School talk:Language and Literature

Reformatting in General
Okay, this entire page is really starting to get on my nerves--can anyone help me out with the extremely overdue reformatting job? Also, I am saving copies of the original formatting to my computer if we need to revert at any point. Oh, by the way--kudos to whoever designed our layout, and please don't misunderstand me when I say the formatting is getting on my nerves--this really is a fabulous page, I'm just trying to make it a little easier to navigate. --Trinity507 01:13, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

I'm moving the "Did You Know" and "Notable Quotes" to a different page--I think they're cluttering up the page as it is now. --Trinity507 20:06, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

I haven't had time to move these to their own page recently, so I'll post them here for now...--Trinity507 16:48, 14 March 2009 (UTC)

Wikiversity language courses

 * Russian
 * Introduction to Sanskrit Language (stub)
 * Introduction to Swedish
 * Common phrases
 * Mandarin
 * Latin stream
 * Introduction to Latin
 * Introduction to Arabic
 * Introduction to Breton
 * Learning Finnish
 * Introduction
 * Common phrases
 * Introduction to Filipino
 * Hindi
 * Introduction to Italian
 * Introduction to the Dutch Language
 * Introductory Ancient Greek Language
 * Japanese question words
 * Portuguese Alphabet
 * Rules of Esperanto grammar
 * Spanish
 * ESL for Primary School
 * Introductory Esperanto
 * Learning the Basics of French
 * Introductory Korean
 * Korean writing system
 * Aztec language
 * Maya language
 * Kernewek Onan

Reformatting Divisions/Departments section
I found the list of our departments and divisions extremely confusing, so I am trying to reformat it -- I noticed we had several "dead links" (notably the Mandarin topic when we already have a Chinese one!) -- I am going to delete these from our list of topics but paste the links here on the discussion page so that the responsible users can clean up a bit. If anyone has any comments/questions/objections to my reformatting job, please let me know (and change it yourself, of course!) --Trinity507 05:17, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

Here is a copy of the old page if we should revert, but I spent a lot of time and effort on reformatting it and, personally, I think it looks great - a lot less confusing! I alphabetized languages and moved the "dead links" and disputed pages into their own categories for the time being. Okay, the old page was:

Departments and divisions

 * School of Linguistics
 * English language
 * English Studies Department
 * Literary Studies Department
 * Foreign language learning
 * Writing
 * History
 * Slavic
 * Brythonic Celtic Languages Division
 * The Breton Language
 * The Cornish Language
 * Klingon
 * Tolkien
 * Southeast Asian Languages
 * South American Languages Division
 * The Aymara Language
 * The Quechua Language
 * British novel
 * British poetry
 * American poetry
 * List of all projects and courses offered
 * Topic:Chinese
 * Topic:Mandarin
 * Topic:Korean
 * Topic:Japanese
 * German
 * French
 * Hebrew
 * Arabic
 * Topic:Portuguese
 * Italian
 * Indonesian
 * Topic:Spanish
 * Topic:Turkish
 * Department of Germanic Studies(under major construction)

Signed, Trinity507 06:06, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

Language and Literature: Which Portal?
So, which portal does this school actually belongs to? Humanities or Social Sciences? And what about School:Linguistics? I don't think that two schools are necessary for almost the same subject (for example, learning foreign languages can be both listed in this school and in the Linguistics school). I wouldn't like participants to split in two. :) --Ђорђе Д. Божовић 15:34, 15 September 2006 (UTC)


 * The School of Language and Literature is part of the Humanities. The School of Foreign Language Learning is part of the Practical Arts and Sciences. The School of Linguistics is part of the Social Sciences. These three schools should cooperate and avoid duplication of effort. --JWSchmidt 16:19, 15 September 2006 (UTC)


 * OK, thank you very much. But yet, there is a topic Language Acquisition within this school, and it aims to be very similar (I'd say almost identical) with School of Foreign Language Learning, doesn't it? --George D. Bozovic talk 16:48, 15 September 2006 (UTC)

This Page Looks Amazing!
this page looks amazing! --Smithgrrl 06:24, 27 September 2006 (UTC)


 * Well, thank you. :) I like to work in a colourful environment. :D I believe that a nice-looking school would attract more people than a boring ugly one. --George D. Bozovic talk 15:00, 27 September 2006 (UTC)


 * I'm so copying this for the school of law! This is really an excellent page.--AdamG 22:11, 29 September 2006 (UTC)
 * Check it out: School:Law. Thanks again!--AdamG 23:02, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

An idea
I have an idea for collaboratively writing a play but I'm not sure what page would be an appropriate location on which to start this project. Any ideas? CDinAshton 00:19, 6 October 2006 (UTC)
 * It sounds like a great idea. Start with the first thing that comes into your head (Collaborative play writing?), it can always be changed later. --JWSchmidt 01:30, 6 October 2006 (UTC)
 * Perhaps you can make a subpage of the Writing Centre or something like that? --George D. Bozovic talk 20:34, 6 October 2006 (UTC)

Eager to get involved
I'm brand new to Wikiversity, and slightly disoriented, but I'd love to get involved. I've studied several foreign languages, and my education is in English and Linguistics (and History). How do I get involved in this School? Jade Knight 07:54, 7 October 2006 (UTC)
 * I'd like to create a Department of English Language (which would fit in both this School and possibly the Linguistics School), which would coordinate non-literary aspects of English. Is this a good idea, or should we have English Linguistics, Old English, Middle English, etc., all in completely separate departments?  Jade Knight 09:59, 7 October 2006 (UTC)
 * Hi there. Have you seen Topic:English Studies (it's currently empty) on the school page? Perhaps that fits your interests? Feel free to contribute. --George D. Bozovic talk 12:07, 7 October 2006 (UTC)
 * Yes, I saw that, but don't know what to make of it—I'm not entire sure what "English Studies" means; I could see that applying to literature as well as language, or it could be a regional grouping, contrasting "English Studies" with "American Studies", etc. Should I go about creating a page for an English Language department, then?  Jade Knight 19:55, 7 October 2006 (UTC)
 * Neither do I know. :) It was named like that when Wikiversity was still held at the Wikibooks, long time ago. I believe that the term "English studies" would cover the English language and literature as well as the culture (mythology and religion, history, etc.) of the English-speaking nations, wouldn't it? "Slavonic studies" works in that way for the Slavonic peoples (its primary topic is studying the Slavonic languages, but also the Slavonic culture trivialy). So, Topic:English language could be a subdivision of Topic:English Studies, don't you think? --George D. Bozovic talk 20:40, 7 October 2006 (UTC)
 * That makese sense. Jade Knight 20:56, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

I've created an English Language Division. Please list it somewhere. The Jade Knight 23:54, 8 October 2006 (UTC)


 * You may create the Topic:English Studies page. Then list it there. :) --George D. Bozovic talk 20:42, 9 October 2006 (UTC)


 * I think that's silly. English Language is currently a division of the Languages and Literature School (and, in fact, is one of only like 2-3 divisions/departments the School has).  It's silly to create another Division just to advertise a Division when the School could advertise the created Division well enough as it is.  The Jade Knight 01:17, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

Course listing?
The main page for the School should either have a listing of courses/projects, or a link to a page which contains such a list. Jade Knight 21:24, 7 October 2006 (UTC)


 * School:Language and Literature/List of projects and topics <-- Is this a good title, what do you think? It is half past midnight here in my time zone, I really can't judge properly now. :) --George D. Bozovic talk 22:30, 7 October 2006 (UTC)
 * "Course Catalog" would be a more clever title, but maybe less inclusive. "Course offerings" is another option.  It would be more inclusive to say "Project offerings" or "Project catalog", but I worry that most users won't recognize that they would find courses there.  The title you've come up with is functional, though I think we need to draw a distinction between Projects and Courses, and Topics, which are academic divisions/departments/etc.  It can be really confusing for new users to learn Wikiversity lingo.  Perhaps it would be better to say "List of Departments, Projects, and Courses Offered"?  Jade Knight 23:11, 7 October 2006 (UTC)


 * I don't know. I have just put School:Language and Literature/Catalogue for now. Do you have any other ideas about the title? It would be great if it wasn't very long. --George D. Bozovic talk 12:01, 8 October 2006 (UTC)
 * I think that would be fine. The Jade Knight 19:18, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

Russian
According to academic V. G. Kostomarov, Russian is spoken by approximately 500,000,000 people. 159,000,000 of these are native Russian speakers, and the rest speak it as foreign language. Russian is taught in 120 countries. 20,000,000 people learn it daily. Each fourth book in the world is printed in Russian. (cited from the book "Руски језик" by Predrag Piper and Vucina Raicevic) --George D. Bozovic talk 14:28, 21 October 2006 (UTC)
 * According to Ethnologue, Russian has 145 million native speakers, and 110 secondary speakers. According to the Linguasphere, Greater Russian has 170 million native, and 150 secondary speakers.  Both of these are highly respected linguistic studies.  Ethnologue gives 380 million Spanish speakers, while the Linguasphere puts this number at 450 million.  Ethnologue gives over 300 million Hindi speakers, while Linguasphere gives about 900 million for the Hindi/Urdu language group.  Ethnologue gives 450 million Arabic speakers.  Arabic, Spanish and French are all official in more countries than Russian.  4 separate sources rank Russian as having 250-280 million speakers, being 5th or 6th in the world in terms of total speakership.  I would like to see the data backing up the claim that every 4th book in the world is printed in Russian, and comparable statistics from a reliable source stating how many countries French, Spanish and Arabic are taught in, and how many people learn them daily.  In the United States alone, which has 300 million citizens, Spanish is the most learned foreign language, and Russian isn't even in the top 3.  I would be very surprised if 20 million people were not learning Spanish every day.  It's fine to say that Russian is one of the top 10 most used languages in the world; I think that's fairly supportable.  But that it's the third?  This seems highly unlikely, considering the data available from multiple reliable linguistic sources.  The Jade Knight 21:46, 21 October 2006 (UTC)
 * My oppinion was fully based on Kostomarov's statement: "По этому критерию русский язык занимает третье (после китайского и английского) место в мире". I am sorry if it was not quite correct. --George D. Bozovic talk 15:45, 22 October 2006 (UTC)
 * I understand. In this case, it seems the book is somewhat off.  However, even if there were 600,000,000 Russian speakers and Russian was an official language in 35 countries, "most used" would still be a very subjective term.  It would be better to say "has more speakers" or "is taught in more countries", etc., as these are more objective and can be quantified better.  It is still possible (though I have some doubts about it) that Russian is taught in more countries or has more books printed in it than any language other than English or Chinese.  If we could find comparable statistics for other languages (particularly Spanish, French, and Arabic), we could accurately make such a comparison.  The Jade Knight 04:50, 23 October 2006 (UTC)

Quenya Course.
Interested in setting up one. Some other too? Suggestions?--Elistir 14:30, 22 October 2006 (UTC)


 * I believe other people will certainly appear later. Good luck. --George D. Bozovic talk 15:42, 22 October 2006 (UTC)


 * Thanks. I'm opem to suggestions (and for someone to help me explaining the exact procedures. Thanks.--Elistir 15:46, 22 October 2006 (UTC)


 * You might want to make a Department for Quenya first (Topic:Quenya), and then come up with a class to go in it. An example of a language Department (currently with no classes) is the French Department.  The Jade Knight 04:55, 23 October 2006 (UTC)
 * I see you've already set up a Department and Stream. Looks good.  The Jade Knight 04:58, 23 October 2006 (UTC)

Lonely
Is it just me or does anybody else ever feel like theyre the only person here? I feel like we need to have a better way of communicating than user talk pages, anybody know of anything? AIM? Y!M?Elatanatari 17:36, 3 December 2006 (UTC)
 * I've got AIM, WLM (MSN), GTalk, and Skype. The Jade Knight 08:52, 10 September 2008 (UTC)

Firefox Language Packs
Does anyone know where I can download Firefox language packs for Japanese, Korean, Chinese, Arabic, Indian, etc?

French: Is It a Department or a Division?
"School:Language_and_Literature" lists French as a Division; but "Topic:French" is ambiguous, a Title listing "French Division", but the accompanying Text reading "Welcome to the French Department at Wikiversity, part of the Center for Foreign Language Learning and the School of Language and Literature."

"Topic:Foreign_Language_Learning" does not speak of Divisions or Departments.

Does "Wikiconsistency" require that a distinction be made; and, if so, do the Naming_conventions point French, and perhaps other Areas of the School of Language and Literature in some clear direction?

Dionysios (talk), a Particapant in the Wikiversity School of Advanced General Studies, Date: 2007-03-31 (March 30, 2007) Time: 2102 UTC
 * At Wikiversity, Division and Department are more or less synonymous, excepting that, generally speaking, a Division is conceptually somewhat larger than a Department. Unless Wikiversity adopts a more firm stand at Naming conventions, I wouldn't worry about it too much.  The Jade Knight 07:56, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

Hebrew Language Division
The Hebrew Language division appears to be rather underdeveloped at the time. I think it should probably be listed under "tasks" because it is potentially valuable as a course but most of the pages are content-free, as of yet. Thanks a lot. Daviddwd (talk) 22:45, 1 August 2012 (UTC)

Mysterious wikicode in the page
I have removed the following mysterious wikicode from the page :

Can anyone explains to me what it is for ? Thanks.

--Thierry613 (discuss • contribs) 22:53, 24 February 2016 (UTC)


 * No clue! It looks like an early version of and . --Marshallsumter (discuss • contribs) 02:07, 25 February 2016 (UTC)
 * Okay. Now, Wikidata is here --Thierry613 (discuss • contribs) 10:25, 25 February 2016 (UTC)

pluralization
"Languages and literatures" is generally the more-correct form when speaking of many different cultures, to emphasize diversity. Is anyone else in favor of formally changing the title of this school to the plural form? Nicole Sharp (discuss • contribs) 19:25, 5 June 2016 (UTC)

- I like the uses of the plurals! --Marshallsumter (discuss • contribs) 02:58, 7 June 2016 (UTC)

Proposal
See : Colloquium. Amqui (discuss • contribs) 17:03, 8 February 2017 (UTC)