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Requests for new languages/Wikipedia Niuean

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submitted verification final decision

This language has been verified as eligible.
The language is eligible for a project, which means that the subdomain can be created once there is an active community and a localized interface, as described in the language proposal policy. You can discuss the creation of this language project on this page.

Once the criteria are met, the language committee can proceed with the approval and will verify the test project content with a reliable neutral source, such as a professor or expert.

If you think the criteria are met, but the project is still waiting for approval, feel free to notify the committee and ask them to consider its approval.

  • The community needs to develop an active test project; it must remain active until approval (automated statistics, recent changes). It is generally considered active if the analysis lists at least three active, not-grayed-out editors listed in the sections for the previous few months.
  • The community needs to complete required MediaWiki interface translations in that language (about localization, translatewiki, check completion).
  • The community needs to discuss and complete the settings table below:
What Value Example / Explanation
Proposal
Language code niu (SIL, Glottolog) A valid ISO 639-1 or 639-3 language code, like "fr", "de", "nso", ...
Language name Niuean Language name in English
Language name ko e vagahau Niuē Language name in your language. This will appear in the language list on Special:Preferences, in the interwiki sidebar on other wikis, ...
Language Wikidata item Q33790 - item has currently the following values:
 Item about the language at Wikidata. It would normally include the Wikimedia language code, name of the language, etc. Please complete at Wikidata if needed.
Directionality LTR Is the language written from left to right (LTR) or from right to left (RTL)?
Links Government of Niue Links to previous requests, or references to external websites or documents.
Site URL niu.wikipedia.org langcode.wikiproject.org

Settings
Project name Wikipedia "Wikipedia" in your language
Project namespace usually the same as the project name
Project talk namespace "Wikipedia talk" (the discussion namespace of the project namespace)
Enable uploads no Default is "no". Preferably, files should be uploaded to Commons.
If you want, you can enable local file uploading, either by any user ("yes") or by administrators only ("admin").
Notes: (1) This setting can be changed afterwards. The setting can only be "yes" or "admin" at approval if the test creates an Exemption Doctrine Policy (EDP) first. (2) Files on Commons can be used on all Wikis. (3) Uploading fair-use images is not allowed on Commons (more info). (4) Localisation to your language may be insufficient on Commons.
Optional settings
Project logo File:Niuean Wikipedia logo.png This needs to be an SVG image (instructions for logo creation).
Default project timezone Continent/City "Continent/City", e.g. "Europe/Brussels" or "America/Mexico City" (see list of valid timezones)
Additional namespaces For example, a Wikisource would need "Page", "Page talk", "Index", "Index talk", "Author", "Author talk".
Additional settings Anything else that should be set
Once settings are finalized, a committee member will submit a Phabricator task requesting creation of the wiki. (This will include everything automatically, except the additional namespaces/settings.) After the task is created, it should be linked to in a comment under "final decision" above.

Proposal

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Discussion

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Arguments in favour

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  • There are reasons that warrant the Niuean language to be part of the Wikipedia. The language is under threat of extinction due to a lot of the native speakers migrated to New Zealand with children adopting english as their first language. There is currently a concerted and collective effort to put into place educational programmes teaching Niuean language, creating a Niuean language wikipedia is a major contribution towards keeping the Niuean language alive. — The preceding unsigned comment was added by Sioneholof (talk)
  • SupportSupport The Niuean community, like any diasporic community, needs to be able to use the broad medium of the internet as it seeks to preserve its language into the 21st century. This is how we feel for the Wikipedia Rotuman, and any other Pacific or diasporic language in need of a common rallying point like that which WIKIPEDIA provides. --Mattbray 12:33, 12 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • According to the article on Niue in the EN Wikipedia, the Niuean-speaking population stands at about 8,000 speakers located in Niue, the Cook Islands, Tonga, and New Zealand.  Although only 2,240 of those speakers live in Niue (as of 1991), the fact remains that there is a relatively large expatriate Niuean-speaking population in addition to those speaking the language on the island of Niue itself.  In addition to the Wikipedia article on Niue, there is also an excellent (academic-level) article in the EN Wikipedia on the linguistics of the Niuean language.  Given the depth of interest in Niue in Wikipedia (as evidenced by the edit histories of both articles), it would be logical for the Administration to take the next step and provide for an incubator to help foster the development of a Niuean Wikipedia. K. Kellogg-Smith 22:19, 23 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support --Leonst 19:28, 24 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support-- I'm a NZ born Niuean but I'm very lucky to be supported by my school principal and BOT to teach Vagahau Niue in Year 11. I have 26 students, making it the largest language class in our senior school. I offer 34 credits under NZQA and the bulk of my students are non-niue BUT they all share a genuine interest to learn this amazing language. All are keen to continue to Year 13 and wish to travel to Niue given I had taken a small school group back to Niue in 2008. At this stage, resources are my biggest problem however, if the Wiki admin were to allow for Vagahau Niue to be included, it would prove to be a valuable resource to access, not just for students but also for my colleagues who wish to teach Vagahau Niue in the future.
  • Support.--Digimon Adventure 03:21, 13 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support. 8000 speakers, official language and most widely spoken language in Niue (2000 speakers), important immigrant language in New Zealand (5700), the Cook Islands (200), Tonga, and the United States. Gertjan R. 07:30, 11 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support. Every language deserves to have a Wikipedia if there are (native) people willing to make it exist! Capsot 11:54, 12 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support. --N KOziTalk 12:25, 22 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support only. --U.Steele 03:48, 27 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support Support --►Safir yüzüklü Ceklimesaj 12:52, 1 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strong Support --Jugydmort (talk) 12:10, 14 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support Wikipedia should exist in more endangered languages, especially those in the Pacific. I think this is one of the higher priority proposed language projects considering there are already translations on TranslateWiki. By the way, I'm actually Australian and I also created a logo for the proposed Wikipedia. 2001:8003:C829:E400:18CB:8847:28BD:B072
  • Support Endangered language. Why not? SHB2000 (talk | contibs) 10:46, 4 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Arguments against

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General comments

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Time is really running out quickly for the people of Niuean descent to preserve their language, over 20,000 Niueans now live overseas mainly in New Zealand and Australia while around 1,000 live in Niue, and most adopting English as the common language for day to day conversation. This is not really a matter of choice as normally people have to adopt to the new living environment they are in. Niuean individuals and may be families as well living in isolation in metropolitan centres are the most at the high risk, losing out in maintaining rich connection to their culture making it easy to lose touch with their Niuean language. Therefore creating a Niuean language Wikipedia will be a major step foward to reaching out to Niueans in those boundaries.

The Niuean language was traditionally only a spoken language until Christianity landed in Niue in October 1846, when the Niuean language reached a milestone of commencing to translate it into a written form of language. This was made possible because of the teaching and preaching of the gospel introduced into Niue by Nukai Peniamina where he was accepted to land in Niue at Uluvehi Mutalau by the people of Mutalau who was said to hold the malotau of the whole of Niue. The Niuean language became a written language when the English Holy Bible was translated into Niuean, creating the Niuean version of the Bible known as the The Holy Bible in Niue ISBN 0 564 00077 9 (also known in Niuean as Ko e Tohi Tapu). Sioneholof 16:35, 23 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

As I see it, the problem here lies in the fact that the Wikipedia Administration currently only allows language-specific Wikipedias, not regional Wikipedias with regional editorial content.  I can't see any reason for the Administration not to allow the creation of Polynesian, Melanesian, and Micronesian Wikpedias whose article content would be focused on the language, peoples, arts, customs and culture of the islands and island nations in those regions of the Pacific.  Niue, for example, is a Polynesian nation, and articles in both English and the Niuean language can certainly co-exist with articles about other Polynesian island nations in a "Wikipedia Polynesia"..  Are there good reasons for not allowing a Wikipedia Oceania, for example, or a Wikipedia Micronesia? Other than breaking with Wikipedia tradition and its current rules?  Chamorro, like Niuean, is a dying language, yet is still struggling to be heard.  So is Hawaiian (take a look at the paucity of articles in the HAW Wikipedia, for example, a dying Wikipedia because of a lack of interest in it by native speakers).  In a regional Wikipedia, it would be quite easy to set up separate namespaces for articles about each nation; Niue:<article name>, or, have a list box to select an island nation to key the sidebar search box.  There may only be a few articles for small nations within the region, but at least writers will have a place to save the bits and pieces, no matter how small, of history, culture, and language of these small nations, and hold that knowledge in one convenient and Internet-accessible location.  And that is what Wikipedias are all about, isn't it?
If the fundamental purpose of Wikipedia and we as authors and editors is to bring knowledge to the world through the Internet, then it is inevitable that small nations and their peoples and cultures will never be documented and preserved in Wikipedia memory if the current Wikipedia policy of specific-language only Wikipedias is maintained by the Administration.  As noted by others in this discussion, preserving whatever can be preserved now of the Niue language really is a cultural responsibility of everyone who has the capability and capacity to do so.  And I believe that includes not only all of us as writers and editors in the Wikipedia community, but the Wikipedia Foundation and its Administration as well. Regional Wikipedias.  Preserving the culture of very small nations.   Something to think about.
K. Kellogg-Smith 02:42, 17 August 2007 (UTC) (temp sysop/administrator for the neo-Melanesian ("Tok Pisin") TPI Wikipedia and Wiktionary)[reply]

Localisation update

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There is currently no localisation effort under way at Betawiki. At least the most used messages need to be localised. GerardM 06:31, 4 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

 
Proposed logo for the Niuean Wikipedia.
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