Talk:Nepali Sign Language

Requested move: from "Nepalese Sign Language" to "Nepali Sign Language"

The following discussion is an archived discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: Move, as evidently the more common form. Cúchullain ^t/c 20:11, 17 October 2012 (UTC)

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Nepalese Sign Language → Nepali Sign Language – Many Nepalis consider the form of the English adjective "Nepalese" as "offensive, and generally prefer "Nepali" which has become general standard practice (e.g. for the name of the spoken language). In addition, all researchers working and writing in English on Nepali Sign Language that I am aware of use the designation "Nepali Sign Language".MWMKdu (talk) 08:22, 26 September 2012 (UTC)

• Support Compare to Nepali language. --BDD (talk) 17:18, 3 October 2012 (UTC)
• Sources? Sounds like the SL of Nepali rather than of Nepal. — kwami (talk) 17:24, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

So the adjective form of Nepali is Nepalese? I'm not sure adjectives can even have adjective forms. --BDD (talk) 20:35, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

No, the adjectival form of Nepal is Nepalese. Thus the point about it being about Nepal. — kwami (talk) 23:30, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

I'm not disputing that Nepalese is an adjectival form of Nepal, but Nepali language and the demonym being listed as Nepali at Nepal leads me to believe that that form is preferred. I wish the nominator would present some evidence that "Nepalese" is offensive (I'm tagging the assertion in the article); as such, it just seems like there are two forms in use (compare, for example, Kazakh vs. Kazakhstani, Azeri vs. Azerbaijani). At any rate, I don't think there could be a compelling reason for different names assuming this is a sign "translation" of Nepali, which it appears to be. --BDD (talk) 00:01, 4 October 2012 (UTC)

No no, that's exactly the point: it is NOT a signed translation of Nepali. It has nothing to do with Nepali except for being in the same country. — kwami (talk) 01:04, 4 October 2012 (UTC)

• Support. The OED defines Nepali as both an adjective of Nepal and a noun meaning "the language of Nepal". It defines Nepalese in exactly the same way: the two words are interchangeable with no difference in meaning. Sources use both Nepalese[1][2] and Nepali[3], but on gbook searches I get over 800 hits for "Nepali Sign Language" and just over 40 for "Nepalese Sign Language", so we can move it on the basis that Nepali is the more common scholastic form. DrKiernan (talk) 20:27, 4 October 2012 (UTC)

The OED says, under Nepalese, "The form Nepali .. also occurs, esp. as the name of the language of the Nepalese." It's that 'especially' that makes it misleading here.

I reverted a premature move, since this discussion is still open. One of the reasons given was that researchers use "Nepali". That may be, but Ethnologue uses "Nepalese", and they get their names from researchers too. Wittmann uses that form, for example. — kwami (talk) 23:19, 4 October 2012 (UTC)

That line (from the Second Edition 1989) is removed in the Third Edition (2003). Ethnologue gives a citation that leads to a work that says Nepali. I think it's clear that the two are interchangeable, but one is more used than the other. DrKiernan (talk) 05:39, 5 October 2012 (UTC)

Yes, the US Peace Corps uses "Nepali SL". No evidence presented that "Nepalese" is offensive. Using "Nepali" has the complication that we then need to clarify that it has nothing to do with Nepali, which isn't a problem with "Nepalese". IMO that alone is reason to choose the latter: cf. the naming problems with the Bamar. — kwami (talk) 06:51, 5 October 2012 (UTC)

I never said Nepalese was offensive. It's just that "Nepalese" also means the language of the country. Your argument that Nepali is the noun for the language and Nepalese is the adjective of Nepal is demonstrably false. Both words mean exactly the same thing. DrKiernan (talk) 07:14, 5 October 2012 (UTC)

"Offensive" was a reason given for the move. I'm not arguing against you exclusively.

They only mean the same thing in dictionary-land, and both may be either noun or adjective. "Nepali" is almost universally used for the national language. "Nepali Sign Language" therefore suggests a connection to Nepali. "Nepalese" is almost never used for the language. You do, however, speak of Nepalese languages, and this is one of them. For example, Nepalese linguistics (2003, Linguistic Society of Nepal) speaks of "Nepalese Languages" but of "Nepali" as the national language; A Foundation in Nepali Grammar (Manders, 2007) presents "Nepali" in the context of other "Nepalese" languages; Language Contact and Contact Languages (Siemund & Kintana, 2008) discusses the influence "Nepali" has had on other "Nepalese" languages; Language Planning in Nepal, Taiwan, and Sweden (Baldauf, 2000) does the same. There is a strong tendency to use "Nepali" for the national language and "Nepalese" for languages of Nepal in general; NSL is one of those Nepalese languages, because it certainly is not Nepali. Yes, some authors use "Nepali" for all things Nepalese, but this is a practical distinction made in many works, including linguistic ones. — kwami (talk) 07:51, 5 October 2012 (UTC)

• Oppose per my argument above. The more I look into this, the more I find that linguistic sources (such as Nepalese linguistics (Linguistic Society of Nepal) and Manders' in-depth A Foundation in Nepali Grammar) distinguish between the national Nepali language and other Nepalese languages. It's not a universal distinction, but it is a useful one.

  Other sources which make this distinction: the 14-volume Encyclopedia of Language and Linguistics (2006) and van Driem's massive Languages of the Himalayas (2001). As for NSL itself, the sources are comparable, with Ethnologue and Wittmann using one, and the Peace Corps and Hurlbut using the other. — kwami (talk) 07:57, 5 October 2012 (UTC)

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

Fixing Issues

I've fixed the issues that were described in the issues box, namely essay-like language and issues with inline citation. I've removed the box but if anyone feels I haven't quite fixed the issues fully please let me know and I'll have another look. -- ☽☆ NotCharizard (talk) 06:46, 4 April 2022 (UTC)