+1 with Ravi *For example, a year back a wrong proposal was sent to Unicode consortium that wanted Grantha script being encoded in Unicode but at the expense of damaging Tamil language in long term.
*The incident Ravi mentions came about because of a similar situation - faulty understanding by external organisations that failed to consult with native language communities. Led to months long discussions, wasting everyone's time - just because the unicode consortium didnt pause to check with the stakeholder community. *Language in India and a citizen's involvement with his language is complex, diverse and many times unusual or interesting.* +1 to this too. In India where various hues of linguistic nationalism are dominant (especially in the south for languages like Tamil) and language heritage is long and linguistic pride is fierce, a WMF blogpost with such words and one that suggests at changing how language should be used has the potential to turn into a long drawn out and ugly dramafest. when i said "burnt in effigy" in the earlier mail, i meant it literally - the passion that language generates in this part of the world is such. On Wed, Nov 30, 2011 at 8:35 PM, Ravishankar <ravidre...@gmail.com> wrote: > Ashwin, > > On Wed, Nov 30, 2011 at 8:08 PM, Ashwin Baindur > <ashwin.bain...@gmail.com>wrote: > >> The aggressive/offended tone in a couple of posts on this thread >> distresses me. I humbly request that all respondents may please tone down >> any agression you may feel. Gerard is trying to understand Indian culture >> in good faith. He has made some assumptions that he is keen to explore. May >> I request that we please discuss maturely without getting offended? We need >> to not only AGF but be CIVIL also. The same points can also be made >> politely. >> > > Every time there is a difference of opinion, some one starts this be CIVIL > message. I don't feel anything un-CIVIL in anyone's message. So, please > don't distract the TOPIC. > > Srikanth, > > //You need to work with someone who knows the language to the purest of > its form, knows it in and out, and also knows technology. I doubt you'd've > come across MANY of those at either WCI or the Hackathon.// > > While I agree with your view that even people not well versed in one > language can donate their technical skills, it is important that the > project as a whole takes in to account the views of people who know the > language well. > > For example, a year back a wrong proposal was sent to Unicode consortium > that wanted Grantha script being encoded in Unicode but at the expense of > damaging Tamil language in long term. The Central Government passed it to > Unicode consortium and it was about to approve it. Only at the last moment > could we intervene and after months of discussion and wasting precious > hours by both Sanskrit scholars and Tamil scholars + Technocrats, the > proposal was held. If only Unicode consortium or Central Government had > asked for the opinion of learned scholars of language, this situation could > have been avoided. So, while lack of proficiency in a language need not be > an impediment for technical contribution, we should not assume that it is > enough for projects of varying nature. > > Ravi > > > _______________________________________________ > Wikimediaindia-l mailing list > Wikimediaindia-l@lists.wikimedia.org > To unsubscribe from the list / change mailing preferences visit > https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediaindia-l > >
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