Wiktionary talk:About Belarusian

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@Ssvb. Hi. In your table Łacinka "simvał" is not attestable, "symbal" is.

I would also stick to one version of Łacinka, even on сі́мвал (símval). Anatoli T. ^{(обсудить}/^вклад) 07:29, 25 March 2024 (UTC)

@Atitarev: Thanks for your feedback. The word "сімвал" and its variants with minor vowel adjustments was in use even before the infamous 1933's reform: "сімвалу" (Уладзімір Пічэта in 1924), "сымвол" (Максім Гарэцкі in 1921), "сымвол" (Максім Багдановіч in 1913), "сымвал" (Зьміцер Жылуновіч in 1918), "сымвалы" (Антон Луцкевіч in 1921), "symwału" (Wacłaŭ Łastoŭski in 1919), "symwoł" (Wacłaŭ Łastoŭski in 1918). The historical dictionary hints simultaneous coexistence of both "сімвал" and "сымбаль" even earlier: https://verbum.by/hsbm/simvol https://verbum.by/hsbm/simbol

In 1927 Аркадзь Смоліч wrote the following about Максім Багдановіч: "У 9-м радку аўтарам, як звычайна, ужыта слова „сымвол“ зам. сучаснага літаратурнага „сымболь“". Hinting that the "сы́мболь" ("symbol") spelling used to be the literary norm in 1927. It had the unstressed о, as prescribed by the rules of Taraškievica 1918 for foreign loanwords ("Словы чужазе́мныя, што ўжываюцца ў кніжках і ў кніжнай мове і да народу не дайшлі або дайшлі нядаўна, пі­шуцца так, як у тэй мове, скуль яны ўзятыя: тэлегра́ф, тэлеграма, літэратура, монолёг, тэа́тр, дынастыя, партыя, рэдакцыя, інспэктар, дырэктар, рэдактар і г. д.").

The modern codification of Taraškievica 2005 abolished the unstressed о ("прыхільнікі клясычнага стандарту ў Беларусі адмовіліся ад захаваньня “оканьня” ў пазычаньнях, ад “правіла другога складу” ды шэрагу іншых правілаў і прынялі сфармуляваныя ў артаграфічным зборы 1959 году асноўныя прынцыпы правапісу складаных словаў"). However it prescribes "сы-" in the beginning of foreign loanwords, so "сімвал" with the letter і indeed does not follow the rules and it would be more correct to have it as "сымвал", similar to how it was in some 1920s books, as shown in the examples above. Still the question remains whether "сымвал" and "сымбаль" have the right to coexist as synonyms within the same orthography standard. Does one of them have to be prohibited and erased? --Ssvb (talk) 00:28, 28 March 2024 (UTC)

I think that this is largely politically motivated. The soviet commissars shoved their vision of the Belarusian language orthography down the people's throats in 1933, also jailing and executing many Belarusian linguists and writers in the 1930s. Even the USSR authorities later acknowledged these atrocities themselves after Stalin's death and posthumously rehabilitated the victims. This is still remembered today and affects how people feel about these things. Anyway, the essence of the 1933's reform can be illustrated using these examples (mostly foreign loanwords, because the deformation of spelling of the native Belarusian words via removing soft signs is a separate issue and deserves a separate comment):

• символ (Russian), сімвал (Narkamaŭka), сымбаль/symbal (Taraškievica), symbol (Polish)
• алфавит (Russian), алфавіт (Narkamaŭka), альфабэт/alfabet (Taraškievica), alfabet (Polish)
• серебро (Russian), серабро (Narkamaŭka), срэбра/srebra (Taraškievica), srebro (Polish)
• миф (Russian), міф (Narkamaŭka), міт/mit (Taraškievica), mit (Polish)
• лётчик (Russian), лётчык (Narkamaŭka), лётнік/lotnik (Taraškievica), lotnik (Polish)
• бизнесмен (Russian), бізнесмен (Narkamaŭka), бізнэсмэн/biznesmen (Taraškievica), biznesmen (Polish)
• гвалт (Russian), гвалт (Narkamaŭka), ґвалт/gvałt (Taraškievica), gwałt (Polish)
• Швейцария (Russian), Швейцарыя (Narkamaŭka), Швайцарыя/Švajcaryja/Szwajcaryja (Taraškievica), Szwajcaria (Polish)

Basically, many of the changes pursued the goal of making the Belarusian language closer to Russian and away from Polish. That's how сымбаль got erased from the official dictionaries. But there's one interesting outlier: the pair of Belarusian words "срэбра" & "серабро". Is their relationship any different from the relationship between the "сымбаль" & "сімвал" pair? I think that the only reason why "срэбра" was kept in the Belarusian dictionaries and survived the 1933's reform is that the Russian language also happened to have words "сребро" and "серебро" as a pair of synonyms. Is there any good reason why "сымбаль" and "сімвал" can't be treated as synonyms as well? BTW, the Ukrainian language is also in exactly the same shoes when it comes to the "міт" & "міф" pair even without having multiple competing orthography standards.

Overall, my non-professional impression is that some of the Taraškievica adepts would want to erase the words of foreign origin, that had been already loaned via the Russian language as an intermediary during the USSR times, as a way to undo the damage done by the soviet commissars. And replace them with proper loanwords, constructed according to the prescribed Taraškievica 2005 rules. But after almost a century, it feels a little bit artificial to replace a part of the familiar vocabulary. The so-called "Дзеясловіца" compromise solution also exists (or existed before 2010) as a middle ground approach: basically use the Taraškievica spelling for the native Belarusian words, but take the existing foreign loanwords from Narkamaŭka, because that's how many real people actually speak today. --Ssvb (talk) 01:22, 28 March 2024 (UTC)

@Ssvb: Thanks for the response and the links. It answered some other questions I had, e.g. regarding the usage of letter ґ (g).

My preference is to stick to one standard but if there are some exceptions based on citations, perhaps a reference should be required? It's good thing to document decisions. Thanks for starting it. Anatoli T. ^{(обсудить}/^вклад) 01:23, 28 March 2024 (UTC)

General Belarusian entries

Hello @Kohannya, @Insaneguy1083, @Ssvb and @Atitarev, how are you all? Well, I decided to mention you because you are the only Belarusian editors I know so far, if there are any others I haven't mentioned, please let me know. Well, without further ado, I'll start talking about what motivated me to create this topic. I've been inactive on Wiktionary for a while now, and when I came back I came across something unpleasant compared to other languages ​​like Polish, etymologies without the use of "From" at the beginning, lack of use of templates like inh+/bor+, af instead of suffix/prefix and col-auto , which I think should be something very solid in the Slavic languages, at least in the vast majority, and I would like to make an appeal to you to make some decision to make the entries in Belarusian something more visually pleasing, something I noticed a lot in the work of editors such as @Vininn126 does in Polish and @Stríðsdrengur with Upper Sorbian. So I start this "agenda" for voting, so that we can decide what is best for this beautiful language. Наименее Полезное (talk) 23:03, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

@Наименее Полезное: Are you primarily talking about the etymology section? Feel free to propose the text of the guidelines related to it or maybe even edit the WT:ABE page yourself to make an initial draft of it. Unification of style with the other languages may be indeed desirable. Now here's one important factor to consider: common sense dictates that any rules have to be practical and they shouldn't become an excessive burden for the editors. Right now the text of the existing old entries is often copy/pasted when creating new entries and we need to take this into account as well. As long as the old templates are still in use in Wiktionary, they may be replicated in the newly created entries too. Personally, I don't see it as a big problem and a lot of the style conversion can be probably automated by a bot. --Ssvb (talk) 03:11, 11 June 2024 (UTC)

I mean, I think you know my stance on this. I've used inh+ and bor+ several times, and I did read (I think) that using the suffix/prefix things in place of af are discouraged so fair enough, no issue for me there; but personally, I really don't think initial "from" or "and" between cognates is really necessary, since you don't see "from" after "By surface analysis" either, and stylistically I don't think it's really obstructive at all. col-auto is kind of a 50/50 personally; I use it when there's really a lot of derived/related terms (like I did with каштаваць (kaštavacʹ)), but for one or two I really don't think it's needed. User Kohannya I believe is Ukrainian and mostly just copies Belarusian entries from their Ukrainian cognates. Insaneguy1083 (talk) 03:38, 11 June 2024 (UTC)

{\{temp|surf}} should be used when a term is inherited/borrowed, but the derivation process would produce the same word. Compare zawód#Polish, which was inherited, but also looks like a deverbal. If the word is internal, then your normal word-formation templates should be used. Vininn126 (talk) 07:18, 11 June 2024 (UTC)

I think that at least "from" in etymologies is more "necessary" than "and" among cognates, it would be good to follow examples from other languages here. Наименее Полезное (talk) 10:54, 11 June 2024 (UTC)

@Benwing2 We can probably safe add "From" to any use of bare {{af}} and the like. Vininn126 (talk) 10:56, 11 June 2024 (UTC)

@Benwing2 Tentative consensus seems to be switching over to inh+/bor+. Think you could help? Vininn126 (talk) 07:17, 11 June 2024 (UTC)

@Vininn126 For Belarusian specifically? Yes I can do that. Benwing2 (talk) 07:43, 11 June 2024 (UTC)

@Benwing2 Also could we do plus templates and also add "From ." to Kashubian entries? There seem to be quite a few without. Vininn126 (talk) 17:59, 11 June 2024 (UTC)

As usual I don't agree with the use of these templates... PUC – 19:20, 11 June 2024 (UTC)

Didn't realize you were an active Belarusian editor! Vininn126 (talk) 19:21, 11 June 2024 (UTC)

Not active, but I created more Belarusian entries than you have, I believe? PUC – 21:43, 12 June 2024 (UTC)

@PUC I did not cast a vote, simply stated what the most active editors prefer! Vininn126 (talk) 21:44, 12 June 2024 (UTC)

Why? Наименее Полезное (talk) 00:26, 12 June 2024 (UTC)

@PUC: Where can we find your arguments against these templates? Are you in favor of some different changes or just want to keep everything as is? As I mentioned in another comment, I personally don't care much about the existing style mismatches as long as the information itself is correct. But looks like some people are more sensitive to it and maybe converting everything to a single style would be a good idea. What I definitely don't want to see is a potential edit war between the supporters of different template styles. --Ssvb (talk) 05:34, 13 June 2024 (UTC)

If I'm going to be honest I wouldn't pay too much heed to it - generally some people find + templates not necessary or overkill. The current consensus is that if a group of editors for a language likes using them, then they may be used for the language. I see more people here for them than against them. Vininn126 (talk) 08:17, 13 June 2024 (UTC)

Following a single style would be the best option tbh, more consistency between entries, and I think the "vast majority" of Belarusian editors we have now are more in favor of + templates. Наименее Полезное (talk) 18:27, 13 June 2024 (UTC)

@Наименее Полезное: No offense, but you seem to be the only one acting as a kind of "style police" here, while everyone else is much more chill. The Belarusian content in Wiktionary will grow faster if we attract more contributors. But contributors tend to flock to useful projects, often ignoring something that has no immediate practical value. And the usefulness itself largely depends on the number of Belarusian lemmas and their quality in Wiktionary. That's a catch-22 situation. The process of gaining new contributors is very slow and we even have no native Belarusian speakers with linguistic education among the current contributors right now. What we surely can't afford in the current situation is losing contributors. See the discussion in https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/User_talk:Ananas022#Wrong_Russian_synonyms as an example of how to communicate badly (on the topic of "how inexact are synonyms allowed to be"). The rude antagonistic manner of telling people that they are wrong is always a big turn off, especially if the guidelines happen to be not very clear.

I'll reiterate it again: we need some simple and clear guidelines related to etymology in WT:ABE, explaining how the global WT:ETY rules are applicable to the Belarusian language in Wiktionary. These guidelines should cover the preferred choice of templates and maybe explain the most common mistakes to avoid. Complete beginners with no clue about etymology (such as myself) need to know what they can and can't do when trying to contribute. Would you volunteer to write the initial draft? --Ssvb (talk) 13:03, 2 July 2024 (UTC)

I understand what you mean, I'll think about it, but I'm very busy, I don't have enough time for Wiktionary for now, I can try later. Regarding what you said, "attract more editors", I partially agree with you, we really need more editors, but it would be better to "educate" them, so that they really understand how to edit the language, after all, it's much better 10 entries done well, than 100 poorly done by someone who has never read a dictionary in Belarusian, I know this may sound rude and rough, but it's the truth. Наименее Полезное (talk) 17:26, 3 July 2024 (UTC)

Honestly, I don't really care anymore, I'm leaving Wiktionary permanently, you and the other editors do what you want with the language, it seems like my efforts didn't do any good here Наименее Полезное (talk) 02:02, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

Animacy and headwords

̯@Atitarev, Наименее Полезное, Ssvb, Kohannya, Insaneguy1083, PUC, Benwing2 (sorry if I forgot to ping someone else, feel free to do so)

So, it has come to my attention that Belarusian headwords ({{be-noun}}) currently make a distinction between "animal" (конь (konʹ)) and "personal" (муж (muž)) animates. From what I have understood, the difference between the two is purely a difference in noun inflection, and they take the same adjectives and the same verbs.

I am of the opinion that making this distinction in the headword (to be clear, not talking about the table header) is slightly misleading: I was confused myself and had to google and ask around to make sure Belarusian didn't indeed make the same distinction as Polish or Pannonian Rusyn do. As such I propose to only make a distinction between "animate" and "inanimate" in the headwords, so like in Russian.

What are your thoughts on the matter? Thadh (talk) 19:05, 15 August 2024 (UTC)

To be honest, I prefer it the way it is in Russian, although the current form is not something that bothers me personally. Наименее Полезное (talk) 19:17, 15 August 2024 (UTC)

We can do some kind of vote where the majority of active and definitive editors decide what is best. Наименее Полезное (talk) 19:19, 15 August 2024 (UTC)

I don't have any thoughts on the matter. I will say, I have had to use animal conjugation on certain very much non-animal words, like блізняты (bliznjaty). So it could be interesting to indicate that the noun isn't necessarily "animal" in nature as such, but rather just happens to have animal-type conjugation in be-conj. Insaneguy1083 (talk) 20:35, 15 August 2024 (UTC)

I'm not competent enough to come up with an authoritative answer. And I even don't know what Polish or Pannonian Rusyn do on this matter. FWIW, the Ukrainian entries кінь (kinʹ) and муж (muž) currently seem to have this kind of "animal" vs. "person" distinction too. Does it look like the Ukrainian language might be in the same boat? --Ssvb (talk) 21:27, 15 August 2024 (UTC)

@Ssvb Ukrainian is different; the three-way distinction between personal, animal and inanimate is reflected in adjective agreement in the accusative plural. Benwing2 (talk) 04:22, 16 August 2024 (UTC)

Per Module_talk:be-noun#personal_nouns,_animal_nouns locative sg. of тру́цень (trúcjenʹ)

• (drone, animal) - тру́тні (trútni)
• (sluggard, person) - тру́тню (trútnju)

Only affecting some nouns, no impact on adjectives. Anatoli T. ^{(обсудить}/^вклад) 06:12, 16 August 2024 (UTC)

It might be interesting to check if any traces of any possible impact on adjectives could be found in older Belarusian texts hosted on Belarusian Wikisource. --Ssvb (talk) 06:55, 16 August 2024 (UTC)

@Thadh: We had clear cases where animal and person had differences. When I have time, I will try to find more cases if I have time but please check Module_talk:be-noun#personal_nouns,_animal_nouns, we agreed on with @Benwing2.

@Ssvb, @Наименее Полезное, @Insaneguy1083. Anatoli T. ^{(обсудить}/^вклад) 03:25, 16 August 2024 (UTC)

Yes, but that difference is not a matter of agreement, which means it's not a gender or animacy, that's my point. Thadh (talk) 08:44, 16 August 2024 (UTC)