User:Njardarlogar/On Bokmål and Nynorsk on enwikt


 * Should Norwegian Bokmål and Norwegian Nynorsk be treated as two separate languages here on the English Wiktionary, or should they be treated as two variants of the same language?

This is a topic that has seen different solutions in place over the years. As of writing this, it is however, an unofficial policy that they should be treated as two separate languages. I support this view, and I will discuss why on this page.

= Background =

Origins
Who are the two written standards?


 * Bokmål
 * Bokmål has its origins in the written Danish language. Gradually, Danish words and grammar was replaced with both Norwegian and Norwegianised Danish counterparts. Much of the spelling convention was also changed. In its modern form, Bokmål is clearly distinct from Danish. Nonetheless, the Danish heritage is still very much alive.


 * Nynorsk
 * Nynorsk has its origins in the works of Ivar Aasen, who, among other things, was a Norwegian linguist from the 1800s. He wanted to create a written standard for the Norwegian language. Aasen collected vocabularies and grammar from the Norwegian dialects, and compared these collections with the Old Norwegian/Old Norse language in order to better decide what the new written standard should look like (such as finding the best compromises where the different dialects differed). Gradually, some of the grammar that was inherited from Old Norwegian was removed from Nynorsk in order to make Nynorsk more similar to Bokmål, as Danish, which Bokmål is built on, has lost more of the old grammatical system than what Norwegian has. Spelling was also changed.

= Arguments for =

Separate traditions
Bokmål and Nynorsk have always been completely separate traditions. Mixing the two standards would to the average Norwegian reader be just as weird as seing Norwegian mixed with e.g. Swedish, only that Norwegian mixed with Swedish is more obvious due to the differing spelling conventions between both Norwegian standards and Swedish (such as Swedish ä and ö for Norwegian æ and ø).

It should be mentioned, however, that given ther general unawareness of Nynorsk in Norway (even among users of Nynorsk), Bokmål words used within a Nynorsk text would be less obvious for the reader than vice versa.