Re: My version

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "Francesco Brighenti" <frabrig@...>
wrote:

>
>
>
>
> --- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, Rick McCallister <gabaroo6958@>
> wrote:
>
> > Francesco:
> >
> > If I remember correctly, you are from Bologna.
>
> No, I am from Venezia (= Venice). Still in the North, anyway, though
> the dialect I speak, called venexiàn/venesiàn (the variety of speech
> used in Venice, which was once, and is to some extent still today, a
> literary language as well as, together with Latin, one of the official
> languages used by the administration of the Repubic of Venice) is a
> variant form of the so-called 'lingua veneta' (= Venetian language).
>
> > If so, I'm guessing you are familiar with some transitional dialect
> > between Gallo-Italian and Standard Italian. Can standard speakers
> > understand Gallo-Italian?
>
> Gallo-Italian idioms are not inherently intelligible to speakers of
> standard Italian, but some of them are more intelligible than others.
> Yet there are some varieties of dialect spoken in Liguria, Lombardy
> and Romagna that may sound as 'foreign' languages to standard Italian
> ears!
>
> > Can you understand Sicilian and Neapolitan?
>
> Neapolitan is often unintelligible to speakers of standard Italian; in
> its purest (i.e. not 'Italianized') form, it is certainly
> unintelligible to _me_. Ditto for Sicilian, though it is, for some
> reason, generally easier to understand than Neapolitan.
>
> The degree of mutual intelligibility between Gallo-Italian and
> southern Italian dialects compares to the one between standard Italian
> and standard French. They are distinct enough to be considered (at
> least by some scholars) separate languages.
>
> Kind regards,
> Francesco
>

Francesco, I just wanted to ask, so that I can be certain that I
understand:

Were you saying that Sicilian, Corsican, Gallo-Italian, Venetian,
Neapolitan, and all the other "dialects of Italian" are better
considered modern dialects of Vulgar Latin, since that is their common
starting point, and standard Italian is not a common starting point?

If so, it seems that by that definition they are equal in status to
Spanish, Portuguese, French, etc., and also Catalan, Occitan, and the
other non-national modern descendants of Vulgar Latin. So it would
seem all these modern descendants of Vulgar Latin are languages,
regardless of political boundaries.

I think "dialect" and "language" have become more political terms than
linguistic terms, or at least they are linguistic terms that are
largely politically defined. "Language" tends to be associated with a
nation-state, and "dialect" to any related varieties, whether mutually
intelligible or not, within that nation-state. At least within
Europe. If a European language spreads beyond Europe, it is either
the same language (American English) or another language (Afrikaans).
It is never a dialect in such cases. For non-European languages, I
know nothing -- it might be interesting to talk about these in regard
to the language/dialect issue.


Andrew