User talk:GinormousBuildings

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Enjoy your stay at Wiktionary! --Apisite (talk) 09:03, 10 August 2021 (UTC)Reply

Unless there is evidence that the words are used outside dialectal contexts, I advise against adding unattested pronunciations and root derivations for their entries. Case in point, abrit-abritan is always pronounced with a rather close in Betawi, and the stem abrit does not exist by itself. The usage of -an there is also closer to Betawi and Javanese -an (equivalent to Standard Malay ber-), so the affixation definitely happened in Betawi first before it got "borrowed" into the wider Malay context.

Also, in Indonesian entries we usually only include Betawi words if they are also used widely in Jakartan Indonesian (i.e. the bahasa gaul of popular Jakarta-centric media). Word like abrit-abritan only very barely fits this criteria, because nowadays it is mostly used by Betawi speakers when speaking Betawi within their community, and not used by the non-Betawi speakers of Jakartan Indonesian. Is there similar criteria for inclusion of dialectal forms in Malay entries? Or are you simply taking by face value the entries in modern "Malay dictionaries", which are often wholesale copied from earlier dictionaries, without bothering to check their usage and attestations? Swarabakti (talk) 18:11, 9 April 2025 (UTC)Reply

Also, Jw =/= Jk. Even back in the 19th century, people have noted that generic Java Malay and Batavian Malay were not the same thing, both structurally and lexically. Word like abuh, for example, is much more associated with Java Malay than Batavian Malay... Swarabakti (talk) 05:35, 10 April 2025 (UTC)Reply

@Swarabakti: I was not aware of that. I was simply adding Malay entries page by page following the word entry order of this Malay dictionary website. As you can see from my edit history, before editing the page for abrit, I was editing the page for abras and after that, the page for absah, in the same order as listed on that dictionary page.

In regards to the pronunciation, I was just adding it based on how a Johor-Riau Malay speaker would hypothetically pronounce that word upon first sight due to my desire to see every Malay entry have an audio recording as you can see with German entries (every single German entry I've come across has one!). As you've said, this is unadvisable if the pronunciation is unattested so I will stop doing it.

About how I decide if a word should be added or not, if a word is found in the Malay dictionary I cited, I just add them. "What about if they're not common or not heard in mainstream non-dialectal speech?" you may ask? Well, just add a dialect label to the word like I did with abrit-abritan by adding the "Batavian Malay" label? I don't see anything wrong with that. Wiktionary is an online dictionary and the purpose of a dictionary is to compile words whether they're common or uncommon or dialectal or non-dialectal. If the Malay dictionary labels it as coming from or being part of a non-Malay language (e.g. Minangkabau, Javanese), I list the word as having been borrowed from that language. Adding a rarity label is a bit difficult for me. I've at times put a "rare" or "uncommon" label onto an entry I thought was so because I'd never come across them, only to later find that word in a book, article or whatever and find out that all the people I know know that word and somewhat commonly use it. So I usually avoid adding a rarity label nowadays unless I'm absolutely sure of it.

Regarding the Jw =/= Jk thing. That's my bad. The Malay dictionary labels that word as "Jw" so following my logic above, I would just put the word as having been borrowed from Javanese, but I think I misread it and so mistakenly labelled that word as Batavian instead. --GinormousBuildings (talk) 15:48, 13 April 2025 (UTC)Reply

As I've said above, the entries in that Kamus Dewan mirror (and Indonesia's KBBI too, FWIW) are often taken wholesale from earlier dictionaries, which may or may not have the same criteria for inclusions as many modern dictionaries, including Wiktionary. For example, a bunch of words labeled as coming from regional (Malayic and non-Malayic) languages in KBBI are specifically engineered into the dictionary before they even saw attested usage in an Indonesian context (not even dialectally). In Wiktionary, if these words come from valid L2 language headings, they need to be added first under these headings (adding another layer of verification) before that of Indonesian, the latter ideally with a usage citation. E.g. a Wiktionary entry for a Jakarta Indonesian word of Betawi origin will have the "Jakarta" dialect label on the definition, an etymological subsection detailing its borrowing via Betawi, and a separate Betawi heading; cf. the bianglala entry.

As you may see, this practice differ from the way "Jakarta" label is used in Kamus Dewan and KBBI, in both of which it is ambiguous on whether they are "Jakarta Indonesian" (= bahasa gaul Jakarta) or "Jakarta Malay" (= "Betawi/Batavian Malay" = bahasa Betawi). This is partially a remnant from Soekarno-era policy of renaming all things Dutch, including "Betawi/Batavian" to "Jakarta". This resulted in a confusion over language names; while many locals continue to refer to the traditional lects of Jakarta metropolitan as bahasa Betawi vis-a-vis the emerging, more "modern" bahasa gaul Jakarta, both varieties have often been subsumed under the "Jakarta dialect" label by authorities in the past. Nowadays, though, while Jakarta Indonesian is firmly considered a dialect of Indonesian, Betawi is often considered a separate, now-endangered language no longer spoken in the urban core of Jakarta (cf. Tadmor 2009, also one of Adelaar's 2024 footnotes in his article on Batavian Mardijker Malay, a now-extinct variety). Traditional speakers of urban Betawi varieties have had most of their old kampungs demolished via urban renewal projects and got pushed to the outskirts, with at least one variety going moribund (the Tanah Abang dialect). A quite significant number of Betawi words survive in modern Jakarta Indonesian, but the latter also has influences from other languages/dialects not necessarily present in traditional Betawi varieties. On lexical and structural comparisons between Jakarta Indonesian and Betawi/Batavian/Jakarta Malay, see Grijns (1991) and Sneddon (2006), among others.

Considering the scholarly literature on these varieties, there are several approaches we can use here: 1) subsume them as a single dialect under Malay/Indonesian (as in Kamus Dewan and KBBI, which is quite misleading), 2) consider them two separate dialects of Malay/Indonesian (not sure of any source doing this, though), 3) consider only "Jakarta Indonesian" a dialect of Malay/Indonesian, while treating Betawi a separate language (current status quo among Indonesian editors and the general populace; which necessitates cross-checking sources other than Kamus Dewan and KBBI), or 4) consider both varieties separate languages from each other and from Malay/Indonesian (pretty much advocated by no one). Just curious, though, for Malay editors, what is the scope of your Batavian Malay label? Swarabakti (talk) 19:15, 13 April 2025 (UTC)Reply

Cf. also the entry for bikin, in which having Betawi as a separate heading makes it easier to trace the origin and descendants of the word... Swarabakti (talk) 19:34, 13 April 2025 (UTC)Reply

I see. As someone who merely has a hobbyist interest in language and linguistics, I wasn't aware of all that history behind it. I was editing with the second approach in mind the same way I would edit for words of peninsular Malaysian dialects such as that of Kelantan-Pattani or Kedah Malay. I did this because, although they had their ISO codes, in my experience, no one ever considers those two varieties of Malay to be separate languages, hence I saw creating a separate entry for them as not necessary. I assumed the same for Betawi as its Wikipedia page lists "Betawi Malay" as an alternative name for it, but after seeing the history behind it and its seemingly harmless but dangerous confusion with Jakarta Indonesian, I think I will stop adding in Betawi words as Malay entries.

Your notion that having Betawi take a separate heading would make it easier to showcase etymology is pretty interesting. That would work with showing the origins of peninsular Malaysian dialect words that have entered non-dialectal speech too (e.g. cakna from Terengganu Malay and kut from Kedah Malay) so I think I may start taking up the fourth approach you mentioned in regards to adding these dialectal words.

Just to be clear, I am operating on Wiktionary completely on my own have never asked any fellow Wiktionary users for help or for their thoughts on something such as what should be given a separate heading and so on. So I am clueless as to what other Malay editors think of something like this. As for what I feel encompasses the "Batavian Malay" label, to be honest, I just thought any traditional Betawi or any modern Jakartan Indonesian word would do, but as you've said, this thought process has its own problems. GinormousBuildings (talk) 16:21, 14 April 2025 (UTC)Reply