Plinul cel tanar (talk) 07:37, 8 July 2008 (UTC)

I changed the lead to better fit the sources, since none made a distinction between "literary" Moldovan and "spoken" Moldovan. Such a distinction, besides being unsourced, would also be pseudosientific since a language is not defined by slang. Plinul cel tanar (talk) 12:16, 8 July 2008 (UTC)

The distinction is made in most Moldovan sources. The only slang here is the literary form, since it's hardly ever used outside written documents.Xasha (talk) 12:30, 8 July 2008 (UTC)

No, many Moldovan sources claim the right to use the name "Moldovan" for the language and argue its historicity (some arguing that the designation is earlier than "Romanian"), others simply state that Moldovan is Romanian, the highly controversial Stati claims that Moldovan is an altogether different language. Plinul cel tanar (talk) 12:45, 8 July 2008 (UTC)

You're not familiar nor with Moldovan sources, neither with Stati. Please don't speak based only on what you've heard around or what the Romanian press says.Xasha (talk) 13:38, 8 July 2008 (UTC)

Assume good faith and remain civil. Plinul cel tanar (talk) 20:09, 8 July 2008 (UTC)

New lead section

I suggest that the first sentence in the lead section be changed to Moldovan is the official and most common name given in Republic of Moldova to the country's native language known elswhere mostly as Romanian. Plinul cel tanar (talk) 07:51, 8 July 2008 (UTC)

Not good. It ignores the quite important phonetic and lexical differences between spoken Moldovan and Romanian.Xasha (talk) 10:55, 8 July 2008 (UTC)

Not more important than those between the English spoken by a Scot and that spoken by an American from Texas. Or Western Catalan (Valencian) from East Catalan (particularly the dialect spoken in France). Or Flemish from standard Dutch. Or Cajun from standard French. But more importantly, this is what almost all sources say, including the Moldovan President, the Moldovan Academy, and almost all linguists aside from Stati. Moldovan is another name for Romanian. We may discuss dialect problems afterwards, but the lead should stress the quasi-unanimous scientific view. Plinul cel tanar (talk) 11:11, 8 July 2008 (UTC)

I made some changes.

So that the text is consistent with the sources and with the content of the article. Dpotop (talk) 19:29, 8 July 2008 (UTC)

And I reverted your edits because: 1.the pdf from the EU site is just a guide to recognize languages, and has no scientific authority. 2.the only official language of Moldova is Moldovan. 3. cyrillics are still used by thousands of Moldovan speakers in Moldova and Transnistria and, unless things have changed in the last years, are the standard way to write Moldovan in Russia and Ukraine.Xasha (talk) 19:41, 8 July 2008 (UTC)

You don't deserve an answer. However, the other readers should really understand that (1) an official document is an official document, (2) official means having official status, and (3) who cares, the paragraph I replaced only talks about official status, which is exactly what mine talks about, too. Dpotop (talk) 19:58, 8 July 2008 (UTC)

Actually the readers should read Dpotop edit and see that 1) there's no official document 2)Russian is as official in Moldova as Romani language in Romania 3) shows the refusal to accept facts by the above user. Xasha (talk) 20:34, 8 July 2008 (UTC)

BTW: The wine bottles in the "Moldovan culture" box are cool. Dpotop (talk) 19:29, 8 July 2008 (UTC)

Make a new footnote for the Moldovan Constitution

The current footnote (Number 1) is a dead-end. The constitution can be read in whole in English and Romanian/Moldovan at the following links:

http://en.wikisource.org/Constitution_of_the_Republic_of_Moldova

http://ro.wikisource.org/Constitu%C5%A3ia_Republicii_Moldova

Raoulduke25 (talk) 12:47, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

Actually http://xiv.parlament.md/en/legalfoundation/constitution/ would be better since, as an official site of the government, is more reliable.Xasha (talk) 13:08, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

Michael I of Romania

Attn Romanian wikipedians: Please help resolve the issue in Talk:Michael I of Romania.

P.S. I find it quite surprizing that no one paid attention to my notice at wikipedia:Romanian Wikipedians' notice board, so I am posting this request here, since it seems that Romanians flock here in numbers. `'Míkka>t 19:01, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

Also check out Talk:Moldovans. Seems to be quite the hit right now. --Illythr (talk) 21:10, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

<shrug> Obviously, to meddle into affairs of another state is much more fun than own history which is probably boring since schoolyears. If they don't care about their former king, all the more I am removing it from my watchlist. `'Míkka>t 23:05, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

Perhaps you can ask user:Biruitorul about this. He seems to be quite fond of the guy. --Illythr (talk) 00:05, 12 July 2008 (UTC)

Transnistria

Somebody can explain to me about what kind of official language in Transnistria is written in the article? As the administration of the region is not recognized, we can talk only about the language usage in the region. I propose to remove the "as well as one of of the three official languages in the the breakaway territory of Transnistria". --serhio 16:20, 17 July 2008 (UTC)

It is an official language by nonrecognized administration, and we can talk about it. `'Míkka>t 16:56, 17 July 2008 (UTC)

Serhio, I don't necessarily see this as a problem though. I mean even though the separatist government is not internationally recognized, the region is de facto under its administration. Essentially what that clause means is that "the Moldovan language is considered official by the unrecognized breakaway Transnistrian government," which after all is true, only in more concise form. TSO1D (talk) 17:07, 17 July 2008 (UTC)

I think the last major battle over the usage of the word "official" around PMR authorities, settled on a "bracketing solution" - that is, since the PMR is not recognized as a statal entity with its entire legislative infrastructure, we simply note that PMR itself is not recognized, thus implying that the rest of its institutions is not recognized as well, avoiding the need to "unrecognize" them at every mention. --Illythr (talk) 19:03, 17 July 2008 (UTC)

Introduction

Can we please agree on an introduction for the article (or more precisely the first paragraph). This seems to be the main point of contention in the edit war that led the page to be blocked, and it hasn't been resolved yet. I propose something like: "Moldovan (also Moldavian) (limba moldovenească), written with Latin script, is the official name given to the Romanian language in the Republic of Moldova, where it has the status of "state language". Written with the Moldovan Cyrillic alphabet, Moldovan (лимба молдовеняскэ) is one of the three official languages of the breakaway territory of Transnistria." TSO1D (talk) 17:06, 17 July 2008 (UTC)

No. This ignores census results, historical use, and, most important, the colloquial language.Xasha (talk) 20:03, 17 July 2008 (UTC)

How about "Moldovan (also Moldavian) (limba moldovenească), written with the Latin script, is the name of the official language of Republic of Moldova. It is essentially identical to the Romanian language. Written with the Moldovan Cyrillic alphabet, Moldovan (лимба молдовеняскэ) is one of the three official languages of the breakaway territory of Transnistria." --Illythr (talk) 21:00, 17 July 2008 (UTC)

How about: ""Moldovan (also Moldavian) (limba moldovenească), written with the Latin script, is the name of the official language of the Republic of Moldova. It is essentially identical to Romanian, the two languages sharing the same literary form. Written with the Moldovan Cyrillic alphabet, Moldovan (лимба молдовеняскэ) is one of the three official languages of the breakaway territory of Transnistria." TSO1D (talk) 22:05, 17 July 2008 (UTC)

Even better. --Illythr (talk) 22:09, 17 July 2008 (UTC)

The part with the name doesn't work. We don't have "Bosnian is the name of the official language of Bosnia". The rest is more or less OK. Also, the article lacks an infobox, required by Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style (infoboxes).Xasha (talk) 22:20, 17 July 2008 (UTC)

Xasha, the problem is that the Moldovan language as a concept only exists in relation to the Republic of Moldova. In any other place it would be called Romanian, and even in Moldova it is only a matter of the name. That's why it makes sense to begin the intro by explaining that Moldovan is what the official language of Moldova is called, even though its written form is identical to Romanian. But if you prefer another version, please explain what that is. TSO1D (talk) 23:51, 17 July 2008 (UTC)

Huh? What about all these Ukrainian, Russian etc nationals who declare their language to be Moldovan (even in an EU countries such as Estonia)? Should we just ignore them? What about all references to the Moldovan language before 1924? Simply dismiss them?Xasha (talk) 00:06, 18 July 2008 (UTC)

Well, we do have Valencian, which is "the historical, traditional, and official name" etc, so, as long as the description is neutral and accurate, why not? Since Valencian has an infobox, so can Moldovan, as long as its contents is formatted the same way (i.e. "Moldovan, Romanian" and so on). --Illythr (talk) 23:53, 17 July 2008 (UTC)

That wouldn't work. Moldovan speakers in a dozen countries don't call their language Romanian, even if other citizens of the same countries call it that way. Also, Moldovan has a unique ISO code, which Valencian doesn't.Xasha (talk) 00:06, 18 July 2008 (UTC)

I think you guys misunderstood me. I was answering Xasha's question about the part of the intro where it begins with Moldovan being the official language of Moldova. I'm not necessarily against an infobox. I guess we could take the Romanian one but also add the name "Moldovan" up top like they do for the Valencian one with Catalan. TSO1D (talk) 00:17, 18 July 2008 (UTC)

I don't think I misunderstand you, seeing as how I approve of your suggestion. I think this last suggestion best as it seems (to me, at least) be the most NPOV: We have a country. It's got an official language. They call the language Moldovan there. It is pretty much the same as Romanian. --Illythr (talk) 15:57, 19 July 2008 (UTC)

Infobox

Langauge infoboxes are for articles on languages, obviously. This article, however, is about the name of a language, while the linguistic details are already included in the article about Romanian. This is only natural, since all linguists agree that Moldovan and Romanian are one language. We have tried several times to fit a language infobox here, but it didn't work:

• How do you classify Moldovan if nobody considers it a separate language?
• How do you count the speakers if at censuses they had to choose between two names of the same thing?
• Then what ranking does it have?
• What body regulates the language, if the Moldovan Academy of Sciences uses the term Romanian?

These are critical pieces of information, without which a language infobox cannot exist. The simple fact that Moldovan has a language code is definitely not enought, and in fact this information is already mentioned in the article.

I agree with any of the three wordings proposed by TSO and Illythr.

I'm afraid what we have here is an attempt to prove that Moldovan is a separate language, while the specialists say otherwise. Misplaced Pages should reflect their view, not "ours". Remember that Misplaced Pages is not for propaganda. — AdiJapan 18:33, 19 July 2008 (UTC)

At the risk of invoking WP:OTHERCRAPEXISTS, I'd like to point out that the aforementioned Valencian as well as Montenegrin do have infoboxes, even though they're but names/dialects of their respective parent languages and their creation was purely political. To address the individual points:

• Since official Moldovan is almost exactly the same as Romanian, it can be classified the same way with putting "Moldovan, Romanian" together.
• According to their census choice.
• I think we can cannibalize the Romanian infobox to modify it the way it was done for the Valencian one (although I foresee this as a major point of contention in the future).
• I believe they'll have to convert to using "Moldovan" this autumn, but since Moldovan is the same as Romanian, I see no problem in listing MAS as the controlling body. --Illythr (talk) 18:56, 19 July 2008 (UTC)

MAS has adopted the same orthography rules as RoAcad. AFAIK MAS calls it Ro, not Mo . So, technically speaking, MAS regulates the use of Ro on the territory of Mo. Meaning that Mo is not regulated by MAS. As for the infobox, something more than "Romanian (named Moldovan in Moldova)", i.e. more than pointing out it's purely a diff name, hm, sounds like assasinating Franz Ferdinand. The cleanest way to do it would be Mo having its own infobox, wikilinking Ro's. It's up to Moldopodo or someone else to find out the regulating body and some scientific sources more recent and more reliable than of the early 18th century (like Cantemir), which, hm, is older than the steam engine (scientifically speaking). adriatikus | talk 19:30, 19 July 2008 (UTC)

Again, since Mo is just another name of Ro, and since MAS remains the regulating body of the main language used on the territory of the Republic of Moldova, I see no problem in naming MAS its regulating body. --Illythr (talk) 19:38, 19 July 2008 (UTC)

Hm. No, MAS regulates the use of Ro in Mo. Saying it regulates "the main language" is like saying that Mo is spoken in Bucharest, because Mo is another name for Ro. Since this is a naming issue, let's stick to facts. MAS names it Ro, so MAS regulates Ro in Mo. If Voronin, or the Parliament, or the Education Ministry, adopt the rules published by MAS for Ro, than it's their business, and the regulating body is Voronin or the Parliament.

The problem is not we don't know the facts. The problem is facts are named differently. Since WP mirrors the reality, let's not use here "direct implications" (perfect fitted for anything else), because Mo propaganda doesn't follow logics. Let's use only quotes. MAS names it Ro, then MAS has nothing to do with Mo. adriatikus | talk 20:13, 19 July 2008 (UTC)

But Ro is Mo (or vice versa?), just under a different alias, so, while it could be said that Mo is spoken in Bucharest, it would be silly. On the other hand, since MAS did adapt the Ro rules for use by the main language used on the territory of the Republic of Moldova, doesn't that make it the governing body for that language? --Illythr (talk) 20:44, 19 July 2008 (UTC)

You're right, only in part. In order to deal with it and try not to profane Franz Ferdinand, let's check *facts*, and then, only if safe, use "direct logical implications". Fact: MAS calls it Ro. Fact: Official lang in Mo is Mo. Fact: Mo and Ro are identical. If we use logical implications, we'll and up with a mess. E.g. because MAS calls it Ro in order to show it opposes Mo politics of renaming the language (but this is not fact, is our conclusion, since we have no evidence). Oh, and MAS didn't adapt, but copied (as in republished and used) RoAcad rules (it's not "something like", it's "identical to"). And where from is this expression, "main language"? Is it from MAS? Then we should write: "The main language in Mo, named Ro by the MAS and Mo by officials, use the Ro ortography rules....". If it's not MAS, but officials using the expression "main language", then we should write "The official main language in Mo, officially named Mo, uses the orthography rules of Ro as published by the MAS which names it Ro and has adopted the rules of RoAcad rules in 2001,....". Or something like this... :)) adriatikus | talk 21:11, 19 July 2008 (UTC)

Well, another fact is that it was MAS that adapted copied the RAS rules for use in yada-yada. Doesn't that make the implication unnecessary? As long as we avoid calling out the True Name of *that language* (Shhh!), we may be spared from the wrath of the demons guarding it. BTW, the expression is my own original research placeholder name used to cheat the demons mentioned above. :-P --Illythr (talk) 21:39, 19 July 2008 (UTC)

All I'm saying is facts, logic and propaganda don't go hand in hand. For this reason, let's stick to facts only (logic offends propaganda and propaganda offends logic). Let's refrain to: «it is X saying something based on that quote». Because if we try to be logical, we end up saying the official lang in Ro is Mo and in Mo is Ro, or else. We should stick strictly to quotes and let the reader come to its own conclusion. (minor: it's RA, not RAS). Basicly, no yada-yada, just bare facts. :P adriatikus | talk 21:51, 19 July 2008 (UTC)

To avoid the yada-yada, I can't seem to find an explicit official mention tying mo and MAS together. Hm. --Illythr (talk) 23:32, 19 July 2008 (UTC)

If this article were about a language, it would contain information about sintax, morphology, phonology, and so on. But since, according to linguists, Moldovan is Romanian, the whole article would then be a mere redirect, wouldn't it? This makes it clear that the subject we have here is not in the field of linguistics proper. Instead, it is about the political controversy around the name of a language.

If an infobox is added, I will demand to see the sources: What language classification ever mentions Moldovan? I mean textually, not by way of deduction. Who says that Moldovan is regulated by MAS? Also, taking the number of speakers from census data represents our interpretation (i.e. original research) of those data. Given the naming controversy, most probably a linguist would just add up the numbers of those who answered "Moldovan" and those who answered "Romanian" to find out the total number of Romanian-speaking population of Moldova. Anyone who has read anything about this subject understands that the census responses in the language section were not simply language-based, but also politically or ethnically motivated. We can't just take census numbers as reflecting a linguistic reality. — AdiJapan 18:31, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

The issue (same as with Valencian, Montenegrin etc) never was about a linguistic reality, but a political one. For the rest - see above, although I'm not sure what you mean by original research regarding the census. --Illythr (talk) 19:22, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

Well then it should be obvious that there is no place for a language infobox in this article. Valencian and Montenegrin are no reference, since other Misplaced Pages articles are not a reliable source. Besides, each such controversy is different. In the particular case of Moldovan, there is a clear consensus among linguists that this is not a distinct language or dialect. All that's left is politics. Why then have a language infobox in a politics article?...

Simply taking census data is original research because it boils down to making the assumption that only those 2 million people speak Moldovan, when in fact all Romanians do, that is, over 20 million people. How can we state the number of Moldovan speakers without making any interpretation of the census data? We can't. — AdiJapan 10:36, 21 July 2008 (UTC)

Moldovan, Romanian
Moldovenească, Română
Native to	Moldova, Romania, European Union, Bulgaria, Canada, USA, Russia, Spain, Ukraine, Israel, Serbia, Hungary; various communities around the wider Balkan peninsula and beyond.
Region	Southeastern Europe, some communities in the Middle East
Native speakers	24 million 22mln as Romanian (sources) 2mln as Moldovan (sources)
Language family	Indo-European Italic Romance East Romance Moldovan, Romanian
Official status
Official language in	As Moldovan:  Moldova As Romanian:  Romania  Vojvodina (Serbia)  European Union
Regulated by	Moldovan Academy of Sciences (in Moldova) (should be sourced) Academia Română (elsewhere)
Language codes
ISO 639-1	md, ro
ISO 639-2	mol, rum
ISO 639-3	mol

Well, if you can find an outside reliable source on the placement of infoboxes in Misplaced Pages, I'd be most interested to see one. ;) In the cases of Valencian and Montenegrin, as can be gleaned from their respective articles, Valencian is but a name of Catalan, whereas Montenegrin has the same motivation behind the political force driving it to officialness (I wonder if anyone has accused the government of Montenegro of Stalinism yet?), so, in case of Valencian, we have a nearly 1:1 match (except Valencian doesn't have its own ISO code).

I still do not see where the interpretation is. The census says: "60% Moldovan, 16.5% Romanian". Please point out original research in the following statement: "60% of the population of RM speak Moldovan 16.5% of RM speak Romanian".

Well, something like that. I stole all the numbers from the ro infobox, so don't kick me if they're all wrong, we're talking general structure here.

What I meant was that "other crap exists" and we don't need to do here what others have done with the articles on Valencian and Montenegrin. What we need to do is judge things individually. We have this question: Is a language infobox appropriate in an article about a political controversy? I say no. You seem to say yes, although you do seem to understand that we're dealing with a use–mention distinction: This article is not called "Moldovan language" because it talks about a language, but because the political controversy happens to be called "Moldovan language". Having a language infobox here is almost as wrong as having a plant taxobox in Apple Inc..

It is perfectly okay to quote the census results, "60% Moldovan, 16.5% Romanian", but it's not okay to state that same information as if it reflected the reality, because we have reliable evidence indicating that all those 60% + 16.5% actually speak the same language. A parallel: It's okay to quote the Bible where it says that God made everything in 6 days, but we cannot state that as being the truth about the origin of the Universe.

The infobox you placed here is full of statements you won't find sources for, I mean textually about Moldovan, without including our own inferrences. Besides, if this is the same info as in the article Romanian language, why copy it? Why is it not enough to link that article here? — AdiJapan 08:36, 22 July 2008 (UTC)

Eh, the article is about the "Moldovan language", which is 1) The state language of Moldova; 2) A local dialect of Romanian; 3) A controversial attempt at Language secessionism. An infobox is thus useful in dealing with all three, by providing census data as well as underlining the essential unity of standard mo and ro by pointing out that the difference is in name only.

I'm not sure if you're reading me right. The infobox is a clone of the Romanian one, as it deals with the same language. All it adds on top of the original is the name of that same language as it is official in Moldova. Both of your parallels are thus completely off the mark, as the existence of a separate language is not even implied (note the "As" parts). On the contrary, the unity of the two is asserted.

What references would you like to see? That Moldovan and Romanian are the same language? That this language (officially) goes under a different name in a certain area?

PS:Whoa, who wrote the "in Romanian" section in that article? O_o --Illythr (talk) 19:26, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

Come on, for #3 (a controversy) you surely don't need a language infobox. The same goes for #1 (state language of Moldova) because all you need to say is that the Constitution of Moldova uses this term. As for #2, that is actually a different subject so it should go in a separate article. Romanian does indeed have local speeches --- about just as different as Texan English and New York English --- but the geographic distribution of the Moldovan speech does not match the territory of Moldova. In fact, in this linguistic sense, there are much more Moldovan speakers in Romania than there are in Moldova. Let's not mix things up.

The current version of the article does imply the existence of a separate language where it says that "Moldovan is the official language of the Republic of Moldova". The reality is the other way round: The official language of the Republic of Moldova is called Moldovan in the Constitution and possibly other official documents. "Moldovan" is a name. For it to be a language it is necessary that those who are specialists in the field of languages say it is so. Well, they don't. — AdiJapan 17:14, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Well, I guess we'll just have to disagree there. I think that #1 deserves an infobox, as long as it's the same one as Romanian and #2 is what this "language" really is, thus making it a good place to explain not just the Moldova-specific controvercy but also the dialect itself (regardless of geographic location and census data). In fact, I think the article should primarily focus on the dialect and only have a section about the controversy. I suppose that if the article had been named just "Moldovan", there'd be much less revert warring over its contents. Sigh.

As long as that is immediately offset by the next sentence - I don't think it's all that bad, although I would rather reformulate the "the two languages" part. Hey look, Austro-Bavarian actually does have an infobox, if only as a dialect... --Illythr (talk) 19:12, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Changing the name to Moldovan won't improve anything. On the contrary, you'd have to disambiguate it from Moldovans.

I don't think I made myself clear: "Moldovan language" as used by politicians and "Moldavian dialect" as used by linguists are two distinct subjects. They mean different things and you can't have both in one article.

The comparison with the Austro-Bavarian doesn't hold. That is a dialect recognized by linguists, while the same linguists say that Moldovan is an "alternate name". (Read the section on Moldova.)

But hey, do whatever you please. I've stated the facts, I tried to explain them, all seemingly to no avail. I got tired. You probably believe that whatever I say should be dismissed or at best taken with a grain of salt, since I must be in a conflict of interests. Well, I'm one of those who think the NPOV is something to be achieved internally, not by negotiation with the other side. As such, I have nothing left to negotiate. — AdiJapan 09:01, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

I still don't see how this case differs from Valencian, which is also but a name of Catalan, but oh well. No consensus - no infobox... This wasn't a negotiation, btw. --Illythr (talk) 11:53, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Consensus doesn't mean unanimity.Xasha (talk) 14:50, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Moldovan language and the EU

It seems that about a fourth of the body of the article is dedicated to this silly matter. Considering how minor and inconsequential this issue is I propose removing this section altogether. Anyone opposed? TSO1D (talk) 13:39, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

It was originally important to whoever added it to "prove" that Moldovan is outlawed in the EU. Since the EU had washed its hands in this matter, the whole section can probably be cut into a single sentence stating that the EU is neutral on the issue. --Illythr (talk) 19:29, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

Can you prove EU washed its hands on the matter? Appolodor din Damasc (talk) 23:34, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

Why, that is, or rather, was, written in the article... Hey, Xasha, surely, that one statement sums up the stance of the EU on that matter - "Call it as you want, we're not interfering, let's all live in peace, bros."? --Illythr (talk) 19:16, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

There was another statement that said Romania has accepted the Moldovan language as a precondition for joining EU (as part of the acquis), so it has to live with that.Xasha (talk) 19:26, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Mhrrrm, didn't read that part... Uh, whatever. --Illythr (talk) 19:43, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Yea, I didn't read it either, I became bored after the third sentence, which is why I tried to abridge it that way. But I see Xasha's point, the last quote directly contradicted the earlier claims. So I substituted this quote for the other one and I tried to simplify the passage a bit. Hopefully everyone will be satisfied. TSO1D (talk) 00:42, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

OR

Xasha labeled the article with an WP:Original Research tag. Could he or anyone else who believes this is justified please explain what specific problems they perceive with the article. TSO1D (talk) 13:49, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

The lead is OR. Moldovan is, according to the Moldovan constituiton, the official language of Moldova, not one of its names. Moreover, people in Russia, Kazakhstan or EU (Estonia), who are not Moldovan citizens and have nothing to do with Moldovan officials, still call their language Moldovan. The current lead imposes the view that "Moldovan" is just imposed by evil Moldovan communist government, with nobody "really" calling it that way, fact that is contradicted by census results and centuries of use. Xasha (talk) 13:58, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

You're talking about this sentence: "Moldovan (also Moldavian) (limba moldovenească), written with the Latin script, is the name of the official language of the Republic of Moldova."? You mean you want the part about "name of" to be removed? That would actually make sense, since it is the language that is written in the Latin alphabet, not just its name. I'll change it. TSO1D (talk) 14:13, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

It still misses the part about Moldovan speakers outside Moldova. After all, they are about 15% of the total speakers. Xasha (talk) 14:40, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

You want to include in the article information about people in other countries who have declared their language as Moldovan? I don't think anyone has a problem with that as long as the information is sourced (preferably by citing the respective census results). But I don't understand why you think that the introduction somehow contradicts this fact. I am especially confused about what you regard as original research, since the first paragraph only has three main points: 1) The Moldovan language is the official language of Moldova 2) Moldovan and Romanian share a literary form 3) Moldovan is official in Transnistria. All three of these facts are well-sourced and almost universally accepted. TSO1D (talk) 15:58, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

So, I take it, the only problem with the lead section is the absence of speakers from outside of Moldova who were counted as "Moldovan-speakers"? This hardly deserves even a "globalize" tag. All it needs is sourced censa data. --Illythr (talk) 19:40, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

In its current state, the lead is to Moldovan government-centred.Xasha (talk) 20:28, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

Well then, propose something! --Illythr (talk) 20:39, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

Indeed, Xasha, if you still disagree with the introduction as it stands, please propose some specific changes or at least be more specific about what you would like to see changed. Otherwise, the tag should not remain up. TSO1D (talk) 15:56, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Something along "Outside Moldova, Moldovan is also spoken as a minority language in RU, UA and KZ".Xasha (talk) 17:17, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Or, rather, "Moldovan is also recognized as a minority language in Ru, UA, and KZ. (sources)" --Illythr (talk) 22:41, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

That would mean putting a long list with all the countries that have reported Moldovan language in their census results, even if that means under 200 speakers, as in the Baltic republics. And what about those states that include it under "Other" just because they're too few speakers (relative to that country's population)? Maybe " Moldovan is also spoken by sizable minorities in RU, UA and KZ." (4,200 in KZ being a reasonable threshold for "sizable").Xasha (talk) 23:10, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

It shouldn't be matter of factly referred to as a language, at least without some clarification, since Romanian is spoken in more places than where Moldovan is recognized as a separate language. I'm not sure that 4200 is sizeable, but ok. Important is mention of recognition. (Huh, the Baltic republics recognize Moldovan?) As for "Others" - I don't think the two-and-a-half speakers this includes really warrant a special mention. --Illythr (talk) 23:32, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

One guy and we have recognition. If we were to believe Stati, even Romanian ethnologist have found people claiming to speak Moldovan in at least two places west of the Pruth. Just that Romania doesn't recognize their right to self-expression. I doubt any other country cares enough to actually join the two categories (Romanian-speakers and Moldovan-speakers). So your formulation still wouldn't resolve the current tagXasha (talk) 00:27, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

I meant official recognition. By the state, that is. Since Romanian is "default", Moldovan can be mentioned only when it is explicitly present as an option in a country's census. --Illythr (talk) 10:11, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Most census forms, including the Moldovan one, have write in language question. So I doubt any country (except Romania maybe) have even "Romanian" as one of the standard answers.Xasha (talk) 11:19, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

(unindent) Hm, ok, then not as a choice option, but as a result, since those are usually filtered (so that no Hobbits, or Martians (along with whatever languages they speak) get into the result sheet). --Illythr (talk) 13:41, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Seems to me like Xasha has been working hard to become the pro-Moldovenist version of "Bonny" :) Dapiks (talk) 04:15, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

He lacks the socks... --Illythr (talk) 20:21, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

All my edits are based on reputable sources, mostly Western. If I were to adopt Bonaparte's mentality, Misplaced Pages would be full of quotes from Stati's book.Xasha (talk) 22:32, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

I don't think his post-ban version is guilty of using any sources at all... --Illythr (talk) 23:31, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

Major revamping: intro and history sections

As User:TSO1D has fully reverted my last edit, considering it as a "drastic change", I would like to discuss with the community, to see what is so drastic about it:

Moldovan also Moldavian (limba moldovenească, Moldavian pronunciation: , also graiul moldovenesc) is a Romance language spoken today around the world by 2.5 to 4.5 million people as a native language, and by about 2.5 to 4.5 million people as a first and/or second language, with significant speakers in Ukraine and Romania. Most native speakers of the language live in Moldavia, where the language originated. The rest live in western and southern Ukraine, eastern Romania, Italy, Spain, Canada and Australia. Moldovan written in Latin alphabet is the official language of the Republic of Moldova. Written in the Moldovan Cyrillic alphabet, Moldavian (лимба молдовеняскэ) is also one of the three official languages of the breakaway territory of Transnistria.

Moldavian is a descendant of the Latin language of the Roman Empire, as are languages such as Portuguese, Spanish, Italian and Catalan. Its development, contrary to most other Romance languages was not influenced by the Celtic languages of Roman Gaul and by the Germanic language of the post-Roman Frankish invaders. However, 20% of the language was influenced by the Slavic languages. Moldavian language shares with the Romanian the literary form. Contrary to the majority of Romance languages, Moldavian had its first alhabet - the Old Cyrillic alphabet. Between 1940-1989, the Moldovan Cyrillic alphabet had been used.

Moldavian has two assigned ISO codes mo in ISO 639-1 and code mol in ISO 639-2 and ISO/DIS 639-3.

This version is too much in line with the "Ro is a dialect of Mo" idea. Unless you resurrect Cantemir to testify for you, this won't get through. --Illythr (talk) 21:14, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

It contains some inaccuracies and misses some points: the phonetic form is awful, and looks more like what a Russian speakers would read the name written in Moldovan Cyrillics (even if Cyrillics are more adequate for writing Moldovan, and even Romanian, phonetic values are not always the same in Russian and Moldovan cyrillics); the 4.5 million figure seems like an exageration; it doesn't mention the important community in Russia, but it does mention the one in Romania, even if the latter's documentary mention in modern times (as in official census results) is inexistent; 20% percent Slavic it's only in the literary Romanian, Slavic lexical influence is much more important in spoken Moldovan and written Moldovan, even the one after the Romanianization in the 70s and 80s (as was in literary Romanian before the 19th century Gallicization)Xasha (talk) 22:47, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

Well, I do not pretend the version itself is perfect, far from that. What is perfect - is the structure of the intrduction and history sections (as well as others to be revamped later) - this version is perfectly in line with the standard used by Misplaced Pages articles on languages. Here is another version, taking in consideration your proposals of improvement.--Moldopodo 23:27, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

Moldovan also Moldavian (limba moldovenească, Moldavian pronunciation: , also graiul moldovenesc) is a Romance language spoken today around the world by to million people as a native language, and by about to million people as a first and/or second language, with significant speakers in Ukraine, Romania and Russia. Most native speakers of the language live in Moldavia, where the language originated. The rest live in western and southern Ukraine, eastern Romania, Russia, Italy, Spain, Canada and Australia. Moldovan written in Latin alphabet is the official language of the Republic of Moldova. Written in the Moldovan Cyrillic alphabet, Moldavian (лимба молдовеняскэ) is also one of the three official languages of the breakaway territory of Transnistria.

Moldavian is a descendant of the Latin language of the Roman Empire, as are languages such as Portuguese, Spanish, Italian and Catalan. Its development, contrary to most other Romance languages was not influenced by the Celtic languages of Roman Gaul and by the Germanic language of the post-Roman Frankish invaders. However, 20% of the litrary form of the language was influenced by the Slavic languages. Moldavian language shares with the Romanian the literary form. Contrary to the majority of Romance languages, Moldavian had its first alhabet - the Old Cyrillic alphabet. Between 1940-1989, the Cyrillic alphabet had been used. --Moldopodo 23:27, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

References

1. Ziua, November 14, 2007: "Parliament of Europe rejects Moldovan language"
2. ^ Article 13, line 1 - of Constitution of Republic of Moldova
3. Kogan Page 2004, p 242
4. http://ec.europa.eu/translation/language_aids/recognition/field_guide_main_languages_of_europe_en.pdf A Field Guide to the Main Languages of Europe - Spot that language and how to tell them apart], on the website of the European Commission
5. Article 12 of the Constitution of Pridnestrovskaia Moldavskaia Respublika
6. ^ Template:Mo icon "Concepţia politicii naţionale a Republicii Moldova" Moldovan Parliament
7. SIL International: ISO 639 code sets: Documentation for ISO 639 identifier: mol
8. Kogan Page 2004, p 242
9. http://ec.europa.eu/translation/language_aids/recognition/field_guide_main_languages_of_europe_en.pdf A Field Guide to the Main Languages of Europe - Spot that language and how to tell them apart], on the website of the European Commission
10. Article 12 of the Constitution of Pridnestrovskaia Moldavskaia Respublika

History

"Moldavian" is a term that has been continuously used for deisgnation of the language in English since its appearance. The term "Moldovan" exists since 1991 and designates the same language. The references to Moldavian language appear as early as 14th century in works of Dmitrie Cantemir. First written documents were attested in the 16th century in the Cyrillic alphabet, as the Old Slavonic, used by the clergy at the time, influenced the choice of alphabet. History of the Moldavian language in Moldova is closely tied to the region's political status, with long periods of rule by Ottoman Empire, Russian Empire, short rule by Romania influencing the language's name and orthography. Today, the Constitution of Moldova (Title I, Article 13) states that the Moldovan language is the official language of the country. In Moldova's Declaration of Independence the state language was called Romanian. Major recent developments include the passing to a Latin script from Cyrillic in 1989 and several changes in the statutory name of the language used in Moldova, commonly referred to as limba de stat - "The State Language".

--Moldopodo 20:11, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

A rather obvious piece of original research; scholars are agreed that the "Moldavian" of Cantemir is Romanian, while the "Moldovan" of Stalin has entirely different origins. I advise against trying to conflate the two. Biruitorul 04:32, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

What do you mean? The attempt to create the language from eastern dialects had failed, its proponents were repressed and, by the late 30s, the language was stabilized (more or less) same as it was before, plus the Cyrillic script. (Linky). --Illythr (talk) 20:50, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

User:Biruitorul, please stop lying. Cantemir has nothing to do with Romania. He is more than widely acknowledged, one of the most prominent Moldavain scholars. He described scientifically Moldavian language well before this was made for Romanian language, well before Stalin was born. Biruitorul, please stop polluting.--Moldopodo 23:21, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

I mean that the language Cantemir spoke of is early modern Romanian, and should be discussed in a history of the Romanian language; while what was official in the MASSR/MSSR is Romanian written in Cyrillic, and has no history distinct from Romanian prior to 1924 or so. In other words, today's "Moldovan language" was split off from Romanian in the 1920s, and has had a recorded history since then, but prior to that time, its history is essentially indistinguishable from that of Romanian as a whole. (Of course, there may be slight variations, but that should be noted here, not here. Biruitorul 00:50, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

NPOV and coherency

I can easily predict I will (again) be catalogued as oscillating, insecure, immature, illiterate and what have you, but I really need to make this point. I have fought a litany of pro-Moldovan contributors over this article several times over the years. Now things seem to have settled -- but the article ended up being too anti-Moldovan (language, not ethnicity) to claim objectiveness. In the current version the article is a continuum of denial, from top to bottom. That can't be right for a presumably balanced article. Just to ensure I explain my position properly from the beginning: yes, of course Moldovan is not a real language in any scientific way or form; yes, it has certainly been forcefully pushed into existence; yes, lacking even the superfluous distinction of Cyrillic writing or at least distinct spelling rules it is currently indistinguishable from Romanian. I agree 100% with all of that, no reservations. But the current version of the article doesn't explain why the Moldovan "language" ever came into existence, why some people welcomed it, why some people are still clinging on to its presumed distinctiveness, it doesn't properly exorcise Cantemir's and other chroniclers' references to "limba moldovenească" -- the current version just says "no" on all levels without any prior explanations. That can't be right, we must abide by NPOV (and common sense) and provide a reasonable overview for the casual reader -- I don't believe the current version does that. At the very least we should include the rationale of immigrants from within the USSR (Ukrainians, Russians and so on) who must have welcomed the creation of a language distinct from Romanian during the Communist era, that would at least explain the social aspect of the deal. What say you? --Gutza 00:34, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

I am afraid I don't understand what exactly it is you want to see changed. If you believe that the historical context of the article is too limited, I agree with that. It appears that the history section was truncated as a result of the numerous debates we've had here to the point that it's now no more than a stump. In that case, that section could be expanded, so that it would constitute a more representative summary of history of the Moldovan language. I'm not really sure what you are referring to when you talk about immigrants who would have supported the development of the concept of the Moldovan language. Few non-Romanian speakers (barring specific groups active in the political/linguistic field) even were familiar with this issue, so I don't understand why they would have welcomed the creation of the language. Could you please elaborate on that. TSO1D (talk) 02:24, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

Come on, think about it. You're a relatively poor but literate Russian/Ukrainian citizen and you get an offer to move into some remote region of the Union where you'd get better pay -- wouldn't you support a sense of self-determination and unique identity for that region as opposed to acknowledging you're moving in what amounts to an imperialistic expansion territory? Even if you choose to doubt my anthropological extrapolation, you need to acknowledge that even today the proponents of a distinct Moldovan language are mostly Slavic by ethnicity, so it's reasonable to trace that choice back to the beginning of this whole nonsense. --Gutza 02:37, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

Well I agree that the idea of a Moldovan language has always had a dominant political aspect. In that light I agree that during the break-up of the USSR a large part of the non-Romanian speaking part of Moldova's population opposed the idea of Moldo-Romanian linguistic unity since they perceived it as nationalistic and irredentist. As for what the views of immigrants to the republic were on the language issue, I simply have no idea. However personally, I doubt more than a few people even considered the issue, particularly when even locals did not really debate this problem(government censure was of couse a large factor here, but there was also much apathy, particularly in the countryside). And as for the idea that most proponents of a distinct Moldovan language are Slavic, I am very skeptical about that. If you're talking at an official level, then there only remain a very tiny number of individuals of any ethnicity who still endorse this idea. As for public opinion, I would wager that most vocal proponents of the Moldovan language would be lower class self-described Moldovans, since this issue affects them more directly (and if you go by sheer numbers considering that most Romanian speakers called their language Moldovan in the census, it's hard to imagine another group surpassing them). As for the opinions of Slavs on the issue, again I have no idea about the statistics, though at least speaking from personal experience, I have hardly met anyone who has argued this point. In any case, this is more or less my personal speculation. If you can find a source that discusses any aspect of this issue, we can of course include that, but don't know where you could find such information. TSO1D (talk) 03:47, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

As a Moldovan, I must say I find Gutza's argument offensive.Xasha (talk) 12:48, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

Crucial question

By reading both article Moldovan language and History of Moldovan language I noticed that neither of them anwsers crucial question about topic; What were the differences between standard language used in Romania and standard language used in Soviet Moldavia (except that it used different script)? Also what were the differences between standard language used in MASSR and MSSR? The anwsers I couldnt even articles in romanian and russian language. Couldnt anyone write about this? Luka Jačov (talk) 13:08, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

You can think of the common literary from of Romanian and modern Moldovan as the "Serbo-Croatian" unified language in former Yugoslavia. Just that Moldovans didn't feel the need to reinforce the characteristics of the their vernacular over literary language, like Croatian did in the 90s.Xasha (talk) 13:32, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

The literary form is based both in Romania and Moldova on the Wallachian vernacular (roughly Bucharest-Prahova area). The differences between Wallachian and Moldavian vernaculars are probably smaller than between American and British English. (mostly some words and a few small accent/phonology differences, I'm not aware of any notable differences in grammar) bogdan (talk) 13:41, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

Well it seams to me noone understood completly my question. Saša I know today Republic of Moldova and Romania use same standard language. But in Soviet times when offical policy that those two languages were similar but seperate it must have been based on different standard. And Bogdan you didnt understood that I am not speaking about verniculars as its normal that every language has its local variations. What I meant the standard forms used in Romania and Soviet Union what were the differences except the script that was used? Was Soviet standard also based also on Bucharest-Prahova area? Or based on first Transnistrian and later Bessarbian vernaculars? Luka Jačov (talk) 14:09, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

Except script, there were only some lexical differences (most of the neologism) in the standard literary language of the 80s. The Transnistrian and Bessarabian standards were dropped on Stalin's orders for some imaginated faults.Xasha (talk) 14:14, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

There were some attempts in the 1920s/1930s to make in Transnistria a "Moldovan language" that is different from Romanian, but Stalin shot all the linguists involved during the Great Purge. (I doubt there were many other massacres of linguists in the history of the world)

After that, they used the Romanian standard language. I read somewhere that the standard grammar description was entirely plagiarized from some grammar published in Bucharest. (which isn't surprising, considering there were no good linguists left) bogdan (talk) 21:10, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

So Soviets in their attempt to differate Romanian and Moldovan didnt even bother to make an effort to really make it different? Btw I noticed that romanian article mentions those slight differences between those two standard languages during Communist era. Could things missing in English article be translated from Romanian one? Could somethin be written about linguistic properties of previous moldovan standards? Luka Jačov (talk) 16:24, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

Concerning your first question, my guess is that it was not worth the trouble. With efficient propaganda and a closed society you can make people believe that the languages are and have always been different. Why bother built up a whole, new, elaborate standard? Plinul cel tanar (talk) 16:30, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

There was no attempt to make them different after WW2, just that the Soviets and most Moldovans chose to name the literary language by the centuries old name of the vernacular.Xasha (talk) 16:53, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

Well, Edward Vajda, an American linguist specialized in dialectology, thinks differently: "When the USSR took over the eastern province of Romania in 1945 at the close of WW2, they declared that the local Moldavian dialect was a separate language. Although Moldavian and other regional dialects of Romanian actually differ very little, the Soviets forced the Moldavians to adopt the Cyrillic alphabet and add many Russian words to the vocabulary." — AdiJapan 17:04, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

Considering the assertions he mades, I won't trust him too much.Xasha (talk) 17:27, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

That's not how Misplaced Pages works. Sources are right until proven wrong by other sources. Users' opinions never matter, even if they strongly believe it's the truth. Verifiability counts. — AdiJapan 01:12, 2 October 2008 (UTC)

As for the centuries old name(s) for the vernacular, both Moldavian and Romanian are atested. Plinul cel tanar (talk) 08:46, 2 October 2008 (UTC)

I am answering here the first post of this section. I think there is no source comparing the standard language of Romania and the standard language of the Moldovan SSR. This seems normal to me, because there was no other difference than the script. A Romanian in Romania, I have read one history book from the Moldovan SSR, and I had no difficulties in reading it (it was just after I learned the Cyrillic script). Dpotop (talk) 14:20, 2 October 2008 (UTC)

On the other hand, what sources say is that: (1) Linguists point to the identity between current standard Moldovan and standard Romanian and (2) Standard Moldovan = (by definition) Moldovan SSR Moldovan + pre-1991 Romanian ortograph. Maybe drawing conclusions from this is WP:OR, but still... Dpotop (talk) 14:20, 2 October 2008 (UTC)

I wrote in the article that Romanian and Moldovan have "full mutual intelligibility", something that Xasha excised as being "BS". (Apparently these two can make do without an interpreter - or will Xasha claim that Chirtoacă is part of the "Romanian minority in Moldova"? - something I believe not even the Soviets claimed existed.) Well, I think it's important for the reader to know this. It would be great to find a citation, too, but meanwhile, if someone from the US or the UK who has no idea about the situation is reading this article, shouldn't we make it clear that the "languages" share a spoken as well as a written form? Biruitorul 18:49, 2 October 2008 (UTC)

Isn't "share the literary standard" stronger than "full mutual intelligibility", and states what you say? --Illythr (talk) 20:44, 2 October 2008 (UTC)

It depends on what you're trying to prove. If I understood Xasha correctly, he was trying to make a point that the vernacular used in RM on a daily basis (e.g. among friends) might not be fully understood by, say, the average person in Bucharest. True as that may be, one can find similar communication problems between generations (I can easily imagine an elderly lady finding it impossible to follow a conversation between two teenagers who live in the same city as she does). The same goes for different vernaculars within Romania proper -- e.g. an ethnic Romanian in Transylvania might not be able to follow a conversation between two friends in Oltenia. Of course, that happens everywhere in the world -- and obviously the question to ask is not whether you're able to follow a conversation you overhear between two total strangers, but rather whether you can communicate with said strangers upon approaching them without any effort or special knowledge; and the answer to the latter is a resounding yes. --Gutza 21:00, 2 October 2008 (UTC)

Illythr, the existence of a literary standard and the mutual intelligibility are different things. A good example is that Italians have a single literary standard, which they all study in schools and can use if they need, but at home they speak local dialects. These are not necessarily mutually intelligible, especially if they are geographically distant. In the case of "Moldovan", there is no such problem. — AdiJapan 02:20, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

Two points Illythr. First: most varieties of the Chinese language are mutually unintelligible, even though they share a written standard. Second: as Gutza pointed out, there are varieties of the Romanian language, in Romania itself, intelligible to a large degree only locally. Example: the poem here. That doesn't mean every variety is a separate language; everyone knows the standard language and someone from Botoşani or, I daresay, Tiraspol, can make himself perfectly understood to someone from Arad.

So I repeat my contention that we should, in some form, preferably with sources, indicate to the reader that spoken as well as written Romanian and "Moldovan" are fully mutually intelligible. That, varieties and politics aside, a single language is spoken from the, if you will, Nistru to the Tisa. Biruitorul 05:16, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

I for one camp on one of my earlier positions: we should follow the Valencian model and define Moldovan as an alternate (and otherwise official and legitimate) name of the Romance language known as Romanian. Plinul cel tanar (talk) 07:58, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

Plinul, that's what Moldovan language used to read a few years back ("Moldovan is the name of the Romanian language in Moldova", or something to that effect). That generated a lot of controversy from select Moldovan nationals and their friends (Romanian arrogance, Moldovans are denied the right to their own language, that sort of thing). Of course, it just so happens that... well, it's true, Moldovan is indeed the name of the Romanian language used left of Pruth. But since one needs to reach some form of consensus irrespective of truth proper, we ended up with what we have now (with a copy of the Moldovan Constitution at hand, a person does have serious sources to make any claim as to the "political independence" of the language, and trying to argue otherwise does make you look like an irredentist/expansionist madman to the average American used to read news about the Middle East). Don't get me wrong, I understand perfectly what you're trying to say (I've read the part with "official and legitimate"), but some Moldovans don't want the article to make that assertion, and, given the topic's relative (nay, absolute) obscurity on en.wiki and the amount of reading required to get up to speed with all aspects of the issue, most third opinions will look at the matter from the point of view of someone trying to resolve a dispute, not from an educated historical point of view. That's why we need to build consensus tightly around rock-solid sources, as opposed to writing summaries that can't be proven point by point. --Gutza 09:26, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

Biru: I find the probability that the language is and was completely uniform everywhere, especially given this map and the fact that when those Soviet linguists attempted to create a separate Moldovan standard, they didn't make it up out of thin air, but had based their standard on some eastern (Transnistrian) dialects, which were found to be unintelligible by the population of central Bessarabia, rather low. The idea, as I understand it, is to say that the standard language is not just mutually intelligible, but pretty much the same everywhere (this seems to be the part everyone agrees on). Whereas the, uhm, vernacular - not so sure.

Plinul: Well, I tried that. Didn't quite work out, as you can see. --Illythr (talk) 09:47, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

We may discuss the actual phrase, but certainly not the meaning. Consensus should not be reached by compromising between scientific views and fringe theories. Introducing any weasel words that contradict the fact that Romanian is just another name for Moldovan (is this more acceptable?) goes against the goal of the project. I am not defending Romanian irredentist views and should I ever be consulted (as in a referendum) about a potential union of Romania and Moldova I would vote against it. Plinul cel tanar (talk) 09:55, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

Illythr, I was reading the other day a very interesting and only loosly related article on Romanian phonolgy. Here it is, I hope you can read French: . Note that the author is doing everything possible to keep out of politics, (she even uses "romanian/moldovan" once) but she does speak of "Romanian in Moldova (but which keeps its official Modavian name)". She also explicitly writes about the Moldavian dialect of Romanian. There isn't the slightest scientific opposition to language identity among linguists. Plinul cel tanar (talk) 10:18, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

Disputed language infobox

Perhaps a "disputed language infobox" should be created and used on pages such as this one or Valencian... Plinul cel tanar (talk) 09:53, 13 October 2008 (UTC)

But Moldovan is not a disputed language. There is a clear consensus among specialists about its identity with Romanian. Let's not be hyper-neutral. — AdiJapan 13:10, 13 October 2008 (UTC)

I see your point... there is a debate but it's political not linguistical... then the infobox should be dropped altogether. Unless we have a reputable source on Romance languages listing Moldovan alongside Italian, French, Romanian etc there is no point in having an infobox. The same should be done for Valencian. The infobox as it is now is missleading and giving undue weight to a fringe theory. Plinul cel tanar (talk) 15:03, 13 October 2008 (UTC)

Huh, was that a Jedi mind trick, Adi? O_o --Illythr (talk) 16:37, 13 October 2008 (UTC)

Well, sometimes my suggestions are good, sometimes they aren't... the "disputed language infobox" seemd like a good one at first but Adi is right about one thing: it moves a political debate into linguistics and that is unencyclopedic. And there is no reason to be hyperneutral about this. Moldovans have the right to there own, distinct identity, they have the right to call there language whatever they want, however the is no point in inducing doubt about the actual identity with Romanian. And the infobox on Romanian is already available. Plinul cel tanar (talk) 07:26, 14 October 2008 (UTC)

You mean something like Alexandru Graur's Studii de lingvistica generala, Bucuresti, Editura Academiei RPR, 1961?Xasha (talk) 19:48, 13 October 2008 (UTC)

With all due respect to the late philologist, any scholarship of a remotely political nature produced under conditions of Stalinism (or other forms of totalitarianism) - particularly when such scholarship can and has been freely undertaken in the last 20 years- is highly suspect. Biruitorul 05:29, 14 October 2008 (UTC)

So you say one of the few Romanian noted linguist, whose field of research is exactly Romance languages, was politically motivated? And you also say we should delete all Romanian sources published between 1938 and 1990, cause they were written under totalitarian regimes.Xasha (talk) 10:06, 14 October 2008 (UTC)

Xasha, you won't find anything published in Romania between 1949 and 1965 that contradicts or criticise the official Soviet stance or Soviet science. For most of those years, there were Soviet troops in Romania, too. I'm sure I wouldn't use any Romanian source between these years as a reliable reference for anything related to the Soviet Union.

After 1965, a little liberalisation occured, being acceptable to criticise Soviet science, although usually not Soviet politics directly. As such, the issue of the Moldovan language has been discussed by linguists from a critical perspective between 1965-1989, although we were still in the "Soviet Block". bogdan (talk) 10:26, 14 October 2008 (UTC)

Soviet left Romania in 1958, and by 1960 Romania was clearly heading away from the Soviet line (it's just chance that the Chinese chose Bucharest in 1960 to start openly criticizing Soviets?). Also this WP article claims late 50s and early 60s Romania as quite independent from Soviet influences. So 1961 doesn't seem like part of the Stalinist period.Xasha (talk) 10:44, 14 October 2008 (UTC)

Yes, that's correct, we were a democracy, there was no censorship whatsoever, we were free to criticise the USSR and so on -- that explains the American immigrants looking for a free country. Come on. --Gutza 11:15, 14 October 2008 (UTC)

I am afraid we are talking here about two or more different things. If you read the article, you would notice that it is not about the language. It says nothing about the letters, the words, the grammar, the literature, the earliest writtings, the 1001 other things you find in a normal article about the language. This article is about the theory that Moldovan and Romanian are different. It shows who brought in that theory, what is the reaction of linguists to it, etc. The article "moral" if you want is that it is not a linguistic, but a political question. From my point of view one can call the language Daco-Bessarabian, as long as we do not invent on WP that the language exists as a separate language.

A thing that somehow I see missing in the article is the mention of the fact that the schools in Moldova teach Romanian language, not Moldovan language, their exams, in their diplomas it is written "Romanian".

It is Moldovan in the sense that it is the language of Moldovans, but not in the sense that it is different from Romanian. And I see no implications here about politics of the country. Do Austrians call their languages Austrian? Dc76\ 04:09, 14 October 2008 (UTC)

Actually 3 Romanian admins forced the exclusion of "the letters, the words, the grammar, the literature, the earliest writtings" without a serious motivation.Xasha (talk) 10:06, 14 October 2008 (UTC)

By the way, good, neutral introduction to the issue (p.68ff.), although a little out of date near the end. Biruitorul 04:58, 14 October 2008 (UTC)

Thank you very much, but i will need time to read it through.Dc76\ 07:04, 14 October 2008 (UTC)

Very interesting. The intro will have to be re-written sooner or later, and now we have some reliable info on the vernacular. Plinul cel tanar (talk) 07:26, 14 October 2008 (UTC)

No, Illythr, I don't have that much power, although I could use some Jedi stuff... The thing is that I know what Plinul was trying to do: balance the article in a way that would make it acceptable to all editors working on it (including Xasha, that is). But this is the wrong definition of NPOV. The balance has to be established among published sources, not among ourselves. And I don't need to repeat what the sources say about the so-called Moldovan language. In fact, Dc76 explained very well what subject this article has. — AdiJapan 10:24, 14 October 2008 (UTC)

Shouldn't this article be named Moldovan Romanian instead of Moldovan ?

Shouldn't this article be named Moldovan Romanian instead of Moldovan ? Similarly,the article about German spoken in Austria is named Austrian German ( http://en.wikipedia.org/Austrian_German ) , the article about English spoken in the US is named American English ( http://en.wikipedia.org/American_English ) ,the article about English spoken in New Zealand is named New Zealand English ( http://en.wikipedia.org/New_Zealand_English ) and so on. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.124.206.132 (talk) 14:21, 23 October 2008 (UTC)

No, because the article is not about a language variety. It's about a political controversy. We don't have any article about the Moldavian variety of Romanian yet. — AdiJapan 15:22, 23 October 2008 (UTC)

ISO 639 decision

See http://www.alvestrand.no/pipermail/ietf-languages/2008-November/008635.html --✉ Hello World! 16:56, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

The cat's already out of the box, so I might as well brag about it: I was the one to contact SIL and the LoC regarding this matter, and I only did it because I was nauseated by all the Wikipedian Moldovenists poking me in the eye with that ISO code. Well, now it's gone, good riddance! --Gutza 22:08, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

Wow! I am speechless. Bravo! :) Dc76\ 22:46, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

Hurray! Hopefully we can now get the Template:Mo icon template deleted too. Biruitorul 23:36, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

Only “mo” is deprecated, not the word “Moldovan”. A language can have several names, for example Spanish is also called Castilian, Catalan is also called Valencian or Balear, depend on which region people come from. The ISO 639 standard(s) will add Moldovan (may also add Moldovian, to be confirmed) under the name Romanian, as other names/aliases of the same language.--✉ Hello World! 18:40, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

Please fix recent inaccurate edits by SPA account

Single purpose account User:ITSENJOYABLE (talk · contribs) made some erroneous edits in his edits of November 8:

1. he changed the perfectly OK wording saying the "mo" and "mol" code in ISO 693/2 was deprecated to the completely inaccurate "revoked" diff (note the decision explicitely says the codes are not invalid ). Moreover, he applies the decision to ISO 693/3, which is not the case as of 15:55, 9 November 2008 (UTC)
2. falsely claims that the Moldovan Constituion was changed in 1995 to change the language from Romanian to Moldovan. The innacuracy of this claim can be verified in numerous sources. There was a movement to change the language from Moldovan to Romanian (the other way around) in 1995, but the proposal was not approved by the MD Parliament.
3. he removed the "globalize" template, even if he has done nothing to fix to problem (i.e. no further info was provided about Moldovan speakers all over the former Soviet Union, recorded as such in the censa of both CIS and EU countries)

Xasha (talk) 15:55, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

Undid 1 and 2, indeed, he's been playing with the sources. 3 - I'm not sure, moldovan usage outside of Moldova seems to be pretty insignificant... And the EU records seem to be referring to the nationality anyway. --Illythr (talk) 19:29, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

History of Moldovan language

Between January 22, 2006 and December 1, 2008, an article History of the Moldovan language also existed. It was then decided to merge its contents into the articles History of the Romanian language (sections 1 & 2), Moldovenism (section 3), and into this article (intro, section 4, biblio, cats, and the talk page). Below is the cut and paste version of the talk page of that article. For the history of that talk page, type Talk:History of the Moldovan language, click on "Redirected from ..." and chose "history".

Why the article split?

I am just wondering. Was it simply to pull the content people were not arguing about out and put it somewhere? It does not leave very much in the other article. Dalf | Talk 11:21, 23 January 2006 (UTC)

Because this part is getting very long. The other article is supposed to talk about Moldovan, the current official language of Moldova and what happend hundreds of years ago is only marginally relevant to that article. bogdan 11:28, 23 January 2006 (UTC)

Ok, seems like a good reason. Sometimes I think people split articles too quickly or for bad reasons. A lot of the best featured articles are quite long. But there does seem to be a good argument for having them seperate. Does the article on ROmanian also link here? I think a line or two mentioning Moldova and a like here (and there) might be worthwhile. Dalf | Talk 11:33, 23 January 2006 (UTC)

I put a link in Romanian language. It should link eventually have a link in the history section, but currently that section has little on the modern history of Romanian language. bogdan 11:41, 23 January 2006 (UTC)

Sections added by Bonaparte

I suspect that the large section of this article originally added by Bonaparte is a direct translation from a copyrighted work in Romanian -- he has only one reference for the whole thing, despite the fact that it's paragraphs long. It's also poorly written, and most of it repeats things already written elsewhere in the article using different, less neutral, wording. I think we should remove it entirely, and if not that, it definitely needs a lot of work. --Node 11:26, 30 January 2006 (UTC)

An observation

In this version of this page, it is possible for a casual reader to get most of the way through the article without realizing that the Moldovan and Romanian languages are basically the same thing. silsor 03:31, 2 February 2006 (UTC)

Why did you delete my addition on Latcu?

I do not understand why Node_ue deleted my text, for it has sources and he can read moldovan. Dpotop 11:21, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

Can he? Alexander 007 07:05, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

I may have fibbed regarding my abilities in the language, but I can certainly read it more or less, even if my writing and speaking may cause laughter and/or tears. Your language is much easier to read than it is to write. The cases, dear God, they are a nightmare. --Node (talk) 06:50, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

From Washington D.C.

I found an interesting book: The Soviet Empire: a Study in Discrimination and Abuse of Power, prepared by the Legislative Reference Service, Library of Congress, at the request of the Subcommitee to Investigate the Administration of the Internal Security Act and other Internal Security Laws of the Commitee on the Judiciary, United States Senate, printed for the use of the Commitee on the Judiciary, Commitee Print, 89th Congress, 1st Session, U.S. Government Printing Office, Washington, D.C. 20402, 1965. Among the passages I will quote: pg. 106:

"Linguistic aggression is one of the foremost operational devices used in furthering the Communist goal of Russifying the multinational Soviet state. Briefly, the Soviet political leadership seeks 1) to break down the native linguistic structure within the various non-Russian societies ; 2) to impose the Russian language upon all sectors of Soviet life; 3) to effect a merging of all Soviet peoples based on Russian-Communist norms; and 4) ultimately to create a Communist state, totally unified and commanding the undiluted loyalties from all its citizenry whose system of values derive wholly from Communist ideology."---Alexander 007---06:16, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

pg. 107:"The implication of Soviet theory is clear that historically languages of the nationalities are doomed; for during the period of transition from socialism to communism measures will be taken, and indeed have already been taken, to accelerate the process of merging the multinational Soviet state into one nation based on the Russian language and Russian culture. Khrushchev made this point fairly clear in his address to the 22d Party Congress when he said that national languages may be used, but their development "must not lead to any accentuation of national barriers; on the contrary, it should lead to a coming together of nations." Khrushcev thus reaffirmed what Soviet theoreticians have been saying for a long time." ---Alexander 007 06:35, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

Here, pg. 111, speaking of the situation in the North Caucasus region alone, not to mention other regions:"In the late 1930s the Soviet regime, pursuing its policy of linguistic fractionalization and national discrimination, invented 13 literary languages; imposed the Cyrillic alphabet;..."---Alexander 007 06:55, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

Does it mention Romanian? --Candide, or Optimism 09:19, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

The book is a slim report running only to 177 pages (not counting appendices and the index); the section on the Soviet linguistic policies does not appear to have a section on Romanian in Moldova; maybe I will write to them and ask them for literature on the matter. Alexander 007 09:25, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

In Appendix A of course it lists Moldovans as an ethnic group speaking Romanian (pg. 179). Alexander 007 09:28, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

Here's more, pg. 117:"Measures have been taken in Lithuania, similar to those already accomplished in the Moslem East, to replace the Latin alphabet with a new "Lithuanian" type of printing whose characters are similar to or identical with the Russian Cyrillic. The new script, designed by the Moscow Experimental-Scientific Polygraphic Institute, is expected to be introduced in 1965. Ostensibly, the "scientific" and "medical" arguments for the change are based on the unsuitability of the Lithuanian alphabet, particularly its "negative effect on the nervous system and the eyesight". The real political objective motivating the change however, is the desire to create more favorable conditions for assimilation." ---Alexander 007 10:10, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

It's pretty clear that these cock-sucking Soviet scum were just interested in exploiting and fucking people over. And the actions of these scumbags lives on: in the cock-sucking, shit-faced, shit-reeking edits of some editors around here. I'll kill and piss in the mouth of anyone who supports Soviet scum, and furthermore support their murder in public. Alexander 007 13:09, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

If I didn't know you're such a womanizer, I'd have said that the verbal violence is a syndrome of having no date on St. Valentine. :-) bogdan 23:02, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

To: Romanizators and Originalists

(copied from archives of Talk:Moldovan language), since this section is relevant to this sub-article). `'mikka (t) 00:58, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

• Romanizators: И.О. Дическу-Дик, А.П. Дымбул, А.А. Залик, А.А. Николау, Н.Г. Плоештяну, Е.З. Арборе-Ралли, Е.И. Багров, В.П. Попович, Г.И. Старый
• Originalists: И.И. Бадеев, Г.И. Бучушкан, Л.А. Мадан, И.А. Малай, И.В. Очинский

AFAIK almost all of them were repressed. Are their names remembered? mikka (t) 07:44, 10 November 2005 (UTC)

What are the original words for these terms? Romanizators just sounds horrible, and I would prefer romanisers. I ask about originalists too, as there might be a better English word for them. --Gareth Hughes 23:54, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

I have honestly never heard of these terms before I read them here. I also find it very hard to believe that in Stalin's Soviet Union and even before and after, people actually could afford to take independent stances on something like this and not expect to be murdered, sentenced to a GULAG or declared insaine (a practice that was very common in the USSR). In the USSR, there was very little room for independent thinking or research. Everything came from the top and was extensively regulated. Therefore, I think that these waves of Cyrillic script and then Latin script and then Cyrillic script, reflected rather the new intentions or policies of the top leadership, rather then the so called Romanizators and Originalizators or whatever they are called here. In fact, I even doubt that these movements existed at all. If there is a refference to them in Soviet literature or sources, then first of all anything Soviet should be analyzed carefully and secondly one should keep in mind that these terms may be used by Soviets in order to give off the impression that an actual Originalist movement existed that wanted a sepparate Moldovan language. Constantzeanu 00:05, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

The biggest problem with the article is probably the fact that it's too big, make it smaller, make it express the main idea: it's official language in moldova as noted in constitution, it's written in latin script, it's considered by the majority to be identical to Romanian. I don't see how the history of languages in moldova made it into the article about "moldovan" language, move it to history of moldova or something :) When it will be smaller, there will be less differences and easier to solve them. Just a tag

I agree but a little history is sometimes useful, because it explains how we ended up with something called "moldovan". Again like AdiJapan said, this article is not really about a language, rather about the name of a language( very similar to the Flemish case)Constantzeanu 00:54, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

These terms are taken by me from a Russian article. Russian terms: румынизаторы, самобытники; the translation, I confess, is mine. "Romanizer" is not the same as "Romanizator": the latter one is the one who supports Romanization. "Самобытник" is from "samobytny", the word means "original", "genuine", in the contexts of indigenous and folk cultures. "Самобытник" was a pretty common word of the time, but it fell into disuse in modern Russian. Therefore I belive the author didn't "invent" the word. I no longer have the artile (Галущенко О. Борьба между румынизаторами и самобытниками в Молдавской АССР (20-е годы), Ежегодный исторический альманах Приднестровья. - 2002. - № 6. - С. 61 - 71. ), but here is a link to another one, of the same author:(in Russian).

You may want to recognize these names:

• Romanizators: И.О. Дическу-Дик, А.П. Дымбул, А.А. Залик, А.А. Николау, Н.Г. Плоештяну, Е.З. Арборе-Ралли, Е.И. Багров, В.П. Попович, Г.И. Старый
• Originalists: И.И. Бадеев, Г.И. Бучушкан, Л.А. Мадан, И.А. Малай, И.В. Очинский

Constantzeanu: as to "find it very hard to believe", you probably have to practice more. You will be surprized. Still, you are partially right. Nearly all people from both lists eventually landed in gulag. mikka (t) 02:33, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

How about "Romanianisers"?

And for those here who can't read Cyrillic, translits of the names into modern Moldovn latin.

Romanizators: "I.O. Dicescu-Dic, A.P. Dîmbul, A.A. Zalic, A.A. Nicolau, N.G. Ploieşteanu, E.Z. Arbore-Ralli, E.I. Bagrov, V.P. Popovici, G.I. Starîi"

Originalists: "I.I. Badeiev, G.I. Buciuşcan, L.A. Madan, I.A. Malai, I.V. Ocinschii". --Node 07:28, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

BTW, only now I paid an attention that the author is from Transnistria, and I may easily guess how it will be percieved here. Anyway, you have names. You may find more names from the provided link and find yourself how these people called themselves and what were their positions. mikka (t) 02:35, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

Russian in Moldova

"In 2002, the government of Moldova gave the Russian language the same privileges as Moldovan. " I am not sure what this statement is supposed to mean. The Communist Party wanted to make Russian co-official, but that was never realized in the face of continuous protests, so Russian cannot possibly have the same priveleges as Romanian. TSO1D 01:51, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

Politically

"Politically called" is bad English and also it's not supported by references. Alæxis_¿question? 10:19, 30 June 2007 (UTC)

Oh really? You haven't read the full article then.--Tones benefit 13:37, 30 June 2007 (UTC)

Another form was proposed--Tones benefit 13:05, 3 July 2007 (UTC)

ok, but you still have to find source for this. Alæxis_¿question? 16:04, 3 July 2007 (UTC)

Newest changes

Thanks Illythr... the fact remains that a lot of that info was added by Bonaparte, and I know in other articles similar text was often translated verbatim from a source, which is inappropriate without quotations. It would be nice if we could find the sources he cited to see how much the text relies on them. --Node (talk) 05:55, 16 February 2008 (UTC)

Well, by the looks of it, all of Bonny's additions to this article were reverted. Some of the sources used are clearly Romanian (perhaps it's the #3 one everywhere?), but this article is slowly getting into shape (it's got a long way to go yet,though). There is a redundancy in the Phases chapter which I am unsure how to integrate intoo the rest of the text... --Illythr (talk) 22:49, 16 February 2008 (UTC)

Some sources

Besides Descriptio Moldaviae, just really quickly, here are some additianal ones:

• http://feb-web.ru/FEB/LITENC/ENCYCLOP/le7/le7-4161.htm
• http://www.diclib.com/cgi-bin/d1.cgi?l=ru&base=bse&page=showid&id=44721
• http://bse.sci-lib.com/article077541.html
• http://www2.unil.ch/slav/ling/textes/Mixalchi51.html
• http://militera.lib.ru/common/show/05_30.html
• http://www.nm.md/daily/article/2002/01/18/0101.html
• http://www.ap7.ru/iskusstvo_znat_budushchee/_god._vospominanija_o_budushchem/glava_tretja_strany_sng_rjadom_s_rossiej_i_vdali_ot_nee._/_._moldavija._uterennaja_chast_kogda_to_edinogo_tselogo.html
• http://www.photo.md/news_info.php?news_id=1040&lang=rus
• http://feb-web.ru/feb/litenc/encyclop/le7/le7-4102.htm
• http://www.krugosvet.ru/articles/63/1006364/1006364a7.htm
• http://www.rusk.ru/st.php?idar=175398
• http://www.volgainform.ru/allnews/998122/

--Moldopodo 10:40, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

To Biruitorul

Moldovan and Moldavian are written the same in Russian. I don't think "Moldovan" was ever used in English before 1990, with "Moldavian" used instead.Xasha (talk) 10:51, 25 June 2008 (UTC)

Well, I don't think this is that important an issue next to all the others, but perhaps it would be better to settle on a single standard rather than alternating between them within the very same article. Biruitorul 14:34, 25 June 2008 (UTC)

Merge first sections

The first few sections discussing the history of the language should be merged with History of the Romanian language, and a separate article should be created specifically for the dispute between Moldovan=Romanian and Moldovan is a stand-alone language. The current setup is misleading. --Gutza 20:26, 21 September 2008 (UTC)

Strong opose. As long as sources talk about "Moldavian" it would be a severe breach of WP:OR and WP:SYNTH to substitute this lingvonym with Romanian.Xasha (talk) 12:02, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

Support complete removal. Grigore Ureche, Jan Długosz, Dimitrie Cantemir are primary sources. See WP:OR and WP:SYNTH:

Misplaced Pages articles should rely on reliable, published secondary sources. All interpretive claims, analyses, or synthetic claims about primary sources must be referenced to a secondary source, rather than original analysis of the primary-source material by Misplaced Pages editors. bogdan (talk) 12:24, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

The opinions of those authors are stated and rightly attributed. No "interpretive claims, analyses, or synthetic claims". On the other hand, moving these opinions to the "History of the Romanian language" is exactly that, i.e. "analysis of the primary-source material by Misplaced Pages editors".Xasha (talk) 12:39, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

Let's get one thing straight: There is no distinct Moldovan language, at least not from a linguistic point of view. "Moldovan" is only an alternative name for the Romanian language. As such, this whole article should be merged with History of the Romanian language. If that article becomes too large, then I would agree to have a separate sub-article for the history of Romanian in the territory of Bessarabia and Moldova.

If we're talking about the history of the name "Moldovan language", which is a different matter altogether, that should be discussed at Moldovan language, together with all the other information about the dispute. — AdiJapan 15:51, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

Come back when you get rid of this propaganda mindset.Xasha (talk) 16:20, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

That's just plain rude. — AdiJapan 03:57, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

I removed the part from Cantemir because it's obsolete scolarship: there are quite a few things he says that are false. You should try to use modern sources, not a 300-years old source. bogdan (talk) 15:55, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

Nobody claims what Cantemir said is absolutely true (because he did get a lot of thing right), the article just says "This 18th century scholar thought so".Xasha (talk) 16:20, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

What's the point in including wrong information and obsolete in this article? Misplaced Pages is supposed to include the current accepted scholarship, not what was thought to be true three centuries ago.

Misplaced Pages, and any serious encyclopedia, is full of obsolete and "wrong" information, which are presented in their right context. If you want only up-to date info, go to wikinews. Also, in controversial topics "obsolete" and "wrong" are a matter of POV.Xasha (talk) 16:45, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

No, Misplaced Pages should present the scientific consensus. Old primary sources should be used only through the lens of a modern secondary source. BTW, in the paragraph you left out, it was wrong that there were any Italian loans before the modern era: the words Cantemir assumed to be from Italian were from Vulgar Latin. bogdan (talk) 16:50, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

For example, vorbă is clearly not from Latin verbum, şchiop is not borrowed from Italian, it's from Vulgar Latin; and there are other misunderstandings and wrong claims. bogdan (talk) 16:35, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

The history of the "Moldovan language" - the official language of the Republic of Moldova - begins in 1924. To claim otherwise is a misleading form of synthesis and original research. Cantemir, Ureche et al. were speaking about Romanian (remember there was no Romanian state in their time, but there certainly was a Moldavian one). So were the Imperial Russian authorities. That history all belongs to the Romanian language. It was only in 1924 (or thereabouts) that the Soviet authorities embarked on a conscious new project to create a new language (albeit claiming earlier references to a Moldovan language as "proof" that their creation had a historical basis), giving birth to the "Moldovan language". So it's time for a restructuring here.
And Xasha, you don't win arguments (especially with AdiJapan, who knows a thing or two about languages) by referring to your opponent's "propaganda mindset". Biruitorul 16:49, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

That's just your OR. Those authors call the language Moldavian, not Romanian, not Klingon. Also per WP:OR:

"To the extent that part of an article relies on a primary source, it should:

• only make descriptive claims about the information found in the primary source, the accuracy and applicability of which is easily verifiable by any reasonable, educated person without specialist knowledge, and
• make no analytic, synthetic, interpretive, explanatory, or evaluative claims about the information found in the primary source. "

This is exactly what it's in the article, so you are breaking the policy by removing them. If AdiJapan claims to be a specialist, he should contribute under its real name (like Bogdan does?) and have its identity verified, otherwise its no more specialist that an anonymous IP.Xasha (talk) 16:57, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

I'm sorry, but Biruitorul is right on the money. Every reputable scholarly reference I've read regarding "Moldavian" spoken in the Principality of Moldavia has been clear to indicate it's Romanian simply called "Moldavian" out of mostly ignorance. (Western Europeans simply called it that because that was the name of the place where the people spoke it.)

   The history of what is called Moldovan today started with the USSR.

   That Moldavian is used to refer to Moldovan today has nothing to do with the "Moldavian" of the Principality of Moldavia. THAT is nothing but pure POV pushing, with Voronin right at the top of the heap. —PētersV (talk) 19:15, 24 September 2008 (UTC)

Those are not just some westen europeans, they are two Moldavian scholars, one of them ruling Moldavia for a short time, so now you're claiming the authors didn't know the "right" way to call their language.

If the history of what is called today Romanian began in the late 19th century, then maybe is comparable to say Moldavian started with the USSR.

"Moldovan" is just a new name imposed politically in English for what until the early 90s was known as "Moldavian". Just like Kiev instantly became Kiyv overnight (the fact that Kiev was more widely known in the English world prevented an early adoption of the new name in English).Xasha (talk) 19:34, 24 September 2008 (UTC)

You forgot to mention that Cantemir himself (the Moldavian scholar who ruled the principality for a while) said that the language is actually called Romanian in another chronicle. --Gutza 20:14, 24 September 2008 (UTC)

AdiJapan, I'm sorry for the ambiguity. I was proposing moving the data from those sections in History of the Romanian language as long as it's still relevant for the Romanian language -- claiming that Cantemir or Ureche were indeed proposing the existence of a stand alone Moldovan language is obviously preposterous (but then again, I've even seen it done with Negruzzi, so there's little that can surprise me now). --Gutza 17:11, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

I'm sorry, Xasha, that's nonsense. Some modern Western sources for you:
Glanville Price: "The foremost literary name in 18th century Romania was ... Cantemir, who, in addition to numerous ... works in Latin, Greek and Romanian, wrote ... the first Romanian novel, Istoria hieroglifică.
Alex Drace-Francis: " was the term most used by the earliest Romanian writers to reflect on Romanian history, language and origins, such as Miron Costin and Dimitrie Cantemir."
Manfred Beller: "...surviving manuscripts of the first native chronice of Moldavian history in Romanian, compiled by Grigore Ureche..."
Note: Romanian, not Klingon. One could go on, but it's pretty clear that the Moldavian spoken of in the 17th-early 19th centuries is an entirely different entity from the Soviet, post-1924 Moldovan. One forms part of the development of the Romanian language; the other was created, out of thin air, for propagandistic (and irredentist) purposes.
Finally: we can let Adi speak for himself (not "itself") on this matter, but he does actually know a fair amount (certainly more than I) on the subject and it would be wise to treat his opinions with a bit more respect. Biruitorul 18:52, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

You ask me to believe someone who talk about Romania in the 18th century? Unless he's somehow exagerating the extent of Rumelia, using its Greek name, that's not just an opinion, but an outright counterfactual information. The other source have a similar character, by claiming authors didn't know in what language they wrote. As for the development of Soviet era, it was just an attempt to standardization of the more or less variated local dialects, that, even if ideological motivated, was closer to the language of these authors than the the mix between East Romance grammar and French lexis we call today Romanian (which was no less ideologically motivated).Xasha (talk) 19:42, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

Michelangelo was from Italy. Beethoven was from Germany. Suleiman the Magnificent was from Turkey. Gogol was from Ukraine. None of these statements is true in the sense that they are anachronistic and those states did not exist at the time, but we understand what they're saying nonetheless. Personally, I wouldn't write in a scholarly work that Cantemir was from "Romania", but we still know what's being said, and in any case, the work is about language, not geopolitics. The point remains the same: reliable sources agree with my version (Romanian developed in Moldavia as much as in Wallachia, "Moldovan" didn't appear until 1924) and not yours. Biruitorul 01:34, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

Xasha, the problem with your claims is that it's your synthesis that leads to the conclusion that Moldovan was intended to be treated as a stand-alone language at that point. True, the sources do indeed include the words "Moldavian language", but unless we have secondary sources confirming the intention of differentiating from Romanian it's reasonable to assume "Moldavian" and "Romanian" were synonyms. For example, see here. --Gutza 19:21, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

There's no synthesis. The article doesn't say Moldavian is not Romanian because Ureche and Cantemir said so, it just says these authors called their language "Moldavian". So unless we have neutral (i.e. non-Romanian and non-Moldovan, for obvious reasons) secondary sources to confirm that "Moldavian" didn't mean something different from "Romanian", we'll just leave those early modern authors to express their opinions, without our personal view on them. We are not allowed to assume on our own, even if it lloks reasonable to you. Also, applying views on the modern post 1980s Moldovan language (which shares the literary form with Romanian) to the 18th century is nothing but clear original synthesis.Xasha (talk) 19:42, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

This is why I initiated a RfC -- I don't want to make this a Romanian vs. Moldovan (or in your case, Russian) thing, so let's see what other recommendations we receive from non-involved parties. --Gutza 19:47, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

That's gross bad faith, and I demand you to take back you view on my ethnicity, unless you can prove it.Xasha (talk) 19:52, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

I'm sorry if you find the Russian ethnicity offensive, I didn't mean to insult you -- I apologise, I take it back and I will avoid calling you that ever again. I have based my assumption on the username you have chosen, corroborated with the fact that you have explicitly avoided an ethnic self-determination ("I'm from Moldova" as opposed to "I'm a Moldovan"). Again, I'm very sorry if you found that offensive.--Gutza 19:57, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

Applying ethnicity based on personal stereotypes in the way you did is always offensive, no matter the ethnicity. The assumption from the name shows that you have little knowledge of life in Moldova, and the second shows that you care more about the form tha the essence (i.e. you apply stereotypes based on ethnicity). I'm curios, what ethnicity do you think Bogdan is, since he has a Slavic name, "avoids an ethnic self-determination", and just says he lives in Bucharest, Romania?

I'm sorry, what stereotype exactly did I offend you with? --Gutza 20:27, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

In a completely different train of thoughts, you should be aware that you're proposing a revolutionary theory which would turn the entire field of linguistics upside down. You're proposing that two independent languages evolved together, and then, when separated, they ended up with a common literary form -- that's red hot stuff. --Gutza <;small> 19:57, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

Nothing revolutionary. Two related languages that evolved more or less separately (as much as two languages in a dialect continuum could do) that, after the aberrant Stalinist policy discredited a literary standard based on one of the languages, tacitly adopted a common literary form, which is much closer to one of the vernaculars than to the other.Xasha (talk) 20:19, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

But... didn't that also happen naturally to the half of Moldavia that ended up as part of Romania? Or were they forced to learn the "new" language by the powers that be? I must say I'm fascinated by your acrobatics, I'm always looking forward to see what you're going to pull out of the hat next -- however, time permitting, you should take a look at Occam's razor. --Gutza 20:27, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

Centralized state education is the most powerfull propaganda tool. After more than 100 years of compulsory study of the Wallachia-based standard, depicting the Moldavian language as a language of the lower and uneducated classes, and purging any use of the Moldavian vernacular from the media, of course this standard was finally accepted in Western Moldavia (as standard French was adopted over whole France). Even nowadays, people from Western Moldavia (who came to call their language Romanian) are being made fun of for they vernacular when they go outside Moldavia. That's quite simple, and Romania is not the only country where more related language were supressed in favour of one literary standard.Xasha (talk) 20:54, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

This is truly remarkable -- you've written an entire self-contained parallel history! Let's explore this further. How did the children learn the new language when Moldavia joined Romania? Were they forced to use Romanian in school while still using Moldavian at home? Were teachers sent from Bucharest to shove Romanian proper down their throats? Do we have records of their feeling alien in the new oppressing system, which surely stifled their culture? Or are native Moldovans incapable of such feelings -- or incapable of culture whatsoever in their own language? --Gutza 21:18, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

If you take the official Romanian propaganda as reference, it may be, if you take history, is just a simplified version of what happened. The same way children of minorities around the world learn the official languages. Plus grammar was almost the same and some basic words were common. Basically yes (you should hear how some Moldovan students in Romania speak with their co-nationals and then compare the way they speak with Romanian students/teachers). That too, especially during communist times. I'm sure such accounts could be found, even if they are repressed by the Romanian propaganda. Mosty had to integrate in the Romanian culture, some continuing to use the vernacular(see Creanga's book with a dozen pages of dictionary). Isn't that curious that while in the 19th century most "Romanian" men of culture were from Moldavia, while after WW I, when the first generation of Romania-educated pupils came to maturity, most were from other regions (with exceptions like Sadoveanu still occasionaly calling the language Moldavian)?Xasha (talk) 22:57, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

Yes, quite, let's indeed see that famous Creanga's book with a dozen pages of dictionary -- you mentioned it before, people told you no such thing existed and now you're using that fantasy again. Can we please find some closure for that once and for all? "Grammar was almost the same and some basic words were common"?! I don't know where you're taking that from, but it surely isn't history. Regarding your assertion about "Romanian" men of culture hailing from Moldavia, aren't you shooting your own foot perchance? (Not that I'm buying it, but even if I had.) --Gutza 23:13, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

Maybe I'll make a video of it one of these days and post it somewhere on the web. You can't blaim me for the work of a Romanian publishing house. Grammar is quite stable, so if you compare the grammar of Ureche with the text of the Romanian Constitution you'll see that's no that different. An author had to live in those times too, so what should have they done in a Romanian state? Moldovans from Bessarabia also integrated in the Russian or Soviet culture without much problems.Xasha (talk) 00:51, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

Oh, and while we're exploring this, I'm also curious what the Russians did in Bessarabia/Moldavian SSR -- surely they liberated it from the danger of Romanian oppression and encouraged the expression of the true Moldavian culture, language and so on (of course, with minor Cyrillic readjustments in order to retain its authenticity). --Gutza 21:29, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

Russians didn't do much - education was not that spread, and culture remained in a primordial form. The Soviet rule was much better, with Moldovan language generall being allowed to develop freely (with the exception of the chaotic stalinist measures that couldn't decide which part of Moldavia should serve as standard). And Cyrillic was the original alphabet for Moldavian. Even some newspaper published in Bessarabia by some philorumanian authors during the Imperial era had two editions: one in Romanian standard with Latin alphabet, one in Moldavian vernacular, with Cyrillic script.Xasha (talk) 22:57, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

Romanian throughout all three principalities have originally been written in Slavonic characters because of the Church, that's completely irrelevant. But I'm curious why you're consistently avoiding the wording "Moldavian language" in talk pages, and instead keep clinging to "vernacular". (Of course, in the article space it's quite the opposite.) Incidentally, the "Soviet rule" slip-up is delicious, it shows how much the Moldavians enjoyed their "Soviet independence" ("much better" as it may have been). --Gutza 23:13, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

Just that Cyrillic is more adequate for writing Moldovan (and Romanian, if you ignore the large French borrowings). Mainspace is for the casual reader. On the talk page we can have more detailed discussions on topics. Since modern Moldovan and Romanian share a literary form, I don't what I could dispute about it (except the fact that Romanians deny our right to call this form Moldovan). But the literary form is just a minor part of a language, the vernacular being the most vital part. Furthermore, there was no Moldovans standard form until the 1920s, and since then it changed several times, unlike the vernacular, which remained stable enough so that Moldovans don't need a dictionary to read 19th century children stories, unlike Romanians. Compared to the Czarist and Romanian experience, the Soviet period was undeniably better for the Moldovan culture.Xasha (talk) 00:51, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

Finally, if I already started this, how does a country whose culture was independently fostered for such a long period of time, a country that becomes truly independent, a country that sees the Romanians for the arrogant oppressors of Moldavians that they are, how does such a country "tacitly adopt a common literary form" with its said cultural oppressor? Are they masochistic? Do they suffer from a misplaced case of a Stockholm syndrome? What happened to them, why aren't they using their own language, established ever since the 1640s, if not earlier? Isn't this really much simpler to explain by accepting that there are no two languages? --Gutza 21:41, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

I've already explained. After Stalin decided to punish the scholars who chose central Bessarabia as standard, and after some time those who chose Transnistria s standard, few scholar were inclined to work on the standardisation. Then came WW2, after which the Soviet Union dropped the nationality card (you couldn't claim it when you deported Germans and Caucasian ethnicities because of their nationality) and just limited itself to encouraging Russian, not caring anymore about other language standards. Since Romanian standard was close enough, and was already systematized, it was easier to adopt its norms as Dachsprache. And Moldovans still use their language, just they don't use it were literary form is generally used (i.e. official documents, scientific works).Xasha (talk) 22:57, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

That's got to be the cherry. So not only that the Soviets were not the ones to invent this language, they were actually the ones who standardised Moldovan per the Romanian norms? I am lost for words -- I thought no argument could surprise me in this context, but you've proven me wrong. --Gutza 23:13, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

You should read again my comment, I never said Soviets "were actually the ones who standardised Moldovan", just that they had a laissez-faire attitude.

Two related languages that evolved more or less separately -- Misplaced Pages is not the place to bring your own fringe theories. The scientific consensus on the evolution of Romanian is quite clear and any other claim is a frige theory which does not belong here. bogdan (talk) 23:40, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

You haven't still solved the problem with the origin of the Vlachs, how do you expect me to believe you have solved the problem of Moldovan language. No matter what you say, people have called their language Moldavian/Moldovan (distinction only in English) for centuries, and the difference between the language was enough for some pro-Romanian authors in Imperial Russia to have their ideas written in Moldavian vernacular, besides the Romanian standard, so that them could be spread to the masses (which didn't help them, since the masses were largely illiterate)Xasha (talk) 00:51, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

Come now, how can you attack that particular point within the entire display above? I'm mesmerized at this historical contraption (and, to be honest, somewhat flattered to find there are some who actually believe the Romanian propaganda could ever beat the Russian propaganda, it would be a resounding success -- mind you, that's supposed to have happened during Romania's period as a Soviet satellite). It's fascinating how a coherent, self-contained parallel history has evolved from just a few crude ideas repeated ad nauseam over the years, and I think the way to deal with this is actually understand how it's supposed to have worked. I know, it's not the Misplaced Pages way, but without a coherent understanding of the theory we're going to end up with a zillion minor battles over wording in various articles -- I think actually discussing sources and evidence based on the model being proposed would be a more constructive approach. Personally, I'm very fond of Creanga's mythical book, I'd love to see the sources for that. There are other very intriguing theories as well (for instance grammar being "almost the same" and "some basic words in common" is something I'd love to hear more about as well). --Gutza 23:55, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

You should note that the above dissertation is just my understanding of how things went, based on the numerous Russian, Western, Soviet and even Romanian sources I've read. I don't claim I am expert, like others do on this page, and just wanted to give a hint on how Romanian education "forgets" to mention some things to the Romanian pupils. I never read Stati's books, so maybe hge has a more consistent story, with all the needed source and opinions clearly given. Also note that's this view is not more parallel to history than the Romanian view you were indoctrinated with, so maybe the illusory truth lays somewhere on the median line between the two, or maybe is nowhere close to neither view. Language is a fabulous construct, so every "minor battles over wording " can make the difference between a POV and an unemotional description of an event. I also agree we should be discussing sources, but I see no source brought by the one who question my view. I already brought undeniable primary sources that speak about a Moldavian language, and use them in a striclty descriptive manner, without judgements, as Misplaced Pages policy requires, but you don't seem happy with them. Moreover I brought a secondary source about the status of Moldavian in Imperial Russia, but you still support the obtuse fiction of "Soviet invention of 1924". I admit that book is original research; i.e. I didn't read about it in some source, I just have it in my book collection , and mentioning it in the mainspace as a proof for the existence of the two languages is impossible, per WP:SYNTH. Also, if it's possible, please don't bring just sources you came about in the first page of GBook search. Try to find some reliable one, or at least one which has enough of it available to understand context, not just largely irrelevant clippets like Biruitorul did. If you want to say Ureche was speaking about Romanian when he wrote about Moldavian, bring a source that says specifically that, not one that says the Moldovan and Romanian of the 1990s are essentially the same. Hope we're finally going to have a relevant discussion about the article.Xasha (talk) 00:51, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

P.S.:Modifying the status quo in a controversial area and then seeking consensus for your action is not the most brilliant idea to begin a constructive discussion.Xasha (talk) 00:55, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

If I understand it correctly, you're saying that Moldovan proper has not changed in the Republic of Moldova, because of various factors (Soviets not caring much about it etc). However, the literary form is "shared" with Romanian -- and said literary form is used, by your own account, for official documents within RM. By corroborating this with your previous claims that the Romanian and Moldovan are quite different, with only a few basic common elements, it would follow that Moldovans who choose to speak Moldovan have to be bilingual -- they necessarily need to speak both Moldovan and Romanian, two quite distinct languages. Is that correct? Also, I have a hard time understanding what you actually mean when you say "Moldovan language" -- if you're defining it as the official language of the state, that in which official documents are written, then it surely is the same as Romanian, by your own definition. However, in the article associated with this talk page you're talking about quite a different thing, "the other Moldovan", "the true Moldovan". So which one is it, and how do we know when you mean one and when you mean the other? --Gutza 01:03, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

The shared literary form and the vernacular are mutually inteligible and are not so far away to call the speakers bilingual (never claimed the two modern forms have " only a few basic common elements" ). So I wouldn't call Moldovan speakers bilingual (in Romanian and Moldovan at least) just how I wouldn't call Low German speakers bilingual in Low and Standard (High) German. The Moldovan language is a whole, even if the association between literary and vernacular is not the most fortunate. But unless someone decides to restandardize the language (and I personally think the fad for language standardization has passed in a multicultural world) this is the language of me and my co-speakers, and we call it Moldovan. However, to apply this modern definition to pre WW2 Moldavian is simply wrong. Xasha (talk) 01:31, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

How can I explain to you that you're proposing an impossible evolution? You start with a common point (Moldovan in the principality), assert a diverging trend (Moldovan in Romania being pressured to adapt, Moldovan in Moldavian SSR being allowed to progress naturally), and end up with convergence (the two are mutually intelligible). Doesn't that logic sound flawed to you? --Gutza 01:42, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

You got me wrong then. If we ignore major cities, vernacular is closer and closer as you go towards the Pruth, were they converge, with the note that on the right you have French neologism and on the left Russian ones (which however are an insignifiant part of the common speech). That's the whole idea of a dialect continuum. Of course, to the west the vernacular is closer to the Romanian-standard, but not the same, while to the east you have a vernacular without major influence from the shared literary language. The vernacular never split. So in Eastern Vaslui-Leova region, for example, the literary-vernacular complex is basically the same, just that some call it with the old name of the vernacular, while other were indoctrinated into calling it with the name of the Wallachia-based standard- note I'm not sure how people form eastern Vaslui call their language, I just assume it. (BTW, I do think that the usual Moldovan speaker has a better grasp Romanian, than the usual Romanian speaker of Moldovan) Xasha (talk) 02:04, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

I'm afraid you don't understand me. Just a few paragraphs above you state that Moldovans who joined Romania had to learn the official language (i.e. Romanian) like any minority, and that Romanian and Moldovan were only loosely related ("Grammar was almost the same and some basic words were common"); according to your theory, from that point on the Moldovans in Romania were assimilated by force, deceit and propaganda (in your own words, "After more than 100 years of compulsory study of the Wallachia-based standard, depicting the Moldavian language as a language of the lower and uneducated classes, and purging any use of the Moldavian vernacular from the media, of course this standard was finally accepted in Western Moldavia"). By contrast, Moldovans in the Moldavian SSR have been allowed to retain their linguistic identity by their less intrusive partner, the Soviets. The two languages (Romanian and Moldovan) have therefore evolved in divergent directions for several decades. However, by some miracle, we can still witness a dialect continuum across the current border; not only that, but Moldavian proper and Romanian proper have ended up converging to the point where they're mutually intelligible without any significant effort. Can't you see the absurdity in that? --Gutza 11:43, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

There's no Misplaced Pages policy favouring the status quo. Sometimes, the status quo of an article may not be neutral or factually accurate. bogdan (talk) 01:02, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

Changing the article of out the blue because you personally think an article may not be neutral or factually accurate is not OK. Even less when the info you delete is based on sources that are fit according to the Misplaced Pages policy. Xasha (talk) 01:31, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

They are not according to Misplaced Pages policy, and the modification did not stand, you reverted it -- and changing the article "out of the blue" is perfectly ok. --Gutza 01:40, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

See the relevant policy above, my revert was just enforcing policy and changing an article because you know it's not ok is not OK.Xasha (talk) 02:04, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

Exactly, let's not split hairs here -- but please don't distort the truth. --Gutza 02:30, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

RfC on merge

This is about whether the history of the Moldovan language before 1924 should reside in a stand-alone article or merged with History of the Romanian language. Preliminary discussion has taken place at Talk:History of the Moldovan language#Merge first sections. --Gutza 18:34, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

Why did you open this RfC, if you still enforce your POV by unilateral edits?Xasha (talk) 13:03, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

I did not move any sections to History of the Romanian language, please see above what this RfC is about. --Gutza 13:18, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

Verifiable subject?

Like every other article in Misplaced Pages, this one too must have a subject, and that subject must be verifiable. Is there any source that talks about the history of the Moldovan language as a distinct subject from the history of the Romanian language? If there is not, it will mean that the very core of this article is in fact unverifiable synthesis. And that will be the end of this charade. — AdiJapan 06:19, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

Cantemir, Ureche et al

This has popped up several times, and I'd like to clarify it once and for all. We are now at a point where chronicles written in the 17th century (Grigore Ureche, The Chronicles of the land of Moldavia, 1640s) and 18th century (Dimitrie Cantemir, Descriptio Moldaviae, 1714) are used as sources to trace the existence of a stand-alone Moldovan language back to those times, with all implications that follow. There are several problems with that approach:

1. On a formal level, when a Wikipedian makes a synthesis of a primary source that is called original research and is not acceptable under the current policies (Misplaced Pages articles should rely on reliable, published secondary sources. All interpretive claims, analyses, or synthetic claims about primary sources must be referenced to a secondary source, rather than original analysis of the primary-source material by Misplaced Pages editors., see WP:PRIMARY).
2. On a logical level, it is unreasonable to push for a particular POV when a source includes both (the chronicles merrily interchange "Romanian language" with "Moldovan language" without any explanation to the reader, the way synonyms are typically used -- drawing the conclusion that the chronicles are a mention of a "Moldovan language" in the modern sense of "language" is dubious at least).
3. On a historical level, if we were to actually pose into historians, this theory is wrong because the primary sources used to prove the existence of a stand-alone Moldovan language do not actually make any such claim, they just use "limba moldovenească", with whatever connotations that might have had in the 17th and 18th century. On the other hand, we do have a chronicle from the late 17th century from a Moldovan chronicler who does address the issue point blank: "Măcară dară că şi la istorii şi la graiul şi streinilor şi înde sine cu vréme, cu vacuri, cu primenéle au şi dobândescŭ şi alte numere, iară acela carile ieste vechiŭ nume stă întemeiat şi înrădăcinat: rumân. Cum vedem că, măcară că ne răspundem acum moldovéni, iară nu întrebăm: ştii moldovenéşte?, ce ştii românéşte?, adecă râmlenéşte, puţin nu zicem: sţis romaniţe? pre limba latinească. Stă dară numele cel vechiŭ ca un teméi neclătit, deşi adaog ori vrémile îndelungate, ori streini adaog şi alte numere, iară cela din rădăcină nu să mută. Şi aşa ieste acestor ţări şi ţărâi noastre, Moldovei şi Ţărâi Munteneşti numele cel direptŭ de moşie, ieste rumân, cum să răspundŭ şi acum toţi acéia din Ţările Ungureşti lăcuitori şi munténii ţara lor şi scriu şi răspundŭ cu graiul: Ţara Românească." (highlighted phrase, my translation: "We can see that, although we call ourselves Moldavians, we don't ask : do you speak Moldavian?, but rather do you speak Romanian?") (Miron Costin, De neamul moldovenilor, 1687 -- ).

Given the above, I'd like to ask our colleagues using those primary sources to prove a particular POV to search for secondary, scholar sources discussing the point. --Gutza 12:30, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

Just a short reply:

1. There's nothing wrong with using primary source, as long as we just descirbe what they say and don't make personal analyses of them. See WP:OR :

""To the extent that part of an article relies on a primary source, it should:

only make descriptive claims about the information found in the primary source, the accuracy and applicability of which is easily verifiable by any reasonable, educated person without specialist knowledge, and

make no analytic, synthetic, interpretive, explanatory, or evaluative claims about the information found in the primary source. "

1. I won't talk about the merits of your "logic", but any personal logic is OR and clearly interpetative of the sources. Also the claim that Ureche and Cantemir don't know what language are they speaking of and mix two different names is utterly false.
2. Costin doesn't speak about Moldavian, and anyway, applying the writings of one author to the other two (one of these being an esteemed member of the Berlin Academy) is just original synthesis.

These being said, it's clear that some users what to impose their POV by removing the purely descriptive (i.e. Misplaced Pages policy proof) part about the writings of two of the early Moldavian scholars.Xasha (talk) 12:53, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

I won't waste any more time than needed on this -- those sources have been available for almost 400 years now, surely you can find a scholarly secondary source to make such a simple statement as "the Moldovan language has been mention as early as XYZ". I will make a non-ambiguous assertion that continuing to use those sources to prove your point breaks WP:OR, WP:PRIMARY and WP:SYNTH, so until you can find secondary sources to support your POV they're gone -- given the age of those sources it shouldn't be difficult to do that, I'm not being unreasonable. --Gutza 13:03, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

Costin talks at the same time about the Moldovans, the Wallachians and the Transylvanians, which he considers all to make up one ethnicity, albeit separated in three countries. What is relevant here is that, according to Costin, all these Romanians were speaking the same language. This is in agreement with what the other chroniclers say.

The fact that the term "Moldavian language" is used in old texts is certainly not sufficient proof that a distinct Moldovan language existed. Take for instance Ureche and his Letopiseţul. He doesn't use consistent names for countries, ethnicities and languages. When he says "limba noastră moldovenească" what he means is textually "the language spoken by us Moldavians", and he makes no assertion as to this language being distinct from that spoken in Wallachia or Transylvania. On the contrary, he does say there is only a minor accent difference. In fact, Ureche often uses phrases like "limba noastră", "limba românească", "rumâneşte" with just the same meaning as "limba moldovenească".

As such, taking the chronicles' phrase "Moldovan language" literally amounts to original research, because is requires the assumption that the term had the same meaning three centuries ago as it does now. And that assumption is in fact false. — AdiJapan 13:57, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

If the above wasn't enough, Cantemir himself writes "Noi, moldovenii, la fel ne spunem romani, iar limbii noastre nu dacica, nici moldoveneasca (dat fiind ca numele Moldovei si al moldovenilor este acordat foarte de curand, cum vom spune mai apoi), ci romaneasca, astfel ca daca vrem sa-l intrebam pe un strain daca stie limba noastra, nu-l intrebam: "Scis moldavice?" ("Stii moldoveneste?"), ci "Stii romaneste?", adeca, "in latineste": "Scis romanice?" (Dimitrie Cantemir, Hronicul vechimii a romano-moldo-vlahilor, sau hronicon a toata tara Romaneasca, care mai apoi s-a despartit in Moldova, Muntenia si Ardeal) -- the translation would be virtually identical to the quotation from Miron Costin above. By the way, can I use the title of his chronicle to assert that the Republic of Moldova is part of Romania? --Gutza 12:20, 24 September 2008 (UTC)

Also see Misplaced Pages:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard#Chronicles from the 17th and 18th century. --Gutza 18:46, 24 September 2008 (UTC)

Crucial question

By reading both article Moldovan language and History of Moldovan language I noticed that neither of them anwsers crucial question about topic; What were the differences between standard language used in Romania and standard language used in Soviet Moldavia (except that it used different script)? Also what were the differences between standard language used in MASSR and MSSR? The anwsers I couldnt even articles in romanian and russian language. Couldnt anyone write about this? Luka Jačov (talk) 13:10, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

It's all part of the debate, I'm sure the answers would be just as controversial, depending on who you ask. That's probably why nobody was brave enough to approach the issue. :) --Gutza 13:16, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

It seems (according to the article in the Russian Misplaced Pages) that the standard language in the MASSR was based on local eastern dialects. After the formation of the MSSR, a language reform was conducted in 1951 that brought the standard "significantly closer" to the standard Romanian. --Illythr (talk) 13:43, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

Again: sources?

I've asked this before, but people were too busy with the microscope on the small print and didn't see the whole picture. Is there any source out there that talks about the subject "history of the Moldovan language"?

Right now the article doesn't mention any such source, so the subject has not even been proven to exist. That means the whole article is either about a non-notable subject, or a hoax, or a synthesis made by Misplaced Pages editors from various other subjects (that is, original research).

If indeed there is no source proving the subject to be notable, the article will need to be deleted or redirected to a more appropriate title, with parts of it moved where they belong, if any. — AdiJapan 04:33, 25 September 2008 (UTC)

Okay. It appears I can start moving paragraphs to the articles where they belong and then replace the article with a redirect. — AdiJapan 04:29, 26 September 2008 (UTC)

I was planning on doing that today, but I'm not sure my schedule will allow it -- please go ahead. --Gutza 07:50, 26 September 2008 (UTC)

Perhaps it would make sense to wait for Xasha's unblock first? To avoid another needless revert war later and so that it won't look like you goaded an editor into 3RR to push this though? Or at least use his talk page or something in the mean time. --Illythr (talk) 08:28, 26 September 2008 (UTC)

There is the matter of whether there are any voices against this besides Xasha. I don't think he will ever agree with this, regardless of whether he is blocked or not; however, if he is the only one against it then this will happen, again, irrespective of whether he is blocked or not. Therefore no, I don't think it would make sense to wait for Xasha's unblock because I don't think that would change anything in the fiber of things -- the only thing different this way is that revert wars will start later rather than sooner. --Gutza 09:25, 26 September 2008 (UTC)

I didn't know Xasha was blocked again. In other circumstances I wouldn't have minded waiting for him. But the problem is that I don't expect him to bring sources and prove the subject exists. He certainly knows he needs to show sources, I have long been asking for them, but nothing happened. And I don't think it will, not any time soon. — AdiJapan 10:22, 26 September 2008 (UTC)

Perhaps asking him on his talk page would bring some progress? I'm not sure it's possible to provide a source that asserts what you are asking for, though - if no controversy existed at that time there was no need to claim that this language is different from any other. So far, Xasha did present a number of sources that the language spoken in Moldavia/Bessarabia was referred to as "Moldavian," no? The issue for him seems to be not whether the language spoken in Moldavia was distinct from some other language, but the name, under which it was mentioned in a certain territory. --Illythr (talk) 14:17, 26 September 2008 (UTC)

I'm sorry, I don't get the relevance of that particular piece of information in the context, and even more so if we assume a good faith intention not to imply Moldovan's presumed separateness from Romanian. Olden sources might have called the Romanian language "Walachian", but nobody would feel the need to push for that in any related article precisely because it's irrelevant today -- by contrast, "Moldovan language" has become a loaded concept in the last century (something the chroniclers couldn't have anticipated), and casually using it throughout the article certainly gives off the wrong impression to the average reader.

On the other hand, I'm afraid Xasha is trying to mirror Vasile Stati's theories here, without mentioning him as a source specifically -- the sources certainly match, and the implication of separateness from Romanian is there rather prominently (or at least was there, in the version of this article that Xasha preferred). Of course, Xasha is intelligent enough not to use Stati himself as a reference, but since there is none other for the implication the article was trying to make, we're left hanging.

However, precisely because we are all too involved in the matter, I am trying to clear this whole matter up in a more neutral environment: Misplaced Pages:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard#Chronicles from the 17th and 18th century, and I did address this point specifically in my last message -- please feel free to get involved in the discussion if you want. --Gutza 15:07, 26 September 2008 (UTC)

I wrote this at the same time with Gutza:

Illythr, you're touching the very heart of the problem: the name and the controversy. Because that's what "Moldovan language" is: a name and a controversy. And this article, if it is ever going to survive, should be about the history of that name and of that controversy. It is not about the history of any actual language. There was one Romanian language 3-4 hundred years ago (the chronicles are very clear on that) and there is one Romanian language today (there is no dispute whatsoever among linguists).

Xasha found in the chronicles the phrase "Moldavian language" and in his interpretation this was meant to distinguish that language from others. The reality is that the very same sources use phrases like "Romanian language" and "our language" to refer to exactly the same thing. This is not my own interpretation: The chroniclers specifically state that the Moldavians, the Wallachians, and the Romanian Transylvanians spoke the same language. There is no room for interpretation. Remember, were talking about times when countries, ethnicities and languages did not necessarily have clearly defined names.

When I ask for a source about the history of the Moldovan language --- a secondary source, obviously --- I don't ask for too much. If I am totally insane and in fact this Moldovan language does exist, then there must be at least one specialist to have written about the history of this language. With all this controversy around the subject there should be not one, but plenty of sources. But there is none! Actually, I'm pretty sure there are some publications that try to explain how this Moldovan language came to exist --- if I'm not mistaken Vasile Stati wrote about this, and surely there are the old Stalinist stories --- but such publications wouldn't qualify as more than fringe theories, maybe not even that. — AdiJapan 15:49, 26 September 2008 (UTC)

This is different from what you asked before - a source with an assertion that a Moldovan language not only exists, but is different from Romanian. Anyhow, here's a picture I've gathered:

A common dialect continuum had existed on the territories in question (Moldavia, Wallachia, Transylvania, plus surrounding areas) with the various dialects spoken in these territories possessing different local names throughout this time period. A common name and standard were not officially established until mid-19th century. One of the names for one of the dialects was "Moldavian," as stated by Cantemir and a number of official Russian (imperial) sources. Due to Bessarabia's isolation from the newly created Romanian state, and especially due to its population being largely illiterate at the time, its local dialects have avoided standardization the rest of them have undergone in Romania (BTW, when was the Latin script first officially adopted in Bessarabia?). Concurrently, after 1924, a number of Soviet activists have attempted to promote some local eastern dialects into a separate language. These attempts have failed and in 1951 a Soviet standardization reform brought these dialects in line with their western counterparts. After Moldova's independence, a few more reforms have virtually eliminated whatever differences remained between the standard official languages of Romania and Moldova. At no time was the dialect continuum interrupted.

The official Moldovan POV seems to have adopted this picture, except for insisting that the name of this standard language is "Moldovan" (for political purposes). Gutza, can you point out what has cause you such incredulity in this picture?

Creation of new languages from modern dialects seems to be the work of politicians, not scientists worldwide (as demonstrated by Valencian and Montenegrin), and I do not see how this process is an affront to science.

As for the contents of this article, it should be as follows: Start with the earliest mention of the dialect, describe the peculiarities of its existence within the common daco-Romanian continuum (if any sources for this are found), then talk about the time during Russian imperial rule (already there), then the Soviet attempts to promote the dialect into a separate language, which failed (there, but kinda small), then the modern (1989-1994 and 1994-now) developments. It should also list the known standardization attempts and their scope (1859?, 1930-1940s, 1951, 1989, one more, forgot when). --Illythr (talk) 18:53, 26 September 2008 (UTC)

Feel free to ask Xasha if that's indeed his view -- I doubt it is, given his explanations above. Maybe you missed the part in Xasha's analysis above where Moldovans in Romania were treated like dirt and had to learn the Romanian language like any minority; the part where they would have wanted to express themselves in their own language but were forced by the powers that be in Romania to use Romanian instead; the part where the history of the Moldovan language starting in 1924 is original research; the part where he refuses point blank to address the issue of whether the chroniclers meant a separate language or the same one, insisting we should allow the reader to form an opinion based on carefully chosen quotations; the part where Romanian and Moldovan only had in common a similar grammar and some basic words; and so on, and so on. It is painfully obvious to me that this article, in the form preferred by Xasha (I suppose this version would qualify), is a transparent attempt at making a case for a stand-alone Moldovan language presumably being traced back to the 17th century (and why not, even earlier, as the article was hinting).

Now, to answer your larger question. We need to decide what this article is about. You cannot have an article about the early history of the Moldovan variety of Romanian (I will use "variety" in favor of "dialect" and "speech") without the context of all the other varieties of Romanian -- they all evolved together, as variations of one single language, because none of the varieties were isolated enough to give birth to a dialect proper, let alone a stand-alone language. One cannot even compare Moldovan and Romanian to British English and American English -- these two varieties have been isolated, they have evolved in different cultures, with different writers and ethnic groups significantly influencing each. In Romania and Moldova (and Banat, and Transylvania, and Oltenia, and Wallachia) that never happened for any significant periods of time, mostly because of the regions' proximity. Throughout the history of the territory of the historical principalities there was a continuous cultural exchange, within the context of a uniform ethnic group -- people were constantly moving from one Principality to the next, depending on where life was better; literature, poetry and ideas as well -- and even the chronicles written in one Principality were being read throughout the region; Cantemir himself started writing a chronicle about all Romanians in all principalities, in a period when the idea of a nation state hadn't yet been invented, that's how close all of Romanians felt about each others.

So, if you cannot do that, you have to move the relevant sections where they belong, namely in History of the Romanian language, where the evolution of the language can be properly analysed in a coherent fashion. That leaves this article with the current form (actually, I'm of the opinion that everything before 1924 should be merged with Romanian, given that that's when the "Moldovan language" proper was actually born -- which you seem to agree with). --Gutza 20:53, 26 September 2008 (UTC)

Opinions on how the various "provincial" subgroups were treated in the central parts of the country may be marginally relevant (if sourced properly), but are beside the current point (Bavarians, with their Boarisch accent are also made fun of in northern parts of Germany). The start of a Moldovan language in 1924 is indeed original research - an attempt to create one had failed, after all. As for what did the chroniclers meant - I have no idea, except maybe like something close to what I described above. The part about "some basic words" I didn't get myself - surely, the reverse is true: there were a few different basic words, the rest being common - that was an odd statement seeing as how Xasha does recognize the dialectal continuity.

You cannot have an article about a dialect that some insist is a standalone language? Why is that? Dialects are not always built in complete isolation as you seem to insist is necessary. There are numerous dialects in the same country, say, in Russia (within Russian) or Spain (within Spanish or Catalan) which have evolved without complete isolation. You also seem to assert that the Daco-Romanian dialect continuum was completely homogeneous at all times. A uniform single language in a medieval society where the most a peasant family sees in their lifetime is the nearest town and almost everyone has trouble putting their own name on paper? Mmmh. It seems you only take the societal elites into consideration - less than 1% of the whole population.

As for article structure - I had laid out a frame I think would be informative and generally nice to have for this article. I would oppose a conscious attempt at promoting Moldovan as an entirely separate language, but exploring its medieval history in the context of it being a dialect within a common dialect continuum looks ok to me. --Illythr (talk) 23:14, 26 September 2008 (UTC)

I'm sorry if I was ambiguous -- I never intended to push for the idea of a completely homogenous form throughout the Daco-Romanian dialect, I fully acknowledge the various... varieties (Transylvanian, Oltenian, Moldavian, "Muntenian" etc). The problem is you're calling them dialects, while linguists aren't that sure they qualify -- I don't want to get too deeply into that because we'd certainly end up discussing nuances beyond our (or at least my) level of expertise in the matter; however, it is important to note that experts do not really agree on that one, and to my knowledge the majority do actually go for "less than dialect", typically opting for "speech". As such, while I totally agree there are varieties within the language, and would most definitely defy any crazy Romanian asserting a completely homogenous continuum, I can't subscribe to the opinion that Moldavian (or any other variety for that matter) is indeed a dialect in its own rights, and even less so to the idea that one of the varieties has actually spawned a stand-alone language at any one time from a linguistic point of view.

One point that I don't understand in your discourse is your apparent willingness to defend Xasha's version of the article named "History of the Moldovan language", while simultaneously rejecting the idea of a Moldovan language ("The start of a Moldovan language in 1924 is indeed original research - an attempt to create one had failed, after all")... --Gutza 23:54, 26 September 2008 (UTC)

(Unindent) Just to make sure - under "variety" we're discussing the spoken colloquial form here, not the standardized versions, which I would assume, always were essentially the same "High Romanian" (for their time). Ok, dialect, variety... I didn't read enough 1000 page monographies (and can't be bothered, really) to discuss the fine points. All I'm saying is that we have a distinct variant whose actual distinctiveness was and is subject to (attempted) accentuation and remains a matter of controversy. As for "Language" - it's quite simple, really: the Republic of Moldova has an official state language. It is called Moldovan. So we have an article on it, and an article on its history as, unlike the Montenegrin language, it does have one of its own, even as a variant of Romanian. Sure, it's just politics, but that's the way it is. I bet a lot of modern "standalone" languages started off this way. Ukrainian certainly is one (just don't tell that to Ukrainian nationalists), Rusyn is another (just don't tell that to... well, you know). Why, even Romanian itself, in a way (um, I don't think I should mention that)... --Illythr (talk) 00:57, 27 September 2008 (UTC)

Illythr, the differences between coloquial "Wallachian" and "Moldavian" consist in just a few words and an accent, nothing more. Even the differences between American English and British English are greater, both in terms of phonology and vocabulary. Comparing with Rusyn is misleading: Rusyn to Ukranian is more like Aromanian to Romanian. bogdan (talk) 01:05, 27 September 2008 (UTC)

Illythr, I want to make this crystal clear: nobody's saying that the Republic of Moldova is "not allowed" to decide what their official language is -- and I seriously mean that. As such, nobody has ever said anything along the lines of "come on, let's come clean and redirect Moldovan language to Romanian language".

Now that we've got that out of the way, let's get back to history, linguistics and NPOV. I have chosen "variety" because it's the most neutral of all terms to describe a... variation from the norm -- speeches, dialects and accents all fall under that umbrella (of course, "language" does not, but again -- we're now discussing from a scientific point of view, politics aside). As such, if you agree that we're only talking about the political definition of this variety as a language, then you can't assert a history besides its political history, because you can't divorce the definition from its own history (since the definition is political, the history is that of politics). On the other hand, I'm certain you're trying to make a specific point that I'm missing, because we should've reached agreement by now -- but I don't get it (I'm honest, really not being sarcastic, I honestly feel there's an aspect we disagree on but didn't yet come to light). --Gutza 01:22, 27 September 2008 (UTC)

Illythr, Gutza, it looks like we're getting somewhere: This article should be about the history of the attempt to create a separate Moldovan language. In this frame, the focus should be on the political rather than linguistic aspects; there isn't much to say on the linguistic level anyway. This would make a logical parallel with Moldovan language, whose subject is also political, not linguistic, in its core.

What do you think about wording the leading section like this:

The history of the Moldovan language refers to the attempt to create a distinct Moldovan language and the string of political and historical events related to it.

or something along those lines. That would clarify the subject and make it verifiable. — AdiJapan 07:18, 27 September 2008 (UTC)

I agree, Adi, something along those lines. By the way (I'm sure this point has been made in similar form before, so my apologies if I'm being repetitive): in my view, for a language to have a history, it must first be a language. According to reliable linguists, Moldovan is not a language and thus has no history as such. What does have a history is a) the 1924 creation and official language of RM; and b) the Moldavian speech or graiul moldovenesc, a variety of the Romanian language. As a) is acknowledged to be a political creation, we can use this article to discuss its history, but the lead should be very clear that this is the history of a political concept and not a "language" as defined by the Oxford English Dictionary - "The system of spoken or written communication used by a particular country, people, community, etc., typically consisting of words used within a regular grammatical and syntactic structure."

As for b) - we could start by placing it in the History of the Romanian language article, but what should eventually happen is an article on each of the varieties, including their history. Biruitorul 23:03, 27 September 2008 (UTC)

Actually, the Moldovan language does conform with the Oxford definition quite nicely -- as I said above, nobody can deny an independent state's right to define its language (notice how the Oxford dictionary explicitly includes that option for the definition of a language). The problem with this article is not the existence of the language (otherwise we wouldn't have an article entitled Moldovan language at all), but rather the implication of distinctiveness from Romanian, which is not scientific, violates WP:SYNTH and WP:FRINGE.

That being said, I agree with AdiJapan's suggestion, with a couple of adjustments:

• In addition to the proposed explanation, the introductory section should contain a soft redirect towards History of the Romanian language (e.g. "For more on the early history, see History of the Romanian language").
• All sections related to periods before 1924 should be moved to/merged with History of the Romanian language (First written documents, Origins) -- otherwise we contradict the very introductory statement being proposed. Also, the section on Imperial Russia needs investigating -- it currently suggests the Moldovan language was actually born in 1812. --Gutza 23:34, 27 September 2008 (UTC)

Biru, I think your comment hit the nail on the head. Unless we make the distinction between the linguistic subject and the political subject, we end up in misleading or at least confusing the reader. (And I'm afraid that is exactly what some people would want.)

Gutza, you are right that the definition of a language can be applied to Moldovan, and actually that argument was brought over and over again by our beloved friend Node_ue. But for a concept (language or anything else) to have a distinct name, it needs to be distinct from other concepts. Well, yes, there are synonyms, but in Misplaced Pages those are dealt with by using redirects.

Anyway, I've changed the lead section. Feel free to adjust it as you see fit. — AdiJapan 04:00, 28 September 2008 (UTC)

Well, unless other sources are brought in, this form can be kept. As for the year 1812 - no it wasn't born then - merely made official together with the Russian language by an ukase from the Tsar, as a local language. --Illythr (talk)

Old historical usage must be explained

My two cents: whatever decision will be assumed about the "beginnings" of the Moldovan language, the article must have a text which explains the usage of the expression "Moldovan/Moldavian language" in old documents - clearly if someone reads this term in a quotation from, say, Grigore Ureche, and then looks up wikipedia this reader must not be surprized by lack of any explanation. Timurite (talk) 17:14, 29 September 2008 (UTC)

I'm not sure there are any reliable sources discussing the matter explicitly -- scientific works everywhere simply use the chronicles to discuss Romanian, without any mention of the original wording. --Gutza 17:30, 29 September 2008 (UTC)

• This would mean that these "scientific works everywhere" suck badly. Quoting the original sources is the primary rule of scientific research. Especially in cases of not readily available documents the absence of citations leaves room to suspicions in maniputating the information and other kinds of scientific sloppiness, eg., when a source is referenced not from the original but from the description by another researcher, which may easily lead to "broken telephone" effect. Therefore I regrettably cannot accept your position: I don't believe in 100% sloppiness of researchers in this area. Timurite (talk) 18:52, 29 September 2008 (UTC)
• P.S. In this particular case "without any mention of the original wording" may lead to suspicions in deliberate concealment the fact that the language was called "limba moldoveneasca", especially in the view of the known Romania/Moldova ethnicity issues. Timurite (talk) 18:52, 29 September 2008 (UTC)

You're certainly free to make your own research -- such deliberate efforts to conceal a language on the part of the government of a European Union country surely would not go unnoticed by the academic community. Alternately, you can choose to accept that in a linguistic sense Moldovan is one of the recognized speeches of the Romanian language, and that old texts were not making a clear distinction between speech and language (see all my rhetoric above regarding the loading of the terms and the evolution of the nation state); you might also accept that this is such a well-known fact in academic circles that they don't bother addressing Vasile Stati's fringe theories explicitly. But then again, feel free to investigate on your own -- if you can find any academic or otherwise reliable sources discussing the matter I promise I won't try to conceal it. :) --Gutza 19:25, 29 September 2008 (UTC)

P.S. I realized I was ambiguous in my previous message -- I didn't mean nobody's quoting the chronicles, I only meant they don't address the issue of the original wording, they don't mention the original wording specifically as in explaining the identity between Romanian and the language the chronicler was writing about (e.g. "well, he does write «Moldovan», but what he actually means is «Romanian»"). There are articles in the mainstream Romanian media addressing the issue within the context of Vasile Stati's theory, but given the sense of paranoia surrounding this issue I don't think they're appropriate (after all, if the government is concealing an entire language, it only makes sense they'd also pay off a few journalists to write the appropriate stories). --Gutza 19:45, 29 September 2008 (UTC)

I'm assuming we need to explain that when the Venetians or whoever traveled to far off exotic Moldavia, they encountered an equally exotic language they called Moldavian, that is, Romanian by another name. Such references are not difficult to find. —PētersV (talk) 21:44, 29 September 2008 (UTC)

My point exactly. I don't know and don't care to know about Vasile Stasi, but I would really like to know about "exotic language they called Moldavian" in old texts. Timurite (talk) 22:04, 29 September 2008 (UTC)

Such references might indeed not be hard to find, but Timurite, that wasn't your point at all when you started this section. You wanted the article to include "a text which explains the usage of the expression "Moldovan/Moldavian language" in old documents" (emphasis mine). You will find both modern and old statements that such old texts were indeed speaking about Romanian (of the very three chroniclers being discussed in the sections above, two actually mention that explicitly), but I'm not sure you're going to find a properly referenced explanation for that usage. And I linked this to Vasile Stati because he was the only one to come up with this original theory which brings controversy around this matter -- without his theory there's no controversy, so you need to find a reliable source who cares enough to go into the issue; given Stati's reputation and his theory's scientific merit, I doubt any serious scientist has wasted time disproving it. But, again, if anybody can dig something up, by all means, let's use it. --Gutza 23:00, 29 September 2008 (UTC)

• I guess see where you are leaning to: you want to keep the topics related "Romanian lang" & "Moldovan lang" strictly separate where it possible and identical where it is necessary. And I am not against this. Let me rephrase it in a third way. A semi-educated person reads the article "History of the Moldovan language" and sees it started from 1818. "Wait a minute!" he says, "I nave seen with my own eyes that there was a "moldavian language" way before Kantemir! So once again wikipedia sucks!" I am saying that if there is a potential natural question, there must be an answer or an easy way (read: one mouse click) to find it. Obviously you haven't read the article with fresh eyes recently. Look how the body of the article starts: "Following annexation of Bessarabia by Russia (after 1812), Moldavian was established as an official language in the bla-bla..." WTF? Did Russian Zzar invent the Moldavian language for Bessarabians? If yes, then why it was not called Bessarabian language? (ok I know this one; I guess because population was called Moldavians.) If no then who and when? Where is the beginning of the history, or the pre-history, or whatever? Timurite (talk) 01:48, 30 September 2008 (UTC)

P.S. Lovely pun there, Timurite -- Vasile Stasi, that's hilariously appropriate. --Gutza 23:09, 29 September 2008 (UTC)

oops... Timurite (talk) 01:48, 30 September 2008 (UTC)

(Unindent) Well, isn't the context set by the introductory section? I think that's pretty explanatory, what would you add? --Gutza 07:42, 30 September 2008 (UTC)

I think you're both right, Timurite and Gutza. Although the old term Moldavian had indeed been used before 1812, it was only from 1812 on that it was going to be used so as to assert a different linguistic entity. Now Gutza is right that the old usage has nothing to do with the political controversy. And Timurite is right that the article should state this explicitely, for the sake of the less informed reader. (By the way, I loved the "Stasi" pun too, whether intentional or not...) — AdiJapan 11:05, 30 September 2008 (UTC)

I expanded the lead section with a few details on how the usage of the term Moldavian evolved in time. — AdiJapan 11:28, 30 September 2008 (UTC)

Can you actually source that "Moldavian" was used to assert a different linguistic entity from 1812? AFAIK, the current Tsar just used the local name and made it official as a display of tolerance to local culture. --Illythr (talk) 12:43, 30 September 2008 (UTC)

While I fully agree with the text added on the older use of the expression "Moldovan language", I'd like to point that this text currently has no support through references. I'm not even sure you can find a good citation, given that citing primary sources (e.g. Miron Costin, De neamul moldovenilor) can be labeled as original research by over-zealous editors. I'm sorry to bother you with this. Dpotop (talk) 11:54, 30 September 2008 (UTC)

My point exactly. The first known attempts to make Moldovan into a separate language began in 1924. --Illythr (talk) 12:43, 30 September 2008 (UTC)

I rephrased the lead and removed the mention of the year 1812. I had just assumed that in 1812 we have the earliest official use of the term Moldavian, which in my mind would make it the beginning of the controversy. But you're right, that would be original research. I wish I had some sources on the semantic evolution of the term. — AdiJapan 03:23, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

By the way, what was happening in the Transnistria area with respect to this issue in 1918-24? Chaos? Indifference? I assume that, with several wars going on, they had other priorities than language policies, but is there any record regarding that period? Biruitorul 06:24, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

Dear all, let us not project modern identity controversies on poor Medieval and pre-Modern Moldavians. Yes, old Moldavian chronicles use the name Moldavian/Moldovan to reffer to the language spoken in the Principality of Moldavia. However, they all mention that it is the same language as the one spoken in Wallachia and Transilvania. Miron Costin goes even further and explicitly states that Moldavians of his time used the phrase "to speak Romanian" when reffering to their native tongue. Of course neither of these early scholars could possibly anticipate the birth of nationalism, the union of Moldavia and Wallachia and probably even less the fact that the eastern marches of the Principality would one day form a separate state. The ideea is that while the name Moldavian was used before 1812 and after 1812 to designate the same language, the ideological load was not tha same. What was a mere choice of words in Costin or Cantemir's time, became under Russian Imperial rule, but particularly under Soviet rule an instrument of distinguishing between supposedly different languages and of (partially successfuly) forging a different identity. Plinul cel tanar (talk) 07:41, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

Miron Costin

Here's the text I've been lookin for in De neamu Moldovenilor by Miron Costin (1633-1691) (Of the Modavian Kin): Cum vedem că, măcară că ne răspundem acum moldovéni, iară nu întrebăm: ştii moldovenéşte?, ce ştii românéşte?, adecă râmlenéşte, puţin nu zicem: sţis romaniţe? pre limba latinească. Stă dară numele cel vechiŭ ca un teméi neclătit, deşi adaog ori vrémile îndelungate, ori streini adaog şi alte numere, iară cela din rădăcină nu să mută. Şi aşa ieste acestor ţări şi ţărâi noastre, Moldovei şi Ţărâi Munteneşti numele cel direptŭ de moşie, ieste rumân, cum să răspundŭ şi acum toţi acéia din Ţările Ungureşti lăcuitori şi munténii ţara lor şi scriu şi răspundŭ cu graiul: Ţara Românească.

My translation (keeping original punctuation): As we can see, though we call ourselves Moldavians, don't we ask: do you speak Moldavian? what do you speak Romanian ? In other words Roman, we are not far from saying: sţis romaniţe? in the Latin tongue. The old name remains as an unomved foundation, although the length of ages, or the foreigners added other names, but that of the root stays unchanged. And that is the name of these lands, Moldavia and Wallachia, the rightfull native name, it is Romanian , and the same answer will be given, in writing and in speach by those inhabitants of the Hungarian lands and by the wallachians who live in there own land: The Romanian Country. In fact, Costin is so clear about the whole thing that I fail to see what can be added. Plinul cel tanar (talk) 08:43, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

So what? Costin's opinion is not to be given primacy over other chroniclers and Cantemir. Also, even according to the Romanian official dictionary "neam" means Nation.Xasha (talk) 08:49, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

There are no official dictionaries in Romania, we're a democracy. But I do believe you mean relyable, academic ones. There are several, you will find a number of references here: http://dexonline.ro/search.php?cuv=neam .Indeed the first explanation given for neam by the DEX '98 is people, nation. I could have used people, since nation in a XVIIth century context is missleading. However note that the second meaning is people related by blood or by marriage. The 2002 dictionary of synonims entry for neam reads "generation, birth, ascendancy, origin," etc. Finally the NODEX explains the particular construction Costin is using de neamul cuiva by from father to son, ancestraly. This editor pleads not guilty to the charges of tendentious translation and believes the word kin to be most apropriate. Plinul cel tanar (talk) 09:13, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

Unlike English (and Moldovan), Romanian is a regulated language. So the dictionary published by the regulating body is the official one. Due you imply that all Moldovans had direct links through blood or marriage? And you're again tendentiously translating. Nodex talks about "neam de neamul cuiva", which is a fixed expression, and has nothing to do with Costin's.Xasha (talk) 09:33, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

Also, let's not play around. Costin is not giving an oppinion. He is attesting the usage of both moldoveneste and romaneste by the very inhabitants of the Principality of Moldavia when reffering to their own language. Cantemir made the choice of using modoveneste and stated that the wallachians speak the same language. Neither Cantemir, nor Costin had the same identity issues that Modovans an Romanians have now, they did not reason in the same terms of ethnicity and nationality that we do. Plinul cel tanar (talk) 09:18, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

No, Costin's just an opinion. Also Cantemir talks about different pronunciation and words used by Wallachians that are unknown to Moldovans.Xasha (talk) 09:33, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

Plinul, if I may, I think you mistranslated a part of Costin's quote. This statement:

nu întrebăm: ştii moldovenéşte?, ce ştii românéşte?

would be transcripted in modern Romanian as

nu întrebăm: "ştii moldoveneşte?", ci ştii "româneşte?"

which in English would be

we don't ask "do you speak Moldavian?", but "do you speak Romanian?"

I thought that was an important point. — AdiJapan 09:40, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

That I plead guilty to. That's what happens when one is doing several things in the same time, none turns out quite right. Yes, the passage is even more powerfull. Plinul cel tanar (talk) 09:49, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

Yes, Xasha, you are perfectly right. Costin's is just an opinion. Except his opinion matters, yours doesn't. And indeed Cantemir mentions differences between how Moldavians and Wallachians spoke. Here is the quote: "Wallachians and Transylvanians have the same speech as the Moldavians, but their pronunciation is slightly harsher, such as giur, which a Wallachian will pronounce jur, using a Polish z or a French j. They also have words that the Moldavians don't understand, but they don't use them in writing." — AdiJapan 09:44, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

Strange.. last week you said neither Costin's matter... now it does. As for Cantemir, the textual translation from latin is "Inhabitants of Wallachia and Transylvania use the same Moldavian language, yet their pronunciation....". He also says "They follow the Moldavian language and ortography...". (Note: this is not the case anymore. In modern Romanian all those word use the Wallachian form).Xasha (talk) 09:57, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

One should also note that in the same paragraph, Cantemir also shows the distinctions between the different regional dialects of "Moldavian": Those who live by the Dnister have mixed Polish words in their language, and name hosehold objects by their Polish names, thus other Moldavians cannot understand them. Those who have their dwellings in the mountains, near Transilvania often use Hungarian words. Those from Falciu, taint their speach with Greek or Turkish words. Moreover, Moldavian women have a different speach than that of men, they change the sylabals "bi" and "vi" in "chi" . What this great early modern scholar is doing is a dialect analysis of a language from north to south and from east to west (he even states it's the same language!). Next we'll have Xasha telling us, based on Cantemir's works that Moldavian women spoke an altogether different language. Plinul cel tanar (talk) 10:01, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

Guess they don't teach you hpw to translate thing there. Cantemir just says "Moldavian women have a peculiar pronunciation", and anyone with knowledge of latin can see that. And yes, Cantemir acknowledges that all dialects of then-Moldavia (The Dniester, Falciu, the mountainous parts towards Transylvania are all regions of Moldavia) formed a single Moldavian language.Xasha (talk) 10:14, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

You have a quote for that last statement? — AdiJapan 10:20, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

He calls all those foreign borrowings as "corruptions of Moldavian" ("moldavum corrumpunt."). What's more to ask?Xasha (talk) 10:26, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

I don't have the Latin original before my eyes, but be that as it may. However, I thoght that according to your own logic, a number of different words + different pronunciation = different language. I also thought that according to your own translation of Cantemir, Wallachians and Transylvanians also spoke Moldavian (the very same language). Could you please point out to the exact passage where the honorable Prince-Scholar is distiguishing between one language spoken in the then-Moldavia and another language spoken outside then-Moldavia. Plinul cel tanar (talk) 10:26, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

Sometimes yes, sometimes no. Old Russian authors also said Ukrainians spoke Russian with some small differences, but this doesn't mean that Russian and Ukrainian are the same language. Cantemir didn't bother to say that Hungarian is not the same language as Moldavian, but this doesn't seem to confuse anybody.Xasha (talk) 10:45, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

So from "moldavum corrumpunt" you inferred that Moldavian was a distinct language. And certainly this isn't original research. What, then, do you infer from this quote: "Valachiae et Transylvaniae incolis eadem est cum Moldavis lingua"? It is just one paragraph below "moldavum corrumpunt". — AdiJapan 10:47, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

Read above.Xasha (talk) 11:01, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

You mean your comment where you say "Sometimes yes, sometimes no"? Sorry to tell you, but that is pure original research. You're drawing parallels completely out of line and commenting on what Cantemir could have said... Anyway, this chat went too far. There is no point in analyzing a primary source here. Leave it to the experts. — AdiJapan 11:12, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

This is getting nonsensical, I have already addressed this above; for your convenience, here it is again: Cantemir himself writes "Noi, moldovenii, la fel ne spunem romani, iar limbii noastre nu dacica, nici moldoveneasca (dat fiind ca numele Moldovei si al moldovenilor este acordat foarte de curand, cum vom spune mai apoi), ci romaneasca, astfel ca daca vrem sa-l intrebam pe un strain daca stie limba noastra, nu-l intrebam: "Scis moldavice?" ("Stii moldoveneste?"), ci "Stii romaneste?", adeca, "in latineste": "Scis romanice?" (Dimitrie Cantemir, Hronicul vechimii a romano-moldo-vlahilor, sau hronicon a toata tara Romaneasca, care mai apoi s-a despartit in Moldova, Muntenia si Ardeal) As such, it is utterly irrelevant that Xasha has found another unrelated quotation that doesn't really quite say this -- because we have this quotation where he really quite does say it explicitly. --Gutza 11:14, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

This is so dubious, that I don't even have to discuss it.Xasha (talk) 11:29, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

Irrespective of the above, I still think that quoting chronicles is original research. Is there really no modern reliable source which has already analysed this, so we don't have to make analyses, translations and interpretations of our own? If not, what's the scientific merit of these ideas? --Gutza 11:16, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

You haven't brought one to support your POV.Xasha (talk) 11:29, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

Thank you Gutza, while having lunch I have just remembered Hronicul vechimii romano-moldo-vlahilor, I thought Cantemir was pretty streight forward there. Please add both that quotation and the one from Miron Costin in the article, they give a great insight on the views of XVIIth and XVIIIth century scholars. To please Xasha we may also add his own translation of the Descriptio Moldaviae: Inhabitants of Wallachia and Transylvania use the same Moldavian language, yet ... Plinul cel tanar (talk) 11:44, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

Well, thing is that Xasha obviously doesn't accept that source (see just above, it's "dubious"), therefore this would result in yet another revert war. Don't ask me why Xasha doesn't like it, I was unable to figure it out. However, if you have the nerves for it, be my guest. --Gutza 11:47, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

Use of obvious neologism such as "acordat" make it highly improbable that the quote is indeed original. Moreover, just randomly browsing Hronicul I found one instance where, talking about Pechenegs he says "ačěle němurj ɨš fəkusə limba lor din trij limbj amestecatə (din karele una au fost Moldoveněskə)" (transliterated from Old Cyrillic; fact most probably false, but presented just to show the use of the glottonym) (ě is yat, so in modern Moldovan either "ia" or "ea", ə si schwa, j is short i, irreproducible in the latin Moldovan script.).Xasha (talk) 12:22, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

Surely, as he is a good faith editor, he would not oppose inserting the translation from Descriptio Moldaviae which he himself so kindly provided here on the talk page? Plinul cel tanar (talk) 11:50, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

Oh, and incidentally, have a ball (that's from AŞM, no less). For your convenience, here's a direct link to Google's Translator: . --Gutza 11:52, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

That unsigned position is no less politicized than Stati's.Xasha (talk) 12:22, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

We are not commenting or upholding that particular position, we are simplu providing you with further references that reproduce Cantemir's views. Whatever your oppinion on the scholars of the Moldovan Science Academy may be I hope you do not want us to believe that they are inventing Cantemir quotations to prove their point? Plinul cel tanar (talk) 12:26, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

That text is not factually scientific (i.e. it says literary Romanian is based on all dialects, when everyone acknowledges is based on the Wallachian one), so it wouldn't be a surprise.Xasha (talk) 12:35, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

I am repeating myself. This particular discussion is on the historical name of the language spoken in the Principality of Moldavia prior to 1812, and more particularly on the writings of early scholars: Costin, Cantemir etc. Are you willing to acknoledge that whether accuratly or misstakenly both Cantemir and Costin atest the usage of the name romaneste by the inhabitants of the Principaliy when refering to their own language - yes or no? Plinul cel tanar (talk) 12:48, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

Costin was. Info about Cantemir is not verifiable.Xasha (talk) 12:49, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

BTW, as a note: in Hronicul uses anachronistically the term Romans to refer to the Romance population in the area in the 10th century.Xasha (talk) 12:56, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

We are not arguing the adequacy of the terminology Cantemir used. We are simply trying to establish what he wrote in order to give a correct historiographical overview. And BTW, in the Xth century, virtually every citizen of the still existing Eastern Roman Empire anachronistically called himself Roman. Plinul cel tanar (talk) 13:11, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

You should bring either a reliable secondary source quoting it, or a verifiable edition of the primary source (that would mean at least the book and chapter, if not the page). Byzantines in 10th century Moldavia?!?Xasha (talk) 13:23, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

Please re-read what I wrote, I am perfectly aware of the Xth century border of the Byzantine Empire. I will provide you with a verifiable reference, I know fairly well to find one, I just need time to find the book. Plinul cel tanar (talk) 13:37, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

Reference for what? You made me curiousXasha (talk) 13:45, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

I will provide you with a reference for Cantemir's statement. The only reason for which I mentioned the Eastern Roman Empire is to show how subjective your own personal statement concerning "Hronicul..." was, and I will not pursue the matter since it is besides the point anyway. Plinul cel tanar (talk) 13:49, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

This is entirely absurd -- Xasha is basing an entire theory on Cantermir's alleged lack of asserting that Romanian and Moldovan were the same thing, at least as far as rigorously reliable sources are concerned. Of course, we have Miron Costin saying that -- but no matter, we have no proof that Cantemir also has, therefore we assert that he didn't mean it. How ridiculous is that? --Gutza 13:25, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

Is called respecting WP:SYNTH.Xasha (talk) 13:27, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

No, to be perfectly honest it is called bad faith. --Gutza 13:29, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

Some may call so the Misplaced Pages policies. But an admin?Xasha (talk) 13:33, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

Putting words in my mouth doesn't help your case. --Gutza 13:37, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

Nor does forgetting what you said earlier help yours.Xasha (talk) 13:45, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

What, finding that you're acting in bad faith? I'm not forgetting that, I really believe you are -- I'm past the point of assuming good faith on your part, given your incessant disruption of this talk page and of the associated article. --Gutza 13:57, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

You and your co-nationals are the one who remove sources, put instead some dubious inverifiable ones, impose their personal opinions, canvass people... no reference, no secondary reputable source, nothing... an I am disrupting the article just because I don't want some nobody (i.e. without any credentials in the domain) to put their truth in the article by analysing primary sources? You have some curious values...Xasha (talk) 14:06, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

Just to be crystal clear about this: you're replicating (not even citing) Vasile Stati's fringe theories on Misplaced Pages, and your argumentation is based on the lack of sources to contradict it -- that is, your fringe theory stands until proven wrong. I had assumed good faith for a long time, but you went way beyond any conceivable limit of a good faith misunderstanding. However, this conversation is obviously not going anywhere, just as all the previous ones -- I just wanted to make my position clear for whoever's reading this. --Gutza 14:18, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

So you're basically saying: "I know you're wrong but I have no way to prove it, nor can I prove my POV". That's nonsense.Xasha (talk) 14:30, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

Cantemir

OK, I found the reference for Cantemir's position as quoted by Gutza: Dimitrie Cantemir, Opere complete, Vol. IX, Partea I, pages 64-65, Editura Academiei, Bucuresti 1983. The chapter is dedicated to the latin version of the Hronicul... called Historia Moldo-Vlachica and to an abandoned work named De antiquis et hodiernis Moldaviae nominibus. The original text reads: Nos Moldavi similiter nos Romanos dicimus, et linguam nostram non Dacicam, non Moldavicam (qui<a> hoc nomen Moldaviae, et Moldavorum recentissimus est, ut postea dicemus), sed Romanam, ita ut si aliquem alienigenam vellemus interrogare an sciret nostram linguam, non interrogamus "Scis Moldavice?", sed "Stii Romaneste?". I believe our differences are settled, then? Plinul cel tanar (talk) 14:21, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

So from which one of the works is it? Cause Hronicul is divided in books and chapters, so you should give me the correct coordinates so I can verify it myself. As for the abandoned work, can that be presented even as a primary source? Is it just a coincidence it has the same name as Descriptios' first chapter, but not the same content as the published version?Xasha (talk) 14:37, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

It is from the Historia Moldo-Vlachica, and I am quite offended by your lack of trust. I was hoping you would asume good faith. I made an international call to get that reference. As for the abandoned work (which contains a similar passage) it is an early version of the first chapter in the Descriptio. Of course, after going throug all that trouble to obtain a reference, I searched for the latin version of the quotation and I found an online document signed by a lecturer from the University of Constanta which should enable you to quickly verify my assertion. You will see it is completely neutral from a political point of view, it is dealing with Cantemir's... grammer. Here's the link: www.uab.ro/reviste_recunoscute/philologica/philologica_2005/26_nicolae.doc . Plinul cel tanar (talk) 14:49, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

I just asked for the chapter so that I can verify in the Moldavian language edition if he mentioned that. I'm not really interested what call you did (getting a facsimile of a 2 centuries old book and reading Old Cyrillic is not easy either), but this is a perfectly legit question. Sources are supposed to be verifiable, not just to beautify the article.Xasha (talk) 14:58, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

I provided you with a reference to an academic book specifically indicating the pages, normally I could have just added it in the article, you are supposed to assume good faith. If that is not verifiable enough for you, I have even provided with an online text signed by a university lecturer explicitly citing the passage and referencing it. Now, is this settled? Plinul cel tanar (talk) 15:03, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

If a proper context is provided (i.e. a unfinished work, not present in the edition in his native language or any published edition), it may work.Xasha (talk) 15:32, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

I don't get that. Historia Moldo-Vlachica is a finnished work, published in several editions since the XVIII century in France, Russia, Romania etc (De antiquis et hodiernis... is unfinnished, but it is a completely different book). It is in latin like the Descriptio (which you based your arguments on) and it is a summerized version of the "Hronicul...". Concerning this latter text, I find absurd to say that the passage is not in there. It is in fact more that probable it is in there, we just don't have source yet. We may simply not include any reference to it in the artile for the time being. Plinul cel tanar (talk) 15:41, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

The first paragraph of the link you gave above is "Dimitrie Cantemir’s “De antiquis et hodiernis Moldaviae nominibus” and „Historia Moldo-Vlachica” are two unfinished historical works".Xasha (talk) 15:43, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

You are right, it does. The English and Romanian abstracts are inconsistent. Plinul cel tanar (talk) 15:52, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

Gheorghe Stefan

Would it be of any relevence to this article the fact that Gheorghe Ştefan, Prince of Moldavia in the second hald of the XVIIth century, refered in his Codex to "our Romanian language" and stated that the codex contained texts translated by himself from Serbian to "Romanian"? May be this is not the right article... being "Moldovan" and all... any second oppinions? Plinul cel tanar (talk) 15:30, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

Let's keep to those author which have a certain reputation as scholars. If not, we could start quoting all writers from Romania (until Sadoveanu, if not later) who called their language Moldavian.Xasha (talk) 15:36, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

It wouldn't bother me, I am convinced that "Moldovan/Moldavian" is a legitimate alternative name for the language most people call nowadays "Romanian". And yes, the name was used in the XVIIth century in the Principality of Moldavia; so was "Romanian". Plinul cel tanar (talk) 15:46, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

Source

I was complaining about the scarcity of sources that talk about this subject. But here's another one that could fill a few gaps: . It's written by linguist Anatol Ciobanu, member of the AŞM. — AdiJapan 15:20, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

That would mean that Stati is also OK.Xasha (talk) 15:29, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

No it wouldn't. — AdiJapan 15:39, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

Xasha thinks we don't accept Stati as a source on ethnic grounds, maybe someone should take some time and explain. --Gutza 17:14, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

There isn't much to explain. Anatol Ciobanu is a reputable linguist, that is, someone who has actually published a significant amount of research results in the field of linguistics; those results made him be considered one of the top Moldovan scientists. Vasile Stati is not a linguist, except that for a while he worked in a linguistics institute (we're not sure what he was doing there), and when he did try his luck in the field with his infamous Moldovan-Romanian dictionary, his writing was called a politically motivated absurdity by every specialist who cared to analyze it. It looks pretty obvious to me which is a reliable source and which is not. — AdiJapan 02:14, 2 October 2008 (UTC)

Original latin in the Descriptio

Yestarday I took Xasha's word about the "textual translation" of a passage in the Cantemir's "Descriptio", which according to him is: Inhabitants of Wallachia and Transylvania use the same Moldavian language . He even put that in the article. Now,the original latin text according to the wikisource would be: Valachiae et Transylvaniae incolis eadem est cum Moldavis lingua . Even for someone with little practice of Latin claiming that "Moldavis lingua" is textual for "Moldavian language" is a striking aberation, "lingua" is a first declension feminin noun, clearly an ablative singular here because of the preposition, and "Moldavis" cannot be its adjective, there's no accord for Christ's sake! In fact there isn't a single adjective in the entire Latin language which ends in -is in the ablative singular. It's a second declension, masculin noun in the genitive, plural - "of the Moldavians". In conclusion: the textual translation would be: <Implied subject: "The language"> Of the Inhabitants of Valachia and Transilvania is the same as the language of the Moldavians. Of course this whole exercise is useless since we have translations from reliable secondary sources, but I found it necessary just as such to show how careful one needs to be when trusting original research provided on talk pages. Plinul cel tanar (talk) 08:34, 2 October 2008 (UTC)

Correct,...

• "((of Wallachia and of Transylvania) (by inhabitants) ) the same is with (by Moldavians ) language
• "The language by inhabitants of Wallachia and Transylvania is the same as by Moldavians."

As Plinul cel tanar properly states, there is no grammatical wiggle room to interpret the Latin as indicating "Moldavian language." —PētersV (talk) 19:03, 2 October 2008 (UTC)

And you are of course correct, which only goes to stress what I said: one should not trust original research provided on talk pages, certainly not my own. Off topic: my Latin is even worse than I thought. Thanks. Plinul cel tanar (talk) 07:05, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

Mine is rusty as well, didn't recognize the plural dative/ablative right away, too many years since my last Virgil class. —PētersV (talk) 04:09, 4 October 2008 (UTC)

Explanation of the merge templates

I have tagged the article with two merge templates: on one side, to move first two sections into the article History of the Romanian language, where I believe a separate section should be alloted to the Moldavian variety (as well as probably some more sections about other varieties), on the other side the last two sections would go into Moldovan language, where also they should form three separate sections: one about 1924-1940, one about 1940-1989, and one about 1989-today.

The history of this article, IMHO, should be moved to Moldavian language, while the talk page should be copied into both Talk:History of the Romanian language and Talk:Moldovan language. An alternative solution is to archive this talk page and transclude it. Or simpler, just archive and cut-and-paste into the archive records of both other articles. An admin should tend to the history of the article issue.

Main reasons for this move are WP:Content forking and WP:POINT. The details are alrady explained on all sides of all coins in the above body of discussion on this talk page (which takes about 1 hour to read, if you also follow the links). The pro and con arguments have been debated, so if you do not add new arguments, please just cite the arguments above (giving, if you wish, a link to a particular section and mention which user/date comment to read; alternatively giving a diff from the history of this talk page). Dc76\ 00:42, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

• I agree - there's too much content forking to serve an ideology going on (and linguistics should be kept as free as possible from ideological taint), so I support the proposed mergers. Biruitorul 01:19, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

• Support consolidation. Even Voronin says of course Romanian and Moldovan are the same language. And the "MO"ldovan language code has been rendered obsolete, superceded by "RO"manian, as of November 3, 2008. It's time to put a quiet and organized end to those who would argue that ideology defines language. —PētersV (talk) 04:20, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

• I agree. WP should be about content, not different formalisms. There is a thing (a language) and 2 unequally sustained interpretations (models): the mainstream one, and the ideologically one (in minority). Having one article for history, and an article for each POV is logical. The same, we have articles for diff Christian denominations, but a single (timely ordered series) article for the History of Christianity. adriatikus | talk 10:42, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

• Definitely no. Moldovan has a longer history as a de jure official language than Romanian, and, anyway, any arbitrarily changing of the sources so that Misplaced Pages says "Romanian" when the sources say "Moldovan" is not only OR and a clear breach of verifiability , but also a very tendentious editing (and thus a breach of 3 of the 4 content standards set into Misplaced Pages policy). (Of course, this seems to be the preferred way of dealing with MD-topics for some, just look at how a Romanian IP -unlogged editor?- put "Romanians" when the source explicitely says "Moldavians") No mather how much Romanian editors would want to supress this and impose the fallacy that "Stalin created Moldovan", the Moldovan language has a longer history, and there are reliable sources to prove it.Xasha (talk) 12:07, 9 November 2008 (UTC)
  • Xasha, in your description you makig a logical mistake when say "Moldavian language langauge has longer history". YOu are confusing "different names" and "different things". The languages which are called Romanian and Moldovan differ just as "American English" and "British English". It is a peculiar accident that they are called very differently, unlike Am/Brit. It just so happened that for some period in the past the language of people in Modavia was called Moldavian. I am not sure whether there were terms "Wallachian language" or "Transylvanian language", but after some time the term "Romanian language" substituted the usage of the term "Moldavian language" in the refernce to the same speech. If you want to say that for some period in the past (eg before unification of Romania) there were separate both "Moldavian" and "Romanian" languages, you please present the corresponding linguistic scholar texts. It will be interesting to learn. Timurite (talk) 16:59, 9 November 2008 (UTC)
    • Russians had no reason to create a new language and make it official in 1818. On the contrary, since their way to Constantinople passed through Wallachia, they had every reason to try to claim language identity to support of inclusion of that region in the Empire (it actually suceeded imposing it's protectorate on Western Moldavia and Wallachia 10 years later, and probably would have annexed them if it weren't for the Western intervention in the Crimean War). But the Russians, with very few exceptions, always called the language Moldavian, and so did the majority of locals from their first scholarly writings until today. The opinions of some linguists about modern literary Moldovan can't delete the long history of this language.Xasha (talk) 17:51, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

• Support the merger as outlined above. How untenable the present article is is shown already by its lead sentence: "The history of the Moldovan language refers to the historical evolution of the glottonym Moldavian/Moldovan". That's nonsensical gibberish. A "history" cannot "refer" to anything (use-mention confusion), and even if it were grammatically corrected to: The term "History of the Moldovan language" refers to..., that would be blatantly incorrect, because it just doesn't. The history of a language is something different from the history of its name(s). Fut.Perf. ☼ 13:04, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

• Support. The article "Moldovan language" is not about a language, but about a political controversy called "the Moldovan language", so it should also contain the history of that controversy. A separate article will be justified only if the text gets too long. Future Perfect, from a linguistic point of view, there is no distinct Moldovan language, so there is no distinct history of a Moldovan language, but there is a politically motivated alternative name for the Romanian language. Despite the bad wording (for which I am to blame), the leading section is not mistaken where it says that the subject of this article is the history of a language name, because that's what it is. — AdiJapan 14:00, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

• Support the merge of the Romanian part, with careful explanations about the usage of the names in the past, present and future. Oppose to the merging of the "Soviet" part: there is no serious reason to merge beyond "WP:POINT" issue, which must be dealt by regular editing. WP:FORK part is relevant only to Romanian part. Also, a brief summary piece must be kept about occasional usage of the term in the past. In addition, the criticism of Soviet theories about both history of the language and its alleged Slavic roots must be written somewhere. Please notice, while the soviet theories may be fringe, still the text about these theories is quite encyclopedic, singe these theories are fact of the past. I am sure that there should be plenty of Romanian sources which criticize these theories. Timurite (talk) 16:59, 9 November 2008 (UTC)
  • The article about these theories is Moldovenism, an absolutely legitimate and encyclopedic subject. Unfortunately, that article as of now does not present the three phases clearly: 1924-1940, 1940-1989, and post 1991. There are different features sometimes at play: Those that you mentioned are indeed key to 1924-1989. Moldovan national identity controvercy (about which for example the French Eikipedia has a whole article) on the other hand is a feature only of the latter period. My point is: by not merging the other 2 sections as well, we would have a content fork with Moldovenism. Dc76\ 23:02, 9 November 2008 (UTC)
    • "Moldovenism" page has no content to fork ;-).Timurite (talk) 15:26, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
      • You are obviously right. I was very busy at the moment I wrote my comment and misworded what I meant. What I meant to say is there is a conent fork between Moldovenism and section 3 here. So, to make it more clear, now I suggest to merge section 3 to Moldovenism rather than to Moldovan language, as I was proposing earlier (the arguments you brought made me change my mind). On the fate of sections 1 and 2 seems to be only one oppose (Xasha), and the fate of section 4 is discussed in the next section of this talk page. Dc76\ 07:34, 13 November 2008 (UTC)

• Oppose full merge. The rationale based on "WP:FORK and WP:Point is invalid. The original structure an basic scope of the article have been created with participation of staunch Romanians Orioane and Bogdanduica almost 3 years ago. It was done way before the xasha warrior arrived. Please settle your disagreements with hime wthout drastic actions. `'Míkka>t 17:28, 9 November 2008 (UTC)
  • P.S. I agree that the part in the Russian Empire grew out of proportions in terms of the artice topic. But this is matter of regular editing. In other words, most of the content of the "Russian Empire" section must be merged into "History of the Romanian language", while leaving the relevant info about the usage of the term "Moldavian language" during this perios `'Míkka>t 17:30, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

• I support the proposed mergers. I read the discussion and now I'm sure about it. --Olahus (talk) 22:00, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

• I support the merges. As far as I can tell, the two opposes are based on (1) a claim that Moldovan was a language in its own right before Romanian, and (2) a request to keep this article in place for the sole purpose of describing the usage of the term "Moldovan language" during some period or another. I believe the former is overwhelmingly being accepted as factually incorrect, while the latter is in my opinion a minor issue compared to the coherency benefits of merging (I don't see much value in keeping this article separated for that purpose alone, while a merge would benefit the reader by providing a whole lot of context). --Gutza 21:22, 15 November 2008 (UTC)

I am closing this discussion (and that of the following section, which is a subissue of this one) with the following results:

1. I read consensus that sections 1 and 2 can be merged into History of Romanian language.

2. I read agreement that section 3 can be merged into Moldovenism.

3. I read agreement that section 4 is better suited under either the existing article Moldovan language or a proposed article Linguistic policies in the Republic of Moldova. Since the latter does not exist, and its creation might bring about some more complex issues that need prior consideration, and since no user has taken upon such consideration on WP, I conclude that section 4 can be moved into the existing article Moldovan language for now.

4. Should anyone in the future start an article Linguistic policies in the Republic of Moldova or an equivalent title, consider using in it the text of the current section 4. Discussion on the usefulness of such an article can be carried out within the framework of the WP:WikiProject Moldova, and/or at the talk page of Moldovan language.

Respectfully, yours, Dc76\ 22:22, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

New title suggestion

There is a cerain historical continuity observed in the current article, of what had happened in the Land of Moldova, regardless the linguistic terminology, and I think the corresponding events deserve a separate "thread" in wikipedia in one place. I would suggest the new title "History of language in Moldova", which avoids putting the disputed term in the article title.

By the way, the article does not present any theories to explain why Imperial Russia introduced the term "Moldavian language". Timurite (talk) 15:32, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

But Moldovan is not the only language spoken in Moldova. There are at least 6 major languages in Moldova nowadays, and if it's going to be a history of the language, you'll have to talk about Crimean Tatar, Turkish, and even Getae and Scythian languages.

Point taken. Should be language-specific, e.g., History of Romanian and Moldovan language in Moldova. Timurite (talk) 18:45, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

There's no theory to present, because the Moldavian language was used long before, as proved by the Moldavian croniclers of the early 17th century (so at least 200 years before the Russians came to Bessarabia).Xasha (talk) 17:19, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

Chroniclers prove nothing; they record chronicles. In any case, I don't see your point. Yes, the language was called "Moldavian" Later it was called "Romanian", still later they some people started insisting the languages are different, while others maintain they are the same. This should be the topic of the current article: why, how and when happened so. Timurite (talk) 18:45, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

Those chroniclers said in the early 17th century that their language is "Moldavian" (And they weren't just some chroniclers, they were the only real scholars in Moldova during those times). The language was always called Moldavian by the majority of Moldavians, just like Croatian was always called so by the majority of Croatians, despite the official policy of the foreign governments (Romania in 1918-1940 for the former, and Serbian-dominate Jugoslavia for the latter) that conflated these languages with theirs.Xasha (talk) 19:01, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

You write "was always called". I hope you have references to prove this. By the way, the majority is not the rule. Linguistics is not democracy. The majority may call penis dick, but the anatomical term is still penis. In this respect I'd rather be curious how claimed Moldovan cultural figures Mihai Eminescu and Ion Creangă called their native language. `'Míkka>t 19:21, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

I doubt you can find any 19th century Moldavian intellectual who disputes that Moldovans, Wallachians and Transylvanian Romanians are the same nation. Mihai Eminescu was a Romanian nationalist, one could argue even an extremist in his views. Ion Creangă didn't approach politics as much as Eminescu, but he did wrote stories praising the union of Wallachia and Moldavia. For example, from Ioan Roată şi Vodă Cuza: "the most righteous cause of the Romanian nation: The Union, the holy Union." bogdan (talk) 22:53, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

"Always" means "since we have written sources about locals writing about their language". You're comparing apples and oranges, humanities aren't as clear-cut as exact sciences, especially when some consider a language is a dialect with an army and navy. I don't know about how Creanga generally called his language (although, considering he was payed by the RO gvt to teach "Romanian", he officially called it that way), but in his stories he says that some characters "speak Moldavian" or in a didactic story talks about peasants asking boyars to speak "in Moldavian" so they can understand what they're being said. Eminescu probably called his language Romanian, after all he was only 7 when "Romanian" was instituted as the only legal language in his home country. BTW, just because you call your language "Romanian" doesn't mean you aren't a Moldovan (there are lots in Moldova, and this is the case of User:Serhio, AFAIK).Xasha (talk) 20:06, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

You didn't answer my main question about references, e.g., about "written sources about locals writing about their language", paying attention to your claim about "always". If you have reliable references, why don't you add the corresponding texts in the articles Romanian language, Moldovan language and whereve else appropriate, rather than waste time in talk pages. `'Míkka>t 20:16, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

There are already on this page (see "Early usage" in this article). Prior to those Moldavians scholars, the name used can't be established (prior to that, foreign scholars called "Vlach" all Romance languages from the Pindus to Moravia, but very few of those speakers used that name when they began to write in their native language), but it would be very strange if they suddenly started to call their language that way just to help Stalin 300 years after. I can't edit those articles.Xasha (talk) 20:31, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

Maybe use the form "History of the state language of Moldova"? Or perhaps just move it to Moldovan language's history section (although it'd get kindaa bloated)... --Illythr (talk) 19:38, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

I think I have a better proposal: "History of linguistic policies in the Republic of Moldova". Note to flamewarriors: the term policy is a neutral one with respect to rightness/wrongness, but it shows a deliberate action of a policy maker (e.g. government). Why this title? Because the overwhelming majority of linguists say Mo language is a political concept (e.g. here). Obviously, the article should present the linguistic arguments in favor of Moldovenism, and the criticism. I make this proposal in addition to user:Dc76's proposals. adriatikus | talk 13:24, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

What about Ureche, Cantemir and the early 19th century Imperial Russia? What policy did they follow, what was their motivation to create such a "political concept" and why did they voluntarily adhered to those evil Stalinist actions?Xasha (talk) 14:18, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

(1) Flamewarrior, re-read my edit: "policy is a neutral with respect to rightness/wrongness". The article should present both the supporting POV (the claim/interpretation that Ureche and Cantemir used Mo as a diff language than Ro) and the criticism. (2) I say it again, Moldovan language is not a mainstream scholar thesis, its main supporters being throughout history policy makers. Therefore the proposed title.adriatikus | talk 14:31, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

I think you don't know what policy means. That's why I am wikilinking the word to its article for a second time. adriatikus | talk 14:38, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

(1)See WP:NPA. (2) You provided no proof that Ureche, Cantemir or Imperial Russia were applying a "deliberate plan of action to guide decisions " Xasha (talk) 14:43, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

(1) Sue me. (2) "Russian was made the official language. Also around 1850, Moldovan was no longer used in schools and the importation of books from Moldavia and Wallachia was banned." - that's policy (depends on the reader to say it was good or bad). As about individuals, it's one thing to quote them if they explicitly say "Mo is diff than Ro", but completely another thing to quote another one (in this case a policy maker) who interprets their writings as being in support of Moldovenism. adriatikus | talk 15:06, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

(1)Sue yourself.(2)What has that to do with Romanian? If I say my native language is Moldovan, would you think I am talking about Russian if I don't explicitely say I'm not? The fault is Romanians cause they "forget" about those passages when talking about those authors, and that they claim the enormity that the Moldovan language was invented by Stalin in 1924. (which, even with its extreme stupidity, is still claimed by some Romanian nationalist, as if Stalin had nothing else to do but imagine in his mind a language for some 200,000 people somewhere on his huge country's western border).Xasha (talk) 15:22, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

(1) "Sue yourself" WP:PA, "fault is Romanians cause..."- WP:WEASEL. Please stop. (2) I was not talking about Stalin, nor your personal opinions. Please refrain from detouring the discussion. The question is: "Is Mo a language?" The mainstream scholars overwhelmingly say "No" (). Saying "Yes" are the policy makers in Moldova (noteworthy, without credible scholar support - if you have supporting quotes, please provide them, otherwise we are talking nonsense). Therefore, the "history of Moldovan language" is actually "the history of linguistic policies in Moldova". adriatikus | talk 15:57, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

(1) Huh?! (2.) Repeating the same things over and over again like a mantra, without bringing anything new and ignoring the arguments of those who don't agree with you, really doesn't make one's opinion more credible or more factual.Xasha (talk) 19:17, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

I'm not sure if any of the suggested titles are appropriate, but certainly something needs to be done, because the current title is indeed misleading. Just by seeing the title, an uninformed reader will think there actually is a Moldovan language and this article talks about its history. Well, as all of you probably already know very well by now, this is not the case. An informative and suggestive title would be something like this: History of the term "Moldovan language". We have the same problem at the article Moldovan language, whose subject does not belong to linguistics, but politics. The right title would be The term "Moldovan language". Alternatively, we could have titles such as Romanian language in Moldova and History of the Romanian language in Moldova. — AdiJapan 07:43, 12 November 2008 (UTC)

First, I want to inform the rest of you that I am quite busy this week, so I appologize for not taking part in anything else. I will only today comment on this page, and then see you next week. But you should proceed ahead without me, I can catch up easily when I come back.

Second, I notice that my proposal has generated discussion in 3 aspects:

• the fate of sections 1 and 2. Except Xasha, I see agreement to move them in History of Romanian language.
• the fate of section 3. Timurite convinced me that Moldovan language is not the most approrpiate place for that info. So, now I changed my mind: that section should go to Moldovenism - it basically describes the issue at core of Moldovenism. Obviously, that article would need substancial development, and I invite everybody to join in that work and by New Year to a achieve a more or less good article. Maybe we can even make a DYK from it.
• the fate of section 4, which - as I understand - is what is being discussed in this section of the talk page. So, I would take adriaticus' proposal and reformultate it: Linguistic policies in the Republic of Moldova (I droped the words "History of"). As Xasha pointed out, there is more to be added to such an article besides section 4 from here (e.g. official language status, how it came about, regional languages status, de facto situation today, legal issues, minority languages, etc) I think we can do that. Thus, we can indeed rename this article and keep section 4 in it. Of course, it would be necessary to further edit it (some info from it would go to Moldovan language, while other info of historical character would be brought in). How is that? Dc76\ 07:51, 13 November 2008 (UTC)

1. Template:Ro iconDeclaraţia de independenţa a Republicii Moldova, Moldova Suverană

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