User talk:Daeron/Scratch

Comment page for User:Daeron/Scratch currently a West Papua work area.

Anyways, my scratch page for West Papua; still would like comment from people especially regarding the 'Government' and 'Regions' sections. Comments please:)Daeron 16:52, 2 May 2004 (UTC)

For Geography section I would like to confirm how extensive the sand beaches are as coastal feature or not.

I've got a few queries and suggestions.

For a start, you refer to it as a 'country', which it isn't (perhaps unfortunately).

You say there's a predominance of rain-forests. I'm not sure of the precise balance of environmental systems, but I've always understood that the swamps in the south-east and around the Mamberamo river were extensive enough that they could perhaps be considered a (or the) major environmental feature.

'Melanesian' is a pretty meaningless term, and is certainly not an ethnic group.

Comparing the linguistic diversity of this area with the mountains of Greece is just silly. And the mountainous areas of New Guinea are actually the least diverse, most of the diversity is in and around the swamp areas of the north (probably the areas least affected by the agriculture-driven expansion of the Trans New Guinea language speaking peoples).

Okay, the name 'Papua'. I've never heard of this being applied to the whole island of New Guinea. I've checked this out with other researchers (some of whom have been working in the area for decades), friends from PNG, and various texts and I've seen no evidence of this (Jorge de Meneses named it 'Ilhas dos Papuas', but that didn't stay the name for long). I'd be interested to hear what evidence you have that this usage is anything but a mistake. Maybe people in West Papua do call the island by this name, but if so it's new to me.

Regards the number of languages: according to Ethnologue there are currently 271 languages spoken (these things are always rough estimates). I'm not sure what it means to say '...over two hundred additional dialects'.

Regards the discussion on a name for this article: given that the western half of New Guinea now comprises three Indonesian provinces, and given that, despite this, it's useful to deal with this region as a unit, it seems reasonable to me to have the page called 'West Papua' so long as it's also subtitled (something like) 'forrmerly known as Irian Jaya, comprising the three current Indonesian provinces of ...'. Also, have a page for each province, with perhaps political/administrative info and pointing to the 'West Papua' page.

Okay, that'll do for now. Cheers, Dougg 01:32, 15 September 2005 (UTC)