User talk:Jeb

I had to make a provision for Castilian since it's one of the two main languages of South Aegea and it was brought over by the Iberians, along with Portuguese. It should also be the lingua franca, much like Hindi is India's lingua franca.


 * I'd rather not, personally. I think if we keep Spanish in Europa, it'll just be too much like another alternative version of Earth which is not really what we aim for, right? As 'English'/'Aegean' is already excluded from Europa and was born in North Aegea, I thought we could do the same for Spanish. In my book, and what I thought Joe had planned in Mexico, 'Spanish' would be 'Mexica' or 'Mexican language', originating in Mexico. There's ways to figure out how linguistically it will work out to develop as modern Spanish. An idea would be through the Iberian colonization of the Aegeas, and possibly through an earlier small colonization of the Aegeas during the Roman Empire, dropping Germanic tribal slaves (and their languages) and Romans and Provincials (Hispania for South Aegea/Mexico areas), who'd speak Latin, Iberian, Celtiberian and Celtic. When Iberia comes and discover/rediscover the Aegeas, all the various linguistic communities of Iberia will merge with that Latin/Iberian/Celtiberian/Celtic languages to form Spanish. Italian, Valois and other colons would come and help develop this new language to form modern Spanish. What do you think? ~ Juls


 * I have chosen to call Spanish "castillian" for the sake of difference and it is the language that South Aegea will use, alongside Portuguese. The history of Iberia is pretty much the same as the history of Spain, even the Napoleonic Wars have been mentioned (Napoleon without France? I'd like to know how that works) Castillian did evolve in the Aegeas, every country has its own accents, its own idiosyncrasies and idioms, yet the language is structurally the same, an empire needs a lingua franca, and if Iberia had an empire, then it also needs a lingua franca. Instead of one, it can have two: Castillian and Portuguese. I have not envisages a Roman colonization of the Aegeas, I find that harder to stomach than Spanish not being one of the languages of Iberia, there is no Iberia without a Castillian language. Also, I think the flag needs to change, the current Coat of Arms is, heraldrically speaking, a royal coat of arms and the colours reflect the Spanish Republic, leaving no representation for portugal. I'm all for changes, and I think Iberia itself is a great change from the Earth equivalent, but the language is hugely important for South Aegea, its history and its roleplay. ~ Jeb.


 * Many republics (Bulgaria, Hungary, Georgia, Montenegro, Serbia, etc.) have royal coat of arms, it's not uncommon, nor is it out of place (historical reasons). An Empire needs a lingua franca, yes, and it would have been Portuguese for Iberia. I'm just very reticent in having 'Spanish' (whatever name you want it to be I don't mind at all) be in Europa. There could be an Iberia without Spanish and a South Aegea with Spanish, and that's the beauty of Kobol, we can make it work out, realistically. There's a need to historical similitude to a certain point for the sake of culture and language development. For instance, the Napoleonic laws and systems (metric), need to be implement to Europa in one way or another, so it's important to have a "Napoleonic era", which I thought of in with Vale as the 'French' speaking homeland, still developing it. I did a rough language map of Europa if you want to have a look, you see how it might seem a bit complicated but I'm making it work with past European history so it makes sense linguistically (e.g. here). ~ Juls


 * So Germany can have a German language but Iberia can't have Spanish? in my history it was the Iberians who brought Castillian and Portuguese to South Aegea ~ Jeb.


 * Well it would still be the Iberians, although Castillian itself would have developed in South Aegea instead of in Iberia. It would need the various languages of Iberia from Catalan to Portuguese to Mirandese/Leonese to Asturian, Basque and Cantabrian, to exist. Oh wait nevermind, I just realized your point about the lingua franca and it makes sense. The colons would necessarily use Portuguese to communicate and if the other colonial languages were to develop as various dialects due to proximity and such, a similar process would have been made in Iberia itself, so that wouldn't work, hmm. Then I guess a solution would be to have Castillan originating from Iberia, but there'd be a reverse French process. Meaning, as France colonized New France, most of the colons were speaking their own patois or regional language/dialect of the langue d'oïl, just like in the rest of France. However, as there was a lack of women and population growth in the new colony, the Kingdom gave young orphan women and other women sums of money to go marry colons in New France (they'd be later known as filles du roi) and those women spoke the French of Paris, of the court. As such, the French spoken in New France was the French of Paris, and not regional patois or dialects. France later standardized French and the whole country was forced to speak only French. So what I propose is that we have the other way around, whereas Castillian is spoken in Madrid, it is brought to South Aegea as the lingua franca and is learned with Portuguese as the main language for the children of colons in South Aegea. But in Iberia, Castillian was isolated to the language of the King and the court, and eventually through succession crisis and potential a civil war, Portuguese, Catalan and Occitan were made the official languages with Portuguese as lingua franca in the west and colonies, southwest of Iberia, Catalan in the east and mediterranean and Occitan in the north. South Aegea then retained Castillian and Portuguese as languages, while it died in Iberia? And that'd be around the time South Aegea gained independence? Not sure which time is more appropriate or if you like the idea at all, since in Kobol the irl 20th century era (technology-wise) is the 16th century. ~ Juls

That seems an overly complicated approach which deeply changes my history, bear in mind that South Aegea is one of the main three states on Kobol which are likely to see the highest amount of activity (along with Vale and the United States), all other states are RP states, so changing the history of one RP state such as Iberia is likely to have a much greater impact on South Aegea, and me as its controller, than Vale or the US, it's all I ask. Furthermore, without Castillian, we are denying huge realities, such as the Flamenco Music of Spain, the whole gipsy culture would disappear, great artists would go along with it, such as Miguel de Cervantes who wrote the first ever modern novel, and without him you have no Don Quixote. Also, you wouldn't have the first ever dictionary, you wouldn't have the Rock en Espanol genre of music, scores of writers, musicians, films, books originating in Spain would simply disappear in the blink of an eye. All of these things influenced South Aegean culture massively and without them, there simply wouldn't be a South Aegea such as I envisage it. I don't want to change something that I've worked hard to complete and it makes me feel as if I have to make changes to my state in order to accommodate to rigid positions, so far I haven't even suggested changes to Vale or the United States because I understand the value of these states as the only other two "active" states. Additionally, there wouldn't be such a thing as "Hispanidad Day" which is celebrated as a national and patriotic day in Iberoamerica, there wouldn't be the sense of brotherhood between Spanish speakers or cultural affinities as close as I envisage them. So, once again, I ask the question, if Italy can have Italian, and Germany can have German, why can Spain not have Spanish?


 * It's not an overly complicated approach. History is complicated, and we're creating a whole new world, so of course to make it work, there needs to be stuff seemingly complicated to have occurred. Now, all the cultural aspects that came with the Spanish language would have been made partly in Iberia and mostly in the New World and there still can be an Iberoamerican brotherhood feel. You can suggest any change to Vale, as to anything else, it's a group project after all, not an individual each-work-in-his-corner thing. Kobol as a whole and all its countries are linked, therefore they all matter to each other. If there's no Roman Empire (or a latin-speaking similar historical period), there's no modern Romance languages, for instance. If there's no Mongol invasion, there's no Hungarian, Estonian or other Finno-Ugaric languages. So to answer your question, there is no Spain. Just like there is no Germany and no Italy. They're different because this is Kobol, not a carbon copy of Earth. The Kobol Germany is different culturally and socially than Earth's Germany. I personally envisioned Iberia as a melting pot of all the various languages in that area, which were oppressed on Earth by Spain and France, which is sad. I don't have a rigid position, I'm up for compromises and we're discussing this as we should. I expressed and explained my opinion, and proposed a solution to the dilemma. Now, as a last solution, I'm willing to compromise to keep a province or two of Iberia to speak mainly Castillian (I was thinking Toledo and Murcia), but as I previously stated, I'd rather not, personally. What is your opinion on that? It would also help if you told me how you think Iberia should be exactly because otherwise I'll just back off completely from Iberia and let you develop it entirely because I'm done discussing this, and I understand the importance of Iberia for you. I said what I had to say, now you take a decision. ~ Juls


 * I find it hard to imagine how the iberoamerican "feel" can work without the Aegeas and Iberia having a language in common than isn't Castillian. Everyone in the spanish-speaking workd knows that the most well-known spanish-language newspaper is El Pais, just like in the English Speaking world you have The Times of London or the New York Times. I had imagined a "Special Relationship" between South Aegea and Iberia as close as the one between the US and the UK so it's hard to see how that can work without having Spanish as a common language. Iberia is already vastly different from the RL version: there's no monarchy, there's no independent Portugal, it's a federal republic, it's many languages have official status, need I go on? in other words, having Spanish as an official language isn't going to make much of a difference and it is certainly not a carbon copy of Earth. I am also willing to compromise because I don't want to take on Iberia as mine, in fact I don't want to take any country as mine other than my own but Iberia is so important to me that I would like to have a say in how it is run. One thing I haven't mentioned is that even though Spain has many different cultures and identities like Basque, Catalan, Galician it doesn't mean that Castile isn't a culture and an identity in its own right. Not having Castile in Iberia means discriminating against the Castillians (there is such a thing as Castillian culture: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Castilian_people ). It's as if we started discriminating against the Catalans or Galicians; so Castile is as important as Catalonia or Portugal or Euskadi. I think we can reach a compromise if we establish Castile, either "Castilla Y Leon" or "Castilla La Mancha" ( I personally prefer the latter) and have one other province, Andalusia as a Castillian speaking province. The national music of Andalusia is Copla (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copla_%28music%29) and I find it very hard to imagine Copla being sung in Portuguese, plus Andalusian Spanish is very distinct and very unique, the closest thing to it would probably Chilean Spanish, which again, links in with the importance of Iberia for the development of language in South Aegea.


 * Also, I have taken the liberty to design a more appropriate flag, one with more historical meaning than the 20th century republican flag which doesn't represent portugal at all. To explain it a bit, I have used the Cross of Burgundy (used by the Spanish Empire) and the blue colour of the royal flag of portugal (the current flag of Portugal is also a 20th century invention). I've superimposed the Pillars of Hercules and the olive branches of the greater and the Orb of the lesser coat of arms of portugal on the flag. I've made several versions:

http://kobol.shoutwiki.com/wiki/File:Iberia_Flag_V1.png http://kobol.shoutwiki.com/wiki/File:Iberia_Flag_V2.png http://kobol.shoutwiki.com/wiki/File:Iberia_Flag_V3.png http://kobol.shoutwiki.com/wiki/File:Iberia_Flag_V4.png

What do you think?


 * "Not having Castile in Iberia means discriminating against the Castillians", that frankly made me snap, because a) I'm not discriminating against Castillians and know very well they're a culture and identity, even a people to me and b) it's Kobol, not Earth (I hate that argument but it's true), so it's obviously different and there could very be no Castillian culture in Kobol if we were to decide so or no French culture or no Swedish culture (as it's the case for example, though it used to exist and evolved into other things). Now to address your vision, I think La Mancha and Andalusia would work well for Castillian, however if possible keeping Portuguese-speaking small minorities in the two provinces, if Murcia stays Portuguese speaking. And your flags are amazing, any would work, although I particularly like the V2, but any is gorgeous! ~ Juls


 * I didn't use the word "discriminating" in terms of prejudice, I meant in general terms, it's just a manner of speech. I'm fine with La Mancha and Andalusia, at least the Don Quixote epic will exist and it will be Iberian. As for Portuguese, I was thinking that all of Iberia could be Portuguese-speaking, as a lingua franca, along with Castillian but with all the other minority languages being widely spoken and with small minorities of Castillian speakers also existing in the Portuguese regions like Portugal and Galicia. I'm fine with Murcia staying Portuguese. Thanks for the comment on the flags, I'll continue to tweak them here and there until they look perfect ;) ~ Jeb.