Talk:Ibanic languages

Sea Dyak (Iban) dictionary

A Sea Dyak dictionary, in alphabetical parts, with examples and quotations shewing the use and meaning of words (1900)

https://archive.org/details/aseadyakdiction00bailgoog

Rajmaan (talk) 20:04, 18 March 2014 (UTC)

Terminology

I have never encountered any literature which classifies the so-called "Malayic Dayak" in this article as part of "Ibanic". It is in fact the other way around; Ibanic is more often classified as part of Malayic Dayak. Hudson (1970) does group together Kendayan-type languages and Ibanic-type languages into "Malayic Dayak", but this is more of a practical grouping than a linguistically defined one (i.e. comprising all Malayic languages used by non-Muslim Borneans, as opposed to Land Dayak languages). Ross (2004) proposes a small group comprising "Malayic Dayak" languages (excluding Ibanic) separate from other "Nuclear Malayic" lects. Adelaar (2006) notes that Kanayatn group and Ibanic are more likely to be primary branches of Malayic rather than forming a single subgroup. However, Smith (2017) concludes that Kendayan-Salako and Ibanic, along with several southern Sumatran isolects, do belong to a "West Bornean Malayic" subgroup. But still, regardless of whether or not they form a single subgroup, I have yet to see a single work using the name "Ibanic" for the whole branch; it is really just used for what this article calls "Ibanic proper". Perhaps it is better to move the article to "Malayic Dayak" or something like that. I am aware that Ethnologue lists "Malayic Dayak" as an individual language, but this is in reality more of an all-catch names for Malayic Dayak isolects that are still either unclassified or poorly studied. Masjawad99^💬 02:12, 23 May 2019 (UTC)

@Masjawad99: I fully agree with your observations. In all relevant publications, "Ibanic" refers to what is called "Ibanic proper" here. I am not fully sure, but most probably the terminology in this article is OR. So this clearly needs to be fixed. There are two options: 1. We keep the lemma, but restrict the content to the Ibanic languages in the accepted sense. 2. We move the article to "Malayic Dayak". I prefer the first option, for the simple reason that there is no consensus on the internal subgrouping of Malayic. There is consensus, however, that "Ibanic" (sensu stricto) and "Kendayan-Salako" (per Smith; = "Kanayatn" per Adelaar and "Western Malayic Dayak" per Ross) each are valid microgroups, but beyond that, the major proposals by Adelaar, Ross and Smith disagree. Personally, I prefer Smiths approach (which is partially based on earlier research by Nothofer in the 1990s), and consider the characteristic grammatical features of Kendayan-Salako as later innovations (which renders Ross' "Nuclear Malayic" paraphyletic). But to avoid POV, we should present all three views as current alternative hypotheses in the Malayic languages article (Nothofer 1988 in effect has become obsolete), and subsequently rework the whole complex of articles on Malayic languages. –Austronesier (talk) 09:37, 23 May 2019 (UTC)

@Austronesier: Option 1 seems to be the best indeed. I agree that any relevant discussion on the subgrouping of Malayic should better be discussed in the Malayic languages article. For this article, I can add a section on the external classification of Ibanic within Malayic. I will also try to slowly cleanup articles on other Malayic languages--perhaps after finishing Lampung language. Masjawad99^💬 09:57, 23 May 2019 (UTC)