Martyr Of Macedon
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Please respect the peace here.
Our language policy bewerken
The policy of our site has been for a long time that we accept the ISO 639-3 codes and the Ethnologue definitions at face value as 'language'. This does not imply any political statement. It is simply a necessary choice: we needed a workable system to deal with the 4000-odd languages/tongues/dialects/whatever call them 'linguistic species' if you like, that this planet possesses. As Macedonian has an ISO-code mkd it is therefore a 'language' and if you are a speaker of that you can enter words etc. This site is not for political diatribes as you now have on your user page, particularly no insults to the neighbors. I would appreciate if you would remove that.
Thank you for your message, and once again: welcome here. I assure you that you are respected member of our community and wish you a pleasant stay here. In fact we would really appreciate some help with any of the Macedonian entries. The truth is that we do not have much expertise. Certainly not enough to keep mk and bg apart. (sorry...) Please do not be offended by that.
As Bogorm is concerned I have made clear to him what our policy is and will not hesitate to intervene if necessary, but I think he understands the situation. The truth is that whatever happened in the past, we all need each other on this tiny planet. That requires that we curb our feelings a little at times and be willing to respect each other. Sometimes that is not so easy but the rewards are great. I think that is both the European and the Wiki-experience.
Bogorm actually brought up an important point: he compared the linguistic relationship between Flemish and Dutch to that between your language and his and it may well be that linguistically he may have a point. There are quite a few, respectably old differences between the dialects at either side of the NL-B border. Also historically and religiously there are considerable differences. I'm afraid we from the north have not always treated our neighbors in the south so respectfully. In Flanders there have been movements in the past that advocated creating a separate Flemish standard language. In contrast to South Africa where such a separate standard was adopted in 1928 the Flemish decided against it because their language was under a lot of pressure from French. Now that Afrikaans is under a lot of pressure from English (like most of us...) there are even people in South Africa that regret the choice of 1928.
The choice is not easy: staying together can be painful because one has to compromise in education etc. and Afrikaans had developed quite a few differences and I don't think there was much willingness from the Dutch side to accommodate people in the Southern Hemisphere we had little contact with. Splitting up however means you are much more vulnerable. I think in my own country there is a growing understanding that we cannot keep the language together if we are not also willing to compromise a little here or there, although personally I think we are not willing to stick our hand in our own bosom enough.
I do not know that much about Macedonia, but maybe our experiences are helpful to come to better terms with your neighbors?