why are you being racist against the Sotho set of languages (SeSotho, SiPedi and SeTswana) :) I loved that part of the quiz, and almost aced it, apart from Venda, which is embarrassing cause I come form Zim and we have Venda at home, so I should have got it.
South Africa and Bolivia really need to narrow the field with their languages. South Africa should just have Afrikaans, Xhosa and Zulu, and Bolivia should have Spanish and Quechua.
I also think that India has 28 languages, for the love of everything, just keep it to what you have here.
Why doesn't "Montenegrin" work with Montenegro even if it's in brackets in the table?
Also I kept thinking about Quechua and Aymara: "Now how are they spelled in English?" because I know in my native language they're written "Ketšua" and "Aimara".
in serbian,croatian and montenegirin there are only a few words that they are different
someone who speak serbian, can speak croatian, montenegerin, bosnian...
Language is not always about being really different from another language linguistically speaking. It's also a political thing. If you want to profile yourself as your own nation, you'll call your dialect a language and everybody else goes with that. Just look at Sweden/Norway/Denmark. Nobody contests that, but essentially Swedes often have an easier time understanding Danish than for example Finns from different parts of Finland have understanding each other. At least if they speak the old dialects. There's no clearcut differentiation between dialect and language, it's what we are taught and used to thinking that matters really. That and the borders of countries.
These are languages diverging for political reasons. Just try walking around Croatian with a "Serbo-Croatian" dictionary/phrase guide. Most language courses and books are now breaking them up.
It's a technicality, english is not the official language so not to pick favourites but then you are picking a De Facto favourite. Bolivia, South Africa and many others are doing exactly the same thing with the opposite approach, all their languages are official not to leave anyone out but spanish is de facto in Bolivia and specific provinces in South Africa have one language above all else, in any case Canada would be a good example English and French are official and every person in the country speaks one or the other or both and then all official communication is done in both.
Not everyone in Canada speaks French or English. And there are probably people in South Africa and Bolivia who do not speak any of the recognized official languages there, as well. Giving a language "official" status doesn't really accomplish anything, but it does give more weight to the protests of ornery racist nativists who love to say things like "learn the language or get out of the country!!" When the United States was formed there were many people living within its borders whose native language was German or Dutch or something else. There was no point in marginalizing those people by declaring that English was the most prestigious language and ethnicity of the country, just like there's no reason to publicly and officially marginalize speakers of Spanish, Chinese or Arabic today.
I live in Canada and know people who speak neither English nor French. Also I think we need to make Aboriginal languages official, (such as Cree and Ojibway), in my opinion. Or at least Inuktitut as that is what majority of Nunavummiut (people from Nunavut) speaks.
Bad baby: why would you assume that? English is my native language and I'm quite proficient at using it. I am sometimes slightly annoyed at the efforts of the historically ignorant nativists who seek to undermine the beauty of the country that was founded on ideas like equality, democracy, and pluralism... but their efforts have rarely done anything to negatively impact me personally and directly.
Also my family has roots in the United States going back 15,000+ years, to Cherokee who originally settled the land, to English and German farmers who colonized Virginia in the 16th century, and to the Pilgrims who landed at Plymouth. Anyone glancing at me would assume I was "white."
But... I honestly don't know what you are implying so my guess work in responding to it could be totally off. A little help?
^That's extremely debatable, I've seen reports suggesting the opposite, and also that both have changed equally. It's very difficult to know when you don't have a spoken record.
Irish Gaelic is spoken in Ireland and Scottish Gaelic in Scotland. Originally I had defined it as Irish Gaelic, but the Quizmaster changed it to just Irish when this became a frontpage quiz.
I think that change doesn't matter much because if you try to type "Irish Gaelic", it will become accepted as soon as you've finished typing "Irish".
I don't think just "Gaelic" is accepted. I believe it is often referred to as just Gaelic, but then it becomes indistinguishable from Scottish Gaelic. So idk if it ought to be accepted or not. :/
Gaelic is accepted if you type it, but almost no one is Ireland uses that world to refer to the language. We refer to our own language as either Irish or Gaeilge (it depends on where you are), and we call Scots Gaelic, that, Scots Gaelic. And to clarify, Scots is it's own language, based more in old English and German.
A language doesn't stop existing just because some government says so. Serbian, Bosnian, Croatian and Montenegrin are considered to be dialects of the same language by some, while others claim that they are different languages. Since there is no scientific definition of what the difference is between a language and a dialect, both claims are equally valid. The quiz has catered for that by letting you type either each language variety separately, or just typing a term that encompasses all of them.
There are languages that are different because they are different. Then, there are languages that are different for political reasons. Serbocroatian is one of those. Before Yugoslavia broke up, these languages were considered to be one language. It was only after Yugoslavia broke up that they were considered separate languages. That is a fallacy to assume that they are separate languages because of politics.
However, Serbian is typically written in Cyrillic where Croatian is written in Latin, yet Hindi and Urdu are considered separate languages: spoken, they are the same language (with dialectal differences), but Urdu is written in Arabic and Hindi is written in Devanagari. Using that logic, it's not a fallacy to assume that Serbian and Croatian are separate languages.
agree with dwo. Student of linguistics here. These languages were invented only to try and create an artificial difference between people who were at war with one another. Realistically, they are the same language. It would be like if the United States had a 2nd civil war, and those in the south declared that they spoke Confederalese and then decreed that all Southern dictionaries excise words like "pop" in favor of "soda," etc... a ridiculous and cynical exercise in the politics of war, not a natural evolution that would produce a truly distinct language.
In the US South, neither "pop" nor "soda" are used...it's all Coke. Or more specifically, Co-cola. Soda is the East & West Coasts, w/an outpost in Milwaukee. Pop is the Midwest, although the dividing line between soda & pop runs north & south from Rochester, NY, through State College, PA, & south, roughly along the Appalachians.
kalbahamut, I see your politico-linguistic point, but as a student of Croatian, I can assure you that the differences between Serbian and Croatian are much bigger than the difference between Northern and Southern English in the US. Aside from the whole issue of using different writing systems, there is a growing difference in vocabulary. I'm guessing time will increase that; mostly because the Croats want it to.
sam.. that's kind of my point though (because the Croats want it to). The differences are artificial and engineered. It's a false evolution of two dialects of the same language. My analogy to Northern/Southern American English was a hypothetical situation in which something similar *could* happen... not something that *has* happened.
Sorry, Bobcat, but soda is definitely used in this part of the Upper South and in the Mid-South where we lived for a while. My college roommates from Michigan and Chicago thought I wanted an ice cream soda when I suggested we get a soda. They were calling it Coke back in the 1970s, but I have cousins in Michigan who still call it pop. I am noticing that the younger generations seem to prefer Coke as the generic word now, regardless of region. My late father-in-law, who grew up in the Ozarks, called it Co-cola.
I forgot to add that when I was a girl in southern Missouri in the 1950s and '60s, everyone called it "sodie" as in, "Let's go to the store and get us a sodie." But when talking about a specific brand, cola was usually attached - Pepsi-Cola, Coca-Cola, RC Cola, Lotta Cola, etc.
kalbahamut, it's a bit more complicated than that. While today's differences are in big part due to conscious political efforts, Serbian and Croatian are not a result of the recent wars. They are two distinct language standards that existed long before Yugoslavia (ok not that long, modern standardization dates to 19th century, but anyway...) Serbo-Croatian is still one language of course.
Australia speaks English and so does the US (with some others like French, Spanish, etc.), Mexico, and apparently they count Canada but not his poor brother? How mean..
It's funny how many of these you can get right just by adding an "ish" or "n" or "i" somewhere. Or even easier: Typing in the name of the country itself. Interesting quiz though, like it.
Hello quizmaster, I'd just like to say that Romansh is only a NATIONAL language of Switzerland, but not an OFFICIAL one! (it is co-official only at regional level in Graubunden Canton, like german in South Tyrol or Catalan in Catalonia). Even many people in Switzerland think it is an official language at national level, but it isn't. Source: I live in Switzerland
According to the Federal Constitution of Switzerland, Romansh is a national language and also an official language for communicating with people who speak Romansh.
I repeat that Romansh it is NOT an official language of Switzerland at national level. The fact that they allow Romansh people communicating to federal units in Romansh does not make it an official language. Only German, French and Italian are fully official and equivalent at national level, and every law must be translated into the three. I repeat that Romansh has the same relevance as REGIONAL LANGUAGES do in other countries. Here a link from the Swiss parliament that unfortunately is not available in English: http://www.admin.ch/opc/fr/classified-compilation/20062545/index.html
And I repeat that also many Swiss people make confusion on this topic and I get often contradicted.
Info about East Timor is not accurate. The official languages of the country do include Tetum, but not English, although it is widely spoken, due to the proximity to Australia. Portuguese is an official language, even if spoken by a minority of the population. Actually, considering East Timor's National Educational Programme, Portuguese is expected to be spoken by almost 70% of the population within a generation.
Portugal has two official languages. Portuguese, obviously enough, but also Mirandese, spoken by 35000 people. The official languages of Spain include Spanish, incorrectly named for it should be Castellan (Castellano); Catalan; Basque; Galician and also Tenerifan, spoken in Tenerife.
Spanish is the only official language of Spain. The others are regional official languages.
La Constitución española de 1978.
Título preliminar
Artículo 3
El castellano es la lengua española oficial del Estado. Todos los españoles tienen el deber de conocerla y el derecho a usarla.
Las demás lenguas españolas serán también oficiales en las respectivas Comunidades Autónomas de acuerdo con sus Estatutos.
La riqueza de las distintas modalidades lingüísticas de España es un patrimonio cultural que será objeto de especial respeto y protección.
http://www.congreso.es/consti/constitucion/indice/titulos/articulos.jsp?ini=3&tipo=2
As the years progress, that is less and less true. Australia is a country based on immigration, so the population of immigrants continues to rise, but there are many of these who chose to live among the enclaves of their own ex-pats, and many (particularly when they bring their elderly parents, etc) do not end up learning English. In fact, there are many areas (esp in Sydney and Melbourne) where you'll often see shops signs, etc, in only Mandarin or Vietnamese... But, no - no language has ever been written in to the Constitution. At the time, it was just assumed, since we based it on Westminster law. It's not expressly forbidden, like the creation of an official religion, but there just doesn't seem to be a need.
Now I have something to memorize after the capitals. I hope you are working on something for once I get these to slide off my tongue....has to take us around the world and be very difficult, like countries and then capitals were the first time we tried. Thank you so much! They say use it or lose it, and you've taken 50 years off the age of my brain as I'm memorizing something new everyday. I read deeper things too but the memorization really makes the blood flow to the dead parts up there! :)
please can you add Pedi or SiPedi for Northern Sotho, as that is it's other (indigenous) name. I was having a hard time with it. Also, as a favour, Ukrainean, and Belarussian. I would appreciate that.
From what I've read, SiPedi/Sepedi/Pedi is a dialect, and "Northern Sotho" or "Sesotho sa Leboa" are the recommended names for the language. I'm no expert on this though.
I'll add the suggested variants for Ukrainian and Belarusian to the pipeline of changes.
Very, very interesting quiz. One of the best I think.
However, I am sorry to say that nowhere in Icelandic law is Icelandic the official language of Iceland. It is by far de facto, but not officially. Strangely, Icelandic sign language is the official language of hearing impaired Icelanders.
Act on the status of the Icelandic language and Icelandic sign language. Article 1:
"Icelandic is the national language of the Icelandic people and the official language in Iceland."
It's funny how former British colonies in Africa with barely any English speakers use English as their official language while the US with the largest English speaking population in the world doesn't.
Huh, this is new. I think Zimbabwe will have to get the same treatment as Bolivia in this quiz. Some of the Zimbabwean languages are poorly defined too. Anyhow, this quiz seriously needs an update...
Hmm. I see it in Wikipedia, but there is no reference to official sources. It's also not in the CIA World Factbook entry, updated this month. But there are many news reports from May 2015 heralding its addition, so I'd suggest to the QM / Zefyrinus that it looks legit.
Hmmm, so I guess people from Switzerland don't speak Swiss. And I was pretty surprised that the US doesn't have an official language, seeing as I am from the USA. You would think I would know that.
Missed Korean which would have gotten me the full 5pts. Annoying to forget that since it's just the country name!
Also South Africa is hogging all the languages. I guess it makes sense in post-apartheid SA to elevate all the major African languages into an official equality, but it looks odd next to e.g. India which has similar language diversity.
I have a big issue with US not having an official language. English is the only language in which all legislation is published and the language used at courts, among other things. There's such thing as customary law.
Otherwise I would expect to see "Nauru ... none" in the capitals quiz, there's a much stronger case for this one.
Well, for the US it's undisputable that English is the de facto "official" language, but when it comes to other countries it might be debatable what languages I should list for them if I opened up for this. So I need to base this on some kind of objective data. And for that reason I have chosen to only include whatever each country has defined as their official language.
Various spellings of Belarusian should be accepted, I have seen Belarussian and Belorussian used before and only guessed those two. Motuan should be accepted for Hiri Motu as it is the English name for the language, I guessed Motuan first.
Also, a note about Slovak/Slovene and the addition of -ian: I believe Slovakian is a correct equivalent but Slovenian isn't, but I'm not 100% sure.
Belarusian with two S was supposed to be accepted, but it wasn't due to a mistake in the type-ins. I've fixed this now. But are you sure about Hiri Motu? There is a language called just Motu, on which Hiri Motu, the pidgin/creole language, is based on. The only thing I can find about "Motuan" is that it's the name of the people who speak Motu.
Surprised so many people missed Quechua/Aymara, Malagasy, Amharic, Tigrinya, and Guaraní... I thought those were all common knowledge, especially Amharic, Quechua, and Aymara
I agree, Hatian Creole should work. I got lucky...I tried Creole and, when that didn't work, I put the cursor in front of Creole and began typing 'Hatian' but it accepted it at Haiti.
That's odd, I can't find any mentioning of official or national languages of Chile on WP. But when I Google, all the sources say Spanish is the official language.
Hmm, I just looked this up now, and one document says that Amharic is the working language of the federal government. Though some other sources say that it's the official language of the government. :?
Not that it matters, but correct me if I'm wrong, in New Zealand, isn't English not considered an official language. When I went there a few months ago, I was told that there are only 2 official languages (Māori and NZ Sign Language), and that English, despite being the most widely spoken language, isn't formally designated as an official language. So if you're including English for New Zealand, you might as well include English for Australia, UK, US, Spanish for Mexico, etc. for the sake of consistency or otherwise remove English as an official language of NZ. Plus, should English be removed as an official language, it would probably confuse many people, and waste their time trying to figure out how to type 'English', which is always entertaining. +1 for accepting Seychellois
India should be removed because India too nor has any official languages. Hindi is the most spoken language and English is used for official works, but they are not our national language. There are 22 recognized languages of India, if possible put all the 22 languages.
According to Wikipedia, Hindi is the "official language of the government" and English a "subsidiary official language". I'm not really sure what exactly those terms mean though...
Nice quiz you made!
Also a little question, how did you make a question have more than one answer? I've always had that dbout. One expample of this is South Africa.
Te Reo Maori was recognised as an official language in 1987, and NZ Sign Language achieved the same status in 2006. But there is currently no legislation that recognises English as an official language. Parliament is currently considering a draft bill to make it so, as it seems a bit daft.
Indeed, it's JetPunk policy to use the common English name as far as I know, so Swaziland should be the name used on this quiz. By the way, Israel is in the process of removing the official status of Arabic, though I'm not sure whether that law change has been completed yet. So maybe that can wait.
Why does the UK not have English as our official language? we invented it!!!! Also, no White English speaking country has it as their official language either. Whats the conspiracy behind this?
But... I honestly don't know what you are implying so my guess work in responding to it could be totally off. A little help?
I think that change doesn't matter much because if you try to type "Irish Gaelic", it will become accepted as soon as you've finished typing "Irish".
I don't think just "Gaelic" is accepted. I believe it is often referred to as just Gaelic, but then it becomes indistinguishable from Scottish Gaelic. So idk if it ought to be accepted or not. :/
I'll add the suggested variants for Ukrainian and Belarusian to the pipeline of changes.
buck1017: OK, I'll add just Haitian to be accepted after the next update.