Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions (use English)

Examples

In a new attempt to enhance the practicality of this guideline (and its coherence with other naming conventions guidelines), I propose an approach where on this talk page we would work with examples, lots or examples - first see if we can agree on these examples, without worrying about how to grasp that in a guideline formulation.

My best guess at this point is that if we have enough examples on which we agree, that the way the guideline should be (re)formulated would be the easiest part, after a certain time.

A German-English example

A month ago someone created Eine Alpensinfonie - today I created An Alpine Symphony as a redirect to that page.

So, for me, I'm quite indifferent whether the one is the content page and the other the redirect, or vice versa - anyway, as far as I'm concerned the present situation is OK, and I see no reason to propose a change.

Any ideas? --Francis Schonken 14:46, 27 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

A cursory web search indicates that "Eine Alpensinfonie" is by far the commoner title in use, so I'd stick with that for the content, and keep "An Alpine Symphony" as the redirect. --Stemonitis 08:45, 28 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

We probably should not use An or Eine in the article title. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 17:08, 23 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

A French-English example

Fin de siècle exists already for some time, current redirects:

(French): Fin-de-siècle
(Without diacritics): Fin De Siecle, Fin de siecle, Fin de Siecle
(English): Turn-of-the-century, Turn of the century

In this case I have a preference: "Fin de siècle" has a richer set of connotations than the English equivalent/calque; without accent grave doesn't seem too suited to me, and French with hyphens is probably not as current as without. In other words, my present preference is to keep it as it is, only, maybe still add Fin-de-siecle as a redirect. --Francis Schonken 12:55, 28 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Lets keep as is, calquing is the work of the Devil.Cameron Nedland 02:34, 13 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

A French/English-English example

A bit more tricky - I proposed this WP:RM:

Talk:Salomé — Salomé → Salome – "Salome" appears to be more often used in English than "Salomé", e.g. Oscar Wilde names his play Salomé in French and Salome in English, see Salome (play)#External links for the original text of both the French and English version of this play

Please go vote at talk:Salomé#Requested move one way or another, this helps making clear how the wikipedia community thinks about the border zones of WP:UE! --Francis Schonken 19:10, 28 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

After a fairly unanymous vote, the page was moved to Salome. --Francis Schonken 09:07, 19 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

A Norse/Old English-English example

Another WP:RM vote recently initiated:

Talk:Níðhöggr/archive1 — Níðhöggr → Nidhogg – Move article back to English name for the mythical creature... editor who moved it claims that if a name isn't common enough in English by his standards that we should use archaic Icelandic instead, rejecting the Wikipedia:Use English standard and creating his own. DreamGuy 23:16, 27 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
I've been using 10 sources to write that article, 5 of them are in English. None of them uses or even mentions the spelling "Nidhogg" which is now being claimed to be "the English form". - Haukur Þorgeirsson 19:37, 28 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Notification copied here by Francis Schonken 19:26, 28 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I closed this vote on December 4th as having no consensus either way. Please continue any unresolved discussion from the vote here, not on the associated talk page. JRM · Talk 01:18, 4 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Diacritics, South Slavic languages

I've been searching many Wikipedia: namespace articles for "established" convention of naming the articles with diacritics but I'm confused at the end. So, I'll pose this as a question:

How to name articles with diacritic (non-Western) letters about South Slavic topics?.

The current situation is pretty much a mess. Take a look at e.g. Category:Serbia stubs. Most pages do have diacritic marks on Serbian-specific letters (š, č, ć, ž), but some don't (Kostana, Marko Lopusina). And no, there are no "well-established English names" nor the language(s) have "official transliteration" -- the most common 'transliteration' is mere "drop the diacritics". My proposal for resolving the situation is to create non-diacritic pages redirecting to "diacritic" ones (like Nada Obric). In this way, one gets correct spelling (which matters) but English speakers can relatively easily find the page using solely English letters. But this ought to be listed somewhere as an official policy so that I don't waste my time convincing other editors (most of them from Balkans) to do so for every affected page. Duja 11:56, 30 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, this is indeed a good suggestion and it is in practice what is done for almost all articles for locations and people related to European countries which use the Latin alphabet, exceptions are places which have English names separate from the name used in the country, e.g. Nuremberg. There are also some articles, manly stubs, which do not use the diacritics marks but when people get round to expanding them they are usually moved to the version with diacritics by the expander. It is very difficult to get this into the "official" policy, even when there is a broad majority for this, see e.g. Wikipedia:Naming conventions (Norse mythology) and the talk page there, and if these moves get posted to Requested moves there are always some people who have never look at the article but start opposing. Stefán Ingi 12:10, 30 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry for multiposting – Wikiproblems; fixed. OK, I'll see what I can do among the, erm, community of South-European editors about it.

It would be far easier to make it an official policy though -- are you referring to the, erm, doubtful 62:48 vote on Diacritics (I only stumbled over it)? Duja 12:22, 30 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Current article moving policy with voting is IMO also a bad idea. And voting is, for the most part, a bad idea as well. I already moved pages few times without the consensus, fixing obvious mistakes. It makes it difficult to fix things that are more or less obviously misnamed. Duja 12:22, 30 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I wholeheartedly agree with you, Duja, as can be seen in my latest screed on Talk:Níðhöggr where I use Lech Wałęsa as an example. - Haukur Þorgeirsson 12:28, 30 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Ah, thus the link to Talk:Níðhöggr ;-). Voted. Noblesse oblige :-). Duja 12:51, 30 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

A Polish/French-English example

In 1810 a guy was was given the name Fryderyk when he was born in Poland. When he was 20 years old he moved to Paris, hence his first name was better known as Frédéric. The English equivalent of that is Frederic (or Frederick?), nonentheless the wikipedia article is at Frédéric Chopin. That's OK for me, though I could live with Frederic Chopin too. Note that on recordings with the sleeve notes in English the name is most often written with the French accents, so there seems no problem at all to keep the guy where he is now. --Francis Schonken 11:00, 4 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

An American/South Slavic roots/Belgian-English example

This pianist and composer lives in the French-speaking part Belgium for nearly 30 years: Frederic Rzewski. Nonetheless his first name did not get affected by French accents. --Francis Schonken 11:00, 4 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

A German/Italian-English example

Crowned Emperor in Rome, he was known in his home country by his German name: Friedrich I. von Hohenstaufen, with a nickname that was the Italian version of Redbeard. The wikipedia article is at Frederick Barbarossa - why not Friedrich Barbarossa? Or Friedrich Redbeard? Or Frederic Barbarossa? Or Frederic Redbeard? etc... I think "Barbarossa" is agreed to be the common name. Whether "Friedrich" or "Frederick" is more suitable as first name mentioned in the wikipedia article name I don't know, but I can live with what it is now. --Francis Schonken 11:00, 4 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I personally have only heard him called Fredrick Barbarossa.Cameron Nedland 02:37, 13 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

An Estonian-English example

The Estonian composer Arvo Pärt is known in the Western world usually with the diacritical on the "a" of his last name. Maybe some record sellers have him in the search engine as "Part", e.g. Amazon, but when they show an image of a CD (which nowadays have almost always the title and notes in English), the spelling is always with the diacritical, e.g. "Orient & Occident" at Amazon

So, no, I don't think this problematic, "Arvo Pärt" seems the only logical choice. --Francis Schonken 11:00, 4 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

A Czech/Bohemian-English example

For similar reasons as the previous I prefer Leoš Janáček above Leos Janacek or Leos Janácek for the article title in English wikipedia. In this case the version without accents has a higher Google result than with diacriticals. Nonetheless, English CD's, concert program notes and books (like John Tyrell's Janáček's Operas) always have the diacriticals, as well on vowels as on consonants. --Francis Schonken 11:00, 4 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

The diacritics will cause fewer mispronunciations.Cameron Nedland 02:38, 13 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

A Polish-English example

The Polish union leader that later became president is now at Lech Wałęsa. With this one I don't agree: this guy has major press coverage in the Western world, where his name is nearly always spelled Lech Walesa, for example the Time magazine covers shown in Lech's article. "Lech Wałęsa" seems like "Fryderyk Szopen" to me: an irrelevant academic correctness for an article title, while that name, by native English speakers, is without doubt much easier recognised as "Frédéric Chopin".

Consequently, I'll trigger a WP:RM on Lech (to my surprise there doesn't seem to have been one yet). --Francis Schonken 11:00, 4 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

After a fairly unanymous vote, the page was not moved. --Francis Schonken
07:29, 28 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

FWIW, whatever correctness there may be to "Fryderyk Szopen" is not of the academic kind. "Chopin" is based not so much on FC's adult life as an expatriate in France as bcz it was the French name of his French father, who was in Poland as an expatriate (and presumably searcher after his lost-for-generations Polish roots).
--Jerzy•t 04:37, 26 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I have to say that I think you are making a lot of work out of something which is not going to be resolved this way. All that will be decided are the names of some specific articles, it is not a way to work out policy. This issue has been discussed for over a year and no agreement has been reached. --Philip Baird Shearer 11:36, 4 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Yeah, I made some work out of it (but don't exaggerate). Whether in the end it will make the guideline more practical, I don't know. I don't see a "line" in the examples yet, I mean: not something I could formulate in a simple principle. Maybe in the end the examples make us start to see a "line", which might help in a clearer formulation of the guideline. Maybe not, but then maybe a choice of representative examples (that help others in making choices) can be added to the guideline, for instance like wikipedia:Naming conventions (common names) which has several examples, as well of instances where the most "common name" has been used, as of instances where that was not the case. But for that conventions text, the whole, that is the principles and their explanation & exceptions + selected examples, give IMHO an insight in how it works - which is far from how things are w.r.t. WP:UE, which is presently only used to slap other wikipedians on the head with, whatever preference one wants to push.

Don't take your failures out on me. I don't intend to "discuss" at length too much. Let examples speak for themselves as much as possible. If the examples bring clarity I'm sure that will make the discussion in the end shorter, while clearer and less emotional. --Francis Schonken 12:26, 4 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

It is not my failure or anyone else's. This issue has turned out to be as is a devise as American English and Commonwealth English. The examples you are dredging up are not going to clarify the situation. The 60% threshold for a consensus for an individual "Wikipedia:requested move" can not be used as an indication for setting a Naming Convention, which must need to be closer to a true consensus than a 60% supermajority for controversial and divisive issues. If I did not think you were acting out of misguided good faith I would be tempted to thing that this was a troll. --Philip Baird Shearer 13:19, 4 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I suppose I think oracle-like assertions ("The examples you are dredging up are not going to clarify the situation") even of less help. --Francis Schonken 13:36, 4 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Another attempt to build a consensus

Clearly as the straw poll shows the Wikipedia community is at present not able to build a consensus over the use of diacritics in article names. Over the last year this issue has wasted a lot of time for a lot of Wikipedia editors and Francis Schonken's latest attempt will IMHO waste a lot more without reaching any consensus. So I have added the following to the page.

Words with diacritics need not be respelled to contain only the 26 letters of the English alphabet, nor vice-versa; for example, either Zurich or Zürich is acceptable. If agreement can not be reached over the spelling of a word, then consider following the spelling style preferred by the first major contributor (that is, not a stub) to the article.

The first sentence is an adaptation of the current WP:UE "American spellings need not be respelled to British standards nor vice-versa; for example, either Colour or Color is acceptable." The second WP:MOS#National varieties of English "If all else fails, consider following the spelling style preferred by the first major contributor (that is, not a stub) to the article."

I have removed my original third sentence from the previous attemt, which was an attempt to adapt the WP:UE phrase "However, any non-Latin-alphabet native name should be given within the first line of the article (with a Latin-alphabet transliteration if the English name does not correspond to a transliteration of the native name)" because this has been added with other words since I originally proposed this compromise. --Philip Baird Shearer 11:36, 4 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Well, I don't agree with your new paragraph, so I removed it. Simply said: there's no consensus to push it that way. If you fear to waste time with the approach "by examples", then I wouldn't invite you to take part in it: just make up your own mind. I can't guarantee any results re. the guideline formulation, but I see that any WP:RM vote in the end has a "result" (whether that result is qualified "consensus" or not), in the end an article is at one place or another. Pushing your preference, after having established that all previous attempts did not result in anything is obviously a loss of time too, while simply, there's no consensus about it.

re. "...style preferred by the first major contributor", I wouldn't apply it in this case. It was applied -against what I'd proposed- in WP:CITE. A few weeks later the person pushing the formulation was on my user talk page asking I'd comment on the RfC conducted against him, based on the interpretation of "...style preferred by the first major contributor". So I think "...style preferred by the first major contributor", is not the way forward, if other techniques to achieve consensus (like WP:RM) are available. --Francis Schonken 12:04, 4 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

After a year of this there is no consensus available via WP:RM or consensus building on this page. WP:RM uses a very low threshold for consensus and in every case where there is a debate there is no agreed method for deciding which style of spelling is the "best" one. So any WP:RM debate only applies to that page. Further when we tried to hold a straw poll about the issue there was no consensus.

The wording I have added does not say that one has to use the first contributer only to suggest that is is used if no other agreement can be reached. This does not stop a vote in WP:RM reversing it for specific pages. The wording is from the AE CE section of the WP:MOS and works well in disputes over different English spellings and words Eg color/colour or petrol/gasoline or tram/street car. So the wording does not stop you putting up test cases (although I think them a waste of time).

I am going to reverse your removal. If someone else (other than you) delets the two sentences then so be it, I will not put them back again. This is nothing against you but it seems the easiest way for us to agree to differ. --Philip Baird Shearer 12:34, 4 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

So, pushing your POV in the guideline whatever the odds? Presently there's 50% of the people involved who want it in (that is you), and 50% of the people involved who want it out (which is me). Which can only be called "consensus" in a very confused way ("it seems the easiest way for us to agree to differ" - what a convoluted nonsense). If no consensus, it goes out. --Francis Schonken 12:43, 4 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

No Francice I am trying to avoid a revert war with you, please read what I wrote. I said if another person agrees with you and delets it I will not revert it. Seems to me that I an not "pushing [a] POV in the guideline whatever the odds". But as you and I dissagree all that is happening now is that we are getting into a revert war. --Philip Baird Shearer 13:02, 4 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

It's not up to you to make the rules of how consensus works. And re-invent them every time we meet. You removed some of my stuff from wikipedia:Naming conventions (names and titles) saying I had not been successful in building consensus prior to making the change (quote: "You have not built a consensus to do this so please do not make any changes to the article until you have built a consensus to do so." diff - note that the change in question had been notified on the talk page of that guideline and on wikipedia:current surveys without receiving any negative comment several weeks before I operated the change). Now apply the same principles to yourself. --Francis Schonken 13:31, 4 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Hello! I concur with Francis Schonken: this is probably not the way to go about arriving at consensus on this. As well, there's a distinct difference between rendering different dialectic spellings in English (e.g., American/British, et al.) and words with non-native derivation. In absence of any consensus I support inclusion of variants, not exclusion of one or the other based on what may or may not be a subjective instigating preference. Including this is not a modus vivendi: discuss it here and arrive at consensus here first. E Pluribus Anthony 13:11, 4 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

tx, let's return to reasonable arguments. --Francis Schonken 13:31, 4 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I am also in favour of including common variants on the first line of the article. This is nothing to do with that. This is to do with whether the page should reside under the name Zurich or Zürich and how to minimise disputes over the name of the article. --Philip Baird Shearer 13:47, 4 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

We agree to disagree; these numerous issues are inextricably linked. Until consensus is reached (or identified) on these issues, and there is currently none, discuss them here before amending conventions. E Pluribus Anthony 21:24, 4 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Haukurth's proposal

When considering a title change for an article it can be useful to consider some of the following questions, though none of them settles the matter definitively.

What spelling did the first author of the article use?
What spelling do those who have contributed most extensively to the article seem to prefer?
What spellings are used in the references used to write the article?
What spellings are used in other reference works which treat the matter in similar detail?
Are there any technical issues involved? Have they changed in the past? Will they change in the future?

Try to work with other regular editors of the article in question towards solving the question with consensus or a compromise. If outside attention is needed a move request can be filed and a vote started. Votes are usually a poor framework for building consensus so consider using that option only when all else fails. Try to stay cool and maintain a sense of proportion - the title of the article is far less important to the reader than the contents of the article.

(moved here for discussion by Francis Schonken)

What has this to do specifically with "use English"? Rather seems stuff for wikipedia:naming conflict or for the intro of wikipedia:requested moves. --Francis Schonken 21:20, 4 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, this is quite general and might belong elsewhere. But it's the "use English" convention which seems to be the most flammable part of our article naming scheme (being vague and disputed) so I thought it would be at home there. These are thoughts along similar lines as Philip's live-and-let-live idea and I feel they might be helpful.

But if you think this is out of place then that's fine, I'm not going to press the issue. - Haukur Þorgeirsson 21:32, 4 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Hello! What's good for the goose may not be for the gander. I believe another meaning of 'live-and-let-live' may be to let sleeping dogs lie: discuss proposed changes (that may or may not be NPOV) before amending or adding to Wp conventions and (given long-standing controversies) only when consensus is reached or IDd with them. E Pluribus Anthony 21:40, 4 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Neah, just boldly edit the thing. Someone will revert you if they don't like it. And there's no consensus on the present convention anyhow - or at least no consensus in how to interpret it. - Haukur Þorgeirsson 21:43, 4 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Noted. I sometimes agree in shaking the tree to see what falls from it ... just so long as you're not injured in the process. If the fruit is forbidden, so much the better. :) E Pluribus Anthony 21:46, 4 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Standardized names across all wikis?

Is an alternate that might be better than having language-x-ized articles all over the place, and making life oh-so-difficult on transwiki bots and other automated validity tools, as well as difficult on search engines.Kim Bruning 03:55, 6 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I don't understand what any of that means. —Michael Z. 2005-12-6 04:18 Z

If you use the same name for an article in all languages (at least when refering to proper nouns), you get the added advantage of being able to find the artice quickly in all languages, and you'll be able to translate between articles that much faster. Kim Bruning 04:28, 6 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Do you mean the article titles only? I couldn't see this working out. There would be too much resistance if I moved Taras Shevchenko to Тарас Шевченко, or Beijing to 北京, for example. —Michael Z. 2005-12-6 04:34 Z

Which is probably petty, because redirects take all the pain out of that. Of course, if there's some way that redirects *don't* take all the pain out... then that's interesting. Kim Bruning 04:47, 6 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Well, there's the title at the top of the page and in the browser's title bar. If you browsed a bunch of articles on Chinese cities, you'd have a hard time going back to a particular one in your browser's history, unless you can read Chinese. —Michael Z. 2005-12-6 05:07 Z

So instead of redirects, we need actual aliases (hardlinks instead of softlinks, in unix parlance). Hmmm. Kim Bruning 05:38, 6 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

IMO we should definitely not have corresponding articles use identical names over all Wikis. For instance, the city of Geneva should be (and is) described under en:Geneva, fr:Genève, de:Genf; London under en:London, fr:Londres, it:Londra, nl:Londen; Brussels under en:Brussels, nl:Brussel, fr:Bruxelles, de:Brüssel, es:Bruselas, ru:Брюссель; etc. Interwiki links exist, and allow finding corresponding articles in various Wikis even if the article name is not identical: see for instance the "In other languages" section somewhere on the above-mentioned pages, usually at top or left depending on which skin you are using. -- Tonymec 04:43, 7 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I concur with Tonymec. E Pluribus Anthony 15:18, 7 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Giving "native versions"

I would like to tentatively propose (or at least see what other people think about the idea) that the requirement to give "native versions" of article names should only apply to proper names, such as personal names, names of organisations, and placenames. I am particularly inspired to this by the experience of the article on Baklawa, where at a previous stage of the article's evolution, the first paragraph consisted mainly of a list of names in bold type, many of them in scripts most of our readers probably can't read, and what's more all of them being more or less versions of the same word. Where we are just talking about a "thing" like a kind of food that is found in more than one country (thus leading to nationalistic demands for "all" the "native versions" to be included if any are), and for which there is one or more more-or-less established English names do we really need to give these foreign-language variants in all their multi-alphabetic glory?

I recognise that where what we are giving is a name of something that's not well known in English and the English name is therefore little more than a transcription of a foreign name, the situation may be slightly different (e.g. Mujaddara). Any comments? Palmiro | Talk 17:30, 10 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

In the case where there are many possible names or name variants it's often better to relocate them to a separate subsection (perhaps linked to with a footnote) rather than cluttering the first paragraph. That's what seems to have happened in your example. - Haukur Þorgeirsson 17:41, 10 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Mm, so should the guidelines explicitly recommend something like this? Palmiro | Talk 17:55, 10 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Definitely. How about:

If the list of word variations — by spelling (see hookah) or by language (see baklava) — is awkwardly long, e.g. longer than a single line:

a section at the bottom of the article should be dedicated to variations in spelling/language,
there should be a link from the top to the section alternate forms, and
a single term should be used throughout the article.

Thoughts? --Mgreenbe 18:06, 10 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Seems fine to me. My only beef is with the third point which may not apply in every case. For example if we're discussing what is basically the same dish but known by different names in different countries it might be expedient to use the local name in a subsection discussing a particular variant and another local name when discussing another local variant. - Haukur Þorgeirsson 18:14, 10 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

That could be the case sometimes. Actually, I think Hookah is fine as it is; my objection would be if we then had Arabic, Hebrew, Syriac, Farsi and Turkish (or whatever) versions of argilah and shisha. Palmiro | Talk 18:21, 10 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Indeed. Look at résumé for a somewhat messy lead sentence. Generally the reader is more interested in content than terminology-wrangling. Let's try to codify some common-sense recommendations while avoiding instruction creep and being too rigid. - Haukur Þorgeirsson 18:40, 10 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Instruction creep was also my worry. Perhaps something along the lines of:

"For the sake of concision, it may be helpful to move the list of word variations to a separate section; see Baklava for an example of this. For the sake of clarity and consistency, articles should use a single form whenever possible."

No more instructions, just advice. If it would help, we could be more specific in the second sentence, saying "Naturally, if circumstances call for a specific form, by all means use it." I don't think there's a need, though. --Mgreenbe 19:14, 10 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Okay - no-one has objected that something like this be included and several of us feel that it's a useful point. I'm inserting a short note into the convention. Feel free to improve, of course :) - Haukur 15:37, 16 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Hawaiian English in Hawaiʻi articles

I propose that it is acceptable and preferred, as mandated by the Hawaiian English standard (solely co-official with Hawaiian in the State of Hawaiʻi), to use full proper Hawaiian language spellings (including ʻokina and kahakō) in every instance of a word of Hawaiian origin in Wikipedia articles, except specifically in situations where a proper name (e.g. Hawaii Five-O) omits the detail. This includes the State of Hawaiʻi's official names for itself and its political terms and units (which differ from the United States national records—a note of this can be made where relevant). Article titles should also be appropriately rendered this way, with the flexible exception that (until Wikipedia either uses {{unicode|template}}-style Unicode character resolution for the display of article titles in HTML, or until the ʻokina becomes displayable for most computer users) article names can use a simple apostrophe (') for ʻokina, with existing redirects for (`) and the absence of the ʻokina altogether (where there is no confusion among minimal pairs), and additional redirects (also without confusion of minimal pairs) for article names without ʻokina nor kahakō. The {{okina}} template can be used for each instance of the ʻokina—this template also internally uses the {{unicode|template}}, which forces even obselete browsers such as Internet Explorer to scour each system's installed fonts for any font that includes the ʻokina character. Browsers such as Firefox do not have this problem, but the user must still have a font such as Arial Unicode MS or Code2000 that contains this character. In practice, Hawaiʻi-related articles and Hawaiian names and terms in other articles are already steadily integrating these conventions into article texts, as per Hawaiian English. For those who may dispute the appropriateness of using Hawaiian English and not American English in these contexts, it should be noted that:

The United States has no federal official language, and American English is a standard adopted individually by states.
Hawaiian English together with Hawaiian is the official language of the State of Hawaiʻi.
Though Hawaiian English is partially reliant on American English, plain American English itself is not an official language of Hawaiʻi.

- Gilgamesh 07:04, 15 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Indeed. As far as I can see this is already our policy :) Any national variety of English is allowed and Hawaiian English is preferred for Hawaiian topics just like Indian English for Indian topics. You should add a note to that effect in here. We don't really need a long note in the use English page but maybe the part on national varieties should be reworded a bit to make it clearer that it's not just a question of US vs. UK spellings. - Haukur 16:46, 18 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Okay, I went ahead and rewrote the relevant paragraph to be more explicit and, in my opinion, less weird. We usually don't refer to redirects as "articles" for one thing. Please improve as needed. Does this look acceptable to you, Gilgamesh? - Haukur 17:10, 18 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I see Philip shortened the paragraph a bit and added a link to the MOS. I think he's right - it makes sense to basically treat this in one place and link to it from other places. Any details about Hawaiian English specifically are best treated there. The only point we really need to get across here is that the rule holds for article titles as well as article content. I think the color/orange (colour) example illustrates that nicely. - Haukur 17:26, 18 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

HOAX regarding Hawaiian English

The writing of user Gilgamesh, above, is a HOAX. Wikipedia wants "no personal attacks", but encourages focussing on what people have written. Therefore, I am not attacking Gilgamesh, but rather, the hoax perpetrated through what he wrote above, and elsewhere in Wikipedia. In particular, Gilgamesh wrote above:

Hawaiian English together with Hawaiian is the official language of the State of Hawaiʻi.
Though Hawaiian English is partially reliant on American English, plain American English itself is not an official language of Hawaiʻi.

HOWEVER, as pointed out in May 2006, by user Bugmuncher, on the Hawaiian English talk page, The Constitution of the State of Hawaii does NOT specify "Hawaiian English", but rather, it specifies "English" as the first official language of the state. Therefore, Gilgamesh's writing is FALSE on both points. Bugmuncher supplied the following URL which exposes the LIES written by Gilgamesh. http://www.hawaii.gov/lrb/con/conart15.html

I added, to the Hawaiian English talk page, the following quotation from the constitution, in order to further expose (for those who don't click on links) the FALSE writing of Gilgamesh:

"OFFICIAL LANGUAGES

Section 4. English and Hawaiian shall be the official languages of Hawaii, except that Hawaiian shall be required for public acts and transactions only as provided by law. [Add Const Con 1978 and election Nov 7, 1978]" (italic added for emphasis)

The italicized portion of the quote PROVES that Hawaiian is NEVER REQUIRED unless there is a specific state LAW making such a requirement. As of today, the Hawaii Revised Statutes have NEVER REQUIRED Hawaiian for any purpose whatsoever.

The writing of Gilgamesh is a complete HOAX perpetrated on this talk page, and elsewhere in Wikipedia, as regards "Hawaiian English" being an "official language" of Hawaii, and any "mandate", or "standard", "to use full proper Hawaiian language spellings". The Wikipedia article that Gilgamesh referred you to, "Hawaiian English", was one that he wrote himself, and which contained the same HOAX. I tried to get the false article deleted, and some highly educated users, including Angr, Andrew Levine, Arthur Rubin, and GassyGuy, essentially agreed that Gilgamesh's hoax was "rubbish". Unfortunately, a user with very rude and dishonest writing, Calton, and the admin who made the call, Sean Black (both of whom apparently live in Japan), failed to acknowledge the hoax. I hope that all users and administrators who see this will make better choices than Sean Black did. Since Sean Black failed to delete the Hawaiian English article, I used Wikipedia's verification policy to justify my own deletion of the HOAX. I deleted the false statements --- the entire bit, except for one line that Andrew Levine had correctly de-falsified --- and added some true statements. So to see the original hoax that was written there, by Gilgamesh, you have to get it through the page history.

Agent X 01:56, 25 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia:Naming conventions (common names)

I think we've done some good work on updating this guideline lately. But another equally important project page is the "common names" guideline. I think it needs some work to more clearly reflect the opinions of Wikipedians. So please come on over, people and have a go at improving it! :) - Haukur 15:15, 18 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Proposing "Spelling according to first edition in English"

Proposing to add the following to WP:UE:

(v0.1) When in English there are two variant spellings of the same title of a book, film, etc..., use the version of the title according to the first full edition in English, unless when this version of the title is barely remembered.

Oddly, if this would become an acceptable part of WP:UE this says something in the diacritcs debate too (in the subject-specific range), if applied to, for instance, this example:

Salome (play) - First edition In English spells "Salome", subsequent editions sometimes spelled "Salomé", also in English;
Salomé (1923 film) - This film, based on the play, was first published in the USA, as "Salomé"; later, when it was published outside the US, it was known there as "Salome", apparently also in English-speaking countries. (see IMDb link in article about the film)

--Francis Schonken 14:22, 31 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

So what would "The Canterbury Tales" appear under or any book that was first published with a spelling different from the common modern spelling? --Philip Baird Shearer 14:58, 31 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

You have a point, although I'm not sure whether it applies to The Canterbury Tales (see, for instance, page XV of this PDF - first "complete" publication would be Thynne's 1532 edition, but it's not clear what spelling of the title is used there - and whether it differs from the first "modernised" edition from 1737/1740).

Is "modern spelling" defined in English? I mean, is that term unambiguous? E.g., from what period on would spelling be "modern"? "Common modern spelling" at least seems tackish to me, as there are at least several "common" modern spellings, according to Wikipedia:Manual of Style#National varieties of English. If, however, the concept "modern spelling" would not be provoking more controversy than it would solve, a formulation in this sense might be attempted:

(v0.2) When in English there are two variant spellings of the same title of a book, film, etc..., use the version of the title according to the first full edition in modern English, unless when this version of the title is barely remembered.

Anyway, for the Canterbury Tales, as probably for many other old books, I don't think the addition "modern" would be strictly necessary. Is, e.g., (the) Tales of Caunterbury as version of the Title "well remembered", in comparison to the version The Canterbury Tales? --Francis Schonken 16:49, 31 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Early Modern English, which seems better defined than "Modern English", is maybe useable, in this sense:

(v0.3) When in English there are two variant spellings of the same title of a book, film, etc..., use the version of the title according to the first full edition in English (for pre-1650 books: first full edition in English printed after the Early Modern English era), unless when this version of the title is barely remembered.

Would that work? --Francis Schonken 17:23, 31 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I don't have a strong opinion on this but it strikes me as likely that many people will prefer using the title of the best known edition to that of the first edition. - Haukur 17:28, 31 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I would say modern spelling came in with the general acceptance of dictionaries as we know them today. When was the first generally accepted dictionary introduced and used?

Is there a policy on movies released on different sides of the pond with different names?

For many centuries most educated English speaking people could read French, Does this mean that if a book was well known in English with a French name that only a translation of the name is acceptable. EG would this mean that "Le Morte d'Arthur" must be moved to "The Death of Arthur" or to it's original title "Le Morte Darthur"?

I don't think that guidelines on a title of a book needs to spelt out here in UE. It crosses too many other guidelines and will lead to more not less arguments. For example if a book is first published in New Zealand in hardback which sold <1,000 copies with CE spelling in the title but is best known in the American paperback addition using AE that sold in the millions and if the article with written using a title with the American spelling then, this suggested guideline would see it moved to the NZ spelling. This breaks common usage and probably the MOS's advice on national spelling. --Philip Baird Shearer 11:18, 1 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Philip, you come to about the same conclusions for books as what I just wrote at Wikipedia_talk:Naming_conventions_(films)#disambiguation_of_films_by_.22nationality.2Flanguage.22 re. films: no need to make new rules, for borderline issues that are (and have been) solved, without making them into a "problem", by a combination of common sense and existing guidelines.

Nonetheless, I'd appreciate if WP:UE would give some indication, specifically for books, *when* a title is translated to English and *in which cases* it isn't, for example: most of Alexandre Dumas, père's books are at the English equivalent of the title - I even used that as example in Wikipedia:Naming conventions (definite and indefinite articles at beginning of name)#Titles of works; now recently *exactly* the example I used to indicate a difference in the use of the definite article between English and French (Queen Margot) was moved to its French title: La Reine Margot is certainly not more English than the Les Trois Mousquetaires, yet these are still in all peace at their English equivalent, The Three Musketeers.

In sum, I think something should be done regarding the randomness with which titles are at their foreign original, or English equivalent.

Note, in this context, that, for example, for operas the "translation" issue is settled in Wikipedia:Naming conventions (operas); and that just now in Wikipedia:Village_pump_(policy)#Titl.28ing.29_books someone remarks that for books naming conventions are not really elaborated.

Shouldn't we start work on that, e.g. Wikipedia:Naming conventions (books), elaborating the *short* and apparently insufficient paragraph Wikipedia:Naming_conventions#Literary_works (which also doesn't mention how to handle book subtitles in article names, on which I could give only an *intuitive* answer at Wikipedia_talk:Naming_conventions#Literary_works_and_subtitles)? --Francis Schonken 13:02, 1 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Francis's recent additions

Francis has recently added two paragraphs. The first one reads

There appears no issue to this question as long as it is described in terms like: "When the native name of an entity contains characters with diacritics some Wikipedians prefer to use those diacritics in the relevant article title, even in cases where they are more often omitted in English texts. Others prefer to apply the most common principle throughout." However, treatment by topic often easily yields result, for example:

The second one is an example about some asteroids. I read this first paragraph as saying that nobody takes issue with the paragraph "When the native . . . principle throughout.". This is the exact paragraph which Haukur has repeatly inserted into the common names guideline and just as often is has been removed by Francis. He has exspressed opposition to it repeatedly, e.g. at [1] with the words "I have two reasons why I wouldn't do it (1) the "dispute" might get solved in a few weeks or months, and then the paragraph is incorrect (and might get forgotten, and then used to resuscitate the dispute, etc); (2) It adds unnecessary volume to this guideline, essentially saying "on this topic we have nothing to report" - in that cas, IMHO, leave it out." and at [2] with the words "I also can't agree with: [Haukur's paragraph] while I don't fit in either category:"

So what is going on? Don't these objections still apply? Stefán Ingi 20:54, 3 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

"No issue to a question" means: "no outcome to a question", or: "the question remains unresolved" - not what you read into it.

The rest of your remark is quite valueless, while based on misunderstanding, so I won't go into that, in order to give you the opportunity to reformulate.

All the objections you quote still apply, even more since it appears not too difficult to solve each and every diacritics question that has come up. So, is there still a diacritics question? I don't see any. I only see persons that try to formulate the diacritics question in an unresolvable format. A.k.a. making problems where there are none. --Francis Schonken 00:53, 4 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Ah, thank you, this makes everything a lot clearer. It's just that I had never seen this expression before and it confused me. As for the rest of your comment, it is of course a lot easier to resolve problems when they are split down into smaller chunks. I'm quite happy to agree with you that it's easy to resolve the diacritics question in each individual case (or rather in small chunks of related cases) but I worry that my willingness to do that relies on the fact that almost all the relevant moves have gone the way I want. This might also be related to the reason why Philip removed the section. Take care, Stefán Ingi 11:05, 4 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I have removed this addition because it does not sit comfortably in either Wikipedia:Naming conventions (use English) or Wikipedia:Naming conventions (common names) and have passed on the information to Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Astronomical objects#Minor planets so the people who edit that page can decide whether the WP:RM move was justified, and if they want to include it in their guideline. If they do then it can be added to WP:RM#Relevant policies and guidelines like that of Wikipedia:WikiProject Rivers etc --Philip Baird Shearer 00:50, 4 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

That's not enough IMO. It needs to be directly or indirectly available from the base Wikipedia:Naming conventions page, in such a way that that someone trying to decide what to name an article in the first place, and with as little as possible assumed knowledge of Wikipedia, will find it. Andrewa 15:00, 4 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I propose the creation of Wikipedia:Naming conventions (astronomy) and I'm surprised one doesn't exist already. Surely there are some recommendations somewhere buried in some project? :) - Haukur 15:09, 4 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I'm a bit surprised too. But it's not enough to create it. It also needs to be accessible. I support the creation of a new naming convention, assuming we can't eventually find one buried in some inaccessible backwater of our enormous project namespace (actually, Minister, you can't bury anything in a backwater,...). Andrewa 15:23, 4 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

"First catch your hare" I suggest that you raise the issue on Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Astronomical objects#Minor planets and with a group of like minded individuals see what can be done. However normally a "new naming convention" is not needed because the issue of page naming within a scope of a project is covered in the project page. For example the Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history states "Articles should be called something like Battle of Gettysburg or Siege of Nuremberg. "Battle" and "Siege" are neutral terms and are preferred to "attack", "slaughter", "massacre", "raid", etc..." or Wikipedia:WikiProject_Rivers says "River articles may be named "X", "X River", or "River X", depending on location and most common usage. "X river" and "X (river)" are not recommended. ...". --Philip Baird Shearer 19:31, 4 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I must disagree here. Yes, we should seek to involve the Wikiproject. But the desired outcome is a guideline that has been approved in the normal way, and is accessible through the more general guidelines so as to maximise the likelihood that someone looking for it will find it. Provided this is done, whether the details of this guideline are in the Wikiproject page, as a section of a more general guideline, or in a seperate guideline doesn't concern me. I don't think it matters in the least. I support creating a new guideline because it will do the job, and because there seems to be resistance (for reasons that mystify me) to incorporating this material in the more general guidelines. Andrewa 13:45, 5 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Well, there are two different things:

Whether and where it should be included in astrology-related project and/or naming conventions pages;
Whether it can be used (as a reference) in the guideline that (until now) centralises info on use of diacritics.

The first point is taken up by Andrewa elsewhere, thanks! But anyhow, that wasn't something to be sorted out on the WP:UE talk page.

For the second point, some questions are to be answered:

Is the example of the 10-odd planets stable? I mean, is there any chance that in the (near) future, the WP:RM multiple page move on these planets would be reverted? - Otherwise, of course, it would be not so interesting to use it as an example. We could wait till the astrology-related NC is fixed and meets community approval. That it would annihilate the WP:RM decision on these minor planets with diacritics seems however very unlikely to me, the consensus on the collective WP:RM vote was outspoken.
Would it be an instructive example? When it illustrates that the "no consensus" situation re. diacritics is not as hopeless as it seems, I don't think anybody would doubt it being an "illustrative" example. Maybe it could be balanced with an example of where there was a community decision not to apply diacritics. I don't have a series example on that, except if the three Leopold/Léopold kings of Belgium would be seen as a series (Leopold I of Belgium, Leopold II of Belgium, Leopold III of Belgium) - if they are used as example it would however be best to retrieve the Village Pump section where that was discussed & decided a few months ago.
Also Salome, Salome (play), Salome (opera) and Salomé (1923 film) could be used as a sort of "series" example, most of them with an "explicit" community approval (see also wikipedia talk:naming conventions (films)#disambiguation of films by "nationality/language"). This example is also illustrative that a "one strike" solution (i.e. a solution that propose diacritics in all cases or alternatively in no single case) wouldn't really work.
Do we accept such examples to be used on the guideline page, as the most appropriate guidance the WP:UE guideline has to offer presently, as long a "general formulation" of the involved principles seems to elude? No secret, also on this question I'm positive. If you can't grasp it by rules (which on top would have the disadvantage of risking to be instructions, a.k.a. near to instruction creep) - then list a few illustrative examples.

--Francis Schonken 15:03, 5 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Disagree with most of this, but I'm beginning to see the problem, and perhaps a solution.

Firstly, WP:UE is as good a place to discuss the first issue as anywhere. The question is, should we have a guideline at all? So far, we have a very strong consensus that the diacritics belong in these particular article names. The only vote against, before or after the poll, has been that of a malfunctioning bot. We also have a strong likelihood that the issue will arise again, and that without a guideline we'll just be re-inventing the wheel. So that's a no-brainer IMO.

Secondly, these questions to be answered are irrelevant to the matter under discussion. The first (might this decision be reverted?) is the whole point of having wider discussion before making this decision a guideline. Yes, of course the decision might be reverted with this wider participation, there'd be little point in seeking this wider participation otherwise. Let's take that a little further: If the decision on guidelines is that including the diacritics is not a good direction, then it should be reverted. That's the idea of a guideline. We follow it.

The basis of these questions seems to be the theory that we need to come to a consensus on this whole mess before we can have a guideline on astronomical features. If there was a good prospect of consensus soon on the larger issues, then it would be sensible to wait for the more general guideline. But it's not the only way.

It's a principle of heuristic to attack any tricky problem from all angles. So, why not try biting off a small chunk and solving it? That's the opportunity we have here. Let's take it. Andrewa 21:27, 5 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Are diacritics part of everyday English?

This has possibly been said before, there has been so much said before that I may have missed it...

Following the question about minor planet names, see Talk:657 Gunlöd, I began to ask myself, are there any other occasions when I, as a native speaker (writer), would use a diacritic as a normal and unaffected part of my writing? I found two cases in which I would: cliché and flambé both look wrong without the accent, and are current Wikipedia article titles. See Talk:Flambé, also of course List of English words with diacritics and English language#Written accents. Andrewa 15:15, 4 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Well, I was leafing through my Webster's 3rd Int'l 1981 printed edition just now, p. 258-259 there are the following:

böttger ware (named after Johann Friedrich Böttger)
bouche and bouché (not interchangable)
bouche fermée
bouchée
bouclé or boucle (interchangeable), but apparently always bouclé yarn (PS: Oxford English Minidictionary has only "bouclé")

On other pages of Webster's:

Always without accent: premiere, siege, chassis,...
Always with accent succès de scandale, succès d'estime, succès fou, fin-de-siècle (always with accent and hyphens), cliché (two entries, both with accent), clichéd, flambé, flambéed, château, château d'eau (which seems to have another meaning than in French),...
Interchangeable with diacritic or without: château d'eaus or chateaux d'eau (plural of "château d'eau" - wondering whether there isn't a typo involved),...

Note that in the Fin de siècle article someone remarks that "The expression often occurs in English prose without the grave accent" - which is different from what Webster's would have. --Francis Schonken 16:52, 4 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Another contributor has just commented at Talk:Cliché that they regard the diacritic on that article name as correct. Andrewa 13:27, 5 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

It's also a misleading question. Neutral Point of View isn't a part of everyday English, but a Wikipedia article can be held to higher standards. If we agree that diacritics play a part in the quest for accuracy (and we don't), then we should strive for them. Everyday English is a red herring in that debate. Arbor 13:44, 5 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Perhaps I could have expressed it better.

The situation is simply that a decision has been made, by due process, on the naming of a few asteroids. Several of those involved searched for a relevant naming guideline, and were surprised not to find one. Rather than repeat this search and discussion for every new article on a minor planet whose name includes a diacritic, we seek to implement such a guideline.

Resistance to this seems to centre on the assertion that diacritics are in some way contrary to the general principle of using English in article names, and by the intensity of some of the comments, I'm guessing that there is fear that this is the small end of the wedge, and may lead to proposals that other article names should also incorporate diacritics.

I don't think this is the case, but in any case, I think we should have a clear and accessible standard for the naming of astronomical features, and that it should be to follow the IAU guidelines, which in these cases means including the diacritics. Andrewa 14:16, 5 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Dispute or discussion?

I've put some more headings and a TOC into the article to make it a little easier to navigate.

In the headings I've used the word discussion rather than dispute. This is with two things in mind:

We've been a long time without consensus on some of these, and need to try some other tacks. Taking the heat and personalisation out of the discussion is one I recommend.

In the meantime, this convention remains in use (not just a proposal), and needs to be as useful as possible.

We're all here to build an encyclopedia. Winning arguments can be a help to this. But trying to win them is more often a hindrance IMO. See Wikipedia:rhetoric, User:Andrewa/creed. Andrewa 15:07, 7 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I think replacing dispute with discussion might indeed be a good idea for the reasons you outline. - Haukur 15:25, 7 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

See the Monty Python argument sketch. It is not a discussion it is a dispute because after more than a year of discussing the situation we are no closer to agreement on the issue. The section quite rightly says dispute. It is on the talk pages we discuss the dispute. --Philip Baird Shearer 15:31, 7 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Agree that Monty Python is an excellent insight on the current process.

If you find it more helpful to think of it as a dispute, I'm not going to revert. Actually, I very rarely revert anything. IMO the past year's discussion here hasn't been particularly productive, in that it hasn't left the guideline in a particularly useful condition. IMO the current version is neither clear in what it covers, nor in what it says, and as an inevitable result people are reluctant to refer to it. IMO the current process is unlikely to improve things.

So, I recommend you try something new. Backing off on the confrontational model would be my first choice, but it's not something anyone can impose on you. Andrewa 17:22, 7 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

We have an article on The Argument Skit for those not familiar with it. One of its key insights IMO is that sometimes people seem to enjoy arguing, even when they are losing and complaining. But this point is made with Pythonesque logic (as are many, many others), and IMO no article can do it justice. Andrewa 23:42, 8 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

But back to the subject at hand, I think that you really need to read ALL the archives to this talk page. I have suggested a compromise based on the wording found in the MOS for the great AE/CE divide, ... (See An attempt to build a consensus) and although he is on the other side of the divide, so has Haukur Þorgeirsson, but there are still a lot of people who do not want to compromise on the issue of "funny foreign squiggles" (to nail my flag to the mast). One positive move is that since I wrote the compromise suggestion, the guideline does now to include explicitly the point that all common spellings should be in the first section (but unfortunatly it can of course be argued that Ubeda and Úbeda are the same spelling :-( ). When I included the full compromise text on the project page it was deleted by two different people almost immediately see above #Another attempt to build a consensus. --Philip Baird Shearer 00:33, 9 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Just to clarify, I have read ALL the archives. I thought I'd implied that above.

Agree that the idea of including all common spellings early in the article is a good one, and of having matching redirects. I don't think this is very clearly expressed currently however. Andrewa 12:30, 9 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I do indeed support some sort of compromise and I think we made some progress towards it in the last year. As Philip says it helps to include all alternative names/spellings in the article text and that does include spellings with and without diacritics. Some of my ideas for compromise include:

Local government. The people actually writing the article should have more say than outsiders coming in to "correct" the spelling. Philip emphasizes the ~~role~~ rôle of the first major contributor while I'm thinking more along the lines of deferring to all major contributors. "But", you might say, "that could encourage people to make major contributions to an article just so they can have their way with the spelling!" Well, yes, but if that would get a spelling warrior to make contributions to articles then that's a perfectly acceptable side-effect :-)
Live-and-let-live. Keeping the peace is more important than maintaining completely consistent naming across our article space. We might have an article at Zürich and another at 1st Battle of Zurich without the inconsistency killing us.
Check the sources. If the references used in the article overwhelmingly use one spelling then that's a pretty solid argument for using that spelling in the article. Again, this could possibly encourage people to find good sources which use their preferred spellings but that's an acceptable side-effect.
Check other reference works. That's often more workable than Google searches.

None of this is really specific to the diacritics debate but more about naming conflicts in general but I still think the points are worth considering here. I think we have a chance to establish some sort of peaceful live-and-let-live environment on this. What I don't think we can do is getting a consensus on exactly when to use diacritics - that debate has been going around in circles since I first entered it and not a single person ever changes their opinions :-) - Haukur 02:04, 9 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I support the Live-and-let-live idea, for several reasons. One is, I don't think any of the debatable cases greatly impact the quality or usefulness of the encyclopedia, either way. The other is, we seem to have no choice.

I'm beginning to doubt that any of this is helpful in the naming of articles about minor planets. We can't agree what English is, whether or not it includes diacritics, and IMO therefore what it means to Use English is similarly vague. We can't even agree on whether or not it matters what English is.

I haven't checked the histories or archives for whether the main players take wikibreaks, but I recommend them. There's a reason for taking them that the project page doesn't mention any more, although m:Wikibreak still does: If a policy decision (however minor, or major) is likely to be reversed without you, it's generally best to let it happen. Andrewa 12:30, 9 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Article titles for books in foreign languages

There is currently a discussion at Talk:Polish Biographical Dictionary#RfC: Request for Comment. The question is whether the title of the page should be "Polski Slownik Biograficzny", or "Polish Biographical Dictionary". Has this kind of "book name" debate come up before? How was it resolved? Elonka 17:52, 16 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I'm sure I was not the first to mention it. I said something about it above regarding Queen Margot/La Reine Margot. Shortly after that I started the Wikipedia:Naming conventions (books) guideline proposal, which effectively contains a Title translations section. Could you indicate whether (or not) that can help solve your question?

Intuitively I would say: use the English title, while: "Generally, article naming should give priority to what the majority of English speakers would most easily recognize, (...)", as indicated in wikipedia:naming conventions, the "official policy" regarding page naming.

The English version of the name of the dictionary appears to be used, e.g. a reference to the 18th volume of the Polish Biographical Dictionary on this webpage (see Fabian Luzjañski short bio on that webpage); this is not a reference to the S. S. Sokol one-volume dictionary. --Francis Schonken 18:19, 16 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

FYI, I've just expanded Wikipedia:Naming conventions (books)#Title translations a bit, for books that have no printed English translation (yet). --Francis Schonken 19:28, 16 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Quotes in secn "Disputed issues"

I conv'd the single quotes to double quotes w/ intervening blanks, to avoid confusing apparent merging of the single quotes with the quoted character. If that's not satisfactory, put the two characters each indented on its own line, w/o any quotes.
--Jerzy•t 04:19, 26 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Letters representing themselves should be italicized, without any quotation marks. I'm updating the last section. —Michael Z. 2006-01-26 13:27 Z

Jogaila of Lithuania/ Władysław II Jagiełło

Can I ask for mediation in a dispute, Talk:Władysław II Jagiełło. It concerns the naming of the Lithuanian ruler Jogaila, who also became King of Poland, as Wladislaus II. The current title is Władysław II Jagiełło, which, along with other rulers of Poland, violates general wiki rules for naming monarchs (although Polish users a little while ago agreed amongst themselves to Polonize the names of all Polish monarchs, moving all the articles in correspondence with this decision). This I personally have little objection to (although others might), but Jogaila was not even Polish nor solely a Polish ruler, and the latter means he is not governed by "rules" "agreed" for Polish monarchs. Moreover, the two variations of his Lithuanian name, Jogaila and Jagiello, are the most common forms in English, not Władysław II Jagiełło. I moved the page to Jogaila of Lithuania. I may or may not have been wrong in the first place for moving it, but I saw this as uncontroversial, as my experience has taught be that it is far more common to refer to him by his Lithuanian name Jogaila, or the corruption thereof Jagiello, and seemed sensible on almost every other ground I could think of. This was objected to by some Polish contributors. Eventually, it had seemed that compromise was reached with Jogaila (Władysław II), but then another Polish user with admin powers (Piotrus), whose intellectual integrity has been far from obviously displayed, reverted this back to the absurd name; moreover, he posted a link Polish wikipedian notice board, and this means that the discussion has attracted more people wishing to Polonize the name than others. Opinions seem hardened, good counter arguments are not being advanced, and the convo now is producing more heat than light. I'm very busy ATM, and am quite anxious to resolve this, but I can't see it happening. Can someone help mediate? Thanks. - Calgacus 16:07, 28 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Hi, seems a difficult case...

Do you want mediation as in wikipedia:mediation and/or wikipedia:mediation cabal? Maybe we could see first if some prior steps in wikipedia:dispute resolution wouldn't be more fruitful?
I had a glance at the talk at Talk:Władysław II Jagiełło, but I saw no indication there has been a WP:RM yet? Do you know whether the WP:RM procedure has been followed yet on this page?
I don't know whether I heard about this king (?) before... Could you tell whether Jogaila of Lithuania would be better in accordance with Wikipedia:Naming conventions (names and titles) than Władysław II Jagiełło? Or what would be the name that is best in accordance to that naming conventions guideline in your view? (please give a short explanation why too). If this person would *not* be a king or any other sort of nobility (?), could you indicate which wikipedia page name would be the best in accordance to Wikipedia:Naming conventions (people) (likewise, with a short clarification of the choice if possible)?

--Francis Schonken 17:34, 28 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

If one holds by the wikipedian legal fiction that Lithuania was more lowly ranked than Poland, the correct naming according to wiki rules would be Ladislaus II of Poland, or at least Wladyslaw II of Poland. But these rules have already been ignored by Polish users wishing to name articles with pure Polish names (without title). If they hadn't done so, there would have been no dispute. - Calgacus 17:47, 28 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Well, looking around a bit myself too:

Question: was he "Grand duke" or "Grand prince" or what was he as highest position in Lithuania?
Was he ruling king or king consort as highest position in Poland?

tx, if you could enlighten a bit! --Francis Schonken 17:52, 28 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

PS, compare (for example - but I don't know if the comparison makes sense) Friedrich III of Germany (Hohenzollern): The wikipedia page of this person is at "of Germany", not because in his days "Germany" was more important than Prussia, but while in Germany he was emperor, and in Prussia he was king: the naming conventions guideline considers the office of "Emperor" more important than that of "king", so he's named after the country where he was Emperor. --Francis Schonken 18:17, 28 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

He was, by English-speaking convention, Grand Duke/Grand Prince of Lithuania, which is Великий князь in "Russian", the "official" language of the Lithuanian establishment; it was the highest office of Lithuania, and the highest royal term available in the Russian-speaking world except Tsar, and meant "Great King" (князь or Knyaz is actually cognate with English King). He was offered the hand of the Polish royal heiress Jadwiga (Hedwig), and thereby became king consort too, but he used the title "King of Poland", and is recognized as King of Poland by historians. Wiki guidelines (I'd say wrongly) considers Grand Prince lower than king (meaning any Grand Duke/Prince (soon to be emperor) of later medieval Moscow/Russia is regarded as lower than the king of Navarre). He later lost or gave away (depending on how you look at it) his lordship of Lithuania (including most of western Russia) to his nephew Vytautas, but remained in some respects his overlord. - Calgacus 18:05, 28 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

If I remember well "Knyaz" is usually translated as prince (the monarchical type of prince, like Prince Rainier). So no, English wikipedia would definitely consider "King" above "Knyaz" - even if in Lithuanian language there would be no equivalent for Król/Koról/(King). See also the big table at Royal and noble ranks. --Francis Schonken 18:17, 28 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I am aware of that, but that is not the crux of the argument. I'm already acknowledging that wiki conventions would have him as "Lasdislaus/Wladyslaw of Poland", but he isn't being called that: simply, Władysław II Jagiełło. - Calgacus 18:23, 28 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

OK,

the language issue is however the really hard part (for Polish that is). Some time ago I initiated a WP:RM on Lech Wałęsa - the request was blown away (see talk:Lech Wałęsa#Requested move)... So, I don't think it would be easy to change Władysław to Lasdislaus or Wladyslaw (for a German ruler, for instance, translating Friedrich to Frederick would not provoke controversy...)
"of Poland" appears to be more in line with Wikipedia:Naming conventions (names and titles) - but for Polish rulers, the specific Polish naming conventions would normally be perceived to have precedence. Note that for instance, also Frederick I, Holy Roman Emperor is not at "Frederick I of Germany" or wherever his most important realm was.

--Francis Schonken 19:00, 28 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I'm giving up for the moment. The whole thing is too tiresome, and I'm sick of the treatment I'm receiving. However, my views haven't changed. So, please message me if there's ever some kind of vote. Thanks for your help. - Calgacus 21:10, 28 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Anyway, there seems to be a lot of prior history to this issue:

Wikipedia:Guidelines for the spelling of names of Polish rulers is "inactive", so can't be really used as guideline (its talk page filled with inconclusive discussion);
List of Polish rulers, is not a guideline but a wikipedia article page, but it seems as if it is presently used as if it were a guideline;
There's a whole Ladislaus/Vladislaus/Wladislaus/other variants discussion at Talk:Ladislaus (but if you ask me: indecisive discussion in the end, seems like just a bunch of people all trying to push their POV, without the least bit of will to come to a consensus).

I wished I could recommend you a WP:RM, but if it's still the same people on this issue, that would likely only result in increase of turmoil, rather than a clean vote result... --Francis Schonken 19:36, 28 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

- Francis, thank you for joining our discussion. There are quite a few talk pages and archives you may want to dig through. Regarding your questions about Władysław, most of them have been addressed (or at least, discussed) at Talk:Władysław II Jagiełło.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus ^Talk 17:24, 29 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I am very interested in being kept informed of this issue. I too have seen many examples of the Polish Wikipedians (especially Piotrus) building an "internal consensus" among themselves to Polonize article titles to non-English names, and then proceeding without agreement from the rest of the Wikipedia community. I can see that some of these issues are borderline, such as whether to include an "L" or "Ł" in an article title. But even though I am a Polish-American (my father was born in Warsaw), I would still rather see the non-diacritic versions as article titles, for a variety of reasons including consistency with alphabetizing in categories. And in the case of where an article title is Polonized to something that is completely incomprehensible to the average English reader (see the debate on "

Polski Slownik Biograficzny"), I have been insisting on an English-readable version of the title. Another example of an article title which (I feel) needs to be changed is here: Okopy Świętej Trójcy. In the English-language Wikipedia, article titles must be understandable (and pronounceable) to the average English reader. Elonka 20:37, 28 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Elonka, perhaps you'd like to quote those examples? Wherever possible, I have tried to advertise the issue to all interested parties. The monarch naming proposal was advertised at RfC and WP:Naming conventions (not the talk but at main section, proposed conventions). John k also posted it at a few other places, IIRC. The fact that most often then not our problems don't attract non-Poles is kind of unfair to use for accusation that we are POV-pushers. As for Okopy..., this is a village's name - do you want to translate the name of a village??--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus ^Talk 17:24, 29 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

If you feel like, have a look at:

Wikipedia:Naming conventions (standard letters with diacritics) (started today; didn't get any further than some rough draft of "scope" and "rationale" sections - feel free to contribute!)
Wikipedia:Naming conventions (thorn) (on which Elonka already commented, tx!)

--Francis Schonken 21:47, 28 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Anyway, I (re-)activated Wikipedia:Naming conventions (Polish rulers), which should be the central place for guidelines on how to name articles on Polish rulers, no? --Francis Schonken 17:42, 29 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

The naming system proposal Francis refers above was rejected. However, a new approval poll has begun, to discuss the matter of how to name the article currently at Władysław II Jagiełło. Interested editors are invited to participate, at Talk:Władysław II Jagiełło. Shilkanni 18:43, 25 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

English Wikipedia's page names for Polish rulers

Please help completing the table below. The table is on a separate page, that opens when clicking the "edit" link below.

Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions (Polish rulers) is the place for discussions on the English Wikipedia page names of individual monarchs. --Francis Schonken 09:46, 12 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

File:Red-x.gif

This proposal was rejected by the community. It is inactive but retained for historical interest. If you want to revive discussion on this subject, try using the talk page or start a discussion at the village pump.

Table

In office as ruler of Poland (for some approx.)	Polish name (from pl:wikipedia)	Page name at en:Wikipedia	Remarks
Monarchs
...	...	...	...
1386-1434	Władysław II Jagiełło	Wladyslaw II/V of Poland, Jogaila of Lithuania	Compromise, since Wikipedia:Naming conventions (names and titles) has no special provisions when a ruler changes name when acquiring a second realm (this ruler was in office in Lithuania since 1377, he didn't receive his Christian name Wladyslaw until conversion to catholicism when acquiring the Polish throne); Double numbering ("II" and "V") while both are used when referring to this Polish ruler: "II" is more common (but overlaps with another Polish ruler, see Wladislaw II of Poland dab page); "V" is less ambiguous, and is also often used. "Jagiello" (the Polish version of Jogaila) is not used in the wikipedia page name while overlapping with another Wladyslaw II Jagiello, see Ladislaus Jagiello dab page.
...	...	...	...
1573-1574	Henryk III Walezy	Henry III of France	per Wikipedia:Naming conventions (names and titles), better known as ruler of France
1575-1587 (most of the reign together with her husband Stefan Batory)	Anna Jagiellonka	Anna of Poland	per Wikipedia:Naming conventions (names and titles), "Anne/Anna Jagiellon(ka)" overlaps with at least two other women (that, btw, also both can be called "Anna of Poland", see Anna of Poland) - because of the unavoidable confusion whatever way it is turned, the "names and titles" guideline is applied very strict in this case, while considered least confusing in Wikipedia context
1576-1586	Stefan Batory	Stefan Batory	per most used in English; note that there is some ambiguity with his father, a namesake in common English spelling, but presently at the Hungarian spelling of the name, István Báthory
1587-1632	Zygmunt III Waza	Sigismund III of Poland	per Wikipedia:Naming conventions (names and titles), best known as ruler of Poland, although (for some years) also ruler of Sweden. Compare Henry III of France above: it's not because this ruler is better known in France than in Poland, that his name would suddenly be written in French (not "Henri III de France", and even less "Henri III (de) Valois"). So also for this Sigismund the spelling most common in English is used, applying the names & titles guideline: First name: "Zygmunt" (Polish) or "Sigismund" (Swedish, but also most common in English, compare Sigismund of Burgundy, in French this name would be "Sigismond")? → Sigismund "Waza" or "Wasa" or "Vasa" (as in: House of Vasa) or "of Poland"? → only of Poland is free of Polish/Swedish ethnic tension, and is not all that unusual in English. Note that the ordinal "III" also only applies to of Poland (in Swedish there is usually no ordinal)
...	...	...	...
1669-1673	Michał Korybut Wiśniowiecki	Michael Korybut Wisniowiecki	per most used in English
1674-1696	Jan III Sobieski	Jan III Sobieski	per most used in English
...	...	...	...
Presidents
...	...	...	...
2005-...	Lech Kaczyński	Lech Kaczynski	English spelling of name according to the English pages on The official website of the City of Warsaw (PS, the same website spells Lech Kaczyński on its pages in Polish [3])
...	...	...	...

Using diacritics (or national alphabet) in the name of the article

The discussion below has been copied from Wikipedia:Village pump (policy)#Using diacritics (or national alphabet) in the name of the article - 07:41, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

I came to the problem with national alphabet letters in article name. They are commonly used but I have found no mention about them in naming coventions (WP:NAME). The only convention related is to use English name, but it probable does not apply to the names of people. National alphabet is widely used in wikipedia. Examples are Luís de Camões Auguste and Louis Lumière or Karel Čapek. There are redirects from english spelling (Camoes, Lumiere, Capek).

On the other hand, wikiproject ice hockey WP:HOCKEY states rule for ice hockey players that their names should be written in English spelling. Currently some articles are being moved from Czech spelling to the english spelling (for example Patrik Eliáš to Patrick Elias). I object to this as I do not see genaral consensus and it will only lead to moving back and forth. WP:HOCKEY is not wikipedia policy nor guideline. In addition I do not see any reason why ice hockey players should be treated differently than other people.

There is a mention about using the most recognized name in the naming conventions policy. But this does not help in the case of many ice hockey players. It is very likely that for American and Canadian NHL fans the most recognised versions are Jagr, Hasek or Patrick ELias. But these people also played for the Czech republic in the Olympics and there they are known like Jágr, Hašek or Patrik Eliáš.

I would like to find out what is the current consensus about this. -- Jan Smolik 18:53, 7 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

The only convention related is to use English name, but it probable does not apply to the names of people - incorrect. "Use the most common name of a person or thing that does not conflict with the names of other people or things" - Wikipedia:Naming :conventions (common names). Raul654 18:54, 7 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I mentioned this in the third article but it does not solve the problem. Americans are familiar with different spelling than Czechs. --Jan Smolik 19:11, 7 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Well, since this is the English Wikipedia, really we should use the name most familiar to English speakers. The policy doesn't say this explicitly, but I believe this is how it's usually interpreted. This is the form that English speakers will recognize most easily. Deco 19:02, 7 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Well it is wikipedia in English but it is read and edited by people from the whole world. --Jan Smolik 19:11, 7 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

There was a straw poll about this with regard to place names: Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions (use English)/Archive 3#Proposal and straw poll regarding place names with diacritical marks. The proposal was that "whenever the most common English spelling is simply the native spelling with diacritical marks omitted, the native spelling should be used". It was close, but those who supported the proposal had more votes. Since, articles like Yaoundé have remained in place with no uproar. I would support a similar convention with regard to personal names. — BrianSmithson 19:17, 7 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I'm the user who initiated the WP:HOCKEY-based renaming with Alf. The project Player Pages Format Talk page has the discussion we had along with my reasoning, pasted below:

OK, team, it's simple. This is en-wiki. We don't have non-English characters on our keyboards, and people likely to come to en-wiki are mostly going to have ISO-EN keyboards, whether they're US, UK, or Aussie (to name a few) it doesn't matter. I set up a page at User:RasputinAXP/DMRwT for double move redirects with twist and started in on the Czech players that need to be reanglicized.

Myself and others interpret the policy just the same as Deco and BrianSmithson do: the familiar form in English is Jaromir Jagr, not Jaromír Jágr; we can't even type that. Attempting to avoid redirects is pretty tough as well. Is there a better way to build consensus regarding this? RasputinAXP _talk _contribs 19:36, 7 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I think you misread my statement above. My stance is that if the native spelling of the name varies from the English spelling only in the use of diacritics, use the native spelling. Thus, the article title should be Yaoundé and not Yaounde. Likewise, use Jōchō, not Jocho. Redirection makes any arguments about accessibility moot, and not using the diacritics makes us look lazy or ignorant. — BrianSmithson 16:34, 8 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Tentative overview (no cut-and-paste solutions, however):

Article names for names of people: wikipedia:naming conventions (people) - there's nothing specific about diacritics there (just mentioning this guideline because it is a naming conventions guideline, while there are no "hockey" naming conventions mentioned at wikipedia:naming conventions).
wikipedia:naming conventions (names and titles) is about royal & noble people: this is guideline, and *explicitly* mentions that wikipedia:naming conventions (common names) does NOT apply for these kind of people. But makes no difference: doesn't mention anything about diacritics.
Wikipedia talk:naming conventions (Polish rulers): here we're trying to solve the issue for Polish monarchs (some of which have diacritics in their Polish name): but don't expect to find answers there yet, talks are still going on. Anyway we need to come to a conclusion there too, hopefully soon (but not rushing).
Wikipedia:Naming conventions (standard letters with diacritics), early stages of a guideline proposal, I started this on a "blue monday" about a week ago. No guideline yet: the page contains merely a "scope" definition, and a tentative "rationale" section. What the basic principles of the guideline proposal will become I don't know yet (sort of waiting till after the "Polish rulers" issue gets sorted out I suppose...). But if any of you feel like being able to contribute, ultimately it will answer Jan Smolik's question (but I'd definitely advise not to hold your breath on it yet).
Other:
- Some people articles with and without diacritics are mentioned at wikipedia talk:naming conventions (use English)#Diacritics, South Slavic languages - some of these after undergoing a WP:RM, but note that isolated examples are *not* the same as a guideline... (if I'd know a formulation of a guideline proposal that could be agreeable to the large majority of Wikipedians, I'd have written it down already...)
- Talking about Lumiere/Lumière: there's a planet with that name: at a certain moment a few months ago it seemed as if the issue was settled to use the name with accent, but I don't know how that ended, see Wikipedia:WikiProject Astronomical objects, Andrewa said she was going to take the issue there. Didn't check whether they have a final conclusion yet.

Well, that's all I know about (unless you also want to involve non-standard characters, then there's still the wikipedia:naming conventions (þ) guideline proposal) --Francis Schonken 19:58, 7 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Note that I do not believe no En article should contain diacritics in its title. There are topics for which most English speakers are used to names containing diacritics, such as El Niño. Then there are topics for which the name without diacritics is widely disseminated throughout the English speaking world, like Celine Dion (most English speakers would be confused or surprised to see the proper "Céline Dion"). (Ironically enough, the articles for these don't support my point very well.) Deco 20:42, 7 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Sticking diacritics, particularly the Polish Ł is highly annoying, esp. when applied to Polish monarchs. It just gives editors much more work, and unless you're in Poland or know the code, you will be unable to type the name in the article. - Calgacus (ΚΑΛΓΑΚΟΣ) File:UW Logo-secondary.gif 20:45, 7 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Redirects make the issue of difficulty in visiting or linking to the article immaterial (I know we like to skip redirects, but as long as you watch out for double redirects you're fine). The limitations of our keyboards are not, by themselves, a good reason to exclude any article title. Deco 20:50, 7 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Deco, I should rephrase what I said. I agree with you that some English articles do require diacritics, like El Niño. Articles like Jaromir Jagr that are lacking diacritics in their English spellings should remain without diacritics because you're only going to find the name printed in any English-speaking paper without diacritics. RasputinAXP _talk _contribs 21:20, 7 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I checked articles about Czech people and in 90 % of cases (rough guess) they are with diacritics in the name of the article. This includes soccer players playing in England (like Vladimír Šmicer, Petr Čech, Milan Baroš). And no one actualy complains. So this seems to be a consensus. The only exception are extremely short stubs that did not receive much input. Articles with Czech diacritics are readable in English, you only need a redirect becouse of problems with typing. This is an international project written in English. It should not fulfill only needs of native English speakers but of all people of the world. --Jan Smolik 22:33, 7 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Very many names need diacritics to make sense. Petr Cech instead of Petr Čech makes a different impression as a name, does not look half as Czech and is much more likely to be totally mispronounced when you see it. Names with diacritics are also not IMHO such a big problem to use for editors because you can usually go through the redirect in an extra tab and cut and paste the correct title. I also don't see a problem at all in linking through redirects (that's part of what they are there for). Leaving out diacritics only where they are "not particularly useful" would be rather inconsequent. Kusma (討論) 22:48, 7 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

As a matter of fact, "Petr Sykora" and "Jaromir Jagr" are not alternate spellings; they are incorrect ones which are only used for technical reasons. Since all other articles about Czech people use proper Czech diacritics, I don't know of any justification for making an exception in case of hockey players. - Mike Rosoft 01:13, 8 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Man, I feel like the bottom man in a dogpile. Reviewing Wikipedia:Naming conventions (common names), there'sWhat word would the average user of the Wikipedia put into the search engine? Making the name of the article include diacritics goes against the Use English guideline. The most common input into the search box over here onthe left, for en-wiki, is going to be Jaromir Jagr. Yes, we're supposed to avoid redirects. Yes, in Czech it's not correct. In English, it is correct. I guess I'm done with the discussion. There's no consensus in either direction, but it's going to be pushed back to the diacritic version anyhow. Go ahead and switch them back. I'mnot dead-set against it, but I was trying to follow guidelines. RasputinAXP _talk _contribs 15:48, 8 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

There are many names, and even words, in dominant English usage that use diacritics. Whether or not these will ever be typed in a search engine, they're still the proper title. However, if English language media presentations of a topic overwhelmingly omit diacritics, then clearly English speakers would be most familiar with the form without diacritics and it should be used as the title on this Wikipedia. This is just common sense, even if it goes against the ad hoc conventions that have arisen. Deco 18:30, 8 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Czech names: almost all names with diacritics use it also in the title (and all of them have redirect). Adding missing diacritics is automatic behavior of Czech editors when they spot it. So for all practical purposes the policy is set de-facto (for Cz names) and you can't change it. Pavel Vozenilek 03:18, 8 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

See Wikipedia:Naming policy (Czech) --Francis Schonken 11:01, 8 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

and: Wikipedia:Naming conventions (hockey) --Francis Schonken 17:41, 8 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

There are those among us trying to pull the ignorant North American card. I mentioned the following over at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Ice Hockey/Player pages format...

Here's the Czech hockey team in English compliments of the Torino Italy Olympic Committee [4] Here they are in Italian: [5], French: [6]. Here are the rosters from the IIHF (INTERNATIONAL Ice Hockey Federation) based in Switzerland: [7].'

Those examples are straight from 2 international organizations (one based in Italy, one in Switzerland). I'm hard pressed to find any english publication that uses diacritics in hockey player names. I don't see why en.wiki should be setting a precedent otherwise. ccwaters 02:19, 9 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Over at WP:HOCKEY we have/had 3 forces promoting non-English characters in en.wiki hockey articles: native Finns demanding native spellings of Finnish players, native Czechs demanding native spellings of Czech players, and American stalkers of certain Finnish goaltenders. I did a little research and here are my findings:

Here's a Finnish site profiling NHL players. Here's an "incorrectly" spelt Jagr, but the Finnish and German alphabets both happen to have umlauts so here's a "correct" Olaf Kölzig. Who is Aleksei Jashin?

Here's a Czech article about the recent Montreal-Philadelphia game [8] Good luck finding any Finnish players names spelt "correctly"... here's a snippet from the MON-PHI article:

Flyers však do utkání nastoupili značně oslabeni. K zraněným oporám Peteru Forsbergovi, Keithu Primeauovi, Ericu Desjardinsovi a Kimu Johnssonovi totiž po posledním zápase přibyli také Petr Nedvěd a zadák Chris Therrien.

Well...I recognize Petr Nedvěd, he was born in Czechoslovakia. Who did the Flyers have in goal??? Oh its the Finnish guy, "Antero Niitymakiho".

My point? Different languages spell name differently. I found those sites just by searching yahoo in the respective languages. I admit I don't speak either and therefore I couldn't search thoroughly. If someone with backgrounds in either language can demonstrate patterns of Finnish publications acknowledging Czech characters and visa versa than I may change my stance. ccwaters 03:45, 9 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I support every word Ccwater said, albeit with not as much conviction. There is a reason why we have Wikipedia in different languages, and although there are few instances in the English uses some sort of extra-curricular lettering (i.e. café), most English speaking people do not use those.

Croat Canuck

04:25, 9 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I must make a strong point that seems to be over-looked: this is not the international English language wikipedia. It is the English language wikipedia. It just so happens that the international communty contributes. There is a reason that there are other language sections to wikipedia, and this is one of them. The finnish section of wikipedia should spell names the Finnish way and the English wikipedia should spell names the English way. The vast majority of english publications drop the foreign characters and diacritics. Why? because they aren't part of the English language, hence the term "foreign characters". Masterhatch 04:32, 9 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I agree in every particular with Masterhatch. The NHL's own website and publications do not use diacriticals, nor does any other known English-language source. The absurdity of the racist card is breathtaking: in the same fashion as the Finnish and Czech language Wikipedias follow their own national conventions for nomenclature (the name of the country in which I live is called the "United States" on neither ... should I feel insulted?), the English language Wikipedia reflects the conventions of the various English-speaking nations. In none are diacriticals commonly used. I imagine the natives of the Finnish or Czech language Wikipedias would go berserk if some peeved Anglos barge in and demand they change their customary linguistic usages. I see no reason to change the English language to suit in a similar situation. RGTraynor 06:46, 9 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

People like Jagr, Rucinsky or Elias are not only NHL players but also members of Czech team for winter olympics. Therefore I do not see any reason why spelling of their name in NHL publications should be prioritized. I intentionaly wrote the names without diacritics. I accept the fact that foreigners do that because they cannot write those letters properly and use them correctly. There are also technical restrictions. I also accepted fact that my US social security card bears name Jan Smolik instead of Jan Smolík. I do not have problem with this. I even sign my posts Jan Smolik. But Wikipedia does not have technical restrictions. I can even type wierd letters as Æ. And it has plenty of editors who are able to write names with diacritics correctly. The name without diacritics is sufficient for normal information but I still think it is wrong. I think that removing diacritics is a step back. Anyway it is true that I am not able to use diacritics in Finish names. But somebody can fix that for me.

I do not care which version will win. But I just felt there was not a clear consensus for the non-diacritics side and this discussion has proven me to be right. As for the notice of Czechs writing names incorectly. We use Inflection of names so that makes writing even more dificult (my name is Smolík but when you want to say we gave it to Smolík you will use form we gave it Smolíkovi). One last argument for diacritics, before I retire from this discussion as I think I said all I wanted to say. Without diacritics you cannot distinguish some names. For example Czech surnames Čapek and Cápek are both Capek. Anyway we also have language purists in the Czech republic. I am not one of them. --Jan Smolik 19:11, 9 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

People like Jagr, Rucinsky or Elias are not only NHL players but also members of Czech team for winter olympics. Therefore I do not see any reason why spelling of their name in NHL publications should be prioritized -Fine we'll use the spellings used by the IIHF, IOC, NHLPA, AHL, OHL, WHL, ESPN, TSN, The Hockey News, Sports Illustrated, etc, etc, etc.

This isn't about laziness. Its about using the alphabet afforded to the respective language. We don't refer to Алексей Яшин because the English language doesn't use the Cyrillic alphabet. So why should we subject language A to the version of the Latin alphabet used by language B? Especially when B modifies proper names from languages C & D.

My main beef here is that that the use of such characters in en.wiki is a precedent, and not a common practice. If you think the English hockey world should start spelling Czech names natively, than start a campaign amongst Czech hockey players demanding so. It may work: languages constantly infiltrate and influence each other. Wikipedia should take a passive role in such things, and not be an active forum for them. ccwaters 20:09, 9 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

People like Jagr, Rucinsky or Elias are not only NHL players but also members of Czech team for winter olympics. Therefore I do not see any reason why spelling of their name in NHL publications should be prioritized Great, in which case for Czech Olympic pages, especially on the Czech Wikipedia, spell them as they are done in the Czech Republic. Meanwhile, in the NHL-related articles, we'll spell them as per customary English-language usage. RGTraynor 08:05, 10 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I wish I understood why User:ccwaters has to be rude in his posts on this subject. "Stalkers of Finnish goaltenders" isn't the way I'd describe a Wikipedia contributor. Also, since you asked, Aleksei Jashin is the Finnish translitteration of Alexei Yashin. Russian transliterates differently into Finnish than into English. Of course you must know this, since you have such a habit of lecturing to us on languages. As for diacritics, I object to the idea of dumbing down Wikipedia. There are no technical limitations that stop us from writing Antero Niittymäki instead of Antero Niittymaki. The reason so many hockey publications all over the world don't use Finnish-Scandinavian letters or diacritics is simple laziness, and Wikipedia can do much better. Besides, it isn't accepted translation practice to change the spelling of proper names if they can be easily reproduced and understood, so in my opinion it's simply wrong to do so. Since it seems to be obvious there isn't a consensus on this matter, I think a vote would be in order. Elrith 16:40, 14 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Alas, a Finnish guy lecturing native English speakers on how they have to write Czech names in English (not to mention the lecturing regarding the laziness) is but a variation on the same theme of rudishness.

So, Elrith, or whomever reads this, if the lecturing is finished, could you maybe devote some attention to the Dvořák/Dvorak problem I mentioned below? I mean, whomever one asks this would not be problematic - but nobody volunteered thus far to get it solved. Am I the only one who experiences this as problematic inconsistency? --Francis Schonken 21:05, 14 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

So is "Jagr" the Finnish transliteration of "Jágr"??? On that note, the Finnish "Ä" is not an "A" with "funny things" on top (that's an umlaut), its a completely separate letter nonexistent in the English language and is translated to "Æ". "Niittymaki" would be the English transliteration. "Nittymeki" or (more traditionally "Nittymӕki") would be the English transcription.

In the past I've said our friend's contributions were "thorough." I'll leave it at that. There will be nothing else about it from me unless asked. ccwaters 21:02, 14 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

My opinion on the Dvořák/Dvorak issue is that his name is spelled Dvořák, and that's how the articles should be titled, along with redirects from Dvorak. Similarly, the article on Antero Niittymäki should be called just that, with a redirect from Niittymaki. You're right that it is a problematic inconsistency, and it needs to be fixed.

The only reason I may sound like I'm lecturing is that there are several people contributing to these discussions who don't understand the subject at all. Ccwaters's remarks on transliteration are

one example. It isn't customary or even acceptable to transliterate or transcribe Finnish letters into English; the accepted translation practice is to reproduce them, which is perfectly possible, for example, in Wikipedia. Niittymaki or anything else that isn't Niittymäki isn't a technically correct "translation". The reason North American, or for that matter, Finnish, hockey publications write Jagr instead of Jágr is ignorance and/or laziness. Wikipedia can do better that that.

However, since this discussion has, at least to me, established that there is no consensus on Wikipedia on diacritics and national letters, apart from a previous vote on diacritics, I'm going to continue my hockey edits and use Finnish/Scandinavian letters unless the matter is otherwise resolved. Elrith 04:32, 20 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Elrith, your new batch of patronising declarations simply doesn't work. Your insights in language (and how language works) seem very limited, resuming all what you don't like about a language to "laziness" and "ignorance".

Seems like we might need an RfC on you, if you continue to oracle like this, especially when your technique seems to consist in calling anyone who doesn't agree with you incompetent.

Re. consensus, I think you would be surprised to see how much things have evolved since the archived poll you speak about. --Francis Schonken 23:14, 20 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

My 2 cents:

1) This should NOT be setteld as a local consensus for hockey players, this is about how we name persons in the english wikipedia. It is wrong to have a local consensus for hockey players only.

2) I have tried to do some findings on how names are represented, it is wrong to say that since these names are spelled like this normally they should be spelled like this, many wrongs does not make it right. So I did a few checks,

If I look at the online version of Encyclopædia Britannica I get a hit on both Björn Borg and Bjorn Borg, but in the article it is spelled with swedish characters, same for Selma Lagerlöf and Dag Hammarskjöld, I could not find any more swedes in EB :-) (I did not check all..)

I also check for as many swedes as I could think of in wikipedia to see how it is done for none hockey swedes, I found the following swedes by looking at list of swedish ... and adding a few more that I could think of, ALL had their articles spelled with the swedish characters (I'm sure you can find a few that is spelled without the swedish characters but the majority for sure seams to be spelled the same way as in their births certificates). So IF you are proposing that we should 'rename' the swedish hockey players I think we must rename all other swedes also. Do we really think that is correct? I can not check this as easily for other countries but I would guess that it is the same.

Dag Hammarskjöld, Björn Borg, Annika Sörenstam, Björn Ulvaeus, Agnetha Fältskog, Selma Lagerlöf, Stellan Skarsgård,Gunnar Ekelöf, Gustaf Fröding, Pär Lagerkvist, Håkan Nesser, Bruno K. Öijer, Björn Ranelid, Fredrik Ström, Edith Södergran, Hjalmar Söderberg, Per Wahlöö, Gunnar Ekelöf, Gustaf Fröding, Pär Lagerkvist, Maj Sjöwall, Per Wästberg, Isaac Hirsche Grünewald, Tage Åsén, Gösta Bohman, Göran Persson, Björn von Sydow, Lasse Åberg, Helena Bergström, Victor Sjöström, Gunder Hägg, Sigfrid Edström, Anders Gärderud, Henrik Sjöberg, Patrik Sjöberg, Tore Sjöstrand, Arne Åhman, so there seams to be a consensus for non hockey playing swedes? Stefan 13:33, 21 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I also checked encarta for Björn Borg and Dag Hammarskjöld both have the Swedish characters as the main name of the articles, Selma Lagerlöf is not avaliable unless you pay so I can not check. I'm sure you can find example of the 'wrong' way also, but we can not say that there is consensus in the encyclopedic area of respelling foreign names the 'correct' english way. Stefan 14:16, 21 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

This seems like a very constructive step to me. So I'll do the same as I did for Czech, i.e.:

start Wikipedia:Naming conventions (Swedish) as a proposal, starting off with the content you bring in here.
list that page in Wikipedia:Naming conventions#Conventions under consideration
also list it on wikipedia:current surveys#Discussions
list it in the guideline proposal Wikipedia:Naming conventions (standard letters with diacritics)#Specifics_according_to_language_of_origin

OK to work from there? --Francis Schonken 15:22, 21 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Works for me :-) Stefan 00:26, 22 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Tx for finetuning Wikipedia:Naming conventions (Swedish). I also contributed to further finetuning, but add a small note here to clarify what I did: page names in English wikipedia are in English per WP:UE. Making a Swedish name like Björn Borg English, means that the ö ("character" in Swedish language) is turned into an "o" character with a precombined diacritic mark (unicode: U+00F6, which is the same character used to write the last name of Johann Friedrich Böttger – note that böttger ware, named after this person, uses the same ö according to Webster's, and in that dictionary is sorted between "bottery tree" and "bottine"). Of course (in English!) the discussion whether it is a separate character or an "o" with a diacritic is rather futile *except* for alphabetical ordering: for alphabetical ordering in English wikipedia the ö is treated as if it were an o, hence the remark about the "category sort key" I added to the intro of the "Swedish NC" guideline proposal. In other words, you can't expect English wikipedians who try to find something in an alphabetic list to know in advance (a) what is the language or origin of a word, and (b) if any "special rules" for alphabetical ordering are applicable in that language. That would be putting things on their head. "Bö..." will always be sorted in the same way, whatever the language of origin.

What I mean is that "Björn Borg" (in Swedish) is transcribed/translated/transliterated to "Björn Borg" in English, the only (invisible!) difference being that in Swedish ö is a character, and in English ö is a letter o with a diacritic.

Or (still the same in other words): Ö is always treated the same as "O" in alphabetical ordering, whether it's a letter of Ötzi or of Öijer--Francis Schonken 10:56, 22 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

For consistency with the rest of Wikipedia, hockey player articles should use non-English alphabet characters if the native spelling uses a Latin-based alphabet (with the exception of naturalized players like Petr Nedved). Why should Dominik Hasek be treated differently than Jaroslav Hašek? Olessi 20:48, 21 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

If we are using other encyclopedias as litmus tests, we don't we look at a few hockey players: Dominik Hasek at Encarta Dominik Hasek at Britannica Jaromir Jagr at Encarta Teemu Selanne in Encarta list of top scorers

Last argument: We use the names that these players are overwhelming known as in the English language. We speak of Bobby Orr, not Robert Orr. Scotty Bowman, not William Scott Bowman. Ken Dryden not Kenneth Dryden. Tony Esposito, not Anthony Esposito. Gordie Howe not Gordon Howe... etc etc, etc. The NHL/NHLPA/media call these players by what they request to be called. Vyacheslav Kozlov used to go by Slava Kozlov. Evgeni Nabokov "americanized" himself for a season as "John Nabokov" but changed his mind again.

ccwaters 22:54, 25 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Dvořák

Could someone clean this up:

Article/category name without diacritics: Category:Compositions by Antonin Dvorak; Category:Operas by Antonin Dvorak; Cello Concerto (Dvorak); String Quartet No. 11 (Dvorak); String Quartet No. 12 (Dvorak); Symphony No. 6 (Dvorak); Symphony No. 8 (Dvorak); Symphony No. 9 (Dvorak); Violin Concerto (Dvorak)
Page name with diacritics: Antonín Dvořák; List of compositions by Antonín Dvořák; Symphony No. 7 (Dvořák)

I'd do it myself if I only knew which way the wikipedia community wants it... --Francis Schonken 10:53, 10 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I've been bold and renamed the articles to use diacritics in the title, since they already use them in the text. I've also slapped {{categoryredirect}} tags on the two categories: a bot should be along shortly to complete the job. —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 14:54, 21 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Tx!!! - I'll remove Dvořák as an exception from Wikipedia:Naming policy (Czech)#Exceptions --Francis Schonken 15:22, 21 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

New guidelines which may impact on this and other guidelines

On 2 March 2006 three new proposed guidelines were altered to guidelines with what seems to me very little Wikipedia community participation. Please have a look at the proposed guidelines and contribute to a consensus on whether these proposed guidelines in their present from should become guidelines. See:

--Philip Baird Shearer 10:33, 3 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Also please see Wikipedia:Naming conventions (hockey) for which there seems not to have been a proposed guideline status before it becames a guideline. --Philip Baird Shearer 11:25, 3 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

This last one in particular is an interesting one because does it mean that every sport should have a guideline page on how to spell players names in English? The obvious sport is football (soccer) where many players with diacritics in their names play for some seasons in the UK and there diacritics are often stripped away in fanzies and by the tabloid press. What about tennis and Formula One etc, etc. Why stop there why not have a policy on this for every possible sport and every language combination.

Wikipedia:Naming conventions (use English) has been the central point of contact over this issue more than a year and the Wikipedia community is very divided on the use of diacritics. I do not think that having a myriad of pages micro-managing the issue is the way to go. Occasionally there may be a reason for having a specific guideline for a specific topic, eg the discussion on the WP:UE talk page about minor asteroids, but if a guideline page contains information like that of the Wikipedia:Naming conventions (Czech) wikipedia is better off without them. --Philip Baird Shearer 13:03, 3 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Fresh meat arriving

Time to bring some Norwegian POV into the debate, seeing as though the world keeps forgetting we've got us some strange keyboards as well. One point only briefly mentioned here, is the fact that using exclusively English letters alters the pronounciation of the names - and, in some cases, their meanings. An example of the former would be Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson - renaming this article title to Bjornstjerne Bjornson (currently a redirect) would make no sense to anyone familiar with the name (well, yes, but you get the point).

Further, the practice of renaming absolutely everything in English is a phenomenon you've more or less got for yourself - at least to this extent. In Norway we refer to Moscow as Moskva, Gothenburg as Göteborg, Venice as Venezia, Vienna as Wien, Rome as Roma, use the Latin names for the biblical evangelists, and generally prefer using the correct names for things. And somewhere, someone pointed out how the USA isn't known by that name in most non-anglophone countries - we do that too. I merely present these examples to discredit anyone wanting to whine that "Why should we conform and be international when no other language does either?" - because English is extreme in that respect.

Hell, more examples of your translations changing meaning - while we refer to Austria as "Østerrike" - thus translating it - we at the very least keep our translation closer to the original "Österreich" than you. "Austria"? What does that even mean? Østerrike and Österreich mean the same thing in our respective languages. Same thing with Germany. I see the relation to Germania and Germanic people, fair enough, but our version "Tyskland" is still closer to "Deutschland" than you'll ever get.

Finally, Dvořák is a more encyclopedic, correct way of spelling the name of, say, Antonin Dvořák than the anglified version - which, then, would be Anthony Dvorak, or even Tony Warshack. And this is not me being absurd, this is me illustrating exactly how far the anglophone world likes to draw its translations, transliterations and so on.--TVPR 15:50, 11 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

As a personal opinion I'd say: start a Wikipedia:Naming conventions (Norwegian) proposal... or join forces with HJV, Stefan and Jannex at Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions (Swedish)#Move up to Naming Convention (these wikipedians already mentioned to expand the original Swedish NC proposal to include Norwegian – that is: among other languages with a similar range of characters that are "non-standard" in English). --Francis Schonken 16:19, 11 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the tip, I've headed over there. I'm not too happy about starting a whole Norwegian naming conventions on itself, nor am I too fond of having one for hockey players, one for Sweden, one for Spain and so on... there are just too many various countries, and I would very much prefer having one all-encompassing convention stating "Original language form, period". But that'd be a tad blunt, so I'll be more than happy if we get a something as wide ranging as a nordic convention for starters.--TVPR 17:41, 11 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Couldn't agree more with your idea of "Original language form." We're facing the same nonsense in the Polish sphere. logologist|Talk 19:27, 11 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I agree too. I don't like having one policy for every nation and especially not for atheltes from every sport. What naming is used for hockey players should be dicatated by general conventions. Jeltz talk 20:34, 24 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Universities and Colleges in other languages

I've noticed a number of universities and colleges, mostly French and Spanish, but also in other languages that use the title in the native language rather than the translated title. I would assume that most of these would fit under this convention but I don't want to start a renaming effort without making sure that I'm not stepping on toes or if there is some convention that I don't know about. It's important to note that items in these category are named both in English and the native language. There was a brief discussion here earlier and elsewhere but little progress has been made for consistency. Other insight is appreciated. --Reflex Reaction (talk)• 15:04, 10 May 2006 (UTC) Updated 15:21, 10 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Category:Universities and colleges by country

Some interesting examples --Reflex Reaction (talk)• 15:21, 10 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

- Vrije Universiteit Brussel - school officially does not translate nor abbreviate its name
- Grandes écoles - Consistently named in French
- École Polytechnique - consistently named
- Politecnico di Milano - recently renamed - also in this case, the university officially discourages translations of its name. --Raistlin 18:24, 13 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

One would expect nothing else from a French University! --Philip Baird Shearer 16:20, 30 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

reliable published sources

I propose a change in the text from "as you would find it in other encyclopedias and reference works" to "as you would find in other reliable published sources"

I am suggesting this for two reasons:

It co-ordinates the text with the Wikipedia policy WP:V. It seems silly to me for this guideline not to follow WP:V policy. As the "verifiability policy" and its guidelines change so this sentence will stay co-ordinated with the policy.
The following is not a page name under this UE guideline but it is a reasonable example to use to illustrate the point. In the last 24 hours I have created a page called Chambers Book of Days. There are a number of other different styles of name which can be used eg "Chambers' Book of Days" and "Chambers's Book of Days" and "Chamber's Book of Days" all in common usage. How to decide which is correct, as the original book was published as "Book of Days" and the two major web sites which carry a copy of the original text use "Chambers' Book of Days" and "Chambers's Book of Days"? I choose to use the site of the original publisher who use the title Chambers Book of Days. Now that is not a name taken from "other encyclopedias and reference works" but it is a "reliable published source". So I could link in the new article to pages which used it, I searched Wikipedia for all the references to "Book of Days" and found that there are may other usages for the phrase Book of Days. One of them was "Book Of Days" (Note the capital "O") which turned out to be the name of a song by Enya. How do I know that there is an "Of" in the name of the song? By referring to her official website, which for this specific factoid is a "reliable published source", but it is not "an encyclopedia and reference work". So using the Wikipedia:Reliable sources covers more situations "other encyclopedias and reference works", yet as encyclopaedias and reference works are "reliable published sources" does not stop them being used.

--Philip Baird Shearer 16:20, 30 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I strongly diagree with altering the policy clause that's been there for years because of a single user's argument presented above. Now to their merit.

It's no secret that different reliable published sources may use different versions of the same city or person due to many reasons. The authors are not required to make any research to choose a particular spelling they would use throughout their work. So, for many places, people, different names are used at different books. Still, these are all reliable sources. OTOH, the reference sources, like encyclopedias, dictionaries, atlases, are compiled following the analysis of the usage in a variety of sources and use the most common one.

Referring to just "published sources" is too ambiguos and is interpretable in varios ways. As soon as the user finds a source that supports his favored version of the name, s/he would change the article. Edit wars will follow with people bringing up sources, all reliable and published. We would have to run a special analysis over all sources and count the usages or something. However, this is already done by the compilers of the reliable reference sources.

We should just follow their lead. I am restoring to the stable version. And in any case we need much more than just one user's feeling to change such a crucial policy page in such a drammatic way --Irpen 06:04, 5 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I think you're overstating the impact of this change a bit :) My main concern is that quite often Wikipedia is basically the only encyclopedia to treat a given topic. Sometimes it is the only reference work as well. In those cases the guideline shouldn't just break down so generalizing it to "reliable published sources" seems like a good idea. And sometimes we may wish to follow an authoritative work even when it isn't strictly a reference work. And many reference works don't particularly try to capture common usage anyhow. Haukur 08:41, 5 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia may be the only encyclopedia to treat a given topic but other encycloepdias do deal with the same towns and people. The point is that references source tend to capture common usage among the publications. They summarize publications, not the other way around. Not always they succeed, but at least they try more than authors in general. --Irpen 18:30, 5 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I'm in favour of the change. By its very nature, Wikipedia can, will and should encompass topics that no dead-wood encyclopedia can include for size and cost reasons. We shouldn't limit ourselves thus. —Nightstallion (?) 13:05, 6 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I prefer the broader guideline, as it provides more flexibility. And I'd hate to be stuck with some stupid Britannica name that doesn't reflect common usage very well. Better to be flexible and look at cases individually. john k 15:03, 6 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I oppose proposed changes strongly. Every sort of trash may be found in published sources. Which sources are "reliable" is always POV and source of contention. Leave the guideline as it is. Anyway, nobody attends to it, as best I know. --Ghirla ^-трёп- 17:00, 6 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I tentatively oppose until I see a clear definition of what makes a reliable source. It is much more easier to identify encyclopedias then 'other reliable sources'. I recently proposed creation of an index of reliabe sources at Wikipedia_talk:Verifiability/archive8#Index_of_.27sources_of_dubious_reliability.27_needed but there seem to be little interest in creating one. Until this changes, I feel that the change you propose would do more harm and good. Once we have such an index then it may be worth revisiting.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus ^Talk 05:00, 7 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

The discussion of what makes a reliable source should be decided on Wikipedia:Reliable sources, this page should just link to that one, which is why it makes sense to make the change. As another example of why the current wording is not adequate: by the end of the World Cup there will be lots of articles on lots of footballers. Many of these article names will not be found in any other encyclopaedia, but they can be found in other reliable published sources. --Philip Baird Shearer 00:54, 8 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

What is 'Latin alphabet'?

Our definition of Latin alphabet states that it has 6 letters and classifies all alphabet with diactrics (ą, ć, etc.) as Alphabets derived from the Latin. As this policy states Article titles should use the Latin alphabet, not any other alphabets or other writing systems, this raises a logical question whether an 'alphabet derived from Latin' is considered Latin or not for the purpose of this definition, especially if we define the 'alphabet derived from Latin' as the one using diactrics and note that this policy in the latter section states: There is disagreement over what article title to use when a native name uses the Latin alphabet with diacritics (or "accent marks") but general English usage omits the diacritics. A survey that ran from April 2005 to October 2005 ended with a result of 62–46 (57.4%–42.6%) in favor of diacritics, which was a majority but was not considered to be a consensus. This would indicate for me that these diactric letters are considered part of the Latin alphabet for the purpose of the WP:NC(UE) definition (otherwise this policy would have to be interpeted as forbidding the use of diactrics in titles, resulting in a need for massive renaming of thousands of articles (ex. Gdańsk or Jäger (military)). Therefore I'd like to propose a change, reflecting our current usage, which would rephrase the policy as follows: Article titles should use the Latin and derived aphabets, not any other alphabets or other writing systems Let me stress that if one disagrees with this change it implies one sees the mentioned thousands of articles in violation of this policy and in need of immediate move.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus ^Talk 00:31, 8 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I disagree with your suggested change. -- Philip Baird Shearer 00:42, 8 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I agree with the change. —Nightstallion (?) 12:21, 8 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Sounds okay to me, but maybe a bit redundant since the sense of "Latin alphabet" in the guideline clearly encompasses derived alphabets, for example it refers to "Latin-alphabet languages, like Spanish or French" both of which include diacritics and stuff :) Haukur 12:30, 8 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I agree with Haukur that the change is, technically, redundant, but I reckon it would be a good idea to get it stated solidly so that there can be no doubts. To that end, your suggestion is admirable. --Stemonitis 13:29, 8 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Disagree:

The proposed change is not something that wouldn't affect article naming in Wikipedia (so not "redundant" in that sense), while after such change we'd have to move Leet to 1337 (linguistics) or something in that vein (1337 is derived from "Latin alphabet", even if it deforms, for instance, and E to 3, etc; "Leet" is an "English" word, so that means "1337" is also an English word different from a number, only it is written in a more "suitable" alphabet derived from the Latin alphabet);
Piotrus misquoted the wikipedia article Latin alphabet, which nowhere limits the Latin alphabet to 26 letters, the exact quote is "The basic alphabet comprises 26 letters and is used, with some modification, for most of the languages of the European Union, the Americas, Sub-Saharan Africa, and the islands of the Pacific" (my bolding). There's no unclarity. FYI, the article Alphabets derived from the Latin gives a rather limited approach (too much limited to a "unicode" viewpoint, also not listing "English" in the extended tables, also doesn't distinguish between "letters" and "characters"/"glyphs",... and other deficiencies) which makes that article IMHO unsuitable as a reference (currently). In other words, maybe go improve that article (I think it needs a lot of improving), instead of trying to obtain a guideline modification on the basis of such incomplete data.
Further, Piotrus builds a contorted reasoning regarding diacritics. Whether a letter has a diacritic or not does not make it "more" or "less" "Latin alphabet". In unicode there's a technical distinction, while diacritics can be added "precomposed" or "combining": although defined in unicode (and "printable" on many systems), the latter type of diacritics can not be used in Wikipedia article names (see wikipedia:naming conventions (technical restrictions)#Browser support limitations). So, Wikipedia uses "precomposed" letters-with-their-diacritical-in-one-glyph, and not letters separately with diacriticals added to them afterwards – assuming that this "technical" distinction defines letters as "Latin alphabet" or not is incorrect.
From Latin alphabet#Other letters:"Eth Ðð and the Runic letters thorn Þþ, and wynn Ƿƿ were added to the Old English alphabet. Eth and thorn were later replaced with 'th', and wynn with the new letter 'w'. Although these 3 letters are no longer part of the Latin alphabet as used for English, eth and thorn are still used in modern Icelandic." So, in Wikipedia's "Latin alphabet" article eth, thorn and wynn *are* defined as belonging to the "Latin alphabet" (as "other letters of the Latin alphabet", no discussion about that), but, as described, used in Old English, but "no longer part of the Latin alphabet as used for English". Anyway, these are *separate letters* (not only separate glyphs), they're "other letters" from the *Latin alphabet*, and they're not "a-z/A-Z" letters with a precombined diacritic.
Please don't try to go always further in the exploitation of the no-consensus resulting from the earlier vote on diacritics. There's no consensus to give all sorts of alphabets "derived from Latin alphabet" an approval that is not covered by the outcome of the earlier vote. The fact that there's no consensus benefits the proponents of forms that are unusual in English enough as it is. Rather we should be working towards consensus, which maybe was out of reach earlier, but maybe today through further analysis (see e.g. this analysis I effectuated on an example given by Piotr), etc... comes closer.

--Francis Schonken 14:58, 8 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I oppose at least the part "derived alphabets". It means such letters that are arduous to write with a regukar keyboard. I am of the opinion that article names should contain basically just such characters that are available in the normal keyboard. So many of the characters of those derived alphabets are not. Shilkanni 17:49, 8 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

As far as I gather British and Irish keyboards are at least slightly different to North American ones, so your idea would lead to problems. Also, why can't you just use the panel of characters beneath the edit box? The point of these conventions is to make it easier on the eye to read, not easier on the hand to type, and in the case of acute accents and such, that is particularly true. elvenscout742 18:38, 8 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think the typing issue is really such a big problem, because there should always be redirects in place from the unaccented forms (if that isn't already a guideline, it certainly should be). So, for instance, even if you find it difficult to type crème brûlée, because yours is not a French keyboard, you should be able to type creme brulee and get to the same article. --Stemonitis 07:40, 9 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

The problem is not so much that of finding and reading articles, though that is frustrating enough, BUT to contribute: to link to right place when writing another article and putting there a link to an article where there are some arduously written or a bit unexpected diacritics. Say, when I am writing an article about Anna of Celje, I actually do not like to bother to check under that workload and having the edit window open, with a bunch of carefully correctured text already almost ready to be inserted, (1) what precise form Casimir III of Poland happens to reside at that moment, and (2) where to find those precise diacriticals used at that time in the article name of dear Jogaila of Lithuania, a rapidly moving creature floating atound in the name space. Actually, knowing that their places may be "weathervanes", I tend to write such using a non-correct version which will however in the future lead in all situations to the correct one and not to a future disambig page, for example. That is the reason why I so often link to "Jogaila of Lithuania" - to link to a Polish monarchical name is inherently risky business, you do not know where it is in the next blink of eye. 84.251.186.14 09:05, 9 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I just wanted to note that not all diacritics are created equal. Diacritics used in the Romance and Germanic languages (French, Spanish, Portuguese, German, the Scandinavian languages to a lesser extent) are fairly familiar in English, and generally are supported by ascii codes (and thus not that hard to write out for those of us with anglophone keyboards). Usually place names and foreign loan words in the English language are written with these diacritics (for instance, we normally see "São Paulo," and not "Sao Paulo"), although not always. Furthermore, I'd suggest that a fair number of english-speakers know, for instance, what an acute accent in French does, or what an umlaut does, in terms of pronunciation. This contrasts with, say, Polish diacritics, which are not in ASCII and are not familiar at all to English-speakers, who have know idea what, say, the little line going through the "l" in the Polish "ł" means. Personally, I would prefer to only use the more familiar diacritics derived from western european languages, and to ignore other diacritics. john k 08:29, 9 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

"for instance, we normally see "São Paulo," and not "Sao Paulo"" I don't

about 20,500,000 English pages for -"São Paulo" "Sao Paulo" -wikipedia
about 11,600,000 English pages for "São Paulo" -"Sao Paulo" -wikipedia

"I'd suggest that a fair number of english-speakers know, for instance, what an acute accent in French does, or what an umlaut does, in terms of pronunciation." Like to take a bet? If so I'll go down to a pub and ask at half time during one of the English World Cup matches. I doubt if it would be 5% would know either, and that it would be less for both, and next to none for German, French and Spanish squiggles. The only thing to be said in favour of French and German squiggles is they are relativly unobtrisive, because there are relativly few in most words comaired to things like Battle of Điện Biên Phủ--Philip Baird Shearer 10:35, 9 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

"A fair number of English speakers" is a reasonably mild claim, and your "I'll go down to the pub" comment is completely specious. And I really do think that, when reading a word with an "é" at the end, a lot of people probably do know that that means that the letter is pronounced rather than silent. Maybe not a crowd of lads watching a football match, but a decent number of people - a large percentage of English-speakers have at least taken a couple of years of French or Spanish, at the very least. As to your google search, I find that profoundly unconvincing. I'm not even sure google is really good at determining this - I did a similar search for "Orleans" -"Orléans" and got back a bunch of results that said "Orléans". At any rate, your position on this is so extreme that all you're doing is giving the victory to the people who like Điện Biên Phủ and Władysław. There really is a substantive difference between the usage of the basic ASCII/Western European diacritics and the usage of all the others - you frequently see the former in English language sources, and you rarely see the latter. I don't see how this is debatable. I suppose we can continue to argue about whether "Sao Paulo" or "São Paulo" is really more common - perhaps I was speaking too strongly, but it's a fact that you see "São Paulo" fairly frequently in English. You rarely see Polish or Vietnamese diacritics. (And what the fuck is up with bizarre-ass Serbian diacritics like Zoran Đinđić - Serbian is written in Cyrillic, it has no write to force these ridiculous diacritics on us. john k 11:58, 9 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

John I apologies, It was not my intention to upset you, but to remind you that the majority of potential English readers will not be familiar with most diacritics, and that in many environments "Sao Paulo" will be the version which is read not "São Paulo". As you say "but it's a fact that you see "São Paulo" fairly frequently in English" and I gladly conceded that is true. Also, I agree with you over the look of the word (see below), if not the understanding of the diacritics. --Philip Baird Shearer 14:15, 9 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

A side issue: only a short time ago Serbo-Croatian was written in both Cyrillic and Latin alphabets, with Croatian still using the Latin, so it's hardly surprising that there are Latin-alphabet transliterations of Serbian names. I don't think any of these languages and alphabets can reasonably be called "bizarre-ass".

I'm worried by the idea of a two-tier system of accents which seems to be developing here, with "familiar" European accents being deemed acceptable, but unfamiliar (to Europeans and Americans) accents like Vietnamese being unacceptable. Unless there are technical problems that affect them differently, Vietnamese accented Latin letters deserve to be treated the same as, say, French accented letters. --Stemonitis 12:27, 9 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I agree. The problem is that while we have a lot of Polish editors ensuring accurate representation of Polish names (like Lech Wałęsa) we have sadly few Vietnamese contributors so many articles on Vietnamese subjects lack the diacritics that they are due (see Trinh Cong Son and its history). Haukur 12:44, 9 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, I was perhaps over-reacting on the Serbian business. That said, the two-tiered system is perfectly appropriate in context of the basic Wikipedia "use common names" rule. In Western European languages, accents are commonly reproduced in English. We have relatively easy built-in ways to type them in Microsoft Word, for instance. The Germanic and Romance languages are also, as a rule, more familiar to English speakers than any other languages, and so people have more of a grasp on what the diacritics mean, as well. Diacritics in Slavic languages, in Hungarian, in Vietnamese, in various transliterated languages, and in any other languages I may have missed are completely unfamiliar to English-speakers. This is a genuine difference, and to formalize is it is in line with the basic principal of "use common names." john k 13:31, 9 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

The problem is, though, where to draw the line. Should Hungarian, a Central European language (i.e. not massively exotic, geographically), be too strange for its accents to be allowed? Hungarian accented letters are pretty easy (much more so than its non-accented letters, incidentally). Are our naming policies really going to follow the Iron Curtain? That that would be a ridiculous anachronism. Trying to quantify how strange a letter has to be before it's unusable, and then dividing all accented letters simply into "good" and "bad" is likely to offend and confuse much more than making a simpler rule that applies to all. --Stemonitis 13:41, 9 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

The Hungarian language is, however, massively exotic, linguistically. Note that Romance and Germanic languages are not only the closest geographically to England, they are the closest linguistically to English (Germanic languages through direct relationship, Romance languages due to the heavy borrowing by English from both Latin and French). Also, again, many more English-speakers have some familiarity with Romance languages or German than do with Hungarian (which, I would guess, very few native English speakers know a word of). john k 13:44, 9 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I'm going to ramble a bit here so if you don't like stories that don't go anywhere you should stop reading now :) I think Philip has the right of it, the idea that the typical English speaker understands the meaning of French, German, Spanish and Portuguese diacritics but not those of Serbian or Vietnamese ones is conceited. As for understanding that the 'é' at the end of words like 'café' is not silent, well, I'd almost call that an English diacritic.

Maybe, maybe not. It's used in English words, but only English words which were recently derived from French. The earliest reference in OED to "café" is from 1802, and all the early references are referring to cafés in continental Europe, which suggests it was still seen as an exotic foreign word well into the 19th century. Furthermore, sure, I'm willing to accept that the "typical English speaker" does not know what accents in French, German, Spanish, and Portuguese mean. I never said otherwise. What I said was that "a fair number" of English-speakers do know what they mean, and that the same is not true of the diacritics of other languages. The idea that the number of native English-speakers who are familiar with French diacritics is comparable to the number who are familiar with Croatian or Vietnamese diacritics is just absurd. The fact that many more native English-speakers speak a little French or Spanish than Croatian or Vietnamese is both incontestable and perfectly relevant to this discussion, and I don't see where conceitedness comes int it. john k 13:31, 9 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

And if you actually want to find out what sound the Serbian 'đ' represents you can punch it into that search box on the left and find out in less than a minute that it represents a voiced alveolo-palatal affricate. If you go to the Serbian language article you'll further learn that the nearest English equivalent is found in words like schedule.

Yes, of course you can. But why not just use "Dj" which is the much more commonly used English form? john k 13:31, 9 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

A wider point is that while it's true that you won't have any idea how to pronounce, for example, Icelandic 'ú' the point that is often forgotten is that you have no idea how to pronounce the Icelandic 'u' either. There's no way to pronounce words from foreign languages correctly without actually knowing something about those languages. If you don't, then you'll just have to guess based on your knowledge on how the Latin alphabet is used to write languages you know. Sometimes you'll mentally strip unfamiliar diacritics from the word before you make your guess and that's fine. For example when faced with the Vietnamese 'đ' your best guess may to pronounce it as an English 'd'. And by a happy coincidence that's just about correct.

Sure. But lots and lots more native English-speakers "know something about" French, Spanish, and German than know something about Polish, Croatian, or Vietnamese. The canon of great English literature is full of untranslated French, etc. etc. This is a relevant fact. john k 13:31, 9 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

It often seems to me that people gloss over the fact that diacritics mean different things in different languages. For example the character 'ú' is found in Icelandic, Faroese, Slovak and Spanish (among others) and in each case it represents a different sound. The same goes for unaccented characters. Haukur 12:20, 9 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Sure. No question. The point is that some languages or more familiar to English speakers than others. Complete astonishment and confusion at French accents is much less likely than the same at Slovak characters simply because a lot of English speakers have some experience with French. john k 13:31, 9 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Okay, sure, I'll concede that point. But remember that English is what passes for an international language and the English Wikipedia is heavily read (and edited) by people whose native language is not English (like me). For example our articles on Slovak subjects are probably heavily read by Slovaks and other people who are at least a little familiar with the Slovak language. Those people will largely prefer to have the diacritics in place. Haukur 13:52, 9 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

It is the same with the German car called a Porsche only those who have more than a passing interest in the model know that, it is sort of, pronounced in German as if it ended in "r" in English. Consequently few in English speakers pronounce it the German way (My friends all have Porsches ...). The major reason given for using national spellings in articles is because wrong spellings tend to grate on the reader. I think the same thing happens with diacritics and letter not in the 26 of the English Alphabet, a "ü" can be more easily glossed over than an "ł" can, this may be in part familiarity, but it is also to do with how the diacritic alters the shape of the letter to the unaccustomed eye. The result is that one is thinking about how odd the word looks instead of what the text trying to convey. I think the major problem is that for many foreign editors, editing an article about something they are familiar with (eg a person or a town), for them not to see the correct diacritics on a familiar word is just as distracting for them as it is for a native English speaking person to see them. --Philip Baird Shearer 14:15, 9 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I would say that a fair number of people kind of vaguely know that "Porsche" is pronounced "Porsch-uh" (at least that's how I'd pronounce it. For us Americans pronouncing something like there's an "r" on the end would mean we'd pronounce it "Porscherrr" with heavy accent on a nasal "r" sound - I assume you're British, and swallow the "r"?) - one sees snobby people on movies and television pronounce it that way, for instance. They don't know the German pronunciation rules that explain why it is pronounced that way, but I don't think the German pronunciation is a mystery. Of course people generally don't pronounce it that way. But that's not the same thing at all. I do think you're underestimating to what extent familiarity with the particular weird foreign squiggle plays a role. The little line through the "ł" isn't noticeably more intrusive than the sedilla ("ç"), but the latter doesn't look nearly as weird, simply because French is a much more familiar language. An additional point, related to your comment that people get annoyed when things they know about aren't spelled correctly - for French, German, etc., you're not just going to find foreign editors irritated at the wrong spelling. You're also going to find Anglophone editors annoyed, because a fair number will be familiar with the foreign language in question. Essentially, then, I would say that the point at which we should start putting diacritics in titles is the point at which the number of anglophone editors distracted by the lack of diacritics approaches the number who are distracted by the presence of diacritics. If that makes any sense. john k 16:33, 9 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I think I actually agree with this principle. The empirical problem is that we have almost no way of knowing what spelling annoys fewest people for any given subject. My guess is that people interested in, for example, obscure Polish subjects will generally know some Polish and prefer to avoid Anglicized forms of Polish words. But when a subject or person is well-enough known you can make a case for stripping diacritics. For example I can understand why people might want to move Lech Wałęsa to Lech Walesa because the latter spelling was frequently used in media coverage of the man outside of Poland (partly for typographical reasons, I suppose). I'd still not agree that this move should be made but then I'm a diacritics fan and I think the form with the diacritics is more informative, even if it may be jarring to some. But still, I'll concede that it's a borderline case. Haukur 22:29, 9 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

A very good observation which I would say explains lots of my corrections.

That aside, while I agree with john that some diactrics are better known then others, I would like to strongly disagree that it implies we should divide them into two groups and use only part of them. First, where do we draw the line? French, German - sounds good. Although... are we sure 'ß' is so popular? What about Scandinavian? Spanish? What if - just gusssing - ñ is more popular then ü? Should we judge it on diactric by diactric basis? Should we use a google search or some academic publication as a criteria? What about historical diactrics and changes in time? While I am not saying it is technically not feasible, such a project seems rather like a big waste of time for me.

Second, why should we let popularity of a given diactric determine this at all? There is a difference between popularity and notability. The fact that an African town has no article on Wiki while an American village has does not make the African town less notable. Haukur raised a very good point that how many wiki-editors a given language has is an important factor in determining how much this language (and the country POV and such) is represented on Wiki. But the fact that this bias exists should not make us accept it as an 'ok' situation, or even worse, enshrine it in a policy. That Lithuania is over 10 times as small as Poland does not mean that its POV or its language is 10 times less important; they are equal. Same goes for example for Poland versus twice as large Germany or France (and let's not forget that population size is only a part of the factor here, and wealth and censorship in some countries even further lower the number of editors representing that area). Either we treat the diactrics as notable and correct for all languages and don't differentiate between French, Polish and Vietnamise, or we outrule all of them on Wikipedia, but I strongly object to some diactrics being more important then others.

Third and somewhat OT. No offence to anybody but I seriously doubt that more then half of English speakers could define diactric or even give you an example (this holds true for all countries - diactrics will not be recongnized by most citizens of any country). Diactrics are strange to most of Wikipedia readers, no matter if they are French or Vietnamise. So the question is whether they are they helpful or not. Here the point about this Wiki being international and about citizens of given country reading en wiki should not be forgotten (this being the biggest wiki of all), and there is of course the disambigs issue, and often the case of having several English variants of a name to chose from, and others. Although if we want to start the debate about diactrics - use them or not - perhaps we should do this in another thread, but I will repeat once again: either we use them all or none at all (or at least that's my view on the possible choices).

Finally, let me restate the original question. Since we currently are using diactrics, we should modify the wording of the relevant articles/guidelines mentioned above to make it clear it is ok or not and if we are not sure if this is ok or not, we need to finally decide on it, sooner the better. Having confusing and unclear guidelines is not helping either side.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus ^Talk 02:59, 12 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

My own feeling is that we should follow the lead of the majority of other popular English-language usage, meaning major newspaper and magazine articles. If a diacritic word shows up with diacritics every time the New York Times and International Herald Tribune write about it, per their style guides, then Wikipedia should reflect that. If English-language newspaper articles omit the diacritics, then we should leave them off the Wikipedia article titles. If it's ambiguous, and consensus cannot be reached to keep diacritics on an article's talk page, then the default should be "don't use diacritics." If a subject does become notable later and the newspapers do start using diacriticals, then the Wikipedia article can be moved to match popular usage, as verifiable third-party sources will be easily available. --Elonka 15:35, 12 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Typically, newspapers have had printing restrictions that limit the extent to which they can use diacritics. I'd suggest not limiting it to media sources - works of reference should be consulted as well, and perhaps textbooks. To Piotrus - Spanish, French, and German would be the obvious languages where diacritics are most used, with perhaps Portuguese added. And I don't see how notability has anything to do with it. The issue is what the "most common name used in English" is, not whether the diacritic is itself notable (which is a nonsensical idea). john k 16:12, 12 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Going by the usage of the sources used to write the article is often a helpful guideline. Haukur 16:24, 12 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I agree with John Kenney's take on the situation. Not all diacritics need to be treated equally. Our goal is to achieve good, readable style, not to pursue some objective of fairness which is really irrelevant to letters (cold, unthinking things that they are). As for where to draw the line, the decision should be made on a case-by-case basis, looking at the specifics of each language in question in terms of how unreadable its diacritics and non-English letters are. In some cases, we should decide separately on the consonants and vowels of a given language (for instance, I oppose β, but ö and ü are among the more plausible non-English letters to use).—Nat Krause^(Talk!) 03:25, 15 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I am against the position that we should treat diacritics case by case. We need a clear cut policy. Therefore, all diacritics need to be treated equally. Not necessarily for the sake of objectiveness or fairness, but for the sake of consistency. Otherwise, there always are going to be issues with each case using diacritics. I say we should either have no diacritics in article names or allow ALL diacritics in Latin-based alphabets. I would vote for no diacritics, even common ones such as cedilla. Furthermore, determining the "Englishness" of particular diacritics is not going to be easy and can not see an objective method on achieving this. --TimBits

20:04, 2 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Related poll

A related poll, with several users citing *this* policy as a reason not to use diactrics, is being held at Talk:List of Polish monarchs.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus ^Talk 18:26, 13 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks Piotrus. And I agree, I would especially like to see the participants of this policy page, weigh in with their own opinions on the poll. --Elonka 18:36, 13 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Huh?

If you are talking about a person, country, town, movie or book, use the most commonly used English version of the name for the article,...

Ok... but what about things that are not people, countries, towns, movies, or books? What about Circumcision, or Voodoo, both of which currently have discussions active on what title is most appropriate? Circumcision could be used to mean either male circumcision only or circumcision of either gender - but best English usage is male-specific. It has been requested that Voodoo be moved to Vodou, a name preferred by the members of the religion, who (it is claimed) feel Voodoo is an ignorant and contemptuous term invented by Hollywood. Other editors claim that the spelling Voodoo is more commonly used in English and therefore should prevail.

These are not people, countries, towns, movies, or books. They are a medical procedure (or, in others' opinion, a traditional ritual) and a religion. Do this article's naming conventions apply? Shouldn't the above sentence be greatly simplified to, "When discussing any object, person, or phenomena in mainspace, it is best to use the most commonly used English version of the name for the subject under discussion"? By narrowly limiting the convention to only people, countries, towns, movies, and books, a vast majority of articles describing objects and phenomena are left without any clear direction as regards naming conventions. What is the purpose of this narrow limitation? Kasreyn 10:08, 13 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Proposal for new general naming convention for non-English proper names

There is proposal regarding whether only English should be used: Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions#Proposal for new general naming convention for non-English proper names. You're welcome. --Monk 17:10, 17 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Poll on some German street

There is a vote ongoing at Talk:Voss-strasse to move that article to "Voßstraße". Shilkanni 17:09, 27 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Umlaut and ß sources

At Wikipedia:German-speaking Wikipedians' notice board/Umlaut and ß I've been putting together some examples of how English language publications deal with ß and umlauts. Would anyone like to contribute? Discussions using reason and argument have so far only ended in stalemates, and I am hoping that if we can agree on how the matter is usually dealt with in printed English it might give us some clues on how to do so at Wikipedia. Saint|swithin 11:12, 7 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Poll on deciding English spelling of the word "Voivodship / Voivodeship"

There has been a multi-month discussion at Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject Geography of Poland, about the correct English term to use for a Polish geographical region. The consensus was "Voivodeship" [9], so an official request on renaming all the "Voivodship" categories to "Voivodeship" was submitted. However, there still appears to be some controversy, so additional viewpoints are being requested. Anyone with an opinion on the matter is invited to participate, at the CFR poll. --Elonka 01:36, 18 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Foreign Artwork

I originally posted this to WikiProject Arts, but I haven't received a response; I thought this policy page might get more discussion.

I have a specific question about the naming of articles for famous sculptures, but I imagine that this issue applies to all art forms. What is the specific policy for the naming of articles for pieces of art with foreign names? I see a fair amount of inconsistency here, as I find many articles with english titles (and the foreign name given in parentheses), and a fair amount with articles with native language titles (and the english title given in parentheses). For example:

Native name: Garçon à la pipe, L’Absinthe, Fontana dei Quattro Fiumi, Les Demoiselles d'Avignon
English name: Apollo and Daphne (Bernini), Triton Fountain, Ecstasy of St Theresa, Impression, Sunrise, Luncheon of the Boating Party

Is there a pre-existing policy for artwork that we can follow? Can we agree on some consistent naming standard for artwork? --DDG 21:39, 31 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Afaik only in music there are separate "naming conventions" guidelines like Wikipedia:Naming conventions (pieces of music), Wikipedia:Naming conventions (operas), and Album titles and band names. Note that, for instance, the "operas" naming convention leads to a mixture of English and Foreign names. Deliberately. The key word is recognisability: The Magic Flute, and La Bohème are the most recognisable names. The first happens to be English, the second happens to be French.

For Art I suppose that the combination of Wikipedia:Naming conventions (common names) and Wikipedia:Naming conventions (precision) (with again recognisability as ultimate judge) usually should lead to an acceptable name.

Wikipedia:Naming conventions (common names) has an Art example: Venus de Milo (French, more recognisable than Aphrodite of Melos) - There is no language rule whatsoever implied: the Mona Lisa is located in the same museum as the Venus de Milo, nonetheless the French name of that painting ("La Gioconde") is less recognisable for an average English speaker. --Francis Schonken 18:29, 17 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Korean native names

This guideline currently reads " However, any non-Latin-alphabet native name should be given within the first line of the article (with a Latin-alphabet transliteration if the English name does not correspond to a transliteration of the native name). " [10]. Yet the manual of style for Korean-related topics stipulates the use of infoboxes instead of the conventional inline-style for all other languages. I'd suggest to add an exceptional clause to this guideline so as to avoid the conflict with the Korean one. Alternatively, the Korean MOS would have to be modified. — Insta ntnood 20:14, 19 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Yes please. Otherwise we're going to go back to having "name soup" in the first line of every Korea-related article, since most Korean-language names are represented in 4 (or more) different ways. The name tables are well established in the Korea-related articles, and do a much better job than any in-line method. -- Visviva 22:08, 19 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I totally agree. Masterhatch 00:12, 20 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I myself have no preference towards the inline-style nor the box-style. But since it's already an established practice provided by the Korean MOS, an exception clause to WP:UE is necessary to avoid a conflict of guidelines. — Insta ntnood 20:17, 24 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I would propose to add the following clause to WP:UE, " Korean-related topics are excepted from this requirement, since it has been an established practice to use the infobox-style, and is regulated by [[Wikipedia:Manual of Style (Korea-related articles)]]. ", following " transliteration of the native name). ". — Insta ntnood 20:17, 24 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Clear transliteration guideline

Wikipedia:Manual of Style (Arabic) gives a great convension about which transliterated form to use. It distinguishes three types of transliteration (read the page for more details):

Primary transliteration

A name has a primary transliteration if at least 75% of all references in English use the same transliteration, and if that transliteration does not contain any non-printable characters (including underscores). Primary transliterations may sometimes be less accurate than other transliterations.

Google searches can be useful in determining the most common usage, but should not be heavily relied upon. The content of large searches may not be relevant to the subject being discussed. For example, القائم has a standard transliteration of "al-Qa'im", but "al-Qaim" receives five times as many hits.

Standard transliteration

The standard transliteration uses a systematic convention of rendering Arabic script into English which is used and standardized by academics and linguists.

Strict transliteration

A strict transliteration is uniquely reversible and allows recreating of the original writing. A strict transliteration need not be a 1:1 mapping of characters. A source character may be mapped (1:n) into a sequence of several target characters without losing sequential reversibility.

The standard transliteration does not carry enough information to accurately write or pronounce the original Arabic script. The standard transliteration does not differentiate between several letters, or between long and short vowels. A strict transliteration is one that uses a system of accents, underscores, and underdots to render the original Arabic in a form that carries all the information held in the original Arabic.

Plus it adds the following guidelines:

If an Arabic article has a primary transliteration, then it should be used as the article title.
If an Arabic article does not have a primary transliteration, the standard transliteration should be used as the article title.
The strict transliteration should not be used in article titles.

I would like to add this to this guideline because it simplifies and propose a clear guideline about how to transliterate, unless you prefer to create a page for this issue. CG 17:54, 23 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

"Native names"

Should names in different official languages be regarded as "native names" for international organisations? The official languages of the FIFA, for instance, are French, English, German and Spanish, whereas for the UPU the official languages are French and English. — Insta ntnood 20:20, 24 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I would propose to add " For international organisations, names in their official languages are "native names" in this context. " before " Also, a non-Latin-alphabet ... ". — Insta ntnood 22:25, 16 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Scottish monarchs

Has anyone noticed that all of the articles on early Scottish monarchs have been moved to the Gaelic forms? This seems to be in direct violation of all applicable naming conventions.

I started a discussion at Talk:Máel Coluim II of Scotland. [Cross post at Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions (names and titles). john k 03:28, 27 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

A requested move has now been added at Talk:Cináed I of Scotland. john k 23:10, 27 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Japanese help

I hope this is an appropriate place to ask this... if it isn't, please direct me to the correct page. ^_^

Alright, I have a question about what we should do for a One Piece character on the Cipher Pol page. The character has not yet shown up in any English releases, and isn't going to for a very long time. The author has never written the character's name in anything trustworthy (the only time he's written it, he spelled other character's names that he has confirmed spellings for wrong...). So, the character has never been given an "official" spelling for his name. The most common (used in almost all scanlations, fansubs, and discussions, and getting over 6000 hits on Google) spelling of his name is Jyabura. However, according to Hepburn romanization, this is incorrect, and his name should actually be spelled "Jabura". However, this spelling is used much less commonly, only getting around 2000 hits on Google...

So, now that I've explained the situation, here's my question: Should we go with the more "correct" spelling (Jabura), despite the fact that it's less common? Should we go with the much more common spelling, despite the fact that it uses a more obscure romanization (Jyabura)? Or should we use the spelling the author used in the earlier mentioned page (Jabra)? We'd like to know, as we can't seem to come to an agreement about what the policy is for this. Thanks for any help anyone can give us! - Murasaki Seiko 23:24, 8 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

German names using ß

Having recently been to Germany and started writing a series of articles on German history and places, I have been waylaid by a small number of people who insist that the word "strasse" must be rendered "straße" in article titles. In my view this is plainly a violation of Wikipedia:Naming conventions (use English), since "ß" is German ligature of "ss" and is not a letter of the Latin alphabet as it is used in the English-speaking world. It is not recognised by most English-speakers (let alone people, other than Germans, using English as a second language): most will read "Voßstraße" as "Vobstrabe." I have wasted hours arguing about this at Voss-strasse, Wilhelmstrasse and elewhere, and now I am sick of it. I would like a firm policy determination on this matter, one way or the other. If there is a decision that "ß" is acceptable, I will accept that, but I am sure that a poll would reject that position. I would like some advice from people who frequent this page on how to bring the matter to a decision. Adam 13:21, 12 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

ß, though historically a ligature of 'ss' is now a separate letter in German - with a different phonetic value from 'ss'. Those of our readers who care about streets in Germany will typically know enough German to know how to pronounce ß correctly. Those who don't will pronounce names like Voßstraße incorrectly anyhow (probably pronouncing 'v' as [v] rather than [f] etc.)

For names which can be said to have a common English form, like Gauß/Gauss it's fine to go with the 'ss' version - the article on Gauss is of generic interest. For marginally notable Germans or marginally notable streets in Berlin it's fine to use the 'ß' because those articles will mostly by read by people who know the letter or would be interested to learn about it. So we don't need a generic proclamation on ß - we can keep on deciding it on a case-by-case basis as we have been doing. Occasionally debates arise but that can't be helped and wouldn't be helped even if you managed to squeeze something into a guideline page somewhere. We're essentially incapable of making binding decisions because new people show up all the time and don't want to abide by something the old farts decided :) I know this can sometimes be annoying but it's not so horrible in this case. Haukur 16:00, 12 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

see also WP:BCE :p dab (ᛏ) 16:35, 12 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

A good example. Wikipedia is not consistent, please don't force consistency in issues like this. Kusma (討論) 16:42, 12 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Though I have enormous respect for Haukur's opinions, in this one case, I'm afraid I have to disagree. I think it is worth creating a Wikipedia guideline that says that the use of the "ß" character is not recommended on the English Wikipedia. Yes, there are some people that will ignore the guideline, and I do see Haukur's point that on some specific pages, the readership will self-regulate as to who does and doesn't understand the character. However, there are many people on Wikipedia who do look to the guidelines to make a decision in borderline cases, and for them, I think it's worth stating that given a choice, it's preferable to stick with the A-Z "English" letters on the English Wikipedia. --Elonka 17:03, 12 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I think use of ß in the main article text needs no regulation at all. If a guideline about titles is necessary, I would propose adding {{foreignchar}} to every article with funny symbols in the title. Fortunately Wikipedia uses Unicode so the technical limitation of other encyclopedias to avoid funny characters is not an issue here. Kusma (討論) 17:13, 12 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Nice to have a vote of confidence out of the blue :) I also think you've grown a lot as a Wikipedian since I saw you first, you should be about ripe for adminship now. Haukur 17:57, 12 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

A couple others links worth reading, are from when this subject came up almost exactly one year ago: Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions (use English)/Archive 3#Proposal on the use of ß, and Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Archive 31#German eszet. --Elonka 17:18, 12 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

An attempt to enforce a site-wide ban on the character ß would be a very bad idea indeed. There is no technical reason to avoid it, or to treat it differently from other unfamiliar accented letters, ligatures and other characters outside the 26 of the "English alphabet". The only argument against it is that it might confuse readers, the corollary being that by transcribing it, we patronise them. Unfamiliarity is not a reason to hide things from people; an encyclopædia exists to clarify and to educate, not to cover up.

At the moment, we decide on a case-by-case basis which topics are known well enough under the "ss" spelling to be more understandable like that to the average reader, and which are not and thereby default to the native (ß) spelling. There are, inevitably, conflicts over the borderline cases, but that is the lesser of two evils. The symbol in question is used by the vast majority of editors writing on German-language topics, and there are hundreds of pages with it in their titles. To ban ß would be to create a huge amount of unnecessary work for very little gain.

This proposal has been tried before and failed then. Judging from the attempts to find a consensus at the subsequent page move debates, I don't think a strong consensus will be found this time, either.

I must disagree with Elonka; where there is doubt, it's better to stick to a demonstrably correct spelling. The idea that the English writing system comprises a rigid set of 26 letters is over-simplistic, especially when dealing with foreign place-names and personal names.

The English Wikipedia, although primarily intended for an English-speaking audience is, de facto, the global edition, and is read by people of many nationalities and many mother tongues, including German.

--Stemonitis 17:36, 12 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

how about recommending ß should only appear in proper names (as always: unless they are notable enough to have familiar anglicizations, such as Gauss)? Spelling German terms in general with ß would be discriminating against the Swiss, too (the humanity!) dab (ᛏ) 17:58, 12 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Just to be clear, I'm not saying that the "ß" character should be banned entirely from Wikipedia. I'm only talking about article titles themselves, which I believe should use the English spelling, and then the native spelling can (and should) be included in the first paragraph of the article. Ultimately, the deciding factor for me on many of these cases, is to fall back on standard Wikipedia policy, of "most common usage" in English-language sources. If it can be shown that a particular subject is most often spelled with the "ß" in an article's English-language sources, then by all means, the article title should reflect that. If, however, the article's sources tend to use the "ss" spelling, then that's what should be used on Wikipedia, per policy in WP:NAME: article naming should give priority to what the majority of English speakers would most easily recognize. --Elonka 19:23, 12 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I find that the expression the English spelling is one of the most irritating thrown about in these debates, since everybody appears to assume they know what it means without pausing to consider that there is no "the English spelling" of non-English terms. Tempelhof-Schöneberg or Graf Zeppelin do not have an "English spelling" because the terms aren't English in the first place (and yet WP has articles about them). Often, there will be various anglicizations or translations which will have to be looked at case by case. Your remark on common usage is spot on, of course (viz., case by case). In the famous Zürich vs. Zurich precedent, English sources were divided, and of course at this point the haggling will begin between proponents of "count google hits", "prefer academic authorities" and various other convictions. Our recommendation should be: "check usage in notable English language sources, then use your common sense." pages and pages of guidelines will not get us further than this. dab (ᛏ) 19:44, 12 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I quite agree about the irritation: it's like nails on a blackboard when editors vote against a proposal boldly proclaiming that obviously the word háček contains letters which aren't in the English alphabet. I'm against over-specification: consistency is the hobgoblin, etc. But I would agree that the ß is unfamiliar and unreadable to most English readers, and in a prominent place like an article title should probably be replaced with an anglicized spelling (isn't ss an acceptable alternative in German?). Evidence of this is that the scharfes s is often used by programmers and online gamers as a fancy letter B, as in an abbreviation of "beta version". —Michael Z. 2006-09-12 20:11 Z

Thanks for all the above comments. The problem with this "case by case" approach is that certain zealots insist on moving articles I have written to include ß in the title when I have chosen not to do so eg Vossstrasse, whereas if I try to move an article from (say) Wilhelmstraße to Wilhelmstrasse I am ruthlessly reverted. I maintain my view that ß should not appear in article titles, but if there is no consensus on this then there has to be an agreement that articles will not be moved in either direction. If this does not happen, I will begin to move all the ß articles to non-ß forms, triggering a series of edit wars which will then require intervention from on high - this often being the only way to get a decision about anything around here. Adam 00:40, 13 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

That's more or less how it is now, requiring no new policy decision. Pages should, of course, only be moved when there is some other compelling reason to do so. In the case which sparked off this latest round of acrimony, "Voss-strasse" was moved, not because of the ß per se, but because the inclusion of a hyphen was interpreted as original research. I assume that that editor was acting in good faith (he gave a reason for his move at least), and no other pages have been moved. So we're back at the status quo, which everyone except Adam Carr seemed happy with. Edit wars are unhelpful, and threats of edit wars doubly so, since they are only likely to raise the hackles of editors with other opinions. --Stemonitis 07:52, 13 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

That was not the reason ProhibitOnions moved the article, as a review of the Talk pages will show. He moved it because he insists that ß should be used.
As I have said, this is not just about Vossstrasse, there are several other articles I have written or edited which need to be brought into conformity. There needs to be a policy one way or another. I don't think that's an unreasonable request.
I didn't threaten an edit war, I predicted one, in fact several, if there is no fixed policy on this matter. If I move Wilhelmstraße to Wilhelmstrasse, as I am entitled to do in the absence of a policy to the contrary, there will certainly be an edit war. Adam 08:15, 13 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

"I propose the following: Rename the article "Vossstrasse." This will eliminate the objections regarding the hyphenation and capitalization issues, and leave the ß/ss issue aside (and in your "favor") until a consensus regarding special characters can be reached" — ProhibitOnions, [11]. ProhibitOnions makes clear elsewhere on the page that it is the hyphen he objects to, and not the ß.
I see no reason why articles need to be brought into conformity. That goes against the practice of following common usage.
They are only wars if both sides fight. Who was it that said "The easiest way to end a war is to lose it"? When you say that there will be an edit war, that is an indication that you intend to "fight" in one, and is thus a threat. --Stemonitis 08:25, 13 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

You need to read the whole history, not just the most recent exchange. If it was just about the hyphen there would have been no issue.
Of course articles need to be brought into conformity. This is an encyclopaedia, not a kindergarten.
Sometimes wars need to be won (I could cite several examples). I am trying to avert an edit war by asking for a policy determination. In the absence of law, however, the only alternative is war. Adam 08:30, 13 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I find this militaristic terminology inflammatory and inappropriate for a discussion about an encyclopædia. --Stemonitis 08:42, 13 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

"War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things: the decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks that nothing is worth a war, is much worse." John Stuart Mill. If you want to avoid a war, then make a contribution to establishing the rule of law in this area, which is always the best guarantor of peace. Adam 08:45, 13 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

@Adam,

You have a point, maybe even a valid point;
You disclose your intentions to illustrate that point by starting a move war;
Causing move wars is considered disruptive, see WP:TT, 6th row, for the templates that warn against that kind of disruption.
Wikipedia:Don't disrupt Wikipedia to illustrate a point, which exposes you to being blocked for up to one month.

Guidelines (and most often, but not exclusively, MoS type of guidance) can allow multiple options. Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Completed requests contains quite some cases with rulings against Wikipedians who think that the fact that a guideline offers several possibilities presupposes the right to "harmonise" Wikipedia to a single one of the described options. If guidance allows multiple options, trying to enforce a single option is considered disruptive.

I'm just trying to get you out of your illusion that it would pe possible to make a change in policy emerge by starting to act disruptively. In fact with what you disclosed above, it would already be possible to block you per WP:POINT. Not that I think that a good idea (yet!). But the moment you start disruption the WP:POINT guidance would better be applied without delay, imho. --Francis Schonken 08:47, 13 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I didn't say I would start a war. I said I would move Wilhelmstraße to Wilhelmstrasse, as I am entitled to do in the absence of a policy to the contrary, not to make a point but because I believe the move to be correct. I know from past experience that if I do this there will be an edit war, because the move will be reverted by the eszettistas and I will oppose the reversion, etc. I am trying to prevent that state of affairs by requesting a firm policy that everyone knows and has to abide by. Human history shows that anarchy, the absence of law, always leads to war. Adam 09:03, 13 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Our rule on British vs American spelling is to leave the original author's spelling alone and to block anyone who insists on making wholesale changes from one variant of English to the other. Maybe we need something like that here to prevent the anarchy you are so afraid of? Kusma (討論) 09:06, 13 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

A weak analogy. No-one disputes that ß is not English. The en.Wikipedia must accommodate variant forms of English. It does not have to accommodate German. Adam 09:08, 13 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

The point is that the absence of a binding decision one way or the other is accompanied by a rule that prevents anarchy. Kusma (討論) 09:17, 13 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I dispute this, you are right - ß is not an English or latin character, it is 2 English or Latin characters. It is a ligature pure and simple. By the same token œ is a ligature of 'oe', and so forth. Lets use the correct terms here. ß is not a letter or a character, it is a code point. If the assumption that all non-"English" characters could not be used in the English Wikipedia, then the powers that be wouldn't have recently allowed titles to be in UTF-8. So I'm all in favour of the same rules that apply to American/British English - the original author gets to decide. --kjd 03:24, 16 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Your position amounts to saying that I am prohibited from making an edit, regardless of the merits of the edit, and regardless of the fact that the edit contrvenes no policy, if I can reasonably expect that the edit will be reverted. I reject this proposition. Adam 09:22, 13 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

OK well you people have been no help at all, so thanks a lot. I am now going to move Wilhelmstraße to Wilhelmstrasse (or get an Admin to do so): not because I want to start a war, or to make a point, but because I believe that is the correct title for the article under Wikipedia's Naming conventions policy, which states: Generally, article naming should give priority to what the majority of English speakers would most easily recognize. (thanks to Masterhatch below for pointing that out). Then we will see what happens. If there is trouble as a result, it will be the fault of people such as those here who have declined to find a solution to this problem. Adam 00:44, 14 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

this ß thing

This ß is not an English character (nor Latin for that matter) and is very rarely found in English publications. Since this is the English section of wikipedia, the most common spelling in English should be used. If there is no common spelling in English, maybe the subject isn't notable enough to have an article. If the subject can't be found in English dictionaries, encyclopaedias, reference books, media works, biographies, atlases, etc. then maybe, just maybe it doesn't deserve an article in English wikipedia. If the subject is found in said sources in English, then maybe it does deserve an artice and in that case, the most common spelling in English should be used (which in the vast majority of cases does not include ß). I am not saying that ß should be banned, but i am saying that most English speakers have no idea what it is (including me until i went to germany a couple of years ago) and this policy is very clear when it states "Generally, article naming should give priority to what the majority of English speakers would most easily recognize, with a reasonable minimum of ambiguity, while at the same time making linking to those articles easy and second nature." This ß should be used in the first line of the first paragraph to show the native German spelling. It should not be used in the title. Masterhatch 15:38, 13 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Consistency

However this is resolved, the policy needs to be consistent. If it is determined that ß should not appear in article titles, then neither should á é í ó ú à è ì ò ù â ê î ô û ä ö ü ã ñ õ ç č š ž ð þ œ æ etc. Perhaps we could even extend the ban to j, which also appears only in words of foreign origin in English. Angr 13:49, 16 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Sigh... I suggest you go away and read Reductio ad absurdum before inflicting such infantile absurdities on us. Come back when you have an intelligent contribution to make. Adam 13:57, 16 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Having read reductio ad absurdum, I can only interpret the above comment as both a non sequitur and a personal attack. A reductio ad absurdum is a kind of logical fallacy; there is no logical fallacy in my statement above. Depending on your definition of "English word", either all of the above characters are used in English words, or none of them is. Angr 14:27, 16 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

To suggest that because I oppose the use of "ß" on the grounds that most English-speakers don't recognise it, I must therefore also oppose the use of "é", which every literate English-speaker is familiar with, is indeed absurd, and can only have been put forward in the tone of heavy-handed "irony" which disfigures so much debate at Wikipedia. I am entitled to respond to such insulting childishness in a tone of asperity, which I did. If you don't like the response, don't provoke it. Adam 14:34, 16 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Where is the evidence that most English speakers don't recognize ß? Where is the evidence that every literate English speaker is familiar with é? The only insulting behavior going on here is your assumption that most English speakers are incapable of reading and understanding our article ß. (And I do wonder what that article will be renamed if your proposed policy is implemented.) Angr 14:47, 16 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Oh very droll. You can't help yourself, can you? Adam 14:51, 16 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Guys, you've both got PhDs! Act your age or the Umlaut Monster will get you!! :) Haukur 17:41, 16 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Shut up guys, Angr has a good point. Although I disagree with him on a lot of things, I respect him a lot as should you. He is a pro and knows what he is talking about, so quit giving him a hard time. All he is saying is that there is no point we should not use a special character simply because it is not used in English.Cameron Nedland 14:43, 12 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I absolutely agree with Angr. —Nightstallion (?) 19:38, 23 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Related poll

A suggested move and related debate about whether to name an article "Meissen" or "Meißen" is ongoing at Talk:Meissen. Interested editors are invited to participate. --Elonka 00:09, 22 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Stale active discussion

I found a link in Disputed issues to a discussion that now is in the new 'Naming conventions' archive, and redirected the link there. However, after reading the Disputed issues section more carefully, I got cold feet, and reverted. The list heading was 'Related proposals and active discussions'; and I don't want people to add their comments to an archived 'active discussion'.

This is the first time I visit this page. Couldn't someone who regularly is here check over the links under 'Related proposals and active discussions', and in case they are archived either remove them, or else both update and relabel them? JoergenB 20:22, 13 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Input desired

There is a debate going on at Talk:Árpád Élő regarding the proper naming on the English WikiPedia for people with dialectrics in their name. Input from the people involved in working on this guideline would be helpful. And please leave the PhD speak behind. Thank you. --StuffOfInterest 13:21, 18 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

(I shouldn't, but can't resist:) seems like fun. Anyway, I take note of your proposal that henceforth, in order to avoid the "accents" vs. "diacritics" terminology disputes, we call them "dialectrics" (i.e. an insulator between two electric fields). Doesn't that solve it all? --Francis Schonken 13:32, 18 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Copied the above (quite appropriately I think) to Wikipedia:ßåd Jøkës åñd Øthër Ðélètêd Ñøñsëñsé --Francis Schonken 14:11, 18 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Ugg. Should not type before morning coffee. Thanks for the trout slap. :) --StuffOfInterest 14:27, 18 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Artwork naming conventions

I originally posted this to WikiProject Arts and Visual Arts, but I haven't received a concrete response there; I thought it might be time to bring this to the broader policy page.

I have a specific question about the naming of articles for famous sculptures, but I imagine that this issue applies to all art forms. What is the specific policy for the naming of articles for pieces of art with foreign names? I see a fair amount of inconsistency here, as I find many articles with english titles (and the foreign name given in parentheses), and a fair amount with articles with native language titles (and the english title given in parentheses). For example:

Native name: Garçon à la pipe, L’Absinthe, Fontana dei Quattro Fiumi, Les Demoiselles d'Avignon
English name: Apollo and Daphne (Bernini), Triton Fountain, Ecstasy of St Theresa, Impression, Sunrise, Luncheon of the Boating Party

Is there a pre-existing policy for artwork that we can follow? Can we agree on some consistent naming standard for artwork? If the policy really is supposed to be "use English", should we move all of the "native" named articles to their english titles for consistency? --DDG 16:19, 27 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

You wrote the same above (#Foreign Artwork) - there's still an answer there --Francis Schonken 17:08, 27 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

What is this "Latin" alphabet?

Those who insist that we must use the "Latin" alphabet ask for something pretty much impossible, I submit. I speak English and Spanish, neither of which use the Latin alphabet, as far as I can tell. In English, we have changed the alphabet to include the letters "J", "U", and "W", none of which, I have always thought, were present in the alphabet of the Romans (which is what I would call the "Latin" alphabet). Germans have inserted the "ß", Spaniards the "Ñ", well, you get the picture. The Latin alphabet is, by and large, used in Latin classes, as far as I can tell. Unschool 19:26, 1 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Ok, so no disagreement there. I submit, then, that as a corollary to this concept, that since the "Latin" alphabet is not used in English, and since we have a Wikipedia policy that states "Use English", that we use only the English alphabet. That is, the 26 letters found on any English keyboard, the 26 letters used to head up the 26 sections of any English-language dictionary, the same 26 letters that every schoolchild in England, Australia, and the United States learns when learning to read. I would propose changing the first paragraph of Wikipedia:Naming conventions (use English), to read as follows:

Article titles should use the English alphabet, not any other alphabets or other writing systems such as syllabaries or Chinese characters. However, any non-English-alphabet native name should be given within the first line of the article (with an English-alphabet transliteration if the English name does not correspond to a transliteration of the native name). Also, a non-English-alphabet redirect could be created to link to the actual English-alphabet-titled article.

I don't know enough about proposing policy to know where this should be posted, and would appreciate being pointed in the right direction. Unschool 06:33, 8 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The "English alphabet" does include many accented characters, but which are only seldom used. See English language#Written accents and English words with diacritics. In particular, any attempts to remove accents from foreign-language article titles (of which there are a great many) will be met with disapproval. The policy is meant only to exclude entirely different writing systems, such as Arabic script, Chinese logograms, the Hebrew alphabet, Cyrillic and so on, and not to affect Latin-based alphabets. Trying to expand this to cover the (largely unrelated) topic of accented characters and ligatures is a step too far. Accents are necessary; 26 characters are simply not enough. Perhaps a change to "Latin-based alphabets" would provide the necessary clarification without requiring sweeping and unwelcome changes to thousands of article titles. --Stemonitis 13:32, 8 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The term "Latin alphabet" is not one we've just invented, as our article on it (linked from the convention page) makes clear. To quote from it: In modern usage, the term Latin alphabet is used for any straightforward derivation of the alphabet used by the Romans. You may not like the term very much, but that doesn't stop it being correct. Proteus (Talk) 17:10, 8 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I'm happy with it, but it does seem to get misinterpreted relatively often. If it does need to be clarified, then I reckon "Latin-based alphabet" is better than "English alphabet". That's all I was trying to say. Dare I ask (as an aside) what "straightforward" is supposed to mean in that context? That looks like another loophole that people could use to argue that some characters are not "straightforward" enough and must be eschewed. --Stemonitis 17:15, 8 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Burma v. Myanmar

I would like to receive input on whether using "Burma/Myanmar" is fine in naming a Wikiproject, or whether one alternative is better than the other. The discussion can be found here: Wikipedia talk:WikiProject_Burma/Myanmar#Project_name. Thank you.--Hintha 04:03, 8 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Ælfric and other Old English names

Section (and subsections) moved in from Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions (standard letters with diacritics)#Ælfric and other Old English names by Francis Schonken 23:37, 8 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

There is a tendency, which I think is a good one, to use the proper Old English forms for personal names (such as Ælfric) from the Anglo-Saxon period in England, rather than forms like Aelfric, even worse, AElfric. Given the widespread availability of extended fonts, I think we should reconsider the current recommendation "that their use be avoided in article titles." My vote would go for judging Old English ligatures by the same critieria that are applied in this article to other accents and diacritics. This could be accomplished by deleting them from the section on other types of diacritics and adding the following to the section on scope:

The ligature~~s like~~ Æ and œæ, when used in Old English ~~and other historical~~ contexts.

Let the discussion begin. --SteveMcCluskey 14:46, 5 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

After carefully reading the article on ligatures, I think the change should be limited to the Old English ligature/character Æ/æ, and not extend to other ligatures. --SteveMcCluskey 15:02, 5 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

The Wikipedia page on Proper names seems to approve the use of Æ in names, in which case the change I've proposed has the merit of consistency. --SteveMcCluskey 15:26, 5 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I would be less sweeping. Some of the problems with exceptional characters, like alphabetization, still apply to Æ; see Category:Archbishops of Canterbury. The page you reference is in fact a polite way of saying that there is no consensus on the spelling of Ægir; which is demonstrated every time the matter comes up. Septentrionalis 18:33, 7 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Fortunately we can give these entries a sort tag so the alphabetization of the category is a non-issue. Kusma (討論) 08:51, 14 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

If someone does it; the Archbishops haven't been. But it would be simpler, and perhaps less jarring, to use Aelfric. Septentrionalis 05:38, 22 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I have fixed them. Kusma (討論) 08:32, 22 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

After this helpful discussion, I changed the article, but further restricting the Æ use in titles to proper names.

The ligature Æ/æ when used in Old English proper names.

Thanks much. --SteveMcCluskey 19:49, 22 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Change article name and scope?

The changes concerning the ligature Æ, discussed above, were reverted. The reason given that "a 'ligature' is not a 'letter with a diacritic'," which is the topic of this propoal and recommended that this should be put in another guideline proposal.

I see the point, but this page already discusses (and recommends against) the use of ligatures in the section on other types of diacritics, non-standard letters and ligatures, which was apparently inconsistent with the Wikipedia page on Proper names.

It seems wisest to consolidate the guidelines for non-standard characters in a single place, rather than scatter them throughout Wikipedia. Since this page seems the ideal place for such a guideline, I suggest this page be renamed to the broader (if less precise) "Naming conventions (accented and non-standard letters)."

Although the previous discussion seemed to achieve consensus on the use the ligature (or letter) Æ (æsc) in Old English proper names, and many, if not most, Old English articles currently do use it, perhaps its time to reopen the discussion on that point as well. Whatever we decide, Naming standards for non-standard letters should be put in one place. --SteveMcCluskey 07:37, 23 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I don't see any problem with using it, but using "Ae" in the sort key. It seems that Æ may, at least in some cases (see Ælnoth of Canterbury), be transliterated as either "Ae" or "Ai", so both these variants should be accessible through redirects. (Aelfric and Ailfric both redirecting to Ælfric). But I don't know enough about Old English to know if "Ai" is always a legitimate variant or if it is dependent on what follows. u p p l a n d 08:15, 23 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Uppland, this subsection started by Steve is, as far as I understand, not about whether or not to use Æ - it is about where (that is: in which guideline or proposal) to place the proposals/consensus regarding Æ. --Francis Schonken 08:58, 23 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

@Steve: Best to approach this thorny field as non-dogmatic as possible. I derive that maxim from the experience that the dogmatic approaches have failed thus far.

"all ligatures, diacritics, non-standard letters (which then would also include Greek, Arabic, etc letters?) on the same guideline page" is dogmatic. All of them on separate guideline pages would, of course, be as dogmatic.

I see no problem whatsoever why the use of Æ/æ (and Œ/œ?) in English words (that is: where the use of such ligature derives from words that have their origins in old English like Ælfric or more modern English like Encyclopædia Britannica) couldn't be treated in Wikipedia:Naming conventions (use English)?

Anyway, the discussion of the Æ/æ ligature (which seems somewhat rooted in English for a considerable length of time) seems, to me at least, different from, for example, the ß ligature, which as far as I know is only used in German loan words or maybe even exclusively in German proper names.

But I'm indifferent how things are grouped in guidelines, which would always be subject to consensus. Only: the page name should cover the content, for example Wikipedia:Naming conventions (thorn), was clear and the proposal covered *exactly* what the name said. No consensus was reached on that proposal, but not because of sloppy naming of the proposal (which would only have worsened the case).

Note that a guideline named Naming conventions (accented and non-standard letters) would inevitably have to cover issues currently covered in Wikipedia:Naming conventions (Greek), Wikipedia:Naming conventions (Arabic), Wikipedia:Naming conventions (Norse mythology), Wikipedia:Naming conventions (Cyrillic), etc, each of which need some expertise in the specific field treated in these naming conventions guidelines and proposals. If you feel like taming all that expertise in a single guideline, who am I to stop you? Based on my previous experience, I'd describe this, however, as an attempt to run against a brick wall head first (without helmet, that is).

Note also that ligatures like æ and œ are arguably standard letters (a, o, e) combined in a single character. So, some could argue they don't even have a place in Naming conventions (accented and non-standard letters).

So what would you think about my idea to treat Æ/æ/Œ/œ in WP:UE? --Francis Schonken 08:58, 23 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Æ/æ/Œ/œ - rules proposal

Apart from the discussion of where to place the rules/proposals (see previous subsection), here are some ideas for what I might see as relevant guidance:

Æ/æ/Œ/œ, use in CONTENT page (redirects can, and in many cases *should*, be created with other variants):

Not as a standard transliteration technique for words from Greek and Roman antiquity, e.g.
- ~~Æneas~~ → Aeneas;
- ~~Julius Cæsar~~ → Julius Caesar (also applies when such name is e.g. included in the title of a Shakespeare play);
- ~~Œdipus~~ → Oedipus.
OK for old English words if it is the way they're usually written:
- Ælfric.
Exceptions derived from Wikipedia:Naming conventions (Norse mythology):
- Æsir
- Hœnir
- Ægir (not "Aegir" nor "Aeger")
More modern English words and expressions:
1. Brand names, commercial products: if it is the correct way to write the name in English according to the owner of the trademark, e.g.:
  - Encyclopædia Britannica.
2. Other proper nouns: follow Wikipedia:Naming conflict#Proper nouns if both the noun with ligature and without ligature occur in English:
  - Humanæ Vitæ or Humanae Vitae? Applying the table with three criteria as proposed in Wikipedia:Naming conflict#Proper nouns leads to Humanae Vitae for the 1968 encyclical (see this page in English on the Vatican website for criterion 2, "Current undisputed official name of entity", and criterion 3, "Current self-identifying name of entity").
3. Article names (or parts thereof) that are not part of a proper name: don't use these ligatures:
  - ~~encyclopædia~~ (not part of a proper name as in the example above) → encyclopedia.

--Francis Schonken 10:40, 23 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Francis,

Thanks for the thoughtful list of criteria; they seem quite complete and meet many of my concerns. Let me think about them for a while and I'll get back on them. I'm not quite sure where they belong, but perhaps they could be put in WP:UE as you suggest, as long as we avoid inconsistencies. Right now I'm in the midst of some major projects in my real life, and it may be a few days before I can give them the attention they deserve.

To avoid inconsistencies I'd like to change the passage in the current article that caused me to open this discussion in the first place. It's at the end of the section on ...non-standard letters and ligatures:

"As a result, this guideline recommends that their use [e.g., æ,Æ] be avoided in article titles."

If we want to avoid conflicts with what is finally decided on other guidelines we could put in something less dogmatic like:

"As a result, this guideline neither recommends nor discourages their use in article titles"

An alternative to, or continuation of, the above would be something like.

"For specific guidance on the use of these symbols see the appropriate guidelines." and provide links in the preceding list from those symbols for which guidelines are developed to the appropriate article.

Best wishes --SteveMcCluskey 00:34, 24 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Sounds like a fair solution to me, and that's coming from one of the strongest supporters of ß and ð. —Nightstallion (?) 19:58, 2 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Updated:

--Francis Schonken 15:38, 8 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I disagree with this suggestion unless there is common usage to to back it up. --Philip Baird Shearer 17:36, 8 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Of course there's common usage to back it up (read the above, please, quite some examples were used), so I can only interpret this as an agreement. --Francis Schonken 23:37, 8 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

There is no common usage exception to this one: "Brand names, commercial products: if it is the correct way to write the name in English according to the owner of the trademark, e.g.:" --Philip Baird Shearer 11:29, 9 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Well, err, what do you want: "common usage" or "common usage exception" (if there's no "common usage exception" then there's "common usage")? "Brand names, commercial products: if it is the correct way to write the name in English according to the owner of the trademark, e.g.:" is common usage. --Francis Schonken 11:42, 9 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

about 987,000 English pages for -nestle Nestlé
about 1,480,000 English pages for nestle -Nestlé
about 619 English pages for -muller-light Müller-light
about 16,300 English pages for muller-light -Müller-light

--Philip Baird Shearer 08:38, 11 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

about 623,000 English pages for "Encyclopædia Britannica" -"Encyclopaedia Britannica"
about 895,000 English pages for -"Encyclopædia Britannica" "Encyclopaedia Britannica"
about 997,000 English pages for -"Encyclopædia Britannica" "Encyclopedia Britannica"

Just to cover your inevitable comment that Nestlé and Müller are not covered by this proposal. --Philip Baird Shearer 08:43, 11 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

And? Google is notoriously unreliable when it comes to these kinds of spelling variants. We made the article title eBay once that became technically possible. "encyclopedia Britannica" is technically correct (only the second word reffering to the brand name, the first word referring to what it is: an encyclopedia) and gives as many hits as "Encyclopedia Britannica".

Please move the diacritic examples to somewhere where they're relevant, not in this section about Æ/æ/Œ/œ. Or delete them, because as said, and as far as I'm concerned that needs no further demonstration, Google is notoriously unreliable to find out "common name" when it comes to these kind of minor spelling variants involving diacritics and ligatures. If these could be reliably demonstrated by Google, there wouldn't have been a problem about these in the first place.

Further, in case you hadn't noticed yet, and if you insist on casting doubt on what is the most common name for a brand product that is on the market in English speaking countries, then the guidance at Wikipedia:Naming conflict#Proper nouns needs to be followed. It *always* leads to the "correct way to write the name in English according to the owner of the trademark", because that name is *always* the self-identified name (criterion 3 in the chart), and *always* the official name (criterion #2: trademark registration is as official as one gets for brand names). Since this *always* leads to two criteria out of the three mentioned in that chart confirming the "trademark" name, we have Encyclopædia Britannica, Nestlé (Nestle is a redirect), Citroën (Citroen is a redirect), etc.

~~Further I'm appalled that you still don't get~~ the basic rules of google searching: among others "-Wikipedia" is an obligatory parameter for avoidance of circularity, see Wikipedia:Naming conflict#Ambiguity persists. Not that it would help the diacritic and ligature related google searches, which are simply unreliable.

Currently "There is disagreement over whether to use œ and æ" is no longer correct, I have no knowledge of lingering naming conflicts involving these ligatures. Do you? --Francis Schonken 10:09, 11 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Francis please stop the personal attacks, I am not sure why you are doing it because even when I disagree with you, I think you usually argue through the use of rational debating points which puts your point across more effectively. There is still disagreement over the use of œ and æ. I think have contributed as much as I can constructively to this discussion. Until others join in and raise other points I'll write no more on this issue. --Philip Baird Shearer 11:36, 11 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Re. "There is still disagreement over the use of œ and æ" - where? I have come to think we're cultivating something that has become a rather artificial problem for some time now. I used "we" in the previous sentence, expressing that I'm probably as guilty to that as you are. At least, currently, I'm prepared to drop issues that no longer cause practical problems.

If you stop commenting on this issue, probably because you can't find recent or ongoing discussions about Æ/æ/Œ/œ in article titles, that OK for me, that closes the discussion as far as I'm concerned. --Francis Schonken 12:11, 11 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

As for examples, here is maybe one: [12] - is this worth discussing, or should the move simply be reverted? --Francis Schonken 08:43, 15 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
PS: according to the Gutenberg text, based on the "first folio" of the play, "æ" is used twice (sic: two times) in that print of the Shakespeare play, all other occurences of "Caesar" (including in the play's title) and other words/names that use the "ae" combination are written without the æ ligature. The Gutenberg edition of the play even has an intro by Gutenberg's boss (Michael S. Hart) attempting to explain such spelling inconsistencies ("You will find a lot of these kinds of errors in this text [...]")... So, really I couldn't see why Wikipedia would write "Cæsar" in the page name referring to the title of that Shakespeare play... --Francis Schonken 09:13, 15 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Updated proposal above accordingly. --Francis Schonken 09:26, 15 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Proposed change to WP:NAME

Given the intent and spirit of the guidelines on this page (as I understand them to give precedence to English translations), the current wording for the organization naming conventions appears to be in conflict (where it seems to call for foreign names to be given equal weight with English translations, and to decide which to use simply based on which is most common). I've made a proposal to rectify this. See Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions#Organizations (such as political parties) (proposed change) --Serge 22:32, 12 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Inclusion of non-native languages other than English

For pages related to Malaysia, a number of editors are including several languages (sometimes 5 languages for various reasons). Some of the pages are Kuala Lumpur International Airport Ipoh and Kuching. Is that justifiable? I am in the position that the only relevant languages should be included at a page and that relevant languages are English name (per WP:UE) and official names. __earth ^(Talk) 08:08, 14 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Médecins Sans Frontières

Interesting, ongoing and relevant discussion at Talk:Médecins Sans Frontières. Andrewa 22:54, 19 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Funny Foreign Squiggles

Ha a new neologism. Thanks to user:Audiovideo creating a redirect from Funny Foreign Squiggle to Diacritic, or by some other trigger, now the first hit in a Google search for the phrase is in the computing-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com as a phrase for diacritic! --Philip Baird Shearer 19:31, 27 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

That kind of intolerance is not really something to be proud of. (It ought not to be capitalised, either, but never mind.) --Stemonitis 19:36, 27 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I recall the time and thread when it was created (and used the redirect myself a few times). Actually, it was a mild WP:POINT regarding the debate about... you know what; but it's more likely that it was created by the "pro-diacritic" camp. While, technically, it might fit under CSD R3, I'd prefer to leave the redirect as a funny piece of Wikipedia history. Duja► 17:53, 28 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Naming of organisations

There are problems about naming organisations in non-English speaking countries and this guideline is not helping me. Specifically there is disagreement between people on Wikipedia:WikiProject Scouting about the naming of Scout and Guide organisations. I am trying to mediate. A simple example is "Asociación de Scouts de Honduras". This title was used for the article until recently, when it was moved to Association of Scouts in Honduras by an English expatriate non-Scout from Hondurus. Is this the best translation or should it be "Association of Scouts of Honduras", or "Scout Association of Honduras", or "Honduras Scout Association", or indeed something else?

There is complete agreement in the Scouting Project for:

For naming articles on Scout organisations/associations, we use an English name if the organisation itself verifiably uses an unique English name in its own documents.

The problem is if this does not apply. In the Honduras case, we have no evidence for a official translation. Honduras however is relatively simple. In other cases we have more than one word that translates to Scout or Guide. In France we have Scouts et Guides de France and Eclaireuses et Eclaireurs de France. These can be translated to "Scouts and Guides of France" and "Guides and Scouts of France" respectively, which are different (perhaps deliberately so), but these translations utterly fail to reflect the way the French understand the terms. Where there are many different Scout organisations, there is the danger that over time, different names for different organisations might be translated to the same English name. Note that Europe is quite different from the US and the UK where there is only one Scout organisation (plus Girl Scouts or Guides). There is also the problem of different words that can really only be translated as "Association" in English.

Some members of the Scout Project conclude that we have to use the correct name in the native language. They also suggest that translating is "original research" and/or that it fails to show respect to other Scout organisations. Other members think that we must translate and use English in every case. The problem arises for all countries in Latin America, most countries in Europe (and for many different organisations) and many elsewhere such as Africa. The world bodies such as World Organization of the Scout Movement (WOSM) and World Association of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts (WAGGGS) sometimes use an English translation. However they do not always do so consistently and where there are many Scout organisations in a country, they do not deal with them directly but through a federal council. There are also many organisations not affiliated to these bodies.

We are agreed about the wide use of redirects and for all countries we have created links to "Scouting in XXX" as a redirect, or a disambiguation page, or as a small article. These aid the reader to use English to find the article they want, but the problem of the name of the organisation article remains.

Articles have been moved by members and non-members of the Scouting Project when no consensus had been reached. I would welcome suggestions on how to proceed and how to modify this guideline to offer clearer advice. --Bduke 22:05, 10 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Proposal to amend video games to this statement:

"If you are talking about a person, country, town, movie or book, use the most commonly used English version of the name for the article"

Video games would have a very similar criteria to films and literature. And there are some major issues regarding naming conventions within video games, and specific clarification that official English titles are advised over the original title. - A Link to the Past (talk) 07:11, 1 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

It appears that the only opposition to this proposal also believes that he is not well-informed in the matter. - A Link to the Past (talk) 18:21, 10 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Support

A Link to the Past (talk) 07:11, 1 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I agree, I think in general movies, books, games, etc. could probably be generalized to art medium, media, or something like that. —Mitaphane _?|! 08:03, 1 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Computer games should use the same naming conventions as the rest of the arts. - hahnch e n 17:30, 2 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose

This is extremely ambiguous and does not list any examples or excpetions or any of that. Please clarify what is meant by most common name - this has proven to be highly controverisal, such as the Brain Training v. Brian Age and other such United States-Ruopean naming wars. Hbdragon88 07:55, 1 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not talking fighting over which English name to use, I'm talking setting precedent to use an English title over a non-English title - example, calling the series Mana (series) as opposed to Seiken Densetsu. - A Link to the Past (talk) 08:00, 1 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

That was one unholy 67KB discussion and something I'm not willing to touch at all. But I will withdraw my oppose. Hbdragon88 08:05, 1 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

There is no consensus regarding many page names within the VG project. Adding this to the naming conventions to circumvent discussion there is really bad form. I'm not even sure this proposal would change anything — "most commonly used" is still entirely subjective. --- RockMFR 17:29, 1 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I'm NOT talking about picking between English titles. I'm only talking about non-English titles. I see no logic in not saying "official English titles should be used instead of other language titles". - A Link to the Past (talk) 19:23, 1 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I still disagree with you. We shouldn't be basing page names on what the name of the English version is. If a title is romanized and there are convincing reasons to use that title, we shouldn't discredit it just because it is not the official title of the "English version". --- RockMFR 22:57, 1 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
That is NOT what I proposed at all. An unofficial translation could never be considered the "English version". An "official English version" is just that - official. Calling the Animal Crossing movie "Animal Forest" instead of "Dōbutsu no Mori", even though AF is unofficial for the movie is NOT what I'm suggesting. I'm suggesting that because, for instance, "Mana" is an official title, it should be used instead of "Seiken Densetsu". - A Link to the Past (talk) 23:06, 1 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Again, I'm not sure this is the correct venue for rehashing this discussion. The page move was rejected at the article's talk page, so even if this is added to the guideline, it does not trump the consensus that is reached at the article's talk page. Guidelines and policy should be created to fit around existing practices. --- RockMFR 23:12, 1 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I'm NOT using this to get SD moved. If you're going to say oppose, I suggest you answer why this rule applies to literature and films, but not video games. - A Link to the Past (talk) 23:15, 1 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

(reset indent) I'm not sure I agree with this guideline applying to literature/films at all. But, I haven't read much of the discussion regarding the matter, so I'm not well-informed regarding this matter. --- RockMFR 23:24, 1 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Well, if you don't know, I don't think you should be voting one way or the other. - A Link to the Past (talk) 23:33, 1 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Note that whereas I agree games should use the same naming criteria as other arts, I do not think the Mana debate is of any relevance here at all. Mana only refers to a subset of the Seiken games in my opinion. Although I think the entire sentence above is too ambiguous and not really followed anyway. For example, Bande à part uses the French name, whereas Breathless (1960 film) uses the English one? - hahnch e n 00:51, 2 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Mana refers to all games released in English. Obviously, because SD games were never released in the US, they would not feature the franchise title in the first place. But if it's irrelevant, let's not even bring it up. It's an example. Regardless, if you think that games should use the same naming criteria, then you ought to vote keep on the matter. And in your examples, that is a case of editors not following the guideline. - A Link to the Past (talk) 01:07, 2 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Major dispute.

See, I'm attempting to slowly but surely convert many Japanese names to English names for articles within the spectrum of WP:ANIME (that is, if there IS an accepted English name). However, I am having many problems with people saying that they choose to "go with the JP name because there are multiple English names that they'd have to decide on". Four places where this discussion is occurring are Makoto Kino, Son Goku (Dragon Ball), WP:ANIME, and WP:DB. I would appreciate it if all interested AND uninterested would assist. - A Link to the Past (talk) 05:24, 8 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Page move - Vossstrasse

There is currently a discussion about whether the page at Vossstrasse should be moved to Voßstraße. Interested editors are invited to participate in the discussion at Talk:Vossstrasse#Page name. --El on ka 00:29, 8 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Squamish/Sḵwxwú7mesh

Can someone with some experience in the matter please weigh in on the discussion going on at Talk:Sḵwxwú7mesh#Name: "7" and pronunciation? The Squamish people is what most English speakers call them, but Sḵwxwú7mesh is the proper name in the Squamish language. Rawr 05:57, 8 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Please use a real glottal stop letter (ɂ, U+0242) instead of number seven. --✉ Hello World! 08:15, 9 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Proposed addendum - Non-Latin disambiguation

I have encountered a number articles, mostly Chinese family names where it is impossible to transliterate into English without losing meaning or context and cause name conflict. For example, this article lists a dozen different surnames that can be transliterated into English as "Li". I proposed adding the following line to the end of the paragraph on Chinese/Pinyin, feel free to edit it:

When name conflict occurs to transliterated titles and cannot be disambiguated by English phrases or Latin alphabet phrases (e.g. homophonic Chinese surnames), the inclusion of minimal amount of non-Latin characters in the article title would be acceptable.

--Voidvector 12:23, 13 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I would prefer not to; Li (surname) as I see it is filled with little square boxes now. These should not occur in article names. Wouldn't indications of (Mandarin) tone be enough? And the dominant surname Li should in any case be transliterated Li (or, when actually done, Lee) as English actually does. We have no problem disambiguating actually identical British names; we can do the same here. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 18:56, 22 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Using mandarin tone marks can solve the problem above, but it cannot solve the problem where their pronunciations are the same, for example 張 and 章 (both are Zhāng). --✉ Hello World! 08:07, 9 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Proposed clarification

We should spell our article titles as English spells them; and we should make our policy clear. The abuse of using diacritics when English does not is being sheltered under this guideline; we should clarify to:

In all cases where English actually has a predominant spelling of a word or name, we should use it, whether it is the spelling in some other language or not. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 18:56, 22 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I think changing the guideline shortly after opening move requests on two articles with ß in their titles might be seen by some as moving the goalposts. Whatever the motivation, no consensus for this change has been achieved, despite the claim in your edit summary. Any change that it might introduce (and it's not immediately clear what the consequences would be) would seem to be negative, as far as I can see. --Stemonitis 17:17, 23 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

In fact, I opened one. The present text is

If a native spelling uses different letters than the most common English spelling (eg, Wien vs. Vienna), only use the native spelling as an article title if it is more commonly used in English than the anglicized form.

This is incoherent, since it implied that the most common English spelling must be anglicized; and it is, while equally decisive as the proposed text (Å and A are different letters, like some examples currently under discussion), not as clear. It gives comfort to disruptive and radical nationalists, of whom I have had enough. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 17:26, 23 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, sorry, one, not two, although you are participating in the second. I am confused by your adding {{disputed}} to the current text ("only use the native spelling if…"). Do you really dispute this? That would seem to indicate that you think the native spelling should be used in other circumstances, too, which would seem unlikely. I don't believe that there is any dispute about this text, but only about your proposed extension to it, which is not on the page marked as disputed. This section of the guideline is all about cases where a topic has different names in different languages (and that we should use the English name when there is one). Trying to extend it to cover accented characters and the like is slightly dihonest. It would be better to openly suggest that accented characters should be avoided. That has been suggested before, of course, and was rejected. Most importantly, if the change in the guidelines is only to combat a group with one point of view, then the change is itself a violation of WP:NPOV and probably WP:POINT. Guidelines should not be changed merely because one group of editors has "had enough" of another. If there is no agreement, then we should neither claim that there is, nor try to enforce one point of view. There is genuine disagreement here, from different people all acting in good faith. --Stemonitis 17:35, 23 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

(After edit conflict) Yes, this seems unclear. How about

If the most common English spelling is more than merely a transliteration of the native spelling, (eg, Wien vs. Vienna), only use the native spelling as an article title if it is more commonly used in English than the anglicized form.

This would clarify that this sentence would not apply to Åmål vs. Amal (the case I guess you are referring to). Since it is already stated that the title must be in the Latin alphabet it is clear that transliteration in this sentence only refers to transliteration of a character for the Latin alphabet to another character from that alphabet. Stefán 17:38, 23 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Stremonitis confuses me with those who want to change policy in one direction, as Stefán does in the other; I want to clarify what this sentence already says. I support Besançon and Göttingen, but I see no support here for Stefán's qualification. Only use the native spelling as an article title if it is more commonly used in English than the anglicized form; use Vienna, not Wien. This follows the fundamental principle of our naming conventions: don't surprise the reader. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 18:11, 23 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

This shows the context the paragraph came in. Then the context of the phrase different letters makes it clear that Å and A are not to be considered different letters in the context of the paragraph. If you didn't like my previous proposal, I can instead propose that we reinsert the first paragraph of the linked-to edit. Stefán 18:20, 23 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Dig into the history a little more and you can see that the paragraph I was pointing out got moved down (and rephrase slightly) and now corresponds to the first paragraph of the Disputed issues section. So my qualification (which you saw no support for) is actually already in the text. Stefán 18:28, 23 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Implications in the edit history are a different matter; since no one sees them, only the actual wording has consensus. Since Curps' text no longer stands, I doubt it has consensus either. But I am prepared to add a counterexample, to discountenance the "no diacritics" crowd too: Use the native spelling as an article title if it is more commonly used in English than the anglicized form: Use Edvard Beneš, not Benes, but Vienna, not Wien. If you would prefer an Icelandic politician, supply a name. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 20:01, 23 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Why don't we just remove the disputed paragraph altogether. The Wien vs. Vienna example is no better than the Christopher Columbus and Venice examples which appear in the next paragraph. Stefán 20:16, 23 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

We should at least add Beneš; and much of the following paragraph is redudant too; a blanket endorsement of Pinyin, even for articles about 1840, may have been unwise, see Talk:Treaty of Nanking. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 20:48, 23 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Agreed about Pinyin but I think we should keep the second paragraph in some form. Stefán 21:09, 23 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I don't see the point of Spanish or French. Without Vienna, this could be construed as forbidding Vienna or Ushant, which are clear English usage. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 21:12, 23 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

We should mention examples of languages that use the Latin alphabet and examples of languages which don't. How mentioning Spanish and French has any effect on Vienna vs. Wien is beyond me. Stefán 21:17, 23 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Oh, there are editors perfectly capable of claiming we don't need to transliterate Wien; "it will be educational for our readers". <sigh> Septentrionalis PMAnderson 21:22, 23 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Then we point out the Venice example to them. If you think the Venice example is somehow worse then the Vienna example then explain why and we can swap them, or even include both. Stefán 21:31, 23 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Page move

There is currently a discussion at Talk:Dynamo Kyiv#Requested move about the correct name to use. This has degenerated into an argument about the validity and relevance of this guideline in relation to football articles like this. Any comments welcome. Woodym555 20:14, 2 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Missing section

This article needs to have a "Specific exceptions" section with a link to Wikipedia:Naming conventions which goes into many details about exceptions to the general rule to "Use English". 199.125.109.26 02:03, 5 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Languages of the Nordic countries

It is outrageous if the Å, Ä, Ö.. letters of Swedish, Finnish, Norwegian, Danish etc. are considered only "accented" versions of the actual letters. Please see articles of Swedish alphabet, Finnish alphabet. They are completely different letters, not accented letters. Then, if someone calls Kimi Räikkönen "Raikkonen", principally it would be same as calling Lewis Hamilton "Hemiltan".

Perhaps Swedish provides the best example, if a word has both Å and Ä, both would be rendered as A. This is utterly wrong, Ä presents "e" and Å "o". Completely different letters they are, not accented.

I am surprised this discussion is still going on. Let's use real names, not misspellings. We have redirects and Unicode for a reason. --Pudeo ⺮ 09:57, 22 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The same problem occurs in Vietnamese too, as d and đ are two different letters. See Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions (Vietnamese), the consensus has not been reached yet. -✉ Hello World! 16:56, 25 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Question about 東北大學

I'd like to ask for some opinions on the naming of this page - 東北大學. Currently it is a disambiguation page. I understand that sometimes non-Latin characters in title names may be unavoidable. But 東北大學 literally translates as "Northwestern University", and there's already a disambiguation page for that (Northeastern University (disambiguation)). So is 東北大學 really necessary as its own page or should it just redirect to Northeastern University (disambiguation)? Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 21:40, 19 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I've started an AFD, see Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/東北大學 -✉ Hello World! 16:48, 25 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Ok. And what do you think of the following:

Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 03:07, 26 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

All of the characters in these links are rendered as question marks (using standard install of Firefox 2.0.0.9) -- which as far as I'm concerned reinforces the point that article titles should use English characters. older ≠ wiser 03:15, 26 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Most people who are literate in the character sets represented by those bytes you see as question marks, and who regularly read in that character set on their computers --- the same people to whom those disambiguation pages will be most useful --- will have the requisite fonts installed. cab (talk) 13:38, 26 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

OK, however, it was not clear from the post that all of ? character articles are disambiguation pages. But even so, this is the English language wikipedia -- persons using the EN wikipedia can be expected to have some proficiency of English in addition to whatever other languages they might know. I don't see that EN:WP has any obligation to make EN pages intelligible in non-English character sets. Brief transliterations are fine and even redirects from foreign character names, but sorry, I don't see the need for such pages. older ≠ wiser 14:52, 26 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Having proficiency in English, and even being a native English speaker, doesn't mean that you will know the name of every Chinese/Korean/Japanese proper noun or culturally-specific concept in English --- they may be transcribed under any system or in an ad-hoc fashion, part transcribed and part translated, or entirely translated in any number of idiosyncratic ways. I don't want to play an exponentially-expanding guessing game every time I see something in Chinese and want to read more about the topic in English. In many cases, someone might not even know how to transcribe the name (e.g. they read in Chinese about a Japanese or Korean topic, but don't speak Korean or Japanese in the first place to know how the name should be transcribed). Hence the need for redirects from foreign character names.

I fail to see how disambiguations on foreign-character titles are anything but a natural extension of this problem. Plenty of topics belonging to one of the Chinese character-using languages share their Chinese character names with other topics from other Chinese character-using languages. Picking e.g. Mandarin Chinese as the title of the disambiguation page, using that to transcribe, and redirecting Japanese and Korean transcriptions to that title is far less sensible and more confusing than admitting non-Latin character disambiguation page names. The Korean transcription should redirect to the Korean-related topic, the Japanese to the Japanese topic, and the Chinese to the Chinese topic. Only in the case where there's genuine uncertainty about what the user is likely to be looking for --- that is, when he entered some Chinese characters, which are a valid title in multiple languages --- should he be getting a disambiguation page.

Also I don't have any idea where "obligation" comes into it --- these pages are useful to a subset of enwiki users and will be maintained by that subset, while not interfering with normal functioning for the rest of the user base. cab (talk) 15:33, 26 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

British and Irish medieval names

A disagreement has emerged over the form of name to use for various early British and Irish historical figures. The main two links for the current debate are:

There are links in those to some prior discussions.

The relevant sentence of this guideline is "If you are talking about a person, country, town, film, book, or video game, use the most commonly used English version of the name for the article, as you would find it in other encyclopedias and reference works."

There appear to be two issues. First, how much relative weight should be given to scholarly sources versus popular sources in determining what the "most commonly used" version is? Second, does the use of one form in the title precludes the use of another form within the article to refer to the subject of the article?

I'm going to create two subsections here since the points seem distinct, and then after I post here I'll notify a few editors I know who have an interest in this kind of article. Please notify anyone else you think would be interested in this topic. Mike Christie (talk) 20:58, 28 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Scholarly and modern vs. popular sources

For the first question, consider Æthelberht of Kent. A search on Google Books finds the following counts:

"Æthelberht of Kent": 3 hits
"Æthelbert of Kent": 0 hits
"Aethelberht of Kent": 238 hits
"Aethelbert of Kent": 142 hits
"Ethelberht of Kent": 665 hits
"Ethelbert of Kent": 282 hits

However, a look at the sources shows that the "Ethelbert" usages are by and large in older books. I looked in a dozen or so recent works on Anglo-Saxon history, and found that "Æthelberht" is clearly the most commonly used spelling, despite the numbers above. (Here's a link to the WP:RM move request I made for it back in June, with the counts.) The works included purely scholarly texts such as Dorothy Whitelock's "English Historical Documents", modern works such as Kirby's "Earliest English Kings", and introductory books aimed at the layman such as Peter Hunter Blair's "An Introduction to Anglo-Saxon England". I don't think anyone who has read even a couple of layman's works in the field of Anglo-Saxon history would think "Ethelbert" was the standard form; but I wouldn't be at all surprised to find that in general English usage (such as church calendars, or names of churches) the most common form was "Ethelbert". (I'm a layman myself; I've no academic background in history at all.) So what does "most commonly used" mean here?

Some kings such as Alfred the Great are too widely known by some specific version of their name for any alternative to be sensible. I think very few early kings are really that well known, though. Constantine II of Scotland, who is one of the articles in question, is not even close to being that famous; I'm part Scots, and interested in medieval history, and I'd never heard of him before I read this article.

Michael Sanders has also argued that the Gaelic names are harder to understand for English readers (and this is the English Wikipedia). I think he's at least partly right, but I don't think that is a key point: if a reader of a Wikipedia article looks up the subject in a book cited in that article, they should not be astonished to discover a different name is generally used in the literature for that topic. Mike Christie (talk) 20:58, 28 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I'd like to say myself that the issue is in this case is concentrating less on "which forms of name should be used in the title" and more on "which form of name should be used in the article": the Scottish monarchs from Kenneth I all use the English forms of name for the arcticle title; however, their article text until roughly William I uses Gaelic forms contradictory to the existing article titles (thus Constantine II of Scotland's article consistently referred to him within the text as 'Constantín'). Michael Sanders 21:08, 28 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Let's try a search for the last 10 years:

63 hits for Aethelberht Kent date:1998-2008
171 hits for Ethelberht Kent date:1998-2008

But this doesn't give us the true picture because Æ is often mis-OCRed. So let's try a few searches for errors:

72 hits for thelberht Kent date:1998-2008
18 hits for Tthelberht Kent date:1998-2008
9 hits for Ithelberht Kent date:1998-2008

But some of the most common error readings for Æthelberht will show up in our search for Ethelberht. Indeed, the top hit when I search for Ethelberht is something which has the reading "/Ethelberht", an OCR-error for Æthelberht. Unforunately Google Books doesn't allow us to filter out "/Ethelberht" and "^Ethelberht" (common erraneous readings of Æthelberht) from the actual Ethelberhts. Haukur (talk) 23:50, 29 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Use of one term within another article

What started this was not a move; Michael simply brought the contents of various articles in line with their titles. See the edit history of Constantine II of Scotland; Michael did this on quite a few articles and the result was an edit war.

The question came up on Constantine's talk page: see this section (last couple of paragraphs). I personally would prefer consistency between the article title and the contents, but Angus convinced me then that the scholarship does not correspond to the article name so I saw no reason to misrepresent the scholarship in the article by enforcing the use of "Constantine". My reasoning was that the article name is for reader convenience, but the article contents must reflect scholarship.

I now think it would be better to make them consistent, but that the best way to do so would be to move the article to the less familiar name, "Constantín mac Áeda". Redirects can solve the problem of readers looking for "Constantine II of Scotland". Mike Christie (talk) 20:58, 28 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

However, wikipedia conventions such as WP:Common name state that the name most readers would be searching for should be used for article titles: "Constantin mac Aeda", in other words, should only be used if most readers will be looking for him rather than "Constantine II of Scotland". Michael Sanders 21:10, 28 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Repeating some three times may make it true but it won't make it verifiable. Not necessarily "Constantine", definitely not "II", definitely not "Scotland", but the "of" is unexceptionable. If the fact that Gaelic names means that patronyms appearing in the genitive case might confuse people (not a problem with Irish articles) or the use of "mac" might do likewise (again not a problem with Irish articles, nor is "ap" in Welsh ones), then "X son of Y" avoids this. But so long as article naming relies largely on the usage in tertiary references, contradictions between the article titles and their content will be an occasional and unavoidable hazard. When that happens, naming policies shouldn't be a reason to present an outdated vision of any subject, whether it's the backwater that is early historic Scotland or something more important. Whether you like it or not, titles like Constantine I of Scotland, Constantine II of Scotland, Donald I of Scotland, &c, &c, say something to our [readers which the contents do not support. Writing around these misleading article names does not help editors and I doubt that the results will help readers. Angus McLellan (Talk) 23:14, 28 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Not necessarily Constantine II of Scotland, but commonly accepted as Constantine II of Scotland. It's more important that readers find articles where they expect them to be than that they are baffled by technically correct names which serve to confuse rather than differentiate people. Furthermore, sources often disagree in their choice of name (look at Catherine of Aragon) - that doesn't require using a different name form in the body than in the title. And when, furthermore, there is apparently no agreement on what form of name to be used (modern vs contemporary Gaelic) it seems slightly disingenuous to claim that using unheard of (outside Scotland) patronymics and Gaelic name forms for the Kings of Scots rather than the standard Anglicised regnal titles is in any sense more 'honest'. Michael Sanders 23:49, 28 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Incidentally, it turns out this was all discussed before last year, at Talk:Malcolm III of Scotland/Archive One. It was, apparently, agreed that the English forms should be used. Clearly this fell through the cracks somewhere. Michael Sanders 03:02, 29 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

There is a major problem when an article entitled Donald I of Scotland seems to the average reader to be about someone else. The article must be rewritten or retitled, but something must change. Srnec (talk) 17:37, 29 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I don't see how the lack of reality of the ordinal, or whatever, is something which ought to be dealt with at the level of article title and name used in the text. Major, recent, scholarly reference sources, whose purpose is similar to that of wikipedia, use the anglicized forms and the traditional ordinals. Note specifically my old favorite the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. That specialist monographs tend towards gaelic forms, etc., strikes me as irrelevant, as their purpose is quite different from ours. The article on Constantine II in the ODNB is by Dauvit Broun, a major historian of medieval Scotland. I don't know what forms he uses in his own publications, but he has clearly at least acquiesced in use of the more familiar forms for his work in the ODNB, presumably on the basis that different standards are applicable to specialist work and general reference materials. Given that wikipedia is a less scholarly, more generalist work than the ODNB, I don't see what basis there is for being more pedantic about names. john k (talk) 18:59, 29 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I'll never support moving an article to a non-English name. As for using non-English names within an article? In the infobox- have the English name then non-English name underneath it in brackets. In opening line- have English name, then non-English name in brackets. GoodDay (talk) 19:21, 29 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

John, you characterize these namings as "pedantry". You think the editors who favour these names, never mind the dozens of salaried scholars who use these names, are pedants, or do you think it more likely they have a list of reasons? Actually, they have reasons, none of which are ever mentioned by any of the Use English Everywhere proponents. There are many, among which it is the norm in insular historiography, from which Scotland lagged behind until the 1990s, and is necessary when the subject becomes much discussed in depth, which it really didn't become until recently. I could go into other reasons, but I know wikipedia talk pages have familiarised you with them enough for now. Google searches are not going to make the absurdity of these names both in themselves and in comparison to other insular lands any more palatable to the editors who have good non-pedantic reasons for favouring them. You at least must have realised this already, no? Lets get you to the nitty-gritty. There is no king in the period before David I where you'd need more than two A4 pages in 12 font to fit all the original source information, and usually you won't need a quarter of that. These kings have no tellable factual narratives. Any article on them more than 2 paragraphs long will need to be highly scholarly. What you seem to want is for editors of these articles to diverge from the names used in virtually all the sources they will consult. And for what? To protect them from being confused by the foreigness of Mael Coluim or Cinaed? This won't work. Your Mael Brigtes, Gilla Comgains, and all the other scores of such names, cannot be made familiar. It's a foreign culture ... as foreign to any Scot as to any American. One has to get used to these things. These kings unfortunately suffer by being at the early stage of king-lists of a modern nation, and have suffered from the imposition of modern formality misleading at even the most basic level. In reality, these kings can't be decently covered in any depth and be easily comprehensible to the "layman" who doesn't have the interest or mental patience to comprehend some foreign names. Wikipedia is not similar to other popular reference works. It's almost infinitely expandable, and there comes a point when one has to abandon the back of cereal boxes as sources. BTW, Broun uses the native forms in all his publications. I've found out that those spellings there are editorial, and the reasoning behind it is to follow the DNB, which used the Anglicized forms; i.e. it was not an issue of difficulty or editorial philosophy regarding anglicization. Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 20:34, 29 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

If it's a foreign culture, then that makes WP:UE even more pertinent. There's no article for Carlos el Hechizado. The case is clearly one of common name - and the names most commonly used for the Scottish monarchs (with the exception of the obscure-even-by-Scottish standards such as Culen or Aed) are the anglicised forms. As it is, you appear to be claiming that using anglicised forms instead of Gaelic forms will lead to the articles being 'dumbed down'. It won't. It will just make them consistent and logical, rather than looking like someone's been on a POINT spree. Michael Sanders 21:21, 29 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Who's arguing for Carlos el Hechizado? Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 21:25, 29 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Nobody, thankfully, the references to the well-known Malcolm III of Scotland as Máel Coluim mac Donnchada are quite bad enough. Michael Sanders 21:28, 29 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

You don't like using the latter form, we know that. Do you have a point beyond that, that might convince others who don't already agree with you? Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 21:30, 29 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I don't particularly care for "Mael Coluim mac Donnchada", but since you've expressed your distaste for the form "Malcolm" I think it's quits there. The point remains, English-language wikipedia uses English forms. "Mael Coluim mac Donnchada" is not an English form, it is a Gaelic form, and a Gaelic form that is rarely used. You can characterise commonly used names as deriving from cereal boxes as much as you like, and sneer at those who don't know much about Scottish history, and criticise the straw man you set up as the "layman"; the point remains, these names are known and used far more commonly in the English forms than in the Gaelic forms, so it is illogical and inconsistent to use the Gaelic forms; all it does is create shoddy articles that read badly because not even the article subject is described by his or her article name. Michael Sanders 21:37, 29 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I wouldn't have a problem with "Malcolm" if it didn't cause so many problems, though I won't lie, I'd still use Mael Coluim if I had to give a preference. The articles on the Scottish kings are actually very good content wise now, and that's mostly because of the heroic work of Angus. I'm still waiting for you to add any content to these articles which isn't dubious. It's unfortunately a difficult area, and you'll need to move beyond the Pears Junior Encyclopaedia and the dictionaries of Names if you really want to add anything useful. This is not meant as an insult ... a genius wouldn't be able to add anything helpful using those sources. If there are actually many grammar difficulties, then you should help out in that. It would look much better if you did. Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 12:01, 30 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Certainly "Duncan" and "Malcolm" are going to remain the preferred forms for just about ever, because of Shakespeare. I don't see how this is any more incorrect than Mark Antony or Pompey. The arguments made against anglicization apply against pretty much all anglicization - scholarly sources more and more use non-anglicized forms for all monarchs, not just gaelic-named ones. And, as Michael says, there really isn't anything unscientific about using anglicized forms. I don't see how referring to Shakespeare's "Duncan" as "Donnchad" is anything but the exact kind of pedantry that would lead to Marcus Antonius, or Friedrich Barbarossa, or whatever else you want to have. It seems to be, at the moment, a relatively more popular form of pedantry, and, of course, pedantry plays a large role in scholarly usage - pretty much all changes in nomenclature are essentially due to pedantic concerns. Anyway, I've lost my train of thought. john k (talk) 22:33, 29 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The national language of Scotland has been English, or a form of English, since the early Middle Ages. What seems utterly pedantic to me is providing a Gaelic form for, say, Anne, or James (any of them). It would be a bit like providing an Anglo-Saxon form for, say, Edward VIII (which would be Eadward). TharkunColl (talk) 00:04, 30 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

You must have a rather bizarre definition of Early Middle Ages if you believe that age starts in the 15th century. At any rate, on the issue of providing (modern) Gaelic forms of the names of all kings (which is not what this discussion is about), this is ubiquitous in wikipedia. Gaelic was still the language of roughly half the population until about 1500, and never fell below a 1/4 or perhaps a 1/3rd (depending on how the statistics are evaluated) at any time before the Scottish kingdom was absorbed. Compare, say, the List of Lithuanian rulers, where "Ruthenian" (i.e Rus'ian) and Polish (bizarrely) forms are given in addition to Lithuanian spellings. Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 11:51, 30 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I was feeling rather pleased with myself when I read here someone saying: "[k]nowing nothing about the subject matter, I was able to jump right in and comprehend the history and significance". But now I learn that I was making articles "look as though they've been got at by a vandal suffering from WP:POINT or POV". Worse yet, I've produced "shoddy articles that read badly because not even the article subject is described by his or her article name". That Encarta's article followed the same "common name" page title and "pedantic academic name" content as had been followed here is apparently no excuse for shoddy, unreadable near-vandalism. I certainly appreciate the resounding endorsement. Angus McLellan (Talk) 01:48, 30 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Well of course, whenever anyone is in doubt, they automatically cry, "I must go to Encarta!". Not. We don't decide the style of articles based on encarta, we decide it based on our own conventions and rules, and our own sense of what is appropriate. You and Deacon appear to be the sole pair who consider naming an article "Macbeth of Scotland" and then consistently referring to him within it by the unheard of "Mac Bethad mac Findleach", and, in general, preferring an obscure name over a commonly recognised name. If an article is not describing its subject, then, yes, I'm sorry, it is shoddy. Michael Sanders 01:54, 30 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Michael, as you know, I and the anon IP who posted at the original discussion both agree with Angus and the Deacon on this. And shoddy is simply incorrect, and insulting too. Please try to use less inflammatory language. Mike Christie (talk) 03:16, 30 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

And the anon is who? Furthermore, you are arguing the usage of the most common name - e.g. Æthelbert. You are not, so far as I can see, arguing for the use of names which contradict the most common name form. Michael Sanders 03:26, 30 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Just to be clear, I fully agree with both Angus and the Deacon on the points they've made. The anon appeared to do so too; and if I recall correctly a fifth editor posted at one of the pages in at least partial support. The anon's opinion is valid input, unless there is some rule I'm not aware of about anons not participating in discussions. But the main point is that reasonable people can agree with Angus and the Deacon here. It is not an irrational position. As for "Æthelberht", I'm arguing for the most common name in recent, reliable secondary sources. That is definitely not the same as the most common in general use and historical scholarly works, which would certainly be "Ethelbert". A similar standard here seems likely (per the only apparent experts who have commented) to lead to the position stated by Angus and the Deacon. Regardless, I'd appreciate it if you'd apologize to Angus for your use of language. Angus has made enormously valuable contributions to Wikipedia, and the particular article in question recently made FA. You're entitled to your opinion, and your point of view may even prevail here, but please consider your language a little more carefully. There is no need for you to be rude to other good faith contributors. Mike Christie (talk) 04:09, 30 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The anglicised forms are as frequently used in recent reliable secondary sources as the Gaelic forms, so that's hardly relevant. Michael Sanders 16:30, 30 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

(Oh, and also? I'm not aware of having said anything so rude as "oh my ... your ignorance of this topic is breathtaking, not even a slightly valid comparison" in the course of this discussion.) Michael Sanders 16:33, 30 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I haven't been able to keep up with every single post and don't know who said that, but I agree it's not very polite. I doubt I'll comment again on politeness, about you or anyone else, since I don't think I have much more to contribute to this debate, but I am glad to see John K (below) provide a reasoned disagreement without a trace of emotion. I hope anyone who's been less than polite on either side of this debate can follow his lead. (John's not the only civil editor here; he's just an example.) Mike Christie (talk) 18:27, 30 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Certainly both sides stake out reasonable positions, and I'd want to distance myself from Michael's more extreme comments. At the same time, I don't see what advantage "Mac Bethad" has over the familiar "Macbeth," or that "Mael Coluim" has over "Malcolm". So long as we explain that "Malcolm," etc., are anglicizations not used by contemporaries, I don't see that there's a problem. We do that in lots and lots of cases. We hellenize the names of Persian kings. We hebraize the names of the more familiar Assyrian and Babylonian kings. We latinize greek names, and we anglicize the names of various ancient greeks and romans. We anglicize the names of most monarchs. We latinize the names of many early modern figures. In this case, where Gaelic is barely used anymore, and where the English names have centuries of use behind them, I don't see what advantage less familiar, more difficult to pronounce, Gaelic forms has. john k (talk) 06:20, 30 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

(Quick exclaimer: None of the following is intended to be rude). "Pedantry" is a derogatory word which implies a thoughtless loyalty to detail of little importance for its own sake. John, there are advantages to using these forms beyond pedantry. I'm really disappointed I have to repeat some of them, to you of all people. It's artificial, crude and looks silly as soon as any of those articles go into any detail or put in a broader and integrated insular context. Now if you don't share that feeling, then fair enough, you don't share that feeling. But for me, it is bothersome to talk about Donald III of Scotland in the same article as his contemporary King over the water, Domnall Ua Lochlainn. What message is this sending to the intelligent reader? Their name is identical, there is no difference in historical importance. Their kingships were just as customary and disputed. The way in which this practice misleads people means it is not comparable to, say, Marc Anthony or Pompey. And John, as a fair man, can you please explain to people that this has nothing to do with nationalism. Much of the actual opposition on wikipedia to these names come from British people, more often than not Scots, hostile (for their own reasons) to Gaelic. I fear that inappropriate suspicions of nationalism and misplaced perceptions of pedantry are actually damaging dialogue here; this is a matter of editorial philosophy as applied to Scotland's early kings, with reference to them and their relevant context, which is Domnall Ua Lochlainn and such topics, not Marc Anthony. Given that almost all the sources which a good wikipedian would want our editors to use in these articles employ natives forms, you're asking editors to actively anglicize the names of kings in order to apply a vague editorial philosophy which emerged without reference to these kings and this problem. Also, a side question, does it not bother you at least a little that no-one on wikipedia who has actually contributed to these articles agrees with your views? Do you have an explanation for this beyond the reasons they (or we) have given, or beyond nationalism and pedantry? Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 11:51, 30 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Donald III was also a contemporary of William Rufus, King of England - or in his own language, Guillaume le Roux. Or how about the former English king, still very much alive in the 1090s, Eadgar Æþeling - or in modern form, Edgar the Atheling. Or does your policy only extend to speakers of Celtic languages? And if so, when does it become no longer appropriate? The Bruces and Stewarts were certainly not Celts (in fact they had mostly Norman ancestry and spoke English), yet you had Gaelic versions of their names. You even had a Gaelic version of the name of William of Orange! How is this possibly useful or justified? TharkunColl (talk) 13:08, 30 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I'm afraid you are confusing different issues. The Gaelic names of all Scottish kings, not put there by me (although I reformatted them), were there because Gaelic is and was a major language of the Scottish kingdom at all periods. That has nothing to do with this topic, and is a entirely different consideration from native names for the Gaelic kings of Alba, used by almost all historians who write about them today. As for the descent of the Bruces and Stewarts, if you take the kings and trace their actual ancestry, you'll realise your belief comes from cultural fallacy, that of Agnatic seniority. As for language, we don't know that they adopted English until the 14th century. All of this is not relevant to this discussion though. And blatant irrelevancies such as these, by diverting energy and distracting from issues, can only hamper progress here, as I've learn through experience on wiki. Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 13:32, 30 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Gaelic is not a major language of Scotland and hasn't been for many hundreds of years. Indeed it was never a majority language and only rose to promince because it was the language spoken by the early kings, after they had conquered the Picts. The Bruces and Stewarts were Norman by ancestry because they inherited Norman attitudes and culture. And since the 14th was when they came to power your assertion that that was when English became the language of the kings fits exactly. TharkunColl (talk) 13:38, 30 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Gaelic is not a major language of modern Scotland, but it was a major language of the Scottish kingdom for all of its existence, the majority language language before the 15th cent, and the only major language before the 12th century. This is not relevant here though, as the issue you're pursuing concerns the Scottish monarchs page and isn't editorially related to this discussion. Because I'm such a great guy though, I've followed this Here on your talk page. Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 14:14, 30 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Hmm...the issue of usage of names of contemporary Irish monarchs is indeed problematic. One option to resolve this would be to use anglicized versions of their names - Rory O'Connor, and so forth - but I get the sense that almost no scholarly literature does this anymore. That being said, Domnall Ua Lochlainn is not, in fact, discussed in Donald III of Scotland. Nor is Donald III mentioned in Domnall Ua Lochlainn. So this concern seems largely theoretical, at this point. And I'm not sure why the same issue doesn't apply to Romans. We talk about Horace and Virgil as contemporaries of people with normal, non-anglicized, Roman names. Obviously there's not quite the same issue of people with the same name treated differently. But this comes up, too. Friedrich Schiller is a contemporary of Frederick the Great, in spite of the fact that they both have exactly the same name - Friedrich. Again, there is an increasing tendency for more scholarly works to stick with the original, but this hasn't migrated to more popular works. In his own writing, a historian obviously can do whatever they like in terms of nomenclature, in order to make whatever point he wants. Wikipedia, though, is a collective venture, and the primary contributors to articles aren't necessarily going to get their way, especially about issues with larger implications, like this one. In terms of article contributors, then, I don't find this to be sufficient - all other things being equal, the major contributors are entitled to some deference, but all other things are not equal. In any event, this is not strictly true. The article was written using the anglicized names, and remained that way until a year and a half ago, so far as I can gather. By "people who have contributed to this article" you mean basically yourself and Angus. I greatly respect the amount of work that you and Angus have put into medieval Scottish history articles, but I don't think that's sufficient on this issue. All this being said, I don't think it would be disastrous to leave the articles as you have written them. I would prefer it be otherwise, but if there's a strong consensus the other way, that's fine. But I'd prefer to just give the gaelic forms in the intro, and to use the anglicized forms otherwise. john k (talk) 15:43, 30 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Like John said: we use the system of "common name" in the Roman articles. Nobody thinks it odd that the son of "Pompey" is "Sextus Pompeius", or that "Mark Antony" is the son of "Antonius", and I doubt many people would bat an eyelid if Livy was described as writing about Livius. We use the most common names of the people we write of, regardless of how euphonius it sounds in an article: at least that is a practice used for centuries, and generally accepted as sensible, instead of this artificial "all the Scots Kings used English names when Malcolm IV died" (and that practice is sanctioned by who?). Michael Sanders 16:46, 30 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Well, it isn't very usual in Roman scholarship to use Marcus Antonius or Cnaeus Pompeius, it is usual to use Mael Coluim mac Donnchada. It wouldn't be an issue if no-one used these forms, but literally no scholar today writing specifically on these kings would use Malcolm MacDuncan. Anyways, are parallels with Frederick the Great and Mark Anthony really helpful? People actually have heard of these guys, they are figures of world historical importance. You think Cinaed mac Duib is comparable? As was said elsewhere, these guys have no common English names because they aren't commonly known. Sure, the internet is spammed with king lists and crummy royalty pages derived from tertiary sources, but that doesn't mean they are commonly known. John, there were articles using anglicized forms a year and a half ago. These articles weren't worth having though, though for reasons little to do with name forms. Use of the forms when these articles got properly written was innocent obedience to the sources that were used. The article titles were then seen as odd. It became obvious this might be an issue when attempts to change the article titles in accordance met with such hostility, and since then the modus vivendi in operation has been English titles, native in text ... an idea which if you'll remember got quite alot of support from the section of wikipedians who favoured retention of the anglicized titles. I think Angus, myself and I assume yours truly are all rather fed up with this issue; Michael Sanders is new and has the energy and innocence to press it, but ultimately I think it is obvious that no consensus is actually ever gonna be reached. Funnily enough, without reference to this particular issue, I'd guess there are probably as many if not more serious users on wiki who prefer native forms for names as who favour "Use English", they just haven't been the ones frequenting the guidelines pages.

Anyways, you are fond of using the Macbeth play in your argument. Well, if you were to do that surely Gruoch should be moved to Lady Macbeth, because all but a few ordinary educated people have ever heard of Gruoch, but most of 'em know Lady Macbeth. And Shakespeare would not have thought of Domnall Ban as Donald III, but as Donald V. Back in the day they numbered through agnatic descent, not office holding, and that aside, the Scottish king list was much longer until the early modern period when the first few hundred kings were discarded, and MacAlpin was chosen as the first king because of a few medieval myths. Cinaed had previously just been another Scottish king, and before that, just another Scoto-Pictish king; it was far more usual in the original myths from the 11th century-9th century to trace Scotic domination of Albania ("Scotland") to Fergus Mor and Aedan mac Gabrain, who were believed to have conquered the Picts, than Cinaed mac Ailpin. The only reason Cinaed emerged as the favored myth is because it was the one Anglo-Norman writers picked up on in the 12th century. The last scholar to have believed Cinaed mac Ailpin did actually conquer the Picts was John Bannerman, who retired nearly a decade ago; no present scholar believes in it, and it is historical consensus that Pictland and Scotland (both called Alba) were the same state, the rest is gradual cultural change and is dynastic. But we digress slightly, although I should say that this seems to be one of the main reasons Angus is unhappy with the numberings.

The issue is often one of theory, but in theory there is no difference between theory and practice. ;) Domnall Ua Lochlainn and Domnall Ban, most often known in tertiary works as Donald Bane, not Donald III, was just an example of two names that could and often do appear in the same articles; the Cinaeds ("Kenneth"), Donnchads ("Duncan") and other Domnalls have the same problem, and there is no shortage of other people also with those names. There's just a double standards that leads to loads of problems. Scottish rulers get anglicized en masse in "popular" works, Welsh, Irish and, yes, even most English rulers don't! Yes, that's from the dynamics of the real world which wiki has to accept ... like there was almost no scholarship on Scotland between Skene and the 1980s, but it causes all the problems already enumerated for editors of an encyclopedia like this. How is this going to be resolved? I personally am keener than ever for an answer, because the issue is now very boring to me. Regards, Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 09:49, 31 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

A simple modus vivendi is to simply accept that the article text should conform to the article titles. The simplest thing to do is to attempt to move the Scottish monarchs and other relevant persons to the Scottish titles. If, as you say, the Scottish forms are the most common form, they will be changed, and the text can conform to the Scottish forms. If, however, the move attempt fails, and the titles remain at the English forms, then the text should be modified to reflect the titles. Michael Sanders 13:11, 31 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I remain to be convinced, however, that it is at all an issue that "Donald III" and "Domnall ua Lochlann" will appear in the same article - they use different naming forms, and come from different cultures anyway, so your argument is flawed; and, besides, we do that all the time in Roman articles, where, as I pointed out above, the well known Mark Antony is the son of the little heard of Marcus Antonius. It's just an application of rationality.

(Oh and incidentally? People have heard of Kenneth MacAlpin - under that name - and people have definitely heard of Macbeth and Malcolm III. They are consistently referred to under that name - whereas the historical wife of Macbeth is not consistently referred to as 'Lady Macbeth', and Donalbane is not consistently referred to as 'Donald V'. Who cares what Shakespeare thought, only what people think today - and the Anglicisations are the terms of choice by most writers.) Michael Sanders 13:16, 31 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Well, the appear in the same article now. They do indeed, contrary to your assertion, come from the same culture, a serious point you've missed. Moreover, these Scottish kings aren't consistently referred to by anything, as you would learn if you did any serious reading. As was said and repeated many times, most of the sources used for those articles do not employ the names you prefer. Ignoring that won't make it go away. Fair enough, you have a number of issues with these forms; but as you have discovered, we have issues with your forms too? Are you looking for a compromise, or for total triumph here? Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 13:28, 31 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I gave you sources which use the English forms, prompting you to accuse me of aiming for the Lowest Common Denominator. And it is by those forms that the Scottish kings are consistently referred to. (And by the 11th century, Scottish and Irish culture were rather different. As, indeed, the differing 'mac' (son of) vs 'ua' (grandson of) demonstrates. Michael Sanders 13:58, 31 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

No, no, no ... not that Ua and Mac would ever tell you anything, but you're thinking of a 12th century divergence (see Bannerman, "Macduff of Fife"), mac names were always used in Ireland, and they used Ua names extensively in Galloway. Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 14:03, 31 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

You haven't responded to the point - general sources refer to them by their English name-forms, because that is what readers expect to see. Michael Sanders 14:09, 31 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I and others have responded to that point dozens of times. Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 14:11, 31 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

With what? Lines of Succession uses the English. 1066 uses the English. Marion Campbell uses the English. Pears Encyclopaedia uses the English. God, Terry Deary uses the English, which should tell you what preconceptions young people are going to be coming to the articles with. And any google search will demonstrate that the English forms are far more widely used than the Gaelic forms. Michael Sanders 14:16, 31 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

And the scores of decent sources who use forms such as Mael Coluim and Cinaed use English to. Your point is not new, and repeating it won't take anything much further. See above convo. Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 14:19, 31 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

And yet you don't name these sources, or specify how many people will actually be reading them. Michael Sanders 14:24, 31 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Erm ... I have. Virtually all the sources used for all those articles. Audience? Everyone who reads those. I'm afraid if you're after exact numbers you'll need to contact all those publishers and all the libraries who stock and lend them. Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 14:27, 31 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Erm...at least one of those sources (in one of the articles on King David) refers to King Malcolm. It has a title featuring the name "Malcolm". The wikipedia article in question, however, uses "Mael Coluim". How many more of your sources actually use English? Michael Sanders 14:55, 31 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Secondary source examples

I hadn't planned to post again but it occurred to me that it would be useful to make a list of what sources use what forms. I've been through the reference sections of Kenneth I of Scotland and Constantine II of Scotland, and looked up the use of Cináed or Kenneth in the books cited there. If a book isn't listed below it's either over 50 years old (and I would contend should not be a source for usage information), or there is no text visible on Google Books, or it does not mention either form. Here's what I found; perhaps others with access to relevant texts can add more. I think the list should ideally be restricted to sources that could be used to write a Wikipedia article; i.e. reliable secondary sources. Technically that would exclude the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography and the Blackwell Encyclopedia of Anglo-Saxon England, as they are tertiary, but those both do get used as sources so I left them in. Mike Christie (talk) 20:21, 30 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

M.O. Anderson, Kings and Kingship in Early Scotland: appears to use both Cináed and Kenneth
D. Broun & T.O. Clancy, Spes Scotorum: Hope of Scots. Saint Columba, Iona and Scotland: Cináed per the Deacon's comments above; several other works by Broun are in the list and those would use Cináed too, presumably.
Oxford Dictionary of National Biography: Kenneth
Sally M. Foster, Picts, Gaels and Scots: Early Historic Scotland: Cináed
D.P. Kirby, Earliest English Kings: Cináedh mac Ailpín
M. Lapidge, Blackwell Encyclopedia of Anglo-Saxon England: Cináed
A. Smyth, Warlords and Holy Men: Scotland AD 80–1000: Kenneth
A. Woolf, From Pictland to Alba, 789–1070: Cináed

In terms of usage, it is tertiary sources, I think, on which we ought to model ourselves. john k (talk) 22:39, 30 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

(It's also illogical to exclude sources over 50 years old, which you seem to suggest means that they aren't going to be read. Or are you suggesting that nobody reads Gibbon or Suetonius? )Michael Sanders 22:50, 30 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

This is an encyclopaedia. A work to be used in general reference by all and sundry. Therefore, we should be following general rather than scholarly usage, since we should be aiming to make the articles accessible to all - and you can assume that anyone familiar with the Gaelic forms will also be familiar with the English forms, and therefore will have no trouble understanding who is meant by "Kenneth I", whereas you cannot make the assumption that the majority of readers familiar with the English forms will be familiar with the Gaelic forms. To put it bluntly - if you are writing about a figure who is well-known by a certain name, you are not using the correct name if the majority of people do not recognise the name, or expect a different name. Michael Sanders 23:02, 30 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

But they don't. Besides everything else, there is almost no means today of reading about these kings today without encountering their real names. Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 09:52, 31 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The present ODNB mentions Cináed mac Alpin once in a several page article on "Kenneth I". Some readers will come to us from the large numbers of sources that don't mention the Gaelic at all; many will have missed a single reference, or have had their eyes glaze over at the Gaelic. We should serve the general readers, and not specialists. I note that it is by Marjorie O. Anderson, and is presumably her judgment of what tertiary literature should do. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 20:08, 31 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Deacon's suggestion

Anglicized or English names should be used in the title and body of articles on Scottish kings where there is a clear superiority in usage
In any Scottish king article where the forename of the king is Scottish, it should be stated explicitly at the beginning of that article that the English form is an anglicization. For example,
Mac Bethad mac Findlaích (died 15 August 1057), known in English today as Macbeth,
Whenever another Scottish king is first introduced into a text, his Gaelic name and patronymic should be besides placed in brackets. This does not need to be repeated. E.g.:
When Canute the Great came north in 1031 to accept the submission of King Malcolm II (Máel Coluim mac Cináeda), King Malcolm ...
Whenever in a royal article a non regal person with a Scottish name occurs, it should not be actively Anglicized if there is no clear superiority of usage in published literature or occurs with a patronymic. A probable anglicization or English translation can be placed in brackets upon its first occurence, so long as it is readily available and useful. E.g.
Macbeth was the son of Findláech mac Ruaidrí (Finlay, son Ruadri), Mormaer of Moray.

Comment: I'm not particularly fond of this solution, but as said on Curb Your Enthusiasm, a good compromise is not supposed to satisfy both, and I dislike all this conflict more than the anglicization. This proposal introduces the reader to the names the readers will encounter in modern historiographic literature, but retains Anglicized forms, per concerns expressed about the "average reader". It avoids anglicization for its own sake, so there's no need to play with Aed, Cuilen and Dub, which do not have forms more common in English than their original, primarily because none of them are well known or are popular modern forenames. And particularly important for me, by explicitly pointing out that the name is anglicized, it doesn't give the impression that the pre-"Feudal" Scots used different names from other Gaelic speakers or were the only people in the British Isles to have modern English names, and the reader understands well what is going on. Anyways, I trust this should be acceptable. It will at least eliminate conflict from the popular monarch articles. Regards, Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 16:21, 31 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Checked it over: I prefer the English as prominant (with Gaelic in a secondary style). I can't even pronounce those Gaelic names. I don't want the Gaelic names banished, just don't want them prominant. Having said all that, I'll accept whatever the majority wishes. GoodDay (talk) 16:46, 31 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment - thank you Deacon for being reasonable, and your suggestions make sense. I'd like to set out my own views about your proposed compromise:

1) Agree absolutely.

2) I'd prefer "Macbeth (Gaelic: Mac Bethad mac Findlaích, "Macbeth son of Findleach", died 15 August 1057)", which conforms to the standard practice of placing the form used for the article title first, and also explains the Gaelic form to any readers not only unfamiliar with it but unaware of the patronymic system, but I can live with your suggested version if it proves a sticking point.

3) The Gaelic form should only be shown in-text as an alternative if it would look strange not to. In an article on Canute, or even Saint Margaret, one wouldn't expect a solitary Gaelic form bravely waving its little flag against an overwhelming presence of English, so the addition of the bracketed form would appear strange; on the other hand, in an article using overwhelming Gaelic forms, it would appear less strange (e.g. Crinan, father of Duncan I).

4) Agree - Victorianism is unnecessary, although there are some cases (e.g. Uen of the Picts, or the Cumbric Welsh figures) where variant name-forms would be acceptable; however, others, such as Olaf Sihtricsson, should not be unreasonably Gaelicised if they are more commonly known by another name. Michael Sanders 17:00, 31 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Here's an oportunity for the both of you to combine your points. Don't rip each other to pieces (I peeked at both your personal talk pages). You both care alot about this Gaelic topic, don't let it die in the graveyard of personal differances. GoodDay (talk) 17:57, 31 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

This appears to be a waste of time. The proposal concedes everything, leaves no Use English issues and is still rejected. Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 18:01, 31 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Why is it a waste of time, Deacon? No unnecessary anglicisation of men and women known principally by Gaelic names, and bracketed Gaelic forms when introducing anglicised persons in principally Gaelic articles...I'd say we're both making concessions there. Michael Sanders 18:11, 31 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

@ Michael: 2) is necessary for a number of reasons, covered earlier by myself and (actually, below) by David Lauder. One of the main arguments put by my side is that these Anglicized names mislead readers. Many readers will think Cinaed mac Dub was actually called Kenneth when his contemporary Cináed ua hArtacáin was called Cinaed. There was no K in any insular language before the Normans! Moreover, these names are not modern Gaelic, and presenting like that indicates that they are modern Gaelic equivalents. These are their actual names in their own language, and they are not modern Gaelic. Moreover, these names are used extensively in English. Because of the length and quality of most of these articles now, readers will not move beyond these articles without encountering their natives names. In most cases, it won't be explained that Mael Coluim is anglicized as Malcolm or Cinaed as Kenneth. So putting the guy's real name in brackets in the intro to an article in your way suggests one will only encounter them in another language where, as it happens, they'll never encounter them. The Gaelic version of Mael Coluim/Malcolm is Maol Chaluim or Calum, not Mael Coluim. I could go on. I don't think point 2) is a real concession on your part. Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 18:23, 31 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Is it not falsifying history to claim that there is a single authoritative spelling of these names for that time? In the articles themselves here, alternate spellings (I thing Kenyd/Cenyd was one) are used, and a lot of the original sources appear to be in Latin. I'd suggest the following: "Malcolm III (Mediaeval Gaelic: Mael Coluim mac Donnchada; Modern Gaelic: Maol Chaluim...), and perhaps a note to the bottom of the page explaining ("Malcolm" is the commonly used name, "Mael Coluim" was the name as used in Gaelic at the time, Maol Choluim is the modern Gaelic form that is rarely used in modern literature regarding him...); but as it is, placing the Gaelic form first is as much a falsehood, since it suggests that that is an authoritative form, which isn't (particularly with the Constantines) the case. Michael Sanders 20:26, 31 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not with you on this I'm afraid, for reasons states above. The medieval names are not of incidental importance, as stated above. As for Constantine, that's not really a Scottish name (see phraseology in the solution), so is a bad example. Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 20:33, 31 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I'd be more comfortable with that if there weren't three different Gaelicisations floating around wikipedia, apparently chosen purely by whim. Furthermore, the value of mediaeval vs modern usages is debatable - nobody talks about King Loys of France. But, as I said, although I'd prefer 2) as I've stated, it's not massively important to me - if we can all agree on the rest, I'd be happy. Michael Sanders 20:40, 31 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Glad to hear you are willing to compromise after all. For the name Constantine, I have seen many more than three "Gaelicization"s of the name, e.g. Custantin, Constantin, Causantin (the most common and well established), Caustantin, and a few others. All the indigenous Gaelic names are standardized as they can be lodged in standardised Gaelic orthography, and there will be almost no variation in the modern sources. Besides reasons of cultural empathy and coherent historiography, these names are the dominant ones in modern historiographic writing and are necessary for the reader; beyond that, they are an entirely different consideration from modern Gaelic names which might be included for different for reasons, another reason why the medieval and scholarly forms shouldn't be buried in incidental brackets at the beginning of an article. I'll digress for a minute, but don't let this distract to much, consensus now appears to be emerging. I notice that most users here unfamiliar with this field consistently confuse these two issues. Let me be clear ... we are dealing with early monarchs here, and modern names aren't really an issue ... though of course there's no harm in including them if they don't distract too much. Using medieval forms is peculiar to Scottish and Irish historiography ... partly because the spelling systems of Irish, Manx and Scottish Gaelic have diverged ... and so generalizing on this topic isn't gonna help. The modern spellings often differ drastically, even the names aren't always the same. E.g. Coinneach is not an accurate version of Cinead. It is inaccurate, but is the modern Gaelic equivalent. Anglicized Kenneth is ironically more accurate. Coinneach comes from the medieval Cainnech, an entirely different name, whereas Cinaed should produce Cionaodh. Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 20:58, 31 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Communicating with our readers is always an issue. All of this, if sourced, belongs in the article; but it should be called Kenneth. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 21:59, 31 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment:We should all be attempting to do what is right as best we can. But this is the English-language Wikipedia. No-one, other than the tiniest (in real terms) group of Gaelic scholars knows our Scottish kings by these Gaelic names. That may not be acceptable to the Deacon et al but it is the truth. The Anglicisation of our culture over the past 800 years has meant that virtually ALL our histories have been written in English form and that is how most Scots know them (not to mention the rest of the world). I have absolutely no objection to the (Gaelic:....) being given. None at all. But the article titles should be in the English form and in the body of the article the Gaelic should be in brackets. (If there was a Gaelic Wikipedia I would argue for it to be in Gaelic with possibly the English in brackets). Regards, David Lauder (talk) 18:06, 31 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

There are two; both use Coinneach. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 20:14, 31 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I'm glad you agree with the proposal. Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 18:08, 31 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I'm guessing the majority is for English (Gaelic) in the content & infoboxes. GoodDay (talk) 18:11, 31 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Well, I and at least 4 other users don't. It's a concession at I am prepared to accept. We don't know yet about the others. Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 18:24, 31 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I would certainly support Deacon's compromise proposal. john k (talk) 19:03, 31 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I'd also support Deacon's proposal. I'd be interested to hear from Angus McLellan, since he is one of the more prolific writers of these articles. Mike Christie (talk) 19:29, 31 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I agree with Michael Sanders reservation on first line name order at point #2, but also agree that this should not sink the proposal. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 20:03, 31 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I support Deacon's proposal as a very reasonable compromies. Perhaps footnotes or some such device will be needed to explain all this to readers? By that I mean that the variations in medeival Gaelic, the difference from modern Scots Gaelic, the contemporary Latinisations, the accuracy/origin of the Anglicisations, the meaning of truly Gaelic names, and the fact that some names (e.g. Causantin and Amlaib) aren't Gaelic. We talk a lot about this on the talk pages and then we talk about how to best serve the reader in terms of understanding, accuracy, readability, yet we never seem to provide him or her with the all the background information which we discuss. Srnec (talk) 23:05, 31 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I also support the proposal in general. My main concern is about point #1. Is it always going to be possible to agree on what constitutes "clear superiority in usage". Deb (talk) 17:52, 1 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not really seeing what the compromise is here, but perhaps I'm being dim. What it looks like to me is that those who wish for national myth and obsolete anglicisations to be perpetuated until doomsday are to have their way in all things. Further, based on recent editing, it seems that things like Template:Scottish Monarchs and List of Scottish monarchs are to embody these same myths because "Kenneth I of Scotland" is clearly the first king of Scotland. Well, the article name says so, doesn't it, and how can we argue with that? Scotland was, and is, and forever will be, founded in 843. Any attempt to tell another story is nationalist propaganda or academic pedantry. I'll acquiesce in this solution, but I consider it a huge step backwards at the very time that Encarta is in the process of adopting Gaelic names. That's as far as I'll go. I do not and will not accept that the title of a Wikipedia article, decided as it is by reliance on tradition and counting the usages in outdated, never especially reliable tertiary sources, and what is little more than a voting process, can have any bearing at all on the content of the article, nor on whether the article belongs in a category, list or template of Xs. "Lists, whether they are embedded lists or stand-alone lists, are encyclopedic content as are paragraphs and articles, and they are equally subject to Wikipedia's content policies such as Verifiability, No original research, Neutral point of view, and others" (thus Wikipedia:Lists; similar in Wikipedia:Categorization). Angus McLellan (Talk) 20:21, 1 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I don't get it - what's the compromise? What do those who prefer the Anglicized forms have to give up? I thought we already had a compromise - where the title is Anglicized but the references in the text are not. Haukur (talk) 22:24, 1 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Using an anglicised title and Gaelic in-body isn't a compromise, it's paying lip-service. As it is, I and several others above expressed a preference for placing the English form at the start, and simply bracketing the Gaelic form; we have accepted Deacon's preference for placing the Gaelic form first and emphasising that the English form is an anglicisation (to avoid readers thinking that the anglicised monarchs were actually named in English). That is in itself is something I'm not very happy about (you saw my original preference of style), but it's something I'm prepared to accept, and so apparently are the other editors above. Michael Sanders 22:32, 1 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Paying lip-service? To what? If some people want to use the Gaelic forms throughout and some people want to use the Anglicized forms throughout, then using one set in the titles and the others in the body of the article is indeed a compromise, involving a significant sacrifice from both parties - I don't see how you can reasonably argue against that. As for placing the Gaelic form first, well, why aren't you doing it, then? Your edit, where you cited this section, still has Constantine rather than Constantín as the first word of the article.[13] Haukur (talk) 22:50, 1 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Using an anglicised title and a Gaelic inbody is just paying lip-service to the Common name Policy - a pretence that the name by which the person is most commonly known is being used, whilst not in fact using it. Now, you can see Kenneth I of Scotland for how the compromise system is going to work; you can also see Constantine I of Scotland, where Deacon (who I have to say I'm grateful to for being willing, if not pleased, to make this compromise) laid it out in the manner I copied in Constantine II of Scotland (I think because 'Constantine', unlike 'Kenneth' or 'Malcolm' is not natively Gaelic and has no one common form. I don't know. Ask Deacon.) Michael Sanders 22:57, 1 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

It's not lip-service to the common name policy - the common name policy only applies to the titles to begin with and its whole rationale is geared to them. Look at Wikipedia:UCN#Rationale. "We want to maximize the likelihood of being listed in external search engines ... search engines will often give greater weight to the contents of the title than to the body of the page" and "We want to maximize the incidence that people who make a link guessing the article name". It's clearly just talking about the title. Haukur (talk) 23:18, 1 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

It is poor form to have an article titled one thing, and then to use a completely different form in the article text, without good reason. If we have an article at Achilles, we shouldn't call him "Akhilleus," for instance, even though the latter is a more accurate transliteration of the original Greek. If the common name policy isn't to apply to how we refer to people in the article itself, what policy are we supposed to use? How is it to be determined? If "common name" plays no part, then who is to stop a pedant in the Achilles article from insisting that we call him "Akhilleus" throughout, because that is his "correct" name? (Note: I understand that the situation here is different, and more complicated, than the Achilles/Akhilleus example. I do think, though, that Haukur's claim that the most common name rule has no place in terms of determining article text would lead to exactly that kind of thing.) john k (talk) 07:43, 2 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'd be more convinced that the broader community agreed with these strident claims if Jogaila didn't appear all over the place as Władysław II Jagiełło, even on the front page. No doubt there'll be a good reason for that. I can't wait to here what it might be. Angus McLellan (Talk) 15:14, 2 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

That's not a good comparison. Polish nationalists have Henryk Sienkiewicz and 20 times the cumulative revert power of insular medievalists. Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 15:29, 2 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The article appears to be at Jogaila...It refers to him as "Jogaila" before 1386, and by his baptismal name thereafter. I don't see a problem with this. The Poles have traditionally been a strong vector of resistance to normal naming policies, but this seems far less true now than it once was. john k (talk) 03:32, 3 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

How about we sweeten the deal and add some moves, so we can get rid of the anachronistic "of Scotland" for those Pictish kings? Haukur (talk) 23:00, 1 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

You could probably move "Kenneth I" to "Kenneth MacAlpin" - I'd imagine that that, like "Hugh Capet", is more commonly used than his regnal form. But the others (i.e. the successors of Donald I up to Donald II)? They are commonly called "X of Scotland". There would be no replacement most common name for them; any name would have to be created, and would thus be as artificial as "x of Scotland", which at least has the advantage of usage and tradition. Michael Sanders 23:06, 1 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I still prefer the Gaelic being secondary to the English, in the opening line & infobox (as this is English Wikipedia). Oh well, I'm in the minorty on this topic, consensus is for the compromise. GoodDay (talk) 23:25, 1 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Am I missing something? The infoboxes in the purported sample articles have the Anglicized versions first. Haukur (talk) 23:34, 1 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Yep infobox is great, the opening sentence is not. But that's my problem. GoodDay (talk) 23:38, 1 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I wasn't aware that infoboxes had been mentioned in the compromise, and since monarch infoboxes are definitively 'royal' rather than 'personal', it seemed important to prioritise the 'x plus ordinal' over the personal 'x son of y'. Is that a problem? Michael Sanders 23:42, 1 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Isn't the compromise: Infobox in English primary style & opening context in Gaelic primary style? GoodDay (talk) 23:50, 1 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I've proposed a move of these kings on Talk:Kenneth I of Scotland. Everyone is invited to contribute. Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 17:35, 2 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Kings preceeding Edgar of Scotland

Deacon has made a request that the kings from Kenneth MacAlpin to Duncan II (and also Constantine of the Picts) be moved to Gaelic article titles - e.g. Malcolm III of Scotland to "Mael Coluim mac Donnchada". I advise you all to go to Talk:Kenneth I of Scotland and express your approval or disapproval. Michael Sanders 17:28, 2 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'm completely against these proposed page movements. It's bad enough we've given Gaelic prominance within the content. This is the English Wikipedia not the Gaelic Wikipedia. The English names are more commonly used. GoodDay (talk) 17:40, 2 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'm afraid that is the truth, GoodDay, unpallatable as it may be to some. I tried to make this point somewhere above (amongst all the semantics). Regards, David Lauder (talk) 18:33, 2 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

When to mention foreign names

'Article titles should use the Latin alphabet, not any other alphabets or other writing systems such as syllabaries or Chinese characters. However, any non-Latin-alphabet native name should be given within the first line of the article (with a Latin-alphabet transliteration if the English name does not correspond to a transliteration of the native name). Also, a non-Latin-alphabet redirect could be created to link to the actual Latin-alphabet-titled article.'

This leaves me a bit confused. The way it reads would suggest that most articles should include stuff like: Red (rouge in French, rode in Dutch, 赤い in Japanese....) etc... But of course this is silly.

Just when is it relevant to have local names? Obvious ones are of course for instance the names of Chinese people, places in Russia, etc...but is there a better definition then just people and places?

What of historical events? I notice for isntance the Franco-Prussian war doesn't mention it is called the Guerre Franco-Prussienne but the first Sino-Japanese war (not the 2nd though) does include the Chinese and Japanese names.

To my mind including foreign names would only be relevant if they are particularly different and its noted what they mean in English but of course this is just what I think, what is the official view?--Him and a dog 15:46, 3 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I would read this as commonly used or mentioned in English writing on the subject (hence include Sverige, Roma in Sweden or Rome). This may be a bit verbose to spell out; but is there a real problem? Septentrionalis PMAnderson 23:03, 9 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

There is a discussion on this subject: do we include Rumania in Romania? see Talk:Romania#Approval poll. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 23:03, 9 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Franz Josef Strauss

There has just been a lengthy, double, move discussion, in which the wording of the lead here came up; see the section here. The lead could use some work, both to reflect this decision (using Strauss and, say, Tenedos, as counterexamples to Beneš?) and to clarify the last paragraph. If read carefully, it does say that we should use local names if they are in a Latin alphabet and there is no common English name; but it is not obvious. Comments? Septentrionalis PMAnderson 17:24, 5 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I've done a draft of what I mean. I hope this is clearer; it is not intended to change guidance at all. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 17:40, 5 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Your draft looks good. It makes it even clearer that Franz Josef Strauß should have stayed where it was. "If the local form of the name is in a variety of the Latin alphabet (as with French, Turkish, or Icelandic) and there is no usual English form, use the local form" applies precisely to that case. —An gr ^{If you've written a quality article...} 19:08, 6 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

How exactly do you manage to read If the local form of the name is in a variety of the Latin alphabet (as with French, Turkish, or Icelandic) and there is no usual English form, use the local form. (italics added, as perhaps we should) as supporting a name which no English work of general reference uses (and which is unintelligible to many English speakers), in preference to the name that all of them use? Septentrionalis PMAnderson 18:16, 7 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Exactly by the phrase you highlight: since there is no usual English form of "Franz Joseph Strauß", we use the local form. The in-house style guides of other publishers have no bearing on the case. —An gr ^{If you've written a quality article...} 17:43, 10 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

But there is a "usual English form" of his name: Strauss. The evidence is overwhelming. Yes, I know, you believe that that's not an English form of his name, it's a misspelling of a German name. I think after two years I've finally come to understand the logic of you and those who share your view, but I respectfully disagree. It doesn't even matter if the common use of Strauss is the result of transliteration, a misspelling, or an anti-German conspiracy. What matters is that Strauss has become the common English usage. The purpose of WP:UE is not to correct possible linguistic errors as you or I may see them, but rather, to assure that readers of the English Wikipedia encounter standard English usage in our articles. This phrase about what to do when no usual English form exists was intended to guide us for what to do when there really is no English form. For example, if there is a town that has not been written about in English language publications, but someone decides to create a Wikipedia article about said town, what do we do then? Well, in such cases, we follow the above policy. But that is hardly the case with FJS; he has been the subject of dozens of books (or more), thousands of periodical articles, and as such, his name has acquired a standard English usage. You would seek to overturn that standard usage becuase you hold to what I regard as a rather technical (not to say questionable) interpretation of the above rule. Unschool (talk) 18:29, 10 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The evidence presented on the talk page only shows that there are publications that never use ß. English-language publications that do use ß (such as Germany Today: A Student's Dictionary ISBN 0-340-66305-7) spell his name Strauß. If you want to show that "Strauss" is the "usual English form" of his name, you have to separate that from the editorial decision whether to use ß or not, and show that there are publications that use ß in other words, but not in his name. —An gr ^{If you've written a quality article...} 21:17, 10 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

We're talking about what constitutes standard English usage. The New York Times, the BBC, the english-language version of Der Spiegel, the Encyclopedia Britannica, and countless (not literally, of course) publications with circulation and/or readership totals in the tens of millions spell it Strauss, and you offer up Germany Today: A Student's Dictionary as a retort to show that Strauß is as standard as Strauss? The publisher of your chosen work describes it like this:

this Student's Dictionary covers the key words of modern Germany. It offers detailed entries on contemporary German politics, economy, society and culture, providing a wealth of information and analysis. Compiled by a team of university specialists in German studies, the Dictionary has been designed for students taking courses on contemporary Germany, for those taking a "year out" in Germany, and for anyone seeking a deeper understanding of German affairs than that offered by traditional language dictionaries.

This should have equal weight to the above? Oh, I'm not saying that you can't find another book or two or even fifty. But we are talking about standard English usage, that is, what the typical English speaker is going to be most accustomed to—not what polyglots and linguists will be accustomed to, but the ordinary reader of the encyclopedia. You've given me a source with such a specialized audience that it simply has very little bearing on the discussion, in my judgement. Unschool (talk) 21:53, 10 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Since there's no consensus on the extent to which þ, ß, etc. should be used, I think the most straightforward and accurate thing is to simply say that names and article titles that are not in any form of the Latin alphabet always do require transliteration. We already note that there's no consensus about what to do with þ and ß. That's clearly true, so any language that will be taken by many editors as implying a consensus one way or the other should be avoided. --Reuben (talk) 22:51, 6 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

There are three views: that we should always use thorn and eszett where the corresponding foreign languages do, that we should never do so, and that we should do so when English usually does. The third middling view is held by distinctly more users than the other two combined. Whether this is consensus is a largely verbal question. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 18:43, 7 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

English-speaking world

The simplest thing is surely for us to be using those naming patterns which are overwhelmingly used in the English-speaking world, and have been for centuries. Translations of names, personal or geographical, are not always going to be universal, but where there are names which pop up throughout our history books in a particular form, I suggest we stick to it, otherwise everyone coming to Wikipedia for one small reason and who does not wish to spend a great amount of time investigating matters is going to find nothing or leave being very confused. Regards, David Lauder (talk) 19:10, 5 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Agreed. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 21:28, 5 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Seconded. Unschool (talk) 07:54, 6 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Tripled. GoodDay (talk) 18:40, 6 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Quadrupled. Michael Sanders 20:48, 6 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The cases where there is a name that is overwhelmingly used in the English-speaking world and has been for centuries are not where the problem usually lies. The problem lies with names that are virtually unknown in the English-speaking world and thus have no established English version. The current guideline says that in such cases, the local form (or a romanization of it, if the local form is not in the Latin alphabet) is to be used, but some people have misinterpreted that to mean "use no letters not used in native English words". There is, however, occasionally also a problem with place names that traditionally had English versions, but those English versions are no longer widely used. I'm thinking of things like "Ratisbon" for Regensburg and "Brunswick" for Braunschweig. The former is now completely obsolete in English, the latter heavily obsolescent. Other names, like Turin for Torino, are still widely used but look like they might be headed down the road to obsolescence (to judge by the number of English-speaking journalists who referred to that city by its Italian name in their coverage of the Winter Olympics there). —An gr ^{If you've written a quality article...} 19:34, 6 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

And an added problem is that the situation isn't always as clear-cut as that! For example, taking your example of Regensburg - I've definitely heard people talking about Ratisbon in a modern context, but most of the modern books on the Carolingians reference that city as Regensburg (although I don't think I've seen any from beyond about 1900 using "Aix-la-Chapelle" in place of "Aachen"). But the rule of thumb in general should be the name which would give least surprise to readers in an English context (since this is English language wikipedia) - and where such examples as Regensburg/Ratisbon and Turin/Torino exist, where there is obvious dual use, discussion should be used rather than applying a procrustean rule (and, by the same token, that should not give carte blanche to a few who favour an obscure name form to argue that it should be used. So far as I know, nobody uses Aix-la-Chapelle these days (except me, because I'm eccentric like that)). Michael Sanders 20:48, 6 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Brunswick is not "heavily obsolescent". False claims of fact are not helpful. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 18:20, 7 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
- Okay then, wholly obsolete. I have actually never heard an English speaker refer to the city as anything other than "Braunschweig". —Angr ^{If you've written a quality article...} 17:47, 10 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  - I have never heard an English-speaker, including my classmate who had lived in Göttingen, refer to it as anything but Brunswick; I would not do so myself, and I would not expect anyone who did not speak German to understand me if I did. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 19:44, 10 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    - I think if you were talking to English-speakers living in Germany and told them you were visiting "Brunswick", they would say, "Where?" I for one would probably think you meant Brunswick, Georgia. Cologne and Munich, yes, and Berlin with its English pronunciation, but never "Brunswick". —An gr ^{If you've written a quality article...} 21:08, 10 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Dnipropetrovsk/Dnepropetrovsk

The article for Dnipropetrovsk gives these conventions a thorough test. The name is somewhat used in English, there's something of a preference, it depends on which sources, the official transcription from Ukrainian is a third name again, and the difference is based on Russian (earlier national association and ongoing local language) versus Ukrainian (the city's current status). I have no idea which way the debate should go, but the discussion should be informative here. 70.15.116.59 (talk) 16:35, 10 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

WP:NCGN has more detailed conventions, which are likely to be more helpful. (As far as I can see, the present edit is fine.) Whether English has adapted to the change in administration is a factual question (NCGN has tests to help decide it); I would be cautious in changing, as with Kiev, where the official transliteration of Ukrainian is not yet established. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 19:51, 10 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Archives

Old discussions

Archive 1

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Examples

A German-English example

A French-English example

A French/English-English example

A Norse/Old English-English example

Diacritics, South Slavic languages

A Polish/French-English example

An American/South Slavic roots/Belgian-English example

A German/Italian-English example

An Estonian-English example

A Czech/Bohemian-English example

A Polish-English example

Another attempt to build a consensus

Haukurth's proposal

Standardized names across all wikis?

Giving "native versions"

Hawaiian English in Hawaiʻi articles

HOAX regarding Hawaiian English

Wikipedia:Naming conventions (common names)

Proposing "Spelling according to first edition in English"

Francis's recent additions

Are diacritics part of everyday English?

Dispute or discussion?

Article titles for books in foreign languages

Quotes in secn "Disputed issues"

Jogaila of Lithuania/ Władysław II Jagiełło

English Wikipedia's page names for Polish rulers

Table

Using diacritics (or national alphabet) in the name of the article

New guidelines which may impact on this and other guidelines

Fresh meat arriving

Universities and Colleges in other languages

reliable published sources

What is 'Latin alphabet'?

Related poll

Huh?

Proposal for new general naming convention for non-English proper names

Poll on some German street

Umlaut and ß sources

Poll on deciding English spelling of the word "Voivodship / Voivodeship"

Foreign Artwork

Korean native names

Clear transliteration guideline

"Native names"

Scottish monarchs

Japanese help

German names using ß

this ß thing

Consistency

Related poll

Stale active discussion

Input desired

Artwork naming conventions

What is this "Latin" alphabet?

Burma v. Myanmar

Ælfric and other Old English names

Change article name and scope?

Æ/æ/Œ/œ - rules proposal

Proposed change to WP:NAME

Inclusion of non-native languages other than English

Médecins Sans Frontières

Funny Foreign Squiggles

Naming of organisations

Proposal to amend video games to this statement:

Major dispute.

Page move - Vossstrasse

Squamish/Sḵwxwú7mesh

Proposed addendum - Non-Latin disambiguation

Proposed clarification

Page move

Missing section

Languages of the Nordic countries

Question about 東北大學

British and Irish medieval names

Scholarly and modern vs. popular sources