How I learnt Romansh and why I love it (guest post by Ogrim)

[rdearman]

Hello everyone, Ogrim has very kindly written a guest post for the main site on Romansh. I highly recommend it! A big thanks to Ogrim!

http://language-learners.org/2016/04/13/how-i-learnt-romansh-and-why-i-love-it-guest-post-by-ogrim/

[iguanamon]

What a wonderful and well written guest post by Ogrim. It makes me appreciate the richness and uniqueness of Romansh. Thanks to Ogrim for a job well done! It's so nice to see the background. I've always been curious.

[smallwhite]

May I suggest the "This guest post written by senior forum member Ogrim who speaks: Norwegian (N), English (C2)..." block to appear also at the top of the page? Like filling out profiles on the forum, that could tell us a bit about the author before we start reading, and that it's Ogrim who's talking right from the first paragraph and not Rick (rdearman), since on other blogs, guest posts often have an introduction paragraph written by the blog-owner, plus right now it says (posted by) "Rick" (rdearman) at the top and it's confusing.

[PeterMollenburg]

A nice read, thanks Ogrim. A got out the trusty google maps and zoomed in on Grisons. An interesting language indeed

Side note:
Why is 'that' site called the 'main site'? I'm lost, I thought THIS was the main site.

PM
(confused as usual)

[AlexTG]

In the "What is Romansh" section, the north Italian language 'Ladino' should probably be called 'Ladin' to distinguish it from the Judeo-Spanish 'Ladino'.

[Bakunin]

This is a beautiful article, thanks, Ogrim! As someone who lives only an hour and a half from the Romansh speaking areas, I can attest that it is a beautiful and fascinating language. The area where it was spoken used to be much bigger as can be seen by place names all around the few remaining valleys where it's still spoken these days (extending well into Austria and other parts of Switzerland), but German has been expanding at the expense of Romansh for many centuries already and continues to do so. With the fall of Chur, the "capital" of Grison, in the 15th century, Romansh lost its only urban center. Due to the strong support by the Confederation, the language is still visible and audible, even to tourists. I always enjoy the moment when the automatic train announcements switch from German to Romansh entering Surselva, close to the point where the two Rhines join.

[Ogrim]

Thanks to all for your kind words. It was fun writing this piece. A decision I struggled with was whether to include a paragraph going a bit into detail about Romansh grammar, but I decided against because the aim was not to write a language profile, and the text would have been very long if I did so.

May I suggest the "This guest post written by senior forum member Ogrim who speaks: Norwegian (N), English (C2)..." block to appear also at the top of the page? Like filling out profiles on the forum, that could tell us a bit about the author before we start reading, and that it's Ogrim who's talking right from the first paragraph and not Rick (rdearman), since on other blogs, guest posts often have an introduction paragraph written by the blog-owner, plus right now it says (posted by) "Rick" (rdearman) at the top and it's confusing.

I think it is a good idea to move the tagline to the top of the page. In any case I have asked the admin to modify my tagline slightly, now it just repeats the list in my profile and I think it looks a bit odd for the main page.

In the "What is Romansh" section, the north Italian language 'Ladino' should probably be called 'Ladin' to distinguish it from the Judeo-Spanish 'Ladino'.

You are right, that is a stupid typo which can be confusing. I have asked the admin to modify it.

Side note:
Why is 'that' site called the 'main site'? I'm lost, I thought THIS was the main site.

PM
(confused as usual)

The "main site" is the part of the site where only the admin can publish or make changes. The main site should function as the "gateway" to the forum. I found HTLAL that way - I read the articles and language profiles on the main page, and only later discovered that there was a forum.

This is a beautiful article, thanks, Ogrim! As someone who lives only an hour and a half from the Romansh speaking areas, I can attest that it is a beautiful and fascinating language.

Lucky you . I wish I had more opportunities to go to Surselva and practise speaking a little bit. I am too far away to take a day trip.

[rdearman]

May I suggest the "This guest post written by senior forum member Ogrim who speaks: Norwegian (N), English (C2)..." block to appear also at the top of the page? Like filling out profiles on the forum, that could tell us a bit about the author before we start reading, and that it's Ogrim who's talking right from the first paragraph and not Rick (rdearman), since on other blogs, guest posts often have an introduction paragraph written by the blog-owner, plus right now it says (posted by) "Rick" (rdearman) at the top and it's confusing.

hummm.... the clue was in the subject line. (guest post by Ogrim) and traditionally taglines are at the bottom of the article. But I'll look at putting a short intro to guest posts in future rather than relying on the subject line.

[rdearman]

A nice read, thanks Ogrim. A got out the trusty google maps and zoomed in on Grisons. An interesting language indeed

Side note:
Why is 'that' site called the 'main site'? I'm lost, I thought THIS was the main site.

PM
(confused as usual)

It is called that just because it is at the top of the domain tree. The domain name "root" is "language-learners.org" and sub-domains have another name prepended in front of the root. The forum and the Super Challenge are sub-domains of the main site. Like this.
language-learners.org
...forum.language-learners.org
...sc2016-17.language-learners.org/