Talk:Central Solomon languages

Table of reconstruction of pronouns
I have been searching in Ross' article and haven't found that reconstruction. Any one could indicate the page? —if this table comes actually from this article.--Toni P. (talk) 10:51, 10 May 2014 (UTC)

Kwamikagami, you have undone the changes I made. The reference you put of Ross 2005 is wrong, because the book is called Papuan pasts: cultural, linguistic and biological histories of Papuan speaking peoples. Besides this, there is no reconstruction of pronouns of Central Solomons languages in this article. The reconstruction is in the reference I wrote and you undid. Besides this, your reconstruction is wrong because you mix data from different languages instead of putting the reconstruction for the family. Furthermore, your table doesn't have a very academic design: in any academic work, terms as dual, plural or inclusive/exclusive are used, not s/he and I, as you put it.

I have the reference of Ross 2005 in PDF and Ross 2001, the one you deleted, in paper, so I can prove what I'm saying. If you don't have better arguments, I'll undo your changes in one day.--Toni P. (talk) 18:19, 15 May 2014 (UTC)


 * The original table, from 2005, is taken directly from that paper. It's Tables 1.3 & 1.4 from §1.3.1. The only change is to replace parentheses with question marks, so their meaning is clear. — kwami (talk) 22:42, 15 May 2014 (UTC)
 * I don't know which article you have. The article "Pronouns as a preliminary diagnostic for grouping Papuan languages", in Papuan pasts: cultural, linguistic and biological histories of Papuan speaking peoples, ed. by Pawley, Attenborough, Hide and Golson, Canberra: Pacific linguistics; has no section 1.3.1 and no table 1.3 or 1.4. Tables have only one number. Section 1.2 is called "Why this project?", and when it finishes, section 2, "A pronoun-based grouping of Papuan languages", starts. I have the article in a PDF file, but was looking at the book at the library and it's the same. I could paste here the PDF file, but it is copyrighted material, so I think I cannot put it in the Wikipedia. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Toni P. (talk • contribs) 06:18, 16 May 2014 (UTC)


 * Given that you abandon the debate, I'm going to change the table of pronouns. I hope you don't reverse it without prior debate and agreement, or I should denounce it to an administrator. The reference you give doesn't exist. The title Papuan languages and the Trans New Guinea phylum was a provisional title for the book that was published later as Papuan pasts: cultural, linguistic and biological histories of Papuan speaking peoples, which is the reference I gave and you deleted. If you search in Google the title you give, you'll find only references to a yet unpublished book. It might be that you have the unpublished version of the article and the pronouns table wasn't included in the final and published version of the article. The fact is that you're giving an inexistent reference. Besides this, I've never seen in any book a table as yours: instead of using know terms as dual and plural, you're giving confusing terms as "s/he & I" or "exclusive we" —note that "exclusive we" can also mean dual, that is s/he & I. It seems that you're expecting the reader to be too stupid so as to know what's dual and plural.--Toni P. (talk) 09:59, 23 May 2014 (UTC)


 * Reverted again. The fact that you don't have the source doesn't mean it doesn't exist.  As for the labels, that has nothing to do with the choice of source.  Change them if you like.  — kwami (talk) 18:13, 23 May 2014 (UTC)


 * I've seen the book cited in 2008 as 'to appear', so if you have a more recent version, by all means use that. Just don't go backwards.  But then A Grammar of Teiwa (2010) cites it as 2005, so the date is independently confirmed.  The version I have is Papuan languages and the Trans New Guinea phylum, Andrew Pawley, Malcolm Ross, and Meredith Osmond, February 5, 2005.  I have two chapters, "Pronouns as preliminary evidence for grouping Papuan languages" (94 pp) and "Defining the Trans New Guinea family: preliminary evidence from pronouns" (123 pp). — kwami (talk) 18:24, 23 May 2014 (UTC)


 * It seems that you don't want to understand what I'm saying. But I'll repeat it again with new additions. As I told, the reference you give, Papuan languages and the Trans New Guinea phylum, was finally published with another title: Papuan pasts: cultural, linguistic and biological histories of Papuan speaking peoples, which is the one actually published. The chapter "Defining the Trans New Guinea family: preliminary evidence from pronouns" was the provisional title for the chapter that was actually published as "Pronouns as preliminary evidence for grouping Papuan languages". In this version, there is no table of pronouns of Central Solomon languages. You can check this easily searching in Google all these titles. Regarding the reference you give with A Grammar of Teiwa, this book was written by Marian Klamer, who is my teacher and is precisely who told me that the book with the title you give was published later with another title. Actually I knew all this what I'm saying thanks to her. I'm afraid you have the article that wasn't published, and if the table wasn't finally published, probably it's because Ross himself thought that there were mistakes. The fact is that the most recent published reconstruction of pronouns is the 2001 reference. Please check these data and I hope that we can arrive to an agreement, I'm not going to engage in an edit war. --Toni P. (talk) 07:37, 24 May 2014 (UTC)
 * Just an addition: you say you have two chapters: the one with 123 pages is the unpublished one; the one you say that has 94 pages is the title actually published. But I have "Pronouns as preliminary evidence for grouping Papuan languages" and it has actually 52 pages (15-65). Now I have been lucky and have found this article freely accessible in Internet, so I think I can past the link here and you can check it by yourself. You can find it here. I hope this helps to solve the matter.--Toni P. (talk) 07:48, 24 May 2014 (UTC)


 * I understand just fine. A shorter version of the chapter was published in 2001.  An expanded version of the chapter was published in 2005.  We should of course follow the latter.  — kwami (talk) 08:21, 24 May 2014 (UTC)
 * I think you don't understand or don't want to understand. A version of the chapter (probably the one with 94 pages you say you have) wasn't published. A shorter version (if there is such a former with 94 pages) was published in 2005 with 52 pages without the reconstruction of the pronouns (the chapter in the link I provide). That leaves as the only published reconstruction the 2001 chapter. I think I have explained it clear enough: there is no 2005 published chapter with the reconstruction of the pronouns. You haven't given a published reference and give no proof of what you're saying. If you don't agree with my change or give proofs of what you're saying, I'll open a dispute because I'm not going to engage in a edit war.--Toni P. (talk) 11:01, 24 May 2014 (UTC)

Sorry, I must have missed some of your comments. Certainly, if what I have is just the preliminary title, and Ross removed the reconstructions before publishing, we should go with your version. I'll revert myself. I wonder if there was anything wrong with them, or if he just needed to cut pages. — kwami (talk) 01:09, 25 May 2014 (UTC)
 * Thank you. I think I gave enough proofs. The fact is that the 2005 article is the one in the link I pasted here. In this article, there is the reconstruction of only some Papuan families. In the 2001 article, there is the reconstruction of all families included in a putative East Papuan phylum. These two articles are the ones that can be used as reference.--Toni P. (talk) 10:05, 25 May 2014 (UTC)

The table of pronouns reproduces the pronouns in the appendix of Ross' article. In this article, he doesn't give explanations on the symbols used in the pronouns tables, so the only one who could give a clarification is Ross. Therefore, the request for clarification has no function because no one except Ross can give any grounded clarification. I delete it because the function of this request is that someone clarifies what is said, and this request could be directed only to Ross.--Toni P. (talk) 10:25, 9 July 2014 (UTC)