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Social/political factors are important so long as the linguistic forms are closely
related.
For instance, we can argue whether Scots is a dialect of English or actually a
separate dialect. We can further recognize that if Scotland had remained an
independent country than Scots would likely be considered a "language".
On the other hand, if the forms are very divergent (e.g. Basque vs French/Spanish),
then the reality is that there are multiple languages. Even if Basque is called a
"dialect" or "patois" for some reason, the speakers understand that Basque is
nothing like French or Spanish.
Similarly, speakers of Cantonese vs Mandarin may identify themselves as Chinese
speakers, but understand that the "dialects" are not mutually intelligible. Linguistic
reality does sometime intrude,
On a side note, a speaker of a minority language/culture like Welsh may have
patriotic feelings for the U.K. as a whole, but still feel a separate identity (i.e. British,
but not English). Language identity and cultural identity do not always overlap.
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