Talk:Guernésiais

Untitled

Scots in Scotland and Ulster are the same language.

See:(http://ww2.eblul.org:8080/eblul/Public/member_state_committ/british_committee/uk2/view)

The european charter from the Council of Europe( http://conventions.coe.int/Treaty/Commun/ListeDeclarations.asp?NT=148&CV=1&NA=&PO=999&CN=999&VL=1&CM=9&CL=ENG)

"b) The United Kingdom declares, in accordance with Article 2, paragraph 1 of the Charter that it recognises that Scots and Ulster Scots meet the Charter's definition of a regional or minority language for the purposes of Part II of the Charter." NOTE: _a_ regional or minority _language_ not two separate ones.

The North/South Co-operation (Implementation Bodies) Northern Ireland Order 1999 defines Ullans (Ulster Scots) as: "the variety of the Scots language which has traditionally been used in parts of Northern Ireland and in Donegal in Ireland."

The Good Friday Agreement simply refers to Ulster Scots without the qualifier 'language'. (http://cain.ulst.ac.uk/events/peace/docs/agreement.htm) "3. All participants recognise the importance of respect, understanding and tolerance in relation to linguistic diversity, including in Northern Ireland, the Irish language, Ulster-Scots and the languages of the various ethnic communities, all of which are part of the cultural wealth of the island of Ireland."

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I've added the two names I knew the language by while growing up -- Guernsey French and patois. The latter should not be considered derogatory, patois was the first language of my grandparents, and they never had a problem with calling it that.

Á la prochaine! Deadlock 16:17, 15 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Norman Wikipedia

Work is currently underway on a test Wikipedia in Norman, inclusive of Dgèrnésiais. Contributions and comments welcome. Man vyi 14:21, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

A full Wikipedia has existed now for some time at nrm:. The Jade Knight 06:42, 30 October 2006 (UTC)

Grammar

I'd like to see a comprehensive verb chart for Guernsey Norman that could easily be compared with that at fr:Jersiais; does Dgèrnésiais, for example, have a similar present progressive? Does it use a compound "composed future" like Jèrriais? Does it have a -z- "composed past" like in Cotentinais? These are more "unique" Norman grammatical features, and some of the most interesting things to compare between dialects. The Jade Knight 06:46, 30 October 2006 (UTC)

Article Name

I don't want to raise anyone's heckles here, but I think this article should be called Guernsey French (and probably have similar changes to the other Channel Island patois).

It's a bit pedantic I suppose, especially as there is a redirect in place already, but this is an English language Wiki. The language is most commonly refered to by English speakers (including those whose first language was Dgèrnésiais) in Guernsey as Guernsey French or the patois - but that wouldn't make a good article heading for obvious reasons! Dgèrnésiais is also pretty unpronouncable looking for an English Wiki!

What do others think? Monkey Tennis 11:27, 26 July 2005 (UTC)

The problem is the inevitable confusion with the Guernsey variety of French, also called Guernsey French (i.e. the variety of French used for official purposes). The same confusion happens in Jersey among Anglophones between Jèrriais and Jersey Legal French, but at least use of the name Jèrriais has been officialised in a way that has not yet happened in Guernsey. I say leave as is for now. Man vyi 15:36, 26 July 2005 (UTC)

OK I wasn't aware there was much of a difference. I'm happy for it to stay as it is, just thought it a bit inconsistent (with other language articles and this) when I first saw it. BTW - how do you pronounce the word 'Dgèrnésiais'? : ) Monkey Tennis 18:19, 26 July 2005 (UTC)

The problem is that as English is so deficient in geographical adjectives, "speaking in Guernsey" is unsatisfactorily ambiguous. "Guernsey language" would have the advantage of clarity, but unfortunately it has the disadvantage of rarity... In Jersey, Jèrriais is sometimes referred to as Jersey language but Jèrriais sticks as being generally snappier, it seems (see BBC Radio Jersey Jèrriais info.

Dgèrnésiais is pronounced as it looks ;-) with dg as in judge. As you can see from the BBC Multilingual Nation the spelling Guernesiais is also used - with gu pronounced dg or not as the case may be (Dgèrnésiais has a hard g dialect and a soft g dialect!) Man vyi 19:11, 26 July 2005 (UTC)

Another possible (but rare) term would be "Guernsey Norman". It is, at least, more commonly used (according to Google) than "Guernsey language". The Jade Knight 06:41, 30 October 2006 (UTC)

I think the article should be at Guernésiais. I'm no expert, but I've been on Guernsey for a week now and have not seen a single reference to Dgernésiais with that spelling – on every published book as well as on local BBC literature it's written Guernésiais (or just ‘Guernsey French’, which I agree is too vague). Widsith 22:12, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

Norman WP article in Dgèrnésiais/Guernésiais has nrm:Guernésiais. Man vyi 05:43, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

I've added a Move template and moved this discussion to the bottom of the page to see if any objections are out there. Widsith 12:11, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

Jèrriais not having a hard g dialect, it's Dgèrnésiais in Jèrriais. I agree that Guernésiais is nowadays the most common spelling in Guernsey - and it's the spelling according to Marie de Garis' Dictiounnaire. (To digress, I am mystified by the idea that English-speakers find it less obvious to pronounce dg as /dʒ/ compared to gu as /dʒ/ - but that's by the by and entirely irrelevant to the question of the move.) Man vyi 12:34, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

I believe the point was not that Dgèrnésiais was unpronounceable by Anglophones, but that it looked unpronounceable. Dg- is at first blush rather alien; AFAIK it's generally only encountered at the end of a syllable. --SigPig |^{SEND - OVER} 12:57, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

That was my irrelevant question: why, if you pronounce dg as /dʒ/ at the end of a syllable, wouldn't you automatically be inclined to pronounce dg as /dʒ/ at the beginning of a syllable? Having grown up with it, it's perfectly obvious to me, so I naturally enough don't see why English speakers would experience any doubt in the matter. Just asking. Man vyi 14:24, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

Part of the answer would be that most English speakers can already pronounce Guernsey, either as a place or a cow; hard English g has a /d/ element. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 22:34, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

Surely English hard g is /g/? Where's the /d/? (outrageously off-topic question, I know) Man vyi 06:46, 15 February 2007 (UTC)

"Les Travailleurs de la Mer" (an album in Guernésiais by The Harp Consort) uses "Guernesiais" as the English form of the language in all cases (no accent). The Jade Knight (talk) 11:51, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

But this website (made by a Guernseyman) has Dgernesiais exclusively throughout (also no accents). The Jade Knight (talk) 12:01, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

Requested move

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the debate was PAGE MOVED per discussion below. -GTBacchus^(talk) 00:04, 20 February 2007 (UTC)

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Dgèrnésiais → Guernésiais — In Guernsey itself, the language seems to be universally referred to as Guernésiais, in published books and in the local BBC literature. I am interested to hear where/if the current form (Dgèrnésiais) actually has any currency, but so far not much has come up on the discussion page. The current spelling also has the disadvantage of being rather daunting to many English readers – was it chosen as the primary form purely because of its "exotic" appearence? —132.185.240.120 12:08, 14 February 2007 (UTC) -Discussion section added by SigPig |^{SEND - OVER} 13:58, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

Survey

Add  # '''Support'''  or  # '''Oppose'''  on a new line in the appropriate section followed by a brief explanation, then sign your opinion using ~~~~. Please remember that this survey is not a vote, and please provide an explanation for your recommendation.

Survey - in support of the move

1. Support. As per nomination above (that was me, I happened to be logged out at the time). Widsith 16:31, 14 February 2007 (UTC)
2. Support Only support I can find for the existing form is one scholar.google.com hit, and the personal web page which is the first link. The Guernesais wikipedia uses nrm:Guernésiais. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 22:31, 14 February 2007 (UTC)
3. Support. I grew up in Guernsey and had never heard of the current spelling, always known it as Guernsey French or Guernsiais footie 22:48, 14 February 2007 (UTC)
4. Support. "Dgèrnésiais" is the Jèrriais name for the language.[1] A bit like having the French language article at Französich. —  AjaxSmack  07:21, 17 February 2007 (UTC)

Survey - in opposition to the move

Discussion

Add any additional comments:

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

Latin Europe

Hello Guernésiais! There is a vote going on at Latin Europe that might interest you. Please everyone, do come and give your opinion and votes. Thank you. The Ogre (talk) 20:43, 27 February 2008 (UTC)

Number of Speakers?

I'm curious where the statistics for the number of speakers came from. It says there are 1327 native speakers, but 2% are fluent, so only around 30 people are fluent? This brings up another point of how you define the number of speakers a language has, what do we count as a speaker or fluency? If someone knows basic Guernésiais are they counted? There are approximately 65 573 residents on Guernsey, 1327 "native speakers" (how many speakers are not Native speakers), and only 2% of those speakers are fluent. Mr Languages (talk) 22:55, 30 August 2011 (UTC)

Two percent of the resident population speak Guernésiais fluently. Note the difference between speakers: 1327 (2%) fluently and speakers: 1327 (2% fluently). Unoffensive text or character (talk) 06:53, 31 August 2011 (UTC)

It is a French dialect

I'm a native French speaker and have conversed with native speakers from both Jersey and Guernsey and I can confirm that both are basically dialects of French, or patois as we call it. Not only are the native speakers I met able to speak standard French, but the dialect is also intelligible to a native French speaker. It's just a bit weird to a native French speaker - but not more than any dialect. Also, the spelling basically reflects emphasis and the "vulgar" pronunciation in the dialect - which exists in other dialects. To classify those as separate languages from French amounts to classifying e.g. the Norman patois as a different language from French - which it isn't, it's just a sub-variety of it, or even amounts to classifying Quebec or Louisana French as different languages - which they are NOT, although pronounced slightly differently, and in Guernsey/Jersey French this is reflected in the spelling.

The (English) decision to classify them as separate languages obviously reflects national pride in England and political motivations - much like Scots is by some a distinct language from English, whereas it is simply a regional variation of English...

— Preceding unsigned comment added by 147.188.71.12 (talk) 16:46, 25 February 2014 (UTC) 

I struggle to understand how you see this as an 'English' thing, given the longstanding and obstinate refusal of the Islands to identify themselves as English. Besides which, the lack of anything along the lines of the Academie Francaise to regulate language in the British Isles means that the definition of what does and does not constitute a language is more elastic than on the Continent - Ulster Scots, for example, has linguistic recognition (though personally I struggle to understand why).

My grandfather was a native speaker of Guernsey French (as he called it) and had to communicate with his French in-laws via his wife, who was a native French speaker. When they spoke to each other, it was in English. Le Crapaud (talk) 13:02, 6 August 2015 (UTC)

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