5. This is Propagation

This means it must be listed in an ISO-639 database, or standards organisations must be convinced to create an ISO-639 code for a ‘new’ language.

This, in most cases, excludes regional dialects and various written forms of the same language.

This requirement, which must be met for the final approval, is discussed in an open forum. To do so, a project will be initiated where interest by individual speakers or supporters of the language is registered and arguments for and against the admission of the new language are gathered. Then a decision will be made by the language committee.

One of the main reasons is often related to the lack of a state, and therefore the absence of the necessity for a single unified language spoken within its borders (Scholze and Hose, 1993: 102).

Stone notes on bilingual street signs: ‘In the GDR era when Sorbian was supported by the state, both languages were represented in the same font size, whereas nowadays, the German names are presented bigger than the Sorbian names. As the joke goes, this is because Germans are short-sighted.’ Retrieved from http://​blogs.​bodleian.​ox.​ac.​uk/​taylorian/​2015/​11/​23/​sorbian-an-endangered-language/​ (5 January 2016).

For more details, see http://​www.​witaj-sprachzentrum.​de/​index.​php/​de (in German); retrieved 25 March 2010.

Personal interview, radio editor of the Sorbian Broadcasting Service, 14 January 2009; Satkula started to broadcast in April 1999 initially as an one-hour program but has since then been increased to two hours once a week; it is also available now online serving both local Sorbs as well as those living elsewhere.

As a prominent Sorbian-speaking observer noted in a personal interview on 12 January 2008: ‘TV programs Wuhladko and Łužica are merely a nod to the Sorbs by regional broadcasters MDR and RBB who gave in after a long period of pressure. But who is watching these kinds of smorgasbord programmes, which [are] comprise[d] of tiny bits and pieces from every Sorbian region?…I wouldn’t even watch that in German, so only because it is Sorbian? Certainly not, and a lot of people feel the same. It is broadcast on Sunday at 1:00 PM in the afternoon, and I’m always asking myself if there is any housewife who can sit down in front of the television and relax…There needs to be more private initiative producing an exciting series, but who is going to pay for it, who can afford it? Mass audience share cannot be expected because Sorbs do not necessarily tune in only because it is in Sorbian. There needs to be something more to it.’ Then Schäfrig notes for Sorbian web presences: ‘[The Internet] has become increasingly important for the Sorbs over the last couple of years. It serves, on the one hand, as a presentation platform for its culture and for the exchange with other nationalities. On the other hand, the Internet is more and more used as a means of communication among each other, particularly among Sorbs outside the Lausitz region.…However, the number of Sorbian web presences is extremely limited. The quality and timeliness varies, which has the effect that only [a] few relevant and informative websites exist for the Sorbs in their language. Furthermore, existing websites are not linked with each other, which results in relevant information being dispersed and hard to locate for Sorbs in the Internet environment’ (Schäfrig, 2008: 11; translated from German).

To put it overtly simplistic: there is a difference between a network with 150 million personbytes, or a network with 20,000 personbytes.

Personal interview with foundational and Top-10 contributing member of Upper Sorbian Wikipedia; Software engineer for localisation (into Sorbian) of various Internet applications (e.g., Mozilla group, Open Street Maps; 16 April 2010).

Dedicated Sorbian discussion forums, such as www.​interserb.​de and www.​internecy.​de, have been described as among the few early sites to attract discussion among the Sorbian community in the digital environment (Wölkowa, 2008). These forums remain important exchange platforms to discuss future digital strategies for the Sorbian language. This includes projects on interserb.de such as ‘Serbski internet a moderne medije’ (engl: the Sorbian Internet and new media), which from January 2009 onward attracted between 10 and 20 Sorbs or Sorbian-interested participants to discuss and develop web projects around the Sorbian language.

See UNESCO’s Atlas of the world’s languages in danger; retrieved from http://​www.​unesco.​org/​languages-atlas/​en/​atlasmap/​language-iso-hsb.​html (1 May 2016).

As Köstlin notes: ‘What remains as a hope—and this is my point—are the friends of the Sorbs, those virtual Sorbs on who it will depend more and more. Those who choose at free will [to become Sorbian speakers] will become…new Sorbs.…In short, the best Sorbs will come from outside.…This needs to be accepted as much as the fact that the head of the Bavarian dictionary is an Englishman. Not all Sorbs need to be able to speak the Sorbian language’ (translated from Köstlin, 2003: 434).

In the original post it says: ‘Are you interested in an Upper Sorbian or Lower Sorbian Wikipedia? It is currently discussed at meta.wikipedia.org to set up an Upper Sorbian version and, if successful, a Lower Sorbian. Unfortunately, I don’t speak any Sorbian.’ (author’s translation); retrieved from http://​de.​wikipedia.​org/​wiki/​Benutzer:​Tilman_​Berger/​Archiv2005-1 (8 August 2009).

Same as previous footnote.

Cf. Wikimedia incubator at http://​incubator.​wikimedia.​org/​wiki/​Wp/​hsb (retrieved 25 June 2010).

Cf. https://​stats.​wikimedia.​org/​EN/​TablesWikipediaH​SB.​htm#editor_​activity_​levels (retrieved 25 October 2016).

The complete Babel index classification is as follows: 0 (no language skills), 1 (basic), 2 (intermediate), 3 (advanced), 4 (near native), and 5 (native). In the example, user ‘Mayur’ indicates, for example, a native and advanced command of Hindi (hi and hi-3), advanced English skills (en-3), and basic skills of Sanskrit (sa-1).

The Czech language is close to Upper Sorbian to the extent that Upper Sorbian speakers can understand Czech or hold a basic conversation with Czech speakers. German and Upper Sorbian do not share any of those similarities that would provide for basic conversations.

Cf. https://​stats.​wikimedia.​org/​EN/​TablesWikipediaH​SB.​htm. (retrieved 25 October 2016).

Personal interview with native Sorbian speaker who contributed to the HSB Wikipedia until 2007, and who translated the interface for the Lower Sorbian version (1 July 2009).

Cf. previous endnote. It has been noted that short entries or stubs are a common issue for languages of similar speaker sizes on Wikipedia (van Dijk, 2009: 238). There are, however, many other variables, which taken together, provide an insight into article quality beyond length measures. One such measure is general article depth—that is, how frequently Upper Sorbian Wikipedia’s articles are updated. For current numbers see https://​meta.​wikimedia.​org/​wiki/​Wikipedia_​article_​depth (last accessed 26 January 2017).

Personal email correspondence with a Sorbian writer of digital knowledge resources in Sorbian for children (1 September 2009).

Personal interview with foundational and Top-10 contributing member of Upper Sorbian Wikipedia; Software engineer for localisation (into Sorbian) of various Internet applications (e.g., Mozilla group, Open Street Maps, 16 April 2010).