Talk:Classification of Romance languages

Removed Russian diagram
I removed the Russian diagram. This looked interesting, but for people with no knowledge of Cyrillic, this is useless on the English site. Perhaps someone can translate it and re-insert it.--91.16.122.70 18:34, 4 December 2007 (UTC)

Corrected IPA for plus
I changed the IPA for fr. plus to /plys/, as the 's' is voiced when the sense is 'more'. The pronounciation is /ply/ only for the negative sense of ne...plus (en. no more). --Denispir (talk) 20:54, 20 October 2008 (UTC)

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Existential clauses in southern Italian
In southern Italian languages the existential clause is done using the equivalent of the verb "stare" (to stay, to be located) in Italian, rather than "essere" (to be): e.g. Neapolitan ce stà. How can this be classified based on the table in this section? According to the article, these dialects would fall under a sort of unique THE (or "THS", where S = to stay) pattern, since the possessive predicate is "ij(e) tengo" and the perfect is done using "ij(e) aggio fatto". --Ritchie92 (talk) 12:14, 23 October 2018 (UTC)

Strange affirmations concerning Portuguese
In Portuguese, both in Portugal and in Brazil, the ver "ter" has gradually replaced the verb "haver". This is true also for the existential form of the verb. It is common to hear people in Portugal or Brazil, mostly in a colloquial way, saying for instance "Tem laranjas?" (Do you have oranges?) to a shop owner for instance. Also the form "have been" in Portuguese, both in Portugal and in Brazil is better translated as "foi" (in Portuguese the simple past has gradually been used to refer to verbs in the past perfect). https://forum.duolingo.com/comment/1240494/Usage-of-Past-perfect-tense-in-Portuguese

I corrected what was written because it made absolutely no sense. Thanks. 188.37.66.243 (talk) 16:40, 11 November 2019 (UTC)

Section 2.2 The standard proposal
As far as I can tell from the academic literature on the Romance languages, the division in Classification of Romance languages does not seems to be the standard (rather the generally accepted first-level division is between Western and Eastern Romance based on the Rimini-La Spezia line). Could somebody provide the source for the proposed classification and the source that states that is the standard classification, since I could not find anything? --SynConlanger (talk) 21:27, 17 February 2020 (UTC)

Section deletion proposal
I propose to remove or move to sandbox the entire first section. Not only it lacks any referencing to supporting literature, but it is also probably not very appropriate for the topic of this article, which is not (supposed to be) a list of linguistic features of the Romance languages. --SynConlanger (talk) 16:30, 2 March 2021 (UTC)
 * hi SynConlanger, I disagree with that proposal. If you were to move that section somewhere else, then perhaps (but where? Romance languages?);  but deleting that information would be unwelcome. One reason why I disagree, is that Romance languages form a linkage, i.e. cannot be correctly represented as a tree: that linkage is characterized by various isoglosses / features that are distributed diversely across the Romance languages. This is (partly) what that section is showing:  e.g. innovations related to the number "16" (showing conservative vs. innovative lgs, with a Rhenish fan distribution); to *habere vs. *tenere;  etc.  These are good examples (though just a sample) of some of the linguistic innovations that should be considered by any linguist working on, well, the classification of Romance languages. Did you think that classification was going to be purely based on phonetic innovations?? In sum, that section is highly topical in this entry, and should remain. -- Womtelo (talk) 21:27, 2 March 2021 (UTC).


 * I repeat, it lacks any supporting citations whatsoever. This is the main reason for deleting it, considering the verification needed notice has been there for ages. I see you are an academic like myself, so I'm sure you understand. --SynConlanger (talk) 07:21, 3 March 2021 (UTC)


 * Well, then I strongly disagree with the course of action you propose. In fact 80% of Wikipedia is made of statements that are unsourced, and that's fine. The only case when an unsourced passage ought to be deleted altogether, is when it is highly dubious. But the way to say "sixteen" in French, Italian or Spanish is uncontroversial and amply documented everywhere, and I find it actually silly to be demanding sources for that. So if you're really bothered that those sections are unsourced, the smart thing to do – especially if you're an academic – is to add the sources yourself! (e.g. link to an Italian dictionary the statement that '16' is sedici, etc.) — you can take as a model the many references under 1.3 Words for "nothing" (don't tell me you were going to delete that section too, when it's filled with sources…). Instead, erasing half of an entry just because you fancy it – when it consists of perfectly correct (if unsourced) information – is, in my opinion, the laziest and most brutal approach. -- Womtelo (talk) 09:11, 3 March 2021 (UTC).
 * Hi again, I just reordered the sections in the entry. I hope this helps address part of the qualms you had with (what used to be) section 1, as it seemed to get in the way of accessing the section on Classification proper. Feel free to add more references, or make constructive edits yourself. Best, -- Womtelo (talk) 10:04, 3 March 2021 (UTC).

"In fact 80% of Wikipedia is made of statements that are unsourced": this is absolutely NOT fine. And, as you can also clearly see in the verification notice, "Unsourced material may be challenged and removed." Collecting words from a dictionary and curating a list to show differences and similarities between languages is original research WP:OR. If I had found an academic publication that could be cited, I would have done that. The referencing in the section is still lacking. In publishing parlance, this would qualify as a "strong reject without possibility of resubmission". Since I had enough of arguing on Wikipedia about what is and what isn't argued for in the literature, I offer now and for ever my resignations as Wikipedia editor. I have better things to do. --SynConlanger (talk) 12:26, 3 March 2021 (UTC)
 * , it's a real pity that an expert leaves us, however to edit WP one should be realistic and accept a lot of compromising, it's simply impossible to keep all the pages and sections to the best academic standards. Please reconsider your decision. --Jotamar (talk) 09:33, 6 March 2021 (UTC)