Talk:Ken George

Academic criticism

The sentence "from experts on Celtic languages" was changed to "from Bold textsomeBold text experts on Celtic languages. Are there are academics withing the field of Celtic philology that support George's version. If yes, then the new version is more appropriate. If not, then the previous version is more correct

(Please sign your posts.) I don't know of any "real" Celticists who support Kernowek Kemyn. Evertype 10:40, August 22, 2005 (UTC)

I don't either, offhand, but as a rule, "real" Celticists have been pretty unenthusiastic about revived Cornish as a whole. Nicholas Williams is an exception of course (hardly a neutral arbiter, in any case) and you're right to mention him in the article. I've read a fair bit of the 'academic' criticisms of Kemmyn, and in my own opinion they don't often rise above petty personal sniping from a rather limited clique of people in what is, after all, a very small field. But hopefully the day's not far off when revivalists and Celticists can sit calmly round a table discussing the actual linguistic questions amicably. QuartierLatin 1968 17:58, 22 August 2005 (UTC)

Despite being factually correct the added sentence makes the article POV. It should either be withdrawn or it should be balanced by information about the response to the criticisms and some details about how successful Kemmyn has been. This needn't be subjective - it could, for example, talk about An Gannas and the amount of literature that has been published in Kemmyn - possibly with a reference to the 'lyenn' page on the Cornish wiki. There are lots of other options too, if you run out of ideas - just pop a note here if you'd like me to list them.

Please register and sign your posts. Evertype 10:16, August 24, 2005 (UTC)

Place of birth?

Mr Everson wrote Apparently he is English, not a Native of Cornwall. I don't dispute this – I have no information one way or another – but if he is from East Cornwall, he might have been born in Plymouth for the simple reason that it's the only handy maternity unit in the area. People in southeast Cornwall have actually been lobbying to have a new maternity ward put in, simply because it's an emotional issue which side of the Tamar a person's born in... QuartierLatin1968 15:41, 17 January 2006 (UTC)

i personally fail to see that it matters where he was born. would it change thing that he was, let's say, pakistani or sudanese rather than english or cornish? are only people having been born in cornwal able to formulate linguistic theories specifically dealing with cornish? doe it run in the blood somehow? feel free to reply to me on the breton wiki here [1]

85.57.163.149 17:46, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

No, that's not the point. George was included in the category Category:Natives of Cornwall, and Mr Everson removed him from that category with the explanation that "apparently" George was English-born. QuartierLatin1968 04:17, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

yes it is for me. i still feel that you are applying an excessively limited concept of the term "native" (reradless of whether it afects Ken George or not, which, I believe, is neither here nor there). you seem to assume that "nativeness" is based on where a person happens to be born, part of the ius solis tradition. other criteria also exist in law, however, such as ius sanguis, so that, for example, third generation galizans are considered galizan to all efects and purposes by the administration whether or not either they, or indeed eitheir of their parents, were actually born in galiza (as is the case, in fact, for several hundred thoudans of people). may i also suggest that, for example, someone born in india but who has spent all of their life, or the best part of it, living and working in cornall and especially for the advancement of cornall would certainly, to my mind at least, be worthy of the title "native of cornwall". this is rather an open concept and need not be applied based on the narrowest interpretaion available, ie. where someone happens to be born. if that needs to be done, ie. sorting poeple based on their place of birth, may i suggest changing the name of the category to the rather simpler and less controversial "people born in cornwall"? Neal [2]

Reversion

I'm reverting most of the recent edits made by Evertype, but I do think he warrants an explanation why:

1. Dr George's "real job" does, I believe, deserve a more prominent mention than merely as an afterthought at the end of his stub.
2. Strictly speaking, it's not unsubstantiated that Kernewek Kemmyn has the most users. The MacKinnon report, to which I've added a link in the article, finds that, "The largest in numerical terms appears to be Kemmyn, and it is certainly the most productive in publications and language resources." I don't say this report is infallible, but it is worth noting that this is an independent scholarly report commissioned by a government office: I find it hard to imagine they've got much of an axe to grind. Elsewhere, Arjan Hut of the Frisian Academy reports for Mercator-Education: "The Cornish Language Board, the language institute that has since produced most language activity, has adopted Kemmyn and approximately 80% of the Cornish speaking population now use it."[3] Again, Hut may be mistaken; he may have been misled; but he does at least seem to be an independent observer.
3. Discussion of the academic criticisms of Kernewek Kemmyn are not out of place here; but it would seem rather bizarre and perverse to make this stub into a platform for delegitimizing Kemmyn. Wikipedia's not for spreading propaganda, it's for reporting on alternate points of view. I would warmly welcome substantive information on the critiques of Kemmyn offered by Jon Mills, Nicholas Williams, Glanville Price, Charles Penglaze, or anybody who's taken a thoughtful and probing look into the matter. But it would certainly not be appropriate to say "George believes X, but this is nonsense; George says Kemmyn is Y, but there's no evidence for it; Kemmyn is meant to be Z, but it's not". (Notice that I'm not suggesting that's what you did say, Mr Everson – your edits were certainly far more measured; but I think you'll agree with me it would be wrong to tread very far down this path.) QuartierLatin1968 04:14, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

Well, I have some responses.

1. I think that George is not in the Wikipedia for his work in his "real job". If this article were to detail that work, I would be very happy to see it given more prominance. Please feel free to write a paragraph detailing that work.
2. The MacKinnon report is not authoritative, though the Kemmynites are pleased to hide behind it. One proponant of traditional Cornish said to me about this "The statistics from MacKinnon on which they base their assumption are very unreliable. I remember being asked to come up with figures for Unified at the drop of a hat and the figures for Kemmyn were just their usual propaganda."
3. Well, there's a lot of that criticism that could be put here. But I take your point. Evertype 09:41, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

Just regarding your comment: The link to the "majority" statement led to a page without evidence. Maybe this is an unreasonable hangup of mine, but I do feel hesitant about linking directly to .doc or .pdf files from an article; I'm imagining that people will want to go to a site, and check out that it seems legit, before agreeing to download files from it. So the link in question takes you to the page on the Southwest regional office website from which the various sections of the MacKinnon report can be downloaded directly. Beannachtaí lá Fhéile Pádraig, by the way. QuartierLatin1968 23:51, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

This article just becomes more embarrassingly POV with each amendment made by one particular editor. Please take note of the anonymous comment made at the top of this page, which is entirely valid: The article "... should be balanced by information about the response to the criticisms and some details about how successful Kemmyn has been. This needn't be subjective - it could, for example, talk about An Gannas and the amount of literature that has been published in Kemmyn - possibly with a reference to the 'lyenn' page on the Cornish wiki. There are lots of other options too, if you run out of ideas - just pop a note here if you'd like me to list them."
Given that Kemmyn is primarily a spelling system, the amount of literature published in it IS a measure of its success. And it far outweighs the amount of literature published in all the other spelling systems put together - a fact that CAN be substantiated. So put something in the article about that. Show us that you can honour Wiki principles.
Suffixing every statement made about Ken George or Kemmyn with "but critics don't agree with this" is just tedious. Next we'll have someone going in and editing the Nicholas Williams article to add "but critics don't agree with this" everywhere. What a game.
Branvras

It also pisses me off that "that particular editor" has a financial stake in undermining Ken George's credibility, and yet he's allowed to edit all he wants, constantly removing referenced information that he finds unpalatable. I'm trying very hard to assume good faith, but surely there has to be some provision for financial conflicts of interest. QuartierLatin1968 18:42, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

Oh come on. Nobody makes money out of Cornish. I support UCR and work against Kernowek Kemyn because I think UCR is the right vehicle for the Cornish Revival, and because I think that Kernowek Kemyn is inauthentic and should be abandoned. Evertype 19:02, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

Nevertheless, you cannot be considered a disinterested party, Mr Everson. QuartierLatin1968 19:33, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

It's true that nobody makes money out of Cornish, but you do have a financial stake in undermining the credibility of Kernewek Kemmyn. You make a smaller loss if you can convince people that they should adopt the form of Cornish that you support. Everything you write about Cornish is POV, mainly by intentional omission. It is misleading at best and deceitful at worst. You want precise and encyclopaedic? Then I suggest you do something about the following: "Given that Kemmyn is primarily a spelling system, the amount of literature published in it IS a measure of its success. And it far outweighs the amount of literature published in all the other spelling systems put together - a fact that CAN be substantiated. So put something in the article about that. Show us that you can honour Wiki principles". Go on, show us. Branvras

I have taken out all the remaining unsubstantiated assertions and heavily biased wording. I wonder really how much of the spelling row is appropriate on what is basically a bio page. Perhaps there should be an article devoted to the various Cornish Orthographies, their histories, philosopies etc. All the various POVs could then be aired in as balanced a manner as possible. I would certainly like to see links to any reasoned arguments against KK, most of what I've seen so far really only boils down to constantly repeated assertions. Why Mr Everson should be so partisan about the spelling of a language he doesn't speak or use himself really baffles me. If he wishes to continue to air his prejudices here, he should at least provide bona fide sources.

The Mercator report takes its figures from McKinnon, and so perhaps should be removed. There is an HTML version of McKinnon on the Cornwall 'County' Council web site, I think there's a link from the Cornish language article. Mongvras 01:29, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

Yes, it should be removed, as it is not itself a source for the claim. Evertype

Re. Everson's latest bout of revertion. KK "appears to be used by the majority", is I think a fair statement of fact. "The majority" means anything > 50%. Can Everson come up with any credible published statement that KK is used by less than half of Cornish speakers/users? Actually, I'm not aware of very much active use of UCR other than by Williams himself, and perhaps two or three others. How many books have been published in UCR over the last two or three years for example? That surely could be ascertained objectively? 'Kowethas an Yeth' has just under 300 members, and a recent survey showed that almost all of them preferred KK. 'Agan Tavas' has about 150 members (recent WMN article) not all of whom speak Cornish. All I can say is that until someone does a proper survey, such evidence as there is all points to the majority using KK. Mongvras 23:51, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

"Reversion". I think "appears to be" is your POV, and I know people who do not share that POV. It is certainly the case that Kernowek Kemyn is held by its supporters to be in the majority, but not everyone believes that. I think that is held by its supporters is verifiable and NPOV, and is a better description than appears to be. My informants suggest that Kernowek Kemyn is losing ground. Evertype 09:20, 20 May 2006 (UTC)

Your informants are leading you up the garden path and you appear to have made no effort whatsoever to verify what they tell you. On the basis of what your informants tell you, which is exactly what you want to hear, you constantly distort any attempt to present a true picture of the state of the language. "appears to be" is not POV. It is backed up by strong evidence. Kernewek Kemmyn is a written medium. Since it was adopted by the Cornish Language Board more than 250 works have been published in Kemmyn, and an all-Cornish magazine has appeared every single month with a circulation of around 300. In that same time, Unified Cornish has managed about 15 publications and a quarterly bilingual magazine - often containing more English than Cornish. Unified Cornish Revised has managed 5 publications and nothing else, and Modern Cornish has managed to produce next to nothing. The popularity of Kernewek Kemmyn is clear from these figures. Perhaps you could research them further and challenge them on the basis of the facts that you uncover. But once you've done that, uphold Wiki principles and write something NPOV based on those facts, rather than constantly taking out everything you don't agree with, because you "heard otherwise", from every attempt to give a fair appraisal of the state of the language. Go on. Show us you can do it. Branvras

Exactly. Evertype has become quite adept at reverting other people's edits by crying 'NPOV' and 'unverifiable', but he has yet to come up with a single verifiable source for any of his assertions. And "it must be stressed that no accurate figures are available" isn't NPOV either, because it sets the Wikipedia editor up as an arbiter of the veracity of the figures. We report arguments, we don't judge them. QuartierLatin1968 14:46, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

Use of sources

Ken George's academic bio does not, in itself, substantiate his characterization as "a linguist", as such. (It's also apparently written by George himself, so it's not an independent source.) Certainly he has some academic qualifications in Celtic studies, however. Shall we change the mention of linguistics to Celtic studies? Q·L·1968 ☿ 11:47, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

It states that he has a Doctorat du Troisième Cycle on the phonology of Cornish. Perhaps this should be changed to "phonologist" ? - Francis Tyers · 15:17, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

"... et la thèse de linguistique soutenue à Brest en 1986 par Ken George." [4]

Says that his thesis was a linguistic one. - Francis Tyers · 15:22, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

Hmm. Well, phonology is of course a branch of linguistics... Still, two of his degrees fall so neatly into the category of 'Celtic studies', while I hesitate to call him a phonologist as such. I mean, he hasn't spent a lot of time formally studying phonology as a whole (i.e. outside of just Brythonic), as far as I know. (And I could be wrong.) Q·L·1968 ☿ 23:06, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

I don't know, it depends on where you're from maybe, but here I'd say if someone has a PhD in a subject, published articles in journals relating to the subject (e.g. KJ George (1983) A computer model of sound changes in Cornish' - Journal of the Association of Literary and Linguistic Computing), and books (Cornish in The Celtic Languages, 1993) you can refer to them by that. I've no idea if these are good or bad papers, but it Is there a publication threshold that I'm not aware of ? Maybe I should stop telling people I'm a computational linguist, as I don't even have a PhD! :) - Francis Tyers · 08:05, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

A doctorat du troisième cycle isn't a PhD. It's a lesser post-grad degree. I don't care much either way, but I know there are Cornish users who are very sensitive about characterizing George as a 'linguist'. (Might just be a tempest in a teapot, though.) Q·L·1968 ☿ 14:24, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

I don't think that "linguist" is a protected title in the way that "social worker" or "pharmacist" are. DuncanHill (talk) 14:33, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Aha, it might be what is called a tesina in Spain, which is like a Masters' dissertation in the UK. I don't see why they would be upset at calling him a linguist, I can see them being angry at his orthography (haha, I hate your spelling!) but to be upset that a man who publishes papers and books on linguistics and language calls himself a linguist. I'm not sure about that... - Francis Tyers · 14:57, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Looking on the French Wikipedia, it seems to suggest that doctorat du troisième cycle = doctorat = PhD. But with the Bologna process I'm not so sure any more — I don't speak French well, so if you could clarify it (either here or on my Wikipedia page) that would be cool. - Francis Tyers · 15:05, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

You can be an amateur linguist too. Just like you can be an amateur archaeologist or astronomer. --MacRusgail (talk) 15:33, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Possible edits by the subject

I believe that these three edits were made by the subject of the article: [5], [6], [7]. The first of these edits merits, in my opinion, review, as it removes verifiable criticism which was written in a neutral fashion. -- Evertype·✆ 14:37, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

@Evertype Tha sibh ceart! Tha e ga dheanamh a-rithist.--MacRùsgail (talk) 12:20, 12 March 2014 (UTC)

Is maith gur runne tú na ceartúchain sin. -- Evertype·✆ 13:08, 12 March 2014 (UTC)

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