Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Japan-related articles/Archive 25

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Format of haiku

I have begun seeing some haiku being given in articles such as Matsuo Bashō as one single line separated by slashes:

toshi kurenu / kasa kite waraji / hakinagara
another year is gone / a traveler's shade on my head, / straw sandals at my feet

Instead of as a block quote of three separate lines:

toshi kurenu
kasa kite waraji
hakinagara 		another year is gone
a traveler's shade on my head,
straw sandals at my feet

I currently understand the use of a single line broken up by slashes to be only for inline quotations, whereas when quoting an entire verse typically a block quote like the later is used.

Could I get some feedback, and should there be some mention of the formatting of haiku in this MOS?AerobicFox (talk) 00:39, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

  • Both forms are commonly used in academic works when quoting haiku. As haiku are quite short, keeping it all on one line is acceptable. I think both methods will work fine here. Anyone else have any thoughts? ···日本穣? · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe · Join WikiProject Japan! 06:31, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
  • Putting all the haiku on one line saves paper (or screen space). Anthony Appleyard (talk) 09:42, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
  • That makes since then. Thanks for the responses.AerobicFox (talk) 16:47, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

cchi vs. tchi

I have a question regarding a year-old edit by Unnecessary stuff where the user edited the general guidelines section to include the sixth point: "The sokuon っ is written as t before ch. (i.e., こっち kotchi, not kocchi) The spelling cch is considered nonstandard and is deprecated." My question is, plainly, was there any consensus for this? As far as I can tell, this user was the only one to argue the usage of "tchi" over "cchi" for "っち" in this thread, which wasn't even the main point of the thread. Since the project didn't embrace the "dji" spelling of "ッジ" (as there is no mention of it in this MOS), why has the project allowed "tchi" to go unnoticed?--十八 12:09, 1 March 2011 (UTC)

I think an elementary element and/or an unquestionable error can be updated without discussion; Though "cchi" is standardized in Japanese romaji standard with table-2 (Hepburn style), "tchi" is common in Hepburn style per Kenkyusha's dictionary (one of revised Hepburn), Hyojun style (one of revised Hepburn too) and so on. "dji" is undefined in the prominent standards and "jji" is right per them.--Mujaki (talk) 17:28, 1 March 2011 (UTC)

Naming of earthquakes: Western year, nengo, or both?

So there's a gentlemanly discussion over at Talk:869 Sanriku earthquake and tsunami over how the earthquake known variously as 869年三陸地震 and 貞観三陸地震 in Japanese should be titled in English. There are three basic options:

  1. Year and place: "869 Sanriku earthquake and tsunami"
  2. Year, nengo, and place: "869 Jogan-Sanriku earthquake and tsunami" or "869 Jogan Sanriku earthquake and tsunami"
  3. Nengo and place: "Jogan Sanriku earthquake and tsunami"

Precedent is currently all over the map, cf. Category:Earthquakes in Japan, where we find eg. 1858 Hietsu earthquake (#1), 1894 Meiji Tokyo earthquake, (#2 w/ space), 1896 Meiji-Sanriku earthquake (#2 w/ dash), some oddballs like 1707 Hōei earthquake (year and nengo only), etc.

While there is no formal WP-wide naming convention for events, precedent and Wikipedia:Naming conventions (events) suggests that, in the absence of an accepted common name, the format <<year>> <<place>> <<event>> is preferred, which argues in favor of either #1 or #2. Ancient nengo are meaningless to 99.9% of English WP readers and only replicate the same info given by the Western year for the remainder, plus many readers would wrongly assume that "Jogan-Sanriku" is place, so I would lean towards #1. Opinions? And, if we can agree, can we add this to the MOS? Jpatokal (talk) 09:20, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

The term in English reliable source should be used per WP:COMMONNAME; The name of well-known earthquake or tunami by the earthquake is mentioned in many English reliable source such as the press and the thesis of earth science. I think either of terms, including "Jogan", is good, and #1 is not suitable for the title because #1 is not populer.
  • 869 Jogan Earthquake (National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology)
  • 869 Jogan Earthquake and Tsunami (Niigata University)
  • Jogan Earthquake (Asahi Shimbun English Edition, Mainichi Shimbun English Edition)
  • Jogan Earthquake Tsunami (Tohoku University)
  • Jogan Sanriku Earthquake (Tokyo University)
  • Jogan Tsunami (Tohoku University, Yomiuri Shimbun English Edition)
and so on.--Mujaki (talk) 16:48, 14 March 2011 (UTC)
As the creator of articles for several historical earthquake in Japan, I have tried to adhere to WP:COMMONNAME as much as I can. '1707 Hōei earthquake' may seem an oddball, but it is the form used in most english language literature, although adding -Edo might be more helpful I suppose (but note that there are no google books or scholar hits for that). The 1854 Ansei-Nankai earthquake appears to be the most common name for that event. I chose '869 Jogan earthquake and tsunami' when I created the article, because that is what the sources mostly use (although normally either the earthquake or the tsunami not both) - almost no sources use '869 Sanriku earthquake' (0 hits on Google scholar, 1 on Google books) and none at all use '869 Sanriku tsunami'. Mikenorton (talk) 21:26, 14 March 2011 (UTC)
I think most of these earthquakes are obscure enough that it's hard to find a definitive "common" name, so I'd err on the side of consistency. If we must stick the nengo in there (and admittedly they are used quite a bit in Japanese sources), then I'd opt for #2, with a space so that it doesn't look like a place name and thus avoids confusion with names like 1891 Mino-Owari earthquake (where Mino and Owari are both places).
And for the specific case of 1707 Hoei, on closer inspection I think the current name is right, since it's not really localized to a single place. (It certainly shouldn't be Edo, since the epicentre was near Shikoku.) Jpatokal (talk) 05:35, 15 March 2011 (UTC)
I support Mikenorton's view; It may be a tough job that we find the most common term in reliable sources, but we can see easily that #1 is rare, and #2 and #3 are written according to common use in reliable sources. --Mujaki (talk) 15:42, 15 March 2011 (UTC)
Again, we should choose the term in English reliable source if the source exists. Incidentally, "Hoei earthquake", "Ansei Nankai earthquake", "Mino-Owari earthquake" ("Nobi earthquake" is more common) and so on are also common in English sources.--Mujaki (talk) 17:05, 15 March 2011 (UTC)
It may be a while. The most common RS ones I see name it as "Japan quake", "Japan earthquake" or "Japan earthquake and tsunami".陣内Jinnai 05:07, 16 March 2011 (UTC)
We're talking about historical earthquakes, not the one in Tohoku last week. (Although, as it happens, there's a current discussion on moving it away from the current inappropriate "Sendai" moniker.) Jpatokal (talk) 08:53, 16 March 2011 (UTC)

Bump. It looks like #2 with a space is the most popular so far, but any other opinions? How's this for as a potential addition to the MOS-JA? Jpatokal (talk) 01:07, 19 March 2011 (UTC)

For historical events (before the Meiji period), if there is no clear common name and the event is widely known in Japan with a nengo, use the format Western year+<space>+nengo+<space>+place+<space>+event, eg. 1498 Meiō Nankaidō earthquake.

We should consider the name of each earthquake with reliable source. I don't oppose "Western year" at front, but the name of repeatless earthquake such as Nobi earthquake does not contain nengo generally, there are placeless name such as Hoei earthquake. and there are some othger cases such as Zenkoji earthquake in the Zenkoji-daira (the Nagano basin).--Mujaki (talk) 03:51, 19 March 2011 (UTC)

Names of modern figures

This policy, in its current wording conflicts with WP:COMMONNAME, or at least has the potential to, without any mention on what to do in such a situation. An example is Koda Kumi, whose name, a Google search will reveal, is far more commonly romanised in Japanese order, yet we have the article at Kumi Koda. Official sources vary on romanisation (her own site uses Koda Kumi, while slightly less official ones, such as Avex China use Kumi Koda), but regardless even when set to search English-only, Google returns ~200,000 for Kumi Koda, while over a million for Koda Kumi. Personally I think WP:COMMONNAME should trump MOS:J, but either way, something should be decided. If WP:COMMONNAME can override one of the most fundamental policies, POV, I don't see why it can't MOS:J. - Estoy Aquí (talk) 11:56, 16 March 2011 (UTC)

I do not really think that the use of "Kumi Koda" is a violation of WP:COMMONNAME. Sure, her name is written as "Koda Kumi" on all of her albums, but this is not what was being discussed. All modern figures use the Western name order. The section concerning "modern figures" on this page primarily concerns spelling, not Japanese order vs. Western order.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 01:19, 7 April 2011 (UTC)
For Japanese names (and likely others as well), TITLE has conflicting statements, specifically WP:UE also specifies to romanize it in a manner that would make it clear to an the average English-reading user. Since most (if not all) English-speaking countries use the personal name first, then using that order would seem to indicate which is appropriate.陣内Jinnai 05:51, 7 April 2011 (UTC)
http://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/倖田來未 says 英語表記はKumi Koda.=> Her English name is Kumi Koda.
Google search for her name in Japanese, 倖田來未, gives 13,900,000 results. The uses of "Koda Kumi" are intended for a Japanese audience who will understand that it is "fashionable", they will not be confused about which is her surname. QuentinUK (talk) 15:51, 15 April 2011 (UTC)
Also, this may very well fall under the Pseudonym entry considering she is legally Kumiko Kouda.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 18:23, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

Undefined period in 1868

Japanese order "For a historical figure, a person born before the Meiji period (before 1868)"

Western order "For a modern figure, a person born after the beginning of the Meiji period (1868 onward)" <= started in September

So the period 1 Jan 1868 to September 1868 is undefined.

QuentinUK (talk) 11:39, 19 April 2011 (UTC)

You're reading too much into it. As with every academic source I can find, the entire year of 1868 is generally considered the "beginning of the Meiji period" for this purpose, and that's how we have always interpreted it here. So, anyone born on or after Jan 1, 1868 is considered a modern figure. ···日本穣? · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe · Join WikiProject Japan! 15:58, 19 April 2011 (UTC)
I have clarified this in the text of the MOS-JA. ···日本穣? · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe · Join WikiProject Japan! 16:05, 19 April 2011 (UTC)

Hepburn romanization

Would somebody please comment about verifiability and/or validity of the article "Hepburn romanization" at its talk page.--Mujaki (talk) 15:30, 20 April 2011 (UTC)

nano.RIPE

I would like some input on the problem with the naming of the Japanese band nano.RIPE, which is how their name is typeset on their official website. What would be the correct way to typeset this on Wikipedia? Nano Ripe? Nano.Ripe? Or should it be left as is? I ask because I'm intending to start on article on the band, and I'd rather not see the article get moved around a bunch of times.--十八 02:27, 21 May 2011 (UTC)

Band names are currently subject to MOS:TM (see current page for m.o.v.e as an example). "Nano.Ripe" would probably be the appropriate location, unless guidelines change.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 02:48, 21 May 2011 (UTC)
I tried MOS:TM first almost two weeks ago, but no one answered, so I thought I'd ask here. Thanks for your input, but if m.o.v.e got renamed to Move (Japanese band), doesn't that mean there's a good chance "Nano.Ripe" would be simply moved to "Nano Ripe"?--十八 09:24, 21 May 2011 (UTC)
What we need to do is completely refactor what is deemed a trademark, because individuals' names are not subject to the capitalization rules. Band names should be treated the same, but "Nano.Ripe" would be a safe choice for now.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 18:02, 21 May 2011 (UTC)

Reliable sources for romanizations

A few days ago I discovered that Xfansd had moved several songs by the band L'Arc-en-Ciel to page titles that did not use the Hepburn romanization. These articles are:

I moved them back and told him that he was incorrect, but he rebutted by claiming these links as sources. I then told him that those were not proper reliable sources for the romanizations of these, but he moved all the pages back regardless (as I did not notice he moved them back when he responded) and I am now bringing it up for discussion here. What determines a reliable source for the romanization of a song title such as these? I always assume that the songwriter/band's preference should be followed, much like any sort of personal name spelling, but I am almost positive that the fandom proliferates with these non Hepburn romanizations that are lending to the skewing of what is determined to be the reliable source on this matter.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 20:39, 19 May 2011 (UTC)

The songwriter's preference applies for how they spell Japanese and any words in romaji. Transliterations, however, should be decided by MOS-JA.
Also, both romanizations for the first song are wrong, it should be Yūutsu (ゆう· うつ). Jpatokal (talk) 22:37, 19 May 2011 (UTC)
Well, there are no romaji instances for these songs by the musicians, and I will fix the Yuuutsu one.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 22:58, 19 May 2011 (UTC)
MOS-JA states; "If an article uses English-language reliables source and those sources use a particular form of romanization to name a topic, give preference to that romanization in the article title and body text." Quite simply, I moved the pages to what is used in the sources.
Good catch with the Yūutsu spelling, however in ordinance with what I just quoted, it should be Yuuutsu as that is what is used in the sources. Xfansd (talk) 23:10, 19 May 2011 (UTC)
Those are not reliable sources that you are using. The only source for the English language spelling should be the performer. If they don't provide one, we have to default to the Hepburn form. Also you're forgetting a sentence before that one:

To determine if the non-macronned form is in common usage in English-language reliable sources, a review should be done of all the related reliable sources used for the article (as well as any which may not have been specifically used, but can still be considered reliable per WP:RS)

—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 23:59, 19 May 2011 (UTC)
Wikipedia does not necessarily use the subject's "official" name as an article title.
BTW, "Natsu no yuu-utsu (time to say good-bye)" (with a hyphen between "uu" and "u") and "Jiyuu eno shoutai" (not "e no") are official[1].--Mujaki (talk) 04:25, 21 May 2011 (UTC)
Wow, I didn't bother to look and just assumed their official site was all in Japanese. Okay so both, their site and the source I used, have "Kasou", "Hitomi no Juunin", and "Jojoushi". In my opinion that clinches those names, no?
Now, which do we choose for; "Natsu no Yuu-utsu" or "Natsu no Yuuutsu", and "Jiyuu eno Shoutai" or "Jiyuu e no Shoutai"? Personally I think the 2nd options (English source's) are best, and with what Mujaki said they trump the band's official site's. Xfansd (talk) 21:29, 21 May 2011 (UTC)
The "Wikipedia does not necessarily use the subject's "official" name as an article title" is not in practice when it comes to Japanese, because there is rarely ever a common name in English. But now that we do have an official source for all of these, we should not use the macron form. However, I do not think we should go with "Jiyuu eno Shoutai" as it is not proper grammar according to the recently discovered Library of Congress romanization standards.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 22:32, 21 May 2011 (UTC)
So Ryulong does that mean we reached a consensus? Xfansd (talk) 23:52, 22 May 2011 (UTC)
I'm going to move everything but Jiyu e no Shotai for now. We need to discuss a location for that one. And Mujaki does not work on titling song and biography pages so he does not know the actual practice. "Common name" is useless when it comes to Japanese because there are rarely ever any reliable sources discussing Japanese music.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 02:00, 23 May 2011 (UTC)

Well what do you think? As mentioned above I vote for "Jiyuu e no Shoutai" as its only difference to what is used on the official site is a space between "e" and "no". Xfansd (talk) 01:49, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

Should work. Just remember that "Jiyū e no Shōtai" should still be on the page in the third parameter of Template:Nihongo.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 01:53, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

Hōichi the Earless: with or without macron?

Please join in the talk. Talk:Hōichi the Earless#Requested move to Hoichi the Earless Thank you. Oda Mari (talk) 08:00, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

Names of schools (ryū)

Folks writing articles about martial arts have this guideline in Wikipedia:WikiProject_Martial_arts#Japanese-specific_conventions, referenced from See Also section of MOS:JP:

For articles that are about a school of martial arts (ryū), capitalize the proper name part and add the suffix -ryū. For example, "Shintō Musō-ryū".

One editor claims that this guideline is against MOS:JP. Please join in the talk at Template_talk:Navbox_koryu#English common names are to be used as stated in policies and guidelines. I believe we need a consistent romanization for word ryū, otherwise we can have sentences like: the commonalities between Araki-ryū, Example Ryu, Second Example-ryu and Mugai ryu styles of iaido are.... Thank you, jni (talk) 14:19, 19 June 2011 (UTC)

RFC: restructuring of the Manual of Style

Editors may be interested in this RFC, along with the discussion of its implementation:

Should all subsidiary pages of the Manual of Style be made subpages of WP:MOS?

It's big; and it promises huge improvements. Great if everyone can be involved. NoeticaTea? 00:37, 25 June 2011 (UTC)

Stage names

Given I'm relatively new to the J-music editing scene, I thought I'll ask around. The Wikipedia:Manual of Style (Japan-related articles) explicitly states:

"Titles of songs, and the names of singers, companies and so forth are often capitalized when written in Roman script within a Japanese-language context or (in flyers, posters, etc.) for a Japanese audience, and the relevant publicity departments or fanbases may vehemently insist on the importance of the capitalization. However, these names and name elements are not excluded from the guidance provided by the main manuals of style for English-language Wikipedia, listed above."

However, what if the only name we have of a singer is the stage name, and the stage name used is either in all-caps or not capitalized at all? This is an interesting case which appears almost solely within Japan, and I believe the section can be further clarified for this special case. If anyone can bring up a WP:MOS for stage names, it would be greatly appreciated, as I cannot find one. Cooldra01 (talk) 10:33, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

The issue at hand is WP:MOSCAPS, but there has been developments that individuals' names are not subject to the MOSCAPS rules.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 18:08, 11 August 2011 (UTC)
Thanks, it always befuddled me why some articles such as will.i.am would blatantly not follow MOSCAPS, and other articles would follow it to the letter. Cooldra01 (talk) 08:48, 13 August 2011 (UTC)
The summation of WP:MOS-JA and WP:MOSCAPS seems to be that a stage name with a lack of capitalization may be written as such, but a stage name in all caps is not acceptable. I personally find it to be an arbitrary double standard. Given that lower case names are acceptable if (to quote WP:MOSCAPS) "they have regular and established use in reliable third-party sources", or (in the case of trademarks with a non capitalized first letter) a special capitalization "has become normal English usage", why would the same standards not apply to names in all caps if the all caps version is standard usage and has regular and established use in reliable third-party sources?
A discussion regarding a situation similar to what you describe - a Japanese musician with a stage name which is used either in all caps or not capitalized at all - is currently happening at [2]. Is this the situation you're referring to, or is there someone else whose name representation on Wikipedia is similarly problematic? Ibanez100 (talk) 22:56, 14 August 2011 (UTC)
I've personally ignored that rule when dealing with articles. Case in point: DJ OZMA.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 23:50, 14 August 2011 (UTC)
Not the situation I was referring to, but here: Yui. Even the first few words look awkward: "Yui (born March 26, 1987), stylized as "YUI"", as it makes it sound as if Yui is the person's birth name. I hope this can be resolved quickly, as there are hundreds of articles in a similar state of limbo. Cooldra01 (talk) 13:40, 17 August 2011 (UTC)
Just write it as "YUI" only throughout the text, pointing out the double standard if necessary.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 14:10, 17 August 2011 (UTC)
It's been tried many times by other users, and with DAJF patrolling the Yui pages recently, any such edit will simply turn into an edit war. I'll just leave it like that until some kind of consensus can be made for stage names Cooldra01 (talk) 11:45, 18 August 2011 (UTC)
Well, I've done it. And I will change the manual of style to reflect the practice when it comes to artists in the Anglophone world.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 17:56, 18 August 2011 (UTC)
I've changed "singers" to "bands", as band names are still subject to the various policies.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 18:01, 18 August 2011 (UTC)
Thanks a lot, hope not much opposition is raised about the change to the MOS. Cooldra01 (talk) 13:42, 19 August 2011 (UTC)
That's great, one more victory for standard real-world usage over arbitrary modification. However, does MOS:ALLCAPS override MOS:CAPS#Mixed_or_non-capitalization? The latter addresses only lowercase and mixed case, not all caps.
Personally, I'm in favor of just typing all names (be they those of individuals, bands, songs, whatever) according to their verifiable use in reliable sources. That's the standard for everything else in Wikipedia and I don't see any compelling reason for names to be treated differently. Ibanez100 (talk) 18:39, 19 August 2011 (UTC)
I've asked for clarification on whether or not all caps in names are allowable.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 19:33, 19 August 2011 (UTC)
I don't think they should be. MOS:CAPS#Mixed or non-capitalization specifically talks about non-capitalization in the case of individuals and gives k.d. lang as the example. Therefore, it'd be a stretch to extend that out to individuals with all caps names like Yui (singer) or Kotoko (singer), especially because WP:ALLCAPS is pretty clear on how we treat all caps. As I understand it, all caps are only used in acronyms, and any usage outside of that would imply the use of an akronym. YUI is not pronounced "Y.U.I", so it shouldn't be in all caps. You don't get this problem with names that are in non-caps, hence the non-issue.--十八 19:55, 19 August 2011 (UTC)
This is still a double standard. Why should it be the automatic assumption that if a name is parsed in all capital letters, then the name has to be read as its individual letters? Yui (singer) is known as "YUI" in all reliable sources, and it would be hard to make the assumption that her name is to be read as "Wye U I". And I am seeking an exception to be made for ALLCAPS. Such that "YUI", "KOTOKO", and "DJ OZMA" should be the accepted forms on Wikipedia because the WP:COMMONNAME policy says "use forms that are in use by reliable sources".—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 20:34, 19 August 2011 (UTC)
Very interesting, I hadn't seen WP:COMMONNAME before. The part about "English-language reliable sources" could pose problems for articles about Japanese subjects, however, if those subjects have little or no reliable coverage in English. It would be nice to see a policy like this in MOS-JA, but with Japanese-language reliable sources also accepted as references. Ibanez100 (talk) 20:51, 19 August 2011 (UTC)
I understand your point about an all caps name potentially looking like an acronym, though I disagree that YUI implies the name is pronounced "Y.U.I.". There are plenty of actual acronyms like NATO and AIDS which are pronounced as words rather than individual letters. Plus, acronyms themselves are not always in all caps - scuba comes to mind. Given all the various ways that acronyms themselves are written and pronounced, I think the acronym comparison is a non-issue. More importantly, I think it's also not our problem and therefore not within our jurisdiction to change: if YUI apparently isn't concerned that her name could potentially look like an acronym in an English context, why should we be? Is it really our part to "correct" it for her? I say no way. I believe our part is to present what is verifiable, not to alter a verifiable name into a non verifiable version simply because we do not like something about the verifiable one. Ibanez100 (talk) 20:43, 19 August 2011 (UTC)
That to me goes purely against the purpose of WP:ALLCAPS. Why do we even have that guideline at all if things like this happen? For example, why don't we just change Time to TIME in Time (magazine)? The whole purpose of that guideline is so that normal English formatting is followed on Wikipedia, except for some extreme cases. I see no reason how you can say YUI is all right and TIME isn't only because Yui is a person.--十八 09:46, 21 August 2011 (UTC)
If Time is more frequently written as TIME in verifiable sources, preferably third party sources, then yes, we should change it to TIME. My point is that I would like to see Wikipedia's standards of neutrality and verifiability extended to names, rather than names being subject to a separate standard. However a name - be it the name of a person, a song, a magazine, whatever - is most frequently written in reliable, verifiable sources is the way the name should appear in the Wikipedia article. I do think it's even more important to do this with BLP articles than with others, but yes, absolutely I believe the same name formatting standards should apply across the board. Ibanez100 (talk) 05:09, 22 August 2011 (UTC)
Judging purely based on your number of contributions, let me tell you that I've been around Wikipedia long enough to know we would never change Time to TIME no matter how many reliable sources used it.--十八 08:53, 22 August 2011 (UTC)
Actually, I've had an eye on Wikipedia long enough to notice that rules like this sometimes do change. A case in point would be the lowercase name rule. It was not long ago that k.d.lang was considered unacceptable. Ibanez100 (talk) 01:16, 23 August 2011 (UTC)
No disrespect, but I feel that the all lowercase example is a separate issue. Currently, I haven't seen anywhere where writing in all caps is acceptable, and I don't see this changing anytime soon.--十八 06:43, 23 August 2011 (UTC)

That is the exact kind of double standard we are dealing with. And if normal English formatting is followed, then that means will.i.am, apl.de.ap, and k.d. lang should all be changed.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 17:40, 21 August 2011 (UTC)

WP:ALLCAPS states quite simply that writing in all capitals should be avoided, which is why (all things being equal) Yui is preferred to YUI, and Time to TIME. k.d.lang and company, on the other hand, are all lowercase and the current consensus, for better or worse, is that such spellings are tolerated. If she started spelling her name as K.D.LANG, WP would smash that down to K.D.Lang, and hence YUI should also be just Yui.
And as for why: WRITING IN ALL CAPS IS GENERALLY CONSIDERED ANNOYING. writing without caps, on the other hand, is a lesser sin. It's an arbitrary line, but you have to draw it somewhere and I think the current consensus is pretty sensible. Jpatokal (talk) 03:19, 22 August 2011 (UTC)
"Annoying", however, is not a neutral point of view. A neutral point of view would be to present the name as it is most commonly presented in verifiable sources, preferably third party sources, and leave it to the reader to decide whether the name is annoying or not. Should Xzibit be modified to Exhibit because Xzibit does not follow the rules of English pronunciation and spelling, which some people may find annoying? Why should non-standard capitalization - be it no caps, all caps, or whatever else - be any different? Ibanez100 (talk) 05:09, 22 August 2011 (UTC)
if writing in all-caps is annoying, i contend that writing in all non-caps makes you look childish. to me, i think its a double standard through and through, and it makes no sense to allow one while not allowing the other. if the only argument has turned to it being "annoying", and theoretical possibilities of spelling, then i think there's something wrong with the current mos. Cooldra01 (talk) 11:22, 22 August 2011 (UTC)
Actually, "text in all caps is hard to read" is a fact, not an opinion, see eg. [3]. In any case, you're welcome to present your viewpoints at MOS:ALLCAPS and argue there for changing it, but I still don't see why the names of Japanese pop artists should be treated any differently from American ones. Jpatokal (talk) 23:10, 22 August 2011 (UTC)
That's the point. They are being treated differently from American ones. If will.i.am can be parsed in all lower case letters, then there is no reason that DJ OZMA should not be parsed in all capital letters. And I have started a discussion but no one has responded.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 23:14, 22 August 2011 (UTC)
Are you saying the policy would treat DJ OZMA differently based on whether he's Japanese or American?! Jpatokal (talk) 01:46, 26 August 2011 (UTC)
As far as I can tell, yes.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 18:03, 26 August 2011 (UTC)
The link you gave does not present a fact, it presents the advice and opinion of the blog's author. When you said "fact", I clicked the link hoping to see a scientific study or something to that effect. But regardless, whether or not people find text in all caps harder to read is not relevant to the issue at hand. The word supercalifragilisticexpialidocious is also hard to read (in my opinion) but is not modified for Wikipedia readers. Again, opinions like "annoying" and "hard to read" have merit as opinions but do not represent a neutral point of view.
No one has said the names of Japanese pop artists should be treated differently. Quite the opposite, as Ryulong mentioned above. The all caps issue comes up more frequently in a Japanese context than in an American context because all caps occurs more frequently in Japanese pop culture than in American pop culture, but the point here is to fix an existing double standard. I can't think offhand of an American pop artist whose name is consistently spelled in all caps in reliable third party sources, but if one exists, his or her name should be in all caps in Wikipedia as well. Ibanez100 (talk) 01:16, 23 August 2011 (UTC)
Check the comments of your so-called "source". You'll see not everyone agrees, and in fact, a user has created an even more comprehensive blog post which debunks the theory that capitalized letters are harder to read. [4] Yep, complete with numerous sources. Cooldra01 (talk) 15:15, 24 August 2011 (UTC)
In short, you're wrong. Your link disputes the claim that all caps are harder to read because of the lack of descendents etc, but only to offer an alternative theory of why they are harder to read: because people aren't used to them. He does not dispute that they are harder to read. See All caps#Readability for a handy summary with references. Jpatokal (talk) 01:46, 26 August 2011 (UTC)
I'll disagree with your very first statement, but agree with the rest. However, these theories and studies refer to entire documents of all-caps, and that's far from the case here. Oh, and about your link. Absolutely zero sources on the blog, and after a little searching, the author evidently forgot to mention that the shape recognition model has long since been outdated. Yep, your handy reference is outdated too. Cooldra01 (talk) 10:53, 28 August 2011 (UTC)

Comments

I'm starting a new subsection, because this section is kind of long. Let me say up front that I have no preference in this matter. No decision made here is going to bother me. I am interested, though, because I close lots of move requests, and I want to understand consensus positions before I go around trying to "enforce" them.

  1. There's something about the "double-standard" point that's bothering me. The situation isn't quite symmetric, because written English doesn't treat all-caps and all-lowercase the same way. Writing in all-caps in English generally means something, whereas all-lowercase writing doesn't carry such connotations. When I see all-caps words in the midst of ordinary text, my guess is that either (a) I'm looking at an all-caps acronym, or (b) someone is shouting. On the other hand, when I see lower-case letters where I expect standard formatting, I tend to think it's a typo.

    For better or for worse, I think that's the reason for the double-standard. It's not "fair" in some sense, but it's unfair for the same kind of reason that the letter "o" is unfairly neglected as a variable in mathematics: It looks too much like something that already means something else. Readers accustomed to Standard Written English in these times have expectations raised when they see all-caps, and most of us don't think, "oh, it's the stage name of a Japanese performer".

    After reading and thinking about this question, I'm better informed, and I might think of Tokyo DJs when I'm confronted with all-caps text in the future.

  2. There's also the relation to MOSCAPS. ("DJ MOSCAPS"?) I know that, for cases such as Time magazine and Kiss (band), a big part of our rationale for avoiding caps is that we're not trying to conduct brand promotion, because we're an encyclopedia. It's really an MOSTM issue, that a company or organization tries to present their name in a unique way, to make it stand out and be memorable to consumers. We're not part of anyone's marketing department, so we're not obliged to make sure their brand is easily distinguished from the others by its UNUSUAL FORMATTING.

    This is the same reason we eschew Macy*s, KoЯn, and even thirtysomething (TV series). We've made exceptions for "eBay" and "iPod" because it's become an unwritten rule of 21st century English that proper nouns created by appending "e" or "i" to the front of words are capitalized according to a different "eRule". It's actually helpful in parsing the word into meaningful units (compare "Erule"), in the same way that internal caps are helpful parsing words in "CamelCase".

  3. So I was pretty much accustomed to all of that, when I noticed that there's an apparent consensus to allow bell hooks and k.d. lang, although brian d foy does not enjoy the same special status. (Perhaps a sign of chivalry? misogyny? inconsistency?) This difference apparently comes from the fact that personal names are afforded a little more leeway than brand names or band names. (Although, stage names aren't allowed fully free rein either: consider P!nk.

    Now anyway, since we've allowed Mademoiselles hooks and lang to insist on all-lowercase, it feels weirder asking DJ OZMA to format like everyone else. However, I think the reason we're not as bothered by "bell hooks" is that her name being in lower-case letters doesn't raise any special flags for readers. It looks awkward to begin a sentence with "bell hooks", but that problem can be avoided by using different word order.

I'm still not convinced that either side of this question is clearly wrong, so I'm still willing to go with the flow. Just thought I'd share those observations. -GTBacchus(talk) 15:29, 30 August 2011 (UTC)

  1. I would have to say all-lowercase does imply something. Specifically it implies ones does not know proper grammar or that one doesn't care. If someone wrote an email to me in all lowercase, I'd assume they didn't care to be bothered using proper capitalization. Depending on the context, I'd be just as much or more offended than someone using ALL CAPS. Therefore your first argument is only a matter of your personal opinion and shouldn't be used as a basis for approving or disproving anything; it essentially amounts to an I like it or I don't like it argument.
  2. I realize there are stuff we don't allow for branding purposes, but here too we make plenty of exceptions, most notably when it doesn't involve special characters. We allow CamelCase even when its something like PlayStation. That is certainly a nod to branding. There is no convention in capitalization that would normally say proper nouns composed of 2 nouns are CamelCased by default. It would be differen't if he had some special characters like ♥. However, searching in all caps doesn't use any special characters.
  3. Probably the best argument is that only personal names are afforded more leway than stage names, band names or other aliases. However, k.d. lang isn't really his name. Her official name is still capitalized: Kathryn Dawn Lang. So it seems even here where we'd normally require more stringent usage for non-personal names, we again have that double standard mentioned above.
The bottom line is that it appears that it truly is a double-standard with the only real backing being that it's less astecitically appealing to have all caps.陣内Jinnai 17:53, 30 August 2011 (UTC)
I wasn't making any arguments, so when you refer to my "first argument", I'm a little nonplussed. What do you think I'm saying here? Was I not clear that I'm not swayed by either side?
  1. Your response to my first observation is a bit beside the point, as I see it. I was making a real distinction, which you seem to want to deny. Oh well. To me there's a very big difference between intentional semantic content along the lines of all-caps=shouting, versus meta-content along the lines of: "Oh look, this person doesn't know how to capitalize properly." Getting an email in all-lowercase or in all-caps has nothing at all to do with what I was saying in my first numbered observation. I don't know what you must imagine I was saying.
  2. I guess CamelCase is a nod to branding, sure. I never said we make no nods to branding, because I wasn't making an argument. The background that I'm providing is accurate. Make of it what you will. If all you're able to hear are arguments for and arguments against, then I guess that's all you'll hear.
  3. The "best argument" again, wasn't an argument. Gee whiz. I don't really understand your reply to it. We seem (this is an observation) to allow more leeway with personal names. I don't know why we do it, but I've observed that we do it. There you go.
I'm not defending the "double-standard", so if you think I am, it's a guarantee that you've misunderstood what I said. As I see it, the reasons behind the apparent double-standard are clear, which is not to say they're good reasons. Actually understanding the thoughts behind an existing convention, before critiquing them, is not a bad thing. -GTBacchus(talk) 19:02, 30 August 2011 (UTC)
I appreciate your comments and observations; it's interesting to see some new outside perspectives on the subject.
1. Actually, a noun in all lowercase indicates a common noun as opposed to a proper noun, and the reader might expect that (a) the noun is not a personal name (personal names are obviously proper nouns) and (b) the noun should be preceded by "a" or "the": "The k.d. lang performed on Tuesday." (I can only wonder if someday there will come along a performer who actually prefers this kind of phrasing.)
It's true that some aspects of the situation aren't quite symmetric - the rules of English being broken are different ones - but I find that the end result is still symmetric in that k.d.lang and DJ OZMA both violate the conventions of English typography, and in both cases their stylization could suggest something other than a personal name. That's why I think it's a double standard to allow the former but not the latter.
2. I understand and agree with the perspective that an encyclopedia should not be (or be beholden to) anyone's marketing department, but I also believe that common usage should be the ultimate deciding factor - and in the interest of neutrality, whether that common usage is or is not the same as the way the commercial entity in question prefers for its branding shouldn't matter. In fact, the "eRule" that allows eBay and iPod is a great example of how brand promotion sometimes becomes the most common usage in reliable third party sources. It does help parse the word into meaningful units, but would anyone have even thought of that before eThis and iThat became so common, thanks in large part to Apple's marketing?
3. I don't know enough about brian d foy to know if that's how his name is commonly presented in reliable sources, but if so, then I would absolutely support the notion of allowing it. About beginning a sentence with "bell hooks", aren't we supposed to capitalize lowercase personal names when they begin a sentence? Though choosing a different word order would be even better if possible. Ibanez100 (talk) 20:15, 30 August 2011 (UTC)


  1. Having something in all caps doesn't mean someone is shouting or is using an acronymn. A lot of sites capitalize family names. They aren't acronyms and I doubt when you see that you think they're shouting the name at you. I doubt when you read Time you think its shouting its name at you on the newstand.

    When someone has a whole sentance or more in all caps, then there might be some level of context that presumes that it is shouting, but even then there are exceptions (such as the caps lock being stuck in the on position, program rendering words in all caps, etc. However all that is aside the point here. We aren't talking about allowing all caps for general prose, just names.

  2. Before eBay, no. After it, yea. I've seen it a bit with other naming sequences where variables are used first, but that's far less common.
  3. I do know that sentances are prefered to be constructed in a way that lowcase names don't start them, but I've not seen any consistant usage one way or the other except with the iPhone/eBay above which still keep it lowercase. It's a seperate issue, but one that should probably be looked into again.陣内Jinnai 21:18, 30 August 2011 (UTC)
Found it, sort of. WP:MOSCAPS#Mixed_or_non-capitalization: "In articles where the case of symbols is significant, like those related to programming languages or mathematical notation (for example, n is not equivalent to N), the title should reflect this. It is best to avoid putting symbols like n at the beginning of a sentence where English rules would require capitalization." It doesn't mention names specifically, but I would take that to mean that the first letter of a sentence should always be capitalized, though you could rearrange the sentence to avoid the issue. If it were me I would just capitalize it if it's the first word of a sentence and there's no easy way to rearrange the sentence, though make sure there are enough repetitions of the name in all lowercase elsewhere in the article. Ibanez100 (talk) 19:46, 31 August 2011 (UTC)
    1. It's whichever way you prefer, I suppose. Personally, I would rather have a sentence such as, "The renowned singer DJ OZMA" rather then, "The renowned singer will.i.am" because the all-caps name is easier to pick out. On the question of the double-standard, it's unfair whichever way you look at it. I doubt you'll see a single word in caps as "shouting", or much less then an entire sentence in all-caps. Furthermore, notable non-caps words are acronyms - just we don't think of it that way, the acronyms having long become standard in our lexicon.
  1. There's no actual standard for all-caps for branding purposes. As noted above, various companies use CamelCase, which is certainly a form of branding.
  2. I have no idea on whether you alter the wording of sentences using non-caps. It seems like a chore to me, and more to the point, you don't need to alter the wording of all-cap names. It's a double standard through and through, and I would imagine the point of WP discussion pages is to take care of these inconsistencies.
Of note, many Japanese artists use only their stage names in the public. Often times, their real name is unknown to everyone but themselves and people who know them. This is what my original argument was about, but somehow it spiraled into a bigger debate then I originally intended. Right now, there isn't much of an argument other then for aesthetic reasons, or people who just don't like it. Cooldra01 (talk) 14:10, 31 August 2011 (UTC)
There's nothing wrong with how your discussion developed, it turned out to reveal a double standard in the MOS which is worth addressing. I agree with you about stage names vs. real names in regard to those Japanese performers who do use stage names. Unfortunately, a very large number of the articles about Japanese musicians I've seen on Wikipedia are plagued by a strange fannish insistence emphasizing birth names even when the performer is better known by a pseudonym and on "outing" the pseudonym-only performers' supposed real names, which are rarely adequately sourced. I've tried to fix this in a couple of articles, but it's extremely pervasive and I don't have the time or energy to chase the "real name" adders across Wikipedia. Ibanez100 (talk) 19:46, 31 August 2011 (UTC)
This will be an interesting one, because while I agree that allcaps should be allowed in cases of personal names and pseudonyms, I also know that the notion will likely attract aggressive resistance from people who are neither fluent with nor edit in the relevant areas. Regardless of personal opinion, capitalisation is typically not used as a branding or marketing technique in Japanese transliterations. Syntax and spelling are meaningful and at times unique information that should not be stripped from names.
WP:V is a policy, WP:MOS is a guideline, it should be clear which one trumps the other. If the majority of reliable sources use allcaps for a name, so should we. It's not our job to make subjective assumptions about the influence of marketing on reliable sources - if a jazz band was referred to in both their own marketing and in the majority of reliable sources as 'neo-synth jazz', that's exactly how we'd refer to it as well. Wikipedia's standard is verifiability, not truth. We already apply this standard to spelling, there's no reason why syntax should receive special exemption from one of the five pillars. TechnoSymbiosis (talk) 23:20, 1 September 2011 (UTC)
Also a brief reply to Bacchus(?) above, we 'eschew' Macy*s and KoЯn because the majority of independent reliable sources don't use those spellings. In these cases it has nothing to do with unusual spelling and everything to do with source content. Again, verifiability over truth. TechnoSymbiosis (talk) 23:24, 1 September 2011 (UTC)
Speaking as someone who was there when that decision was made, it wasn't because of sources. I mean, that seems like a good reason, I agree, but that's not the reason that was cited at the time, when we decided to avoid cutesy formatting.

Is there something wrong with the word "eschew"? -GTBacchus(talk) 16:08, 5 September 2011 (UTC)

The reasoning applied at the time the guidelines were altered doesn't match with the reasoning I've seen most people apply to the same issue today. It's less 'we don't do pretty names' and more 'the sources don't use pretty names'. I find it to be a more rational argument, which may be why it has grown in use.
To digress on the word 'eschew', the original meaning of the word wasn't as vague as 'deliberately avoid using', but more along the lines of 'dread using' or 'fearful of using'. To 'eschew violence', for instance, conveyed a fear of consequence or retaliation, rather than just simply a conscious decision not to be violent. That meaning has diluted in recent times so I certainly don't find fault in its more general use, but I prefer keeping its subtlety in my own use. TechnoSymbiosis (talk) 23:28, 5 September 2011 (UTC)
Thanks for the word info. Fascinating. :)

Yeah, "following sources" in formatting has grown in popularity as an argument, which might be because it's more rational, or it might be because it's easy and consistent with other matters. "Verifiability over truth" was not originally about formatting questions, but about content of articles. Only in the last couple of years have people started to apply that principle to the difference between capital and lower-case letters. One could argue that the principle of "verifiability not truth" was not first adopted with style issues in mind, and that capitalization is a matter of style, not of "truth". We consistently use title case in, for example, album titles, and that's not in any way due to verifiability. It's about style, and using our own internal style manual. -GTBacchus(talk) 23:43, 5 September 2011 (UTC)

Name order

On WMF editor Aphaia/Kizu Naoko

These guidelines should include an exception for people whose names are always or primarily listed elsewhere in a different order (in which case we should use the order which is always associated with their name).

For historical figures
"always use the traditional Japanese order of family name + given name" ...
  • Add "for Western alphabet" after the above quote
  • Add below "Exception: figures that are always referred to by a different form of their name should use that form instead."
For modern figures
always use the Western order of given name + family name for Western alphabet ...
  • Add below "Exception: figures that are always referred to by a different form of their name should use that form instead."

– SJ + 22:07, 5 September 2011 (UTC)

Those exceptions I believe are covered elsewhere on the page, such as under "Stage Name".—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 23:36, 5 September 2011 (UTC)
Ryulong is correct. ···日本穣? · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe · Join WikiProject Japan! 01:08, 6 September 2011 (UTC)
SJ, the posters believed that you were referring to particular pen names like Nisioisin and Neko Hiroshi, and not legal names like "Kizu Naoko" (from Logo of Wikipedia)
User:Aphaia is mentioned in a NYT article about the Logo of Wikipedia, so she is also mentioned in the Wikipedia article about the logo, with the NYT article being used as a source. Her legal name is 木津 尚子 Kizu Naoko.
Aphaia insists on using Japanese order and, she personally finds it offensive when her name is stated in western order. However, "Kizu Naoko" is not a pen name. It is her legal name, and AFAIK legal names post-Meiji are universally western order, according to the MOS.
There are so far at least four reliable sources that mention her name. One uses "Naoko Kizu" in an acknowledgement section, and three use "Kizu Naoko"
The acknowledgements in Andrew Lih's book refers to her as "Naoko Kizu" [5]
There is one book that uses Kizu Naoko: Bruns, Axel. Blogs, Wikipedia, Second life, and Beyond: From Production to Produsage. Peter Lang. 116.
That book cites: "How and Why Wikipedia Works: An Interview with Angela Beesley, Elisabeth Bauer, and Kizu Naoko" and Bruns also stated that when he writes books he uses the naming forms that the subjects prefer.
There's also: Riehle, Dirk. "How and Why Wikipedia Works: An Interview with Angela Beesley, Elisabeth Bauer, and Kizu Naoko." Proceedings of the International Symposium on Wikis (WikiSym), 21-23 Aug. 2006, Odense, Denmark, ACM Press, 2006. Page 3-8. http://www.riehle.org/computer-science/research/2006/wikisym-2006-interview.pdf (Archive) - It is also available from the Association of Computing Machinery.
One New York Times article by Noam Cohen refers to her as "Kizu Naoko"
Since the popular media puts modern Japanese names in western order, and this is the only newspaper article in English about her, I believe that Cohen likely made a mistake and/or was not informed that "Kizu" was the family name, so I would very much like to get in touch with him. I might contact Bruns too (as his book was about the internet, and not about East Asian society/culture)... EDIT: Sent an e-mail. Hoping for a response...
WhisperToMe (talk) 15:58, 13 October 2011 (UTC)
I got an e-mail back from Dr. Bruns. He says that in his books he prefers to use naming styles that the subjects themselves prefer, i.e. "danah boyd" instead of Danah Boyd (that was his example) since that is what the subject prefers. Also he got the naming order from the document he cited.
Wikipedia uses the naming styles that are the most common and/or are the best style. I.E. Cat Stevens is under that name even though the man is now known as Yusuf Islam. It's not necessarily what the subject prefers.
WhisperToMe (talk) 18:15, 13 October 2011 (UTC)
We should more consistently follow the advice of Dr. Bruns. [We do for many name-sensitive people, in areas where we do not have detailed rules that someone can use for rules-lawyering.] As you note above, the majority of reliable print sources list the name in question as "Kizu Naoko". We should as well. (Given your documentation of those sources, I don't understand why you are continuing to push for using the minority order...)
To your examples: I understand that Noam Cohen did know what he was doing, checked with the subjects of his article, and abided by their preferences. Your Cat Stevens example isn't a good one -- he preferred that name for much of his life, during which he did his most popular work; and he does not specifically discourage use of that name in print. I know of no example where the subject has a clear preference, asks people not to use one form of their real name, and has no clear "most common" winner -- and Wikipedia ignores their preference. In general the subject's preference should certainly be a consideration; we don't want to be the "canonical source on the web" for some piece of trivia and to have that be a point of contention. In this case if the subject had an article about her, it would be appropriate imo for the article title to be the name which is both most commonly used and preferred by her; and it should list the "MOS" form of the name in the lead sentence. – SJ + 23:45, 14 October 2011 (UTC)
Maybe this will be a better example... "Arudou Debito" consistently refers to himself as such on his webpage and his writings, but because the newspaper articles in the Japan Times call him "Debito Arudou" we use Debito Arudou. I do not know if Arudou actually feels offense when "Debito Arudou" is used instead of "Arudou Debito," and he never said "I don't want Wikipedia using that form of my name," but I know in his own works he clearly has a preference for "Arudou Debito"
The reason why Wikipedia does not go with Arudou's own preference is because it prefers using what popular media secondary sources use ("Debito Arudou") versus what primary sources (Arudou himself) use ("Arudou Debito"). The underlying principle is that EN and the MOS-JA do not go by necessarily what the person prefers, but what is preferred in the wider media/publishing world.
I anticipated that if the popular media/secondary sources would write articles about Aphaia, they would use western order, despite her preferences, just like how Anglophone sources use western order with Arudou's name, despite his preferences. Because the NYT article is so far the only popular media newspaper source in English that mentions her name, and that it uses Japanese order, I want to contact Noam Cohen to learn more about how this came to be.
I still would like to have Noam Cohen's e-mail and see if he knew and what his opinions on the matter are. Also I would like to see if The New York Times or other English-speaking media (like the Japan Times) have specific policies on the matter.
WhisperToMe (talk) 13:40, 15 October 2011 (UTC)
If anybody's interested, here are some discussions from the Commons about this matter:
WhisperToMe (talk) 14:44, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

I was referring to both pen names and legal names where the subject has a preference in how it is displayed. The two are on a spectrum, with overlaps where the 'pen' name is mainly a respelling of one name, or an extra middle initial.

In the specific case of Kizu Naoko, the quote from her was not a significant part of the article in question, and is clearly controversial, so I removed it to the article talk page. Let's not use that article to make a point about the MOS -- we can have the generic debate about how to handle subject name preferences here. – SJ + 00:14, 15 October 2011 (UTC)
The quote is controversial? (I'll check out the talk page) WhisperToMe (talk) 13:40, 15 October 2011 (UTC)
For discussions about the quote itself, please see: Talk:Logo_of_Wikipedia#Controversial_and_barely_notable_quote_removed WhisperToMe (talk) 14:51, 15 October 2011 (UTC)
After a Google Scholar search, it seems other journal used the Riehle article as a source and used the same naming order:
Berner, Sam. "Misinformed, but democratically so!" South African Journal of Information Management. March 2007. Volume 9, Issue 1.
WhisperToMe (talk) 19:17, 21 October 2011 (UTC)
If there are no further posts in a week or so, I may use the WP:BLPN noticeboard and ask for comments there. WhisperToMe (talk) 19:02, 22 October 2011 (UTC)
No further posts, so I took it to the noticeboard: Wikipedia:Biographies_of_living_persons/Noticeboard#Naming_order_of_a_Japanese_person WhisperToMe (talk) 03:49, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Sumo and royalty

I would also like to inquire about names of Sumo wrestlers. Many articles about them use Eastern order (Akebono Taro) even though the MOS says that (post-Meiji 1) names always must be in western order (in the case of Akebono, that is the man's legal name) WhisperToMe (talk) 15:38, 29 September 2011 (UTC)

Rikishi names are all pseudonyms, and they are more commonly known under the Eastern order.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 18:16, 29 September 2011 (UTC)
Not all of them are. "Akebono Taro" is the legal name of that Rikishi.
Even for the ones that are pseudonyms, Yukio Mishima is a pseudonym too. Pseudonyms in other professions are name order switched as well.
Anyway, on Google News "Taro Akebono" nets 15 English results while "Akebono Taro" nets 14 English results.
On Google Books "Taro Akebono" nets 6 English results while "Akebono Taro" nets 7 English results (one result used "Akebono Taro no Akebonoryu" as a title of a Japanese work, so I did not count that one)
WhisperToMe (talk) 18:34, 29 September 2011 (UTC)
Also, what about Prince Higashikuni Naruhiko? I wonder why that one is in Japanese order... WhisperToMe (talk) 18:34, 29 September 2011 (UTC)
Some pseudonyms are more commonly found in the eastern order. Rikishi and prince Naruhiko are under that umbrella. Yukio Mishima is a pseudonym by which he was known as in the Western order. It all comes down to WP:COMMONNAME.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 18:37, 29 September 2011 (UTC)
There may be some that are. What may help is compiling Google Books/Google News results and/or checking to see if any books explicitly state that sumo names are usually in eastern order.
When I tried doing Akebono's name, it seemed like it was 50-50. If you want I can try a different sumo wrestler and see what his Google news/books hits are.
WhisperToMe (talk) 18:42, 29 September 2011 (UTC)
All I know is that the general practice when it comes to rikishi is that the eastern order is used. For other individuals, it's based on the common usage in English or the Latinate form in Japan (see Neko Hiroshi).—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 18:54, 29 September 2011 (UTC)
For other sumo wrestlers:
"Kotoshogiku Kazuhiro" (this is just a stage name) gets zero Google News hits, and zero Google Books hits. "Kazuhiro Kotoshogiku" also gets zero Google News hits and zero Google Books hits.
"Kitazakura Hidetoshi" (AFAIK it's a stage name) gets zero English Google news hits and zero Google Books hits (BTW I am not counting "Books LLC" results since they seem to be Wikipedia mirrors) - "Hidetoshi Kitazakura" gets zero Google News hits and zero Google Books hits
"Asashoryu Akinori" (this is just a stage name) gets 16 English Google news hits and 4-5 English Google books hits. "Akinori Asashoryu" gets zero Google News hits, and one Google books hit.
The names did not turn up any hits on Jstor. -- Academic Search Complete: 1 hit for "Akebono Taro" and 1 hit for "Taro Akebono" (both news articles) - No results for any of the others
There simply seems to be a dearth of English language coverage that at least mentions the full names of these sumo wrestlers.
As for the prince (first ten pages of Google Books counted):
Google News: "Naruhiko Higashikuni" (or "Naruhiko Higashi-Kuni") = 63 results - Google Books: 45
Google News: "Higashikuni Naruhiko" = zero results - Google Books: 45 - Jestor: 1
Two as an index: "Higashikuni, Haruhiko"
One as "The first Higashikuni Prince, Naruhiko,"
One as "Naruhiko, Prince Higashikuni of Japan"
One incorrect on Google Books: "Naruhiko, Higashikuni"
So in news publications he is always "Naruhiko Higashikuni" just like any other Japanese person. In books it apparently depends on whether the book author is using Japanese or Western order. Some of the books that use Western order are quoting from news publications.
I am in favor of using "Prince Naruhiko Higashikuni" for this person - The usage of his name seems to match patterns with other names of modern Japanese people.
WhisperToMe (talk) 00:16, 30 September 2011 (UTC)
We've already determined that these are the most common names. Why are you trying to redetermine that?—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 00:41, 30 September 2011 (UTC)
1. I'm trying to find out for myself to confirm the work done and
2. If one is going to determine which naming order is more common, determining Common names should be based on what reliable sources say.
Where are the discussions on the Sumo wrestlers? And the prince? Because consensus can change, depending on new relevations and/or how old discussions went, I would like to see the older discussions.
For instance, the fact that the general convention for modern Japanese people is to use family name last is confirmed with reliable sources, and I used several to add to the section Japanese_name#Japanese_names_in_English
WhisperToMe (talk) 01:22, 30 September 2011 (UTC)
FYI, I cannot find anything with "sumo" in the talk page archives of MOS-JA. On the Sumo project I can't find anything with the word "order"
WhisperToMe (talk) 03:12, 30 September 2011 (UTC)
Does there need to be a discussion? Perhaps the authors of both of these sets of pages determined the most common name when they first authored them. Rikishi have pseudonyms that are more commonly written in the Eastern order in the West. Akebono Taro is an oddity in that both orders are prevalent. Prince Naruhiko's name is a pseudonym, as well. His given name is "Naruhiko Higashikuni", as he was born following the Meiji Restoration, but the "Higashikuni" part is as much a title as it is his surname.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 04:12, 30 September 2011 (UTC)
"Perhaps the authors of both of these sets of pages determined the most common name when they first authored them" - But policies and standards of proof have changed dramatically since then
"Akebono Taro" was first created in 2004 by an anonymous user
"Higashikuno Naruhiko" was first created in 2003 by Takuya Murata - Taku used Western order, but the following user (User:Nanshu) changed it to Japanese order in the following edit
Unless one can find a talk page discussion where it was determined that the prince and in general sumo wrestlers are best referred to by family name first, then I have no other ways of evaluating which names are the most common.
As of now the sources are divided on the Sumo wrestlers, and seem to clearly prefer "Naruhiko Higashikuni" in the same contexts where western order is used for commoners.
"His given name is "Naruhiko Higashikuni", as he was born following the Meiji Restoration, but the "Higashikuni" part is as much a title as it is his surname." - It may be true that his family name has different connotations than family names of commoners. However English language media sources treated it the same.
Because apparently there was never any discussion on these two specific issues before my post, I feel that this discussion here is needed.
WhisperToMe (talk) 04:27, 30 September 2011 (UTC)
As for Higashikuni, the family removed from the Imperial Household register after the war and became commoners and they have been used Higashikuni as their family name. See the article of Naruhiko's son. I think the lead of Naruhiko article should be written like that and the article titles should be moved and used Japanese orderWestern order. But which order is commonly used in en? Oda Mari (talk) 08:51, 30 September 2011 (UTC)
If a commoner is born after the first year of Meiji, western order (family name last) is used. Anyway, en:Higashikuni Morihiro needs to use western order. WhisperToMe (talk) 10:19, 30 September 2011 (UTC)
Oops! Sorry. Stupid of me! What was I thinking? I meant Western order. Oda Mari (talk) 14:23, 30 September 2011 (UTC)
The crux of this is what is more common in English usage. For all we know, the more common form of these individuals' names in English is the eastern order. They might fall under the "born after Meiji restoration, use Western order" rule we have, but because they are either born early in the Meiji era or they fall under this royalty thing which might make them different. We do need to figure out what should be done here, but I personally doubt that anything will have to be done with it.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 18:45, 30 September 2011 (UTC)
What I'll do is wait and see if anybody can find any other sources related to royalty and/or sumo. Hopefully that will help clarify the issue WhisperToMe (talk) 01:54, 2 October 2011 (UTC)
With no further evidence presented (also the Look Japan article that I found doesn't discuss sumo), I would like to move Prince Naruhiko and Taro Akebono to western order. I am not going to make a decision on the other sumo wrestlers yet... WhisperToMe (talk) 15:47, 13 October 2011 (UTC)
I think we should wait for a comment from a Japanese scholar.—Ryulong (竜龙) 19:34, 13 October 2011 (UTC)
If he/she can find additional reliable sources on the matter, then it would be helpful (i.e. the Look Japan article really helped develop the section on Japanese names in English).
But otherwise I think we will have to do with what reliable sources say. In a Wikipedia article the main factor is what reliable sources say, and IMO in how subjects are treated according to manuals of style the same practice should occur. If a scholar has something important to say that will affect the MOS, it will be written in an academic journal, in a popular journalism article, or elsehwere in a document that fits the RS requirements.
WhisperToMe (talk) 19:46, 13 October 2011 (UTC)
If reliable sources are using Western order, then that is what we should do. The exceptions are exactly that, and they detail how academia generally does name order in articles, books, and so on. The Meiji split on that is very common in academic works. ···日本穣? · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe · Join WP Japan! 05:41, 14 October 2011 (UTC)
The prince article is now at Prince Naruhiko Higashikuni WhisperToMe (talk) 17:04, 16 October 2011 (UTC)
I think "Prince" should be removed as he died as a commoner like Puyi. Oda Mari (talk) 17:12, 16 October 2011 (UTC)
If Wikipedians agree to that, I'm fine with that :) WhisperToMe (talk) 18:29, 16 October 2011 (UTC)
I forgot that he was a prime minister. What is he referred in history books in en? If Prince N.H. is more common than N.H., the title should be needed. I leave the matter to native en editors. Oda Mari (talk) 06:24, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

Lang template

Per Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Accessibility#Other languages, this part of the MoS should advise editors to wrap non-English text in {{Lang}}. How should we word that, in this case? Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 19:23, 5 September 2011 (UTC)

{{nihongo}} does it for us.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 20:08, 5 September 2011 (UTC)
How would you use that, in lieu of say, ''{{Lang|jp|[[mono no aware]]}}''? Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 21:46, 5 September 2011 (UTC)
Well, you wouldn't put English text in there like that because it ends up being displayed weird. {{Nihongo}} takes care of those things by having a parameter for the English language form (a parameter for the Japanese text form, and a parameter for the romanization form). Also I've just fixed up the lede of Mono no aware to deal with these things.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 23:38, 5 September 2011 (UTC)
You haven't said what you mean by "displayed weird" (it looks fine on my screen, no different to surrounding text (maybe you have something in you local CSS?); and you haven't answered my question. I've just added several instances to Mono no aware which illustrate its usage. I also note that the template is used in the source of Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Japan-related articles. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 09:15, 6 September 2011 (UTC)

No reply. Where are we with this? Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 12:25, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Andy. The formatting {{lang|ja|foo}} is meant to encode Japanese script properly. It is not meant to wrap romanizations. In most browsers there should be a very clear difference between the way "Mono no aware" and "Mono no aware" should appear on your screen (and I have not modified my local CSS to encode it differently, perhaps it is my machine's local fonts at work). {{Lang|ja}} should only be used if you are directly implanting Japanese script into article text, such as 月世界の魔女, but we have {{nihongo2}} to do that, as well. So Andy, you should not use {{lang|ja}} as you had done on Mono no aware (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views), and I have fixed the article, again.—Ryulong (竜龙) 20:14, 31 October 2011 (UTC)
Okay. I have just checked this page in IE, Chrome, and Safari, and the text I see encoded differently in Firefox is plain text in the other browsers. However, I am still fairly certain that {{lang|ja}} is not meant to wrap around the romaji.—Ryulong (竜龙) 20:37, 31 October 2011 (UTC)
My machine, a friend, User:Logan, another friend (I used a section I wrote on your talk page because that's what I asked them to look at). All FireFox users.—Ryulong (竜龙) 20:50, 31 October 2011 (UTC)
{{Lang}} - and, more specifically, the (X)HTML attributes it emits - are for identifying languages, not scripts. You have not fixed Mono no aware, but broken it. "Genji Monogatari" is a Japanese language phrase, regardless of the character set used. It is certainly not an English language phrase. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 22:07, 31 October 2011 (UTC)
I've fixed mono no aware because you are mistaken about how to treat languages that are not derivatives of the Latin alphabet. Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Accessibility#Other languages states nothing about wrapping romanizations in the language templates because they are not words in the language represented. Neither pinyin, Hebon-shiki, or any other romanization form should be encoded or rendered in the manner that Chinese characters, kana, hangul, etc., are. It is wrong to say that "Mono no aware" and "Genji Monogatari" are Japanese words/phrases. They are romanizations of the Japanese words/phrases "物の哀れ" and "源氏物語", and not Japanese unto themselves. This is why the Japanese WikiProject developed the {{nihongo}} family of templates to render the Japanese script separately from its romanization. Romanization is not meant to be rendered or encoded as Japanese text, and that is why I have removed your incorrect uses of {{lang|ja}} from Mono no aware (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views).—Ryulong (竜龙) 22:51, 31 October 2011 (UTC)
I'm citing the W3C standard and you're telling me I'm mistaken, citing a lack of guidance in a part of the WP:MoS which I wrote? Again, this is about metadata for specifying languages, not text-encoding. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 23:26, 31 October 2011 (UTC)
I am trying to say that the W3C standard should not be applied to romanizations as you have been doing because they are not the language that is being wrapped in the meta data. And the fact that it also encodes it differently is another reason why it is only italicized.—Ryulong (竜龙) 23:41, 31 October 2011 (UTC)
Your assertions that romanisations of Japanese words are no longer in the Japanese language does not accord with my understanding, nor our own articles on the subject: Romanisation and Romanization of Japanese (from the latter: "…the application of the Latin alphabet to write the Japanese language"). Can you cite sources? Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 00:29, 1 November 2011 (UTC)
Also, when you say "encodes it differently", what is being encoded, by what, and how? Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 00:32, 1 November 2011 (UTC)
When you wrap text with {{lang|ja}}, it notifies Firefox that it should use its Japanese language fonts to render it for the reader. For myself and anyone else using Firefox, these underlined words are being rendered as MS PGothic. As far as I am aware, the {{lang}} template is only meant for the original language and not the romanizations of the language. {{Lang|he}} is not used to wrap the Romanization of Hebrew, but only the Hebrew text itself, and {{lang|ru}} is not used for the romanization of Russian, but to wrap around the Cyrillic alphabet. This is why {{lang|ja|mono no aware}} is incorrect formatting, but {{lang|ja|物の哀れ}} or {{nihongo2|物の哀れ}} is when it should only be used, as far as I am aware, and even then that is only when the kanji are being placed on their own in the article text. In any other case it should be {{nihongo3|[this should be empty]|物の哀れ|mono no aware}}.—Ryulong (竜龙) 00:41, 1 November 2011 (UTC)
Using {{Lang}} says nothing at all, to Firefox or any other user agent, about fonts. It notifies them that - and only that - the content is in the specified language; in this case, Japanese. What Firefox chooses to do with text in that language is a matter for Firefox and its users. If Firefox is doing something stupid, tell Mozilla. I note that you again fail to cite your claims about romanisations; or to counter the sources I have cited. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 01:04, 1 November 2011 (UTC)
I have shown you examples of four different users of Firefox all of whom have text wrapped by {{lang|ja}} being rendered differently than the rest of a page ([6], [7], [8], [9]). It is not an end user issue. Wrapping text with {{lang}} notifies a browser to use the specific encoding it has in its programming to use for that particular piece of text. And no where on the project does romanicized text get wrapped by {{lang}}. Pinyin isn't wrapped by {{lang|zh}}. Romaji isn't wrapped with {{lang|ja}}. Scientific transliteration of Cyrillic isn't wrapped with {{lang|ru}}, {{lang|bg}}, {{lang|uk}}, etc. The Royal Thai General System of Transcription isn't wrapped with {{lang|th}}. Romaja isn't wrapped with {{lang|ko}}. I don't need a source to tell you what the general practice is when it comes to romanizations of non-Latin script just because you have never encountered it before and your focus on the templates states otherwise.—Ryulong (竜龙) 01:41, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

Common usage is not evidence of correct usage. You have demonstrated multiple examples of what transpires to be a single, known, browser bug. Your repeated claims about the correct markup to use for foreign-language text, romanised to use the western alphabet; and about the functionality of {{Lang}}, are merely unsubstantiated - and fallacious - assertions. As for your use of "Royal Thai General System of Transcription", which is clearly in English, as an example... Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 12:26, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

You are right. Common usage is not correct usage, but you are not encoding or wrapping words in the original language when you do mono no aware. You are improperly using {{lang}} to wrap around the transcription of the language into the Latin alphabet, just as much as Krung Thep Maha Nakhon ({{lang|th|Krung Thep Maha Nakhon}}), Hēunggóng ({{lang|zh|Hēunggóng}}), and ニューヨーク ({{lang|en|ニューヨーク}}) are incorrect usages of {{lang}}.—Ryulong (竜龙) 19:06, 1 November 2011 (UTC)
Until and unless you cite some evince for that claim - sufficient to counter the evidence I have already cited to the contrary - that's merely your opinion. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 22:04, 1 November 2011 (UTC)
What evidence do you need? You are using parameters for non-Latin text for Latin text. "Krung Thep Maha Nakhon" isn't written in the Thai language so why would you use {{lang|th}} for it? And "ニューヨーク" is the Japanese language transcription of an English phrase. Do you suggest we use {{lang|en}} for it? I understand the ulility of {{lang|fr|Champs-Élysées}} and {{lang|es|madrileño}}, but {{lang}} should not be used for the romanizations of languages that do not use the Latin alphabet or some derivative thereof because it is not the language you are formatting/encoding it as.—Ryulong (竜龙) 22:24, 1 November 2011 (UTC)
"Krung Thep Maha Nakhon" may not be written in a Thai character set, but it is in the Thai language. Please feel free to provide a citation to contradict that. Once again, you refer to {{Lang}} as "formatting" a language; it does no such thing. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 23:51, 1 November 2011 (UTC)
I have given you multiple examples of how {{lang}} renders text differently. It is not my fault that you don't have a Japanese font installed and that your browser does not pick on it when lang="ja" is used in a span tag. That is my main issue. No where on Wikipedia does anyone wrap transliterations with the tags of the original language. You have been the only person to insist upon this. "Krung Thep Maha Nakhon" on my machine, and for everyone else who uses Firefox is rendered like this. Anything wrapped by {{lang|ja}} shows up like this. Chinese pinyin and Korean romaja are also not immune. And Khmer is also an issue. This is why all transliterations are only italicized and never treated any different.—Ryulong (竜龙) 00:17, 2 November 2011 (UTC)
I'm amazingly impressed that you can divine what's installed on my PC. Or I would be, if you weren't completely wrong. You have demonstrated multiple examples of what transpires to be a single, known, browser bug. But I've already said that; and you have apparently failed to understand or accept it. {{lang}} does not "render text differently", because {{lang}} does not render text. Even if "Krung Thep Maha Nakhon" is rendered in pink 24-point comic sans, its language is still Thai. I again invite you to provide a citation to the contrary. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 00:43, 2 November 2011 (UTC)
It is not a "single, known, browser bug" as you keep calling it. The HTML coding built into {{lang}} forces the browser to check on its internal settings to decide what font to render it with. It is not a bug that Firefox uses different fonts for drastically different non-Latin Unicode fonts. It is what should be expected. One could say that it is an oddity that IE, Chrome, and Safari do not change the encoding on the user end when it encounters Latin text wrapped with lang="ja", or one of the other languages I have brought up. It seems strange that it would ignore the HTML/XML formatting around the word "pan" but not around the word パン, unless パンpan just makes your browser explode.
And I seriously doubt that I am going to find his magical source you want from me which says "a romanization/transliteration is not an example of the original language". I am merely presenting evidence on how no one in any non-English or non-Romance topic area on Wikipedia does anything to the romanization of whatever language, be it Russian, Korean, Ancient Greek, Chinese, or Japanese, other than italicize. There is no reason to use {{lang}} in-line with Japanese text unless you are referring to one of the kanji or kana. And even then, Template:Nihongo2 serves that purpose.—Ryulong (竜龙) 01:22, 2 November 2011 (UTC)
You haven't a clue what you're talking about. Please acquire some clue. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 01:28, 2 November 2011 (UTC)
Well what the fuck are you asking? Is it "How should WP:MOS-JA advise editors to use {{lang}}?"? Because we do not have to because {{nihongo}} takes care of the tagging of Japanese text with the HTML/XML markers and the romanization of Japanese, and the romanization of any language, is not tagged with those markers because it causes browser issues as there is no ISO entity for the romanization.—Ryulong (竜龙) 01:40, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

'Contains Japanese text' template

{{Contains Japanese text}}

What about this warning template, "Contains Japanese text"? Should it be used or depreciated? Is it redundant with the lang template? Is there any general policy or guideline on whether to apply these kinds of warnings to articles containing non-roman charachers? What exactly does the lang template do in the cases where it fails to display the intended characters, and is it possible to make it do something helpful (like detect whether the fonts are available and replace with an inline note reproducing the warning template's content if not)? Cesiumfrog (talk) 02:17, 3 October 2011 (UTC)

That's fairly rarely used.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 02:35, 3 October 2011 (UTC)
That has a completely different purpose and function to {{Lang}}, which neither fails nor succeeds "to display the intended characters", as that's not its purpose. Please see its documentation. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 12:25, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Templates

For the past few months, User:Aspects has been modifying Template:Kamen Rider (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs) to remove the minor stylizations within the template (having some items piped in all caps). Each time, he has cited WP:MOS-JA#Capitalization of words in Roman script. Now, does this proscription against all capital letters extend to every single namespace, or is he wrong?—Ryulong (竜龙) 19:21, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

Long paragraph to explain history I first made the capitalization change on August 15 with the edit summary of "Fixed capitalizations per WP:MOSJP." Within an hour Ryulong reverted and started a discussion on my talk page. I responded then next day stating "Under the section, Capitalization of words in Roman script, it states "However, these names and name elements are not excluded from the guidance provided by the main manuals of style for English-language Wikipedia, listed above. Words should not be written in all caps in the English Wikipedia." Templates are part of Wikipedia and should also follow the guidance. Also in my experience piped links should not use a different style than the title of the article being linked to." I waited two and a half weeks and without any response from Ryulong, I edited the template on September 4 with the edit summary of "rv capitalizations per WP:MOSJP, "Words should not be written in all caps in the English Wikipedia." as explained on my talk page and not responded to)" pointing out the specific place of the MOS that my edit talked about. A month later on October 4, Ryulong reverted without an edit summary. Today, November 1, I noticed the non-edit summary and reverted back since he did not explain how my edit was incorrect.
My original response on my talk page is the part I think this MOS applies to templates, "Words should not be written in all caps in the English Wikipedia." and templates are part of Wikipedia and therefore the MOS also applies to them. As a side note, I will not make any edits to this on other Japanese templates while this discussion is talking place. Aspects (talk) 19:50, 1 November 2011 (UTC)
My thought is that within the template space, there should be some leeway, particularly if it is only a handful of links on a navbox.—Ryulong (竜龙) 20:16, 1 November 2011 (UTC)
Also I do not think you should restrict yourself from editing templates entirely. The only issue being raised is changing the formatting on them.—Ryulong (竜龙) 20:20, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

Naming conventions for 町丁 vs. 町

I'm planning on doing some editing/cleanup for cities that used to be independent towns (町) but have since been merged into larger cities. These former towns keep their old 町 suffix, however it's now used in the context of a city subdivision instead of the former usage of "town". For example, Iizaka-machi used to be the independent town known as Iizaka-machi, however it now maintains the same name but under the administration of Fukushima-shi. The article's infobox currently states that Iizaka is a "City", but I find that to be incorrect.

The problem I'm having is what that 町 should be translated to now. "Town" is fine in my mind if it was still an independent town, but I don't know what 町 is translated to when in the context of an area of a larger city. I want to say "district", but that seems to be reserved for 郡. "Ward" comes next in my mind, but that seems to apply to 区. I've searched through the MOS but can't find anything that spells out what the preferred English translation for this is.

Any suggestions? -- purplepumpkins (talk) 05:38, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

From what I can tell, Iizaka is not considered a town but considered just one massive onsen by the Japanese Wikipedia. Why not use "township"?—Ryulong (竜龙) 10:41, 15 November 2011 (UTC)
"Township" sounds good.
Actually what started this whole internal debate is because editors over on the Japanese Wikipedia have recently gone about creating articles for the three main ways that you can identify Iizaka. Until recently both the Japanese and English Wikipedias each had a single onsen-centric article (ja:飯坂温泉). However I noticed that within the past few months Japanese Wikipedia editors also created an article for both the former city (ja:飯坂町_(福島県)) and the post-merger "township" (ja:飯坂町_(福島市)), so now the same geographic area has three separate Japanese-language articles.
I feel that that's a bit too much specificity of articles for the English Wikipedia (and IMO, too much for the Japanese Wikipedia too), so I was planning on doing a page move to... something... then expand the single article to include all three facets of the area.
That actually brings up another question I have in that what's the proper course of action when there are three separate articles on a non-English Wikipedia that all should be linked to the same English Wikipedia page? Is it kosher to have all three Japanese Wikipedia pages' "English" link go to the same English Wikipedia page? Or should you link them to redirects? -- purplepumpkins (talk) 11:32, 15 November 2011 (UTC)
I think it's fine to have multiple interwikis.—Ryulong (竜龙) 19:53, 15 November 2011 (UTC)
Not only fine, but common practice. We do that a lot with subpages if the info is generally the same as on the one single page in the other Wikipedia article.∞陣内Jinnai 16:47, 16 November 2011 (UTC)

Song/album titles that conflict with WP:ALBUMCAPS

I am becoming increasingly dissatisfied with the attitude I am receiving at WT:ALBUM#ALBUMCAPS where I am seeking to initiate a discussion as to whether or not the usage of English within the Japanese music industry for song and album titles should have an exception to their capitalization rules. The basic response I am getting is "deal with it and leave us alone".

As it is up to the individual language WikiProjects to decide the capitalization rules for the titles of songs and albums, I am proposing that we add a rule to our current WP:MOS-JA#Titles of media rules to define what this page, as the Japanese language style guide, should do when it comes to the use of English in the Japanese recording industry.

I personally think that we should ignore the fact that titles such as "Journey through the Decade" and "My Best Of My Life" are only non-standard in one word and can get a by, instead of relying on WP:ALBUMCAPS to define what we should do, particularly when we already have problems if something ends with one of the particles that are not capitalized (e.g. "Ai o Komete Hanataba o").—Ryulong (竜龙) 23:44, 11 November 2011 (UTC)

I am becoming increasingly dissatisfied with your quixotic one-man campaign and refusal to take "no" for an answer. User:MrMoustacheMM sums it up very well: English capitalization rules apply to English album/song titles, regardless of the capitalization appearing on the album cover or sources covering the album. Pretty straightforward. It really makes no difference if the song/ablum is written by Americans, Japanese or Martians; as long as it's in English, English rules apply. Jpatokal (talk) 10:56, 12 November 2011 (UTC)
I am seeking to form a consensus within this project which is fully capable and permitted to form a separate consensus from WP:ALBUMS, and to fully comply with the fact that WP:IAR can be applied however possible. The editors who work with manual of style can decide things, rather than single people saying "No, you're wrong. Stop trying to change things because you're wrong."—Ryulong (竜龙) 21:07, 12 November 2011 (UTC)
I'd say both of you are in the wrong. If independent secondary reliable sources use unusual capitalization, except for cases of ALLCAPS (with the few notable exceptions), we go by what they use. If they capitalize "Of" and don't capitalize "through" we do that. If there is inconsistent use, we fall back on those rules. If it's just the primary label that is using it, then I'd say that's an editorial decision because it complies with WP:ENGLISH, but it could also be seen as a promotional and as such should probably best decided on a case-by-case basis.∞陣内Jinnai 21:22, 12 November 2011 (UTC)
That is what I am trying to say we do, Jinnai. I know that ALL CAPS and all lowercase are not going to fly. However, I believe we should very well make exceptions when we have titles like "Journey through the Decade", "My Best Of My Life", "Leave all Behind", "I sing by my soul", "4 chords", or even "Non stop love Yoroshiku!!" (Non stop love 夜露死苦!!). If reliable sources capitalize some of the words, but not all of them (or capitalize all of them as is the case with "My Best Of My Life"), why should we change it when it's only slightly different from the norm?—Ryulong (竜龙) 21:53, 12 November 2011 (UTC)
As I was quoted above, English title = WP:ALBUMCAPS. It doesn't matter whether the band itself is Japanese, English, or Klingon, only that the language that the title is written in is English. The only way I possibly (no guarantees) could see allowing this exception is if someone can provide a reliable source stating that these incorrect capitalizations are intentional. This doesn't mean some site that simply lists the album and tracklist (like Yahoo Music or Livedoor), but sources like an interview with the band where the interviewer asks "Why didn't you capitalize 'through'?" and they reply "We felt that a lowercase 't' would increase the impact of the other words in the title." or some such thing.
Also, I have seen a link to WP:MOS-JA. I see that Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Japan-related articles#Capitalization of words in Roman script says: "Titles of songs, and the names of bands, companies and so forth are often capitalized when written in Roman script within a Japanese-language context or (in flyers, posters, etc.) for a Japanese audience, and the relevant publicity departments or fanbases may vehemently insist on the importance of the capitalization. However, these names and name elements are not excluded from the guidance provided by the main manuals of style for English-language Wikipedia, listed above." (emphasis mine). One of the two main manuals linked to is Wikipedia:Manual of Style (capital letters), which under Composition titles says to capitalize "prepositions that are long, such as those not listed above". "Through" is a long preposition, and therefore should be capitalized. As for the other examples given above, again, they are also "not excluded from the guidance provided by the main manuals of style for English-language Wikipedia", and again their capitalization is covered under Wikipedia:Manual of Style (capital letters)#Composition titles.
Sorry, but I don't see a good reason to ignore the rules in this case. WP:ALBUMCAPS and WP:Manual of Style (capital letters) exist for this very reason: when non-standard capitalization is used, we change it to match Wikipedia's manual of style, for consistency across the project. MrMoustacheMM (talk) 17:43, 13 November 2011 (UTC)
I'm with MrMoustacheMM on this. Title written in English = follow English capitalization rules as per WP:ALBUMCAPS. We do so for every artist from an English-speaking country that uses wrong capitalization on their album covers, why shouldn't we do it for other-language artists whose album titles are in English but butcher the capitalization? We have a manual of style for a reason: to create consistency within the encyclopedia, even (and especially) when there is inconsistency in the world at large. --IllaZilla (talk) 17:54, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

Reply to both MrMoustacheMM and IllaZilla: It is only considered "butchering" capitalization or "incorrect" capitalization because of our own internal rules. It is clearly allowed under WP:MOSALBUMS that this manual of style can come up with its own methods of stylization for song and album titles by Japanese artists. And we should not be required to only use the "non-standard capitalizations" if the band has a reason for it. News articles in Japan use the particular spelling that we wish to use by which to ignore the rules of the more general guidelines. And finally, MrMoustacheMM, the "Capitalization of words in Roman script" section refers to ALLCAPS (so we don't use "BLEACH", "NARUTO", or "BOOM BOOM SATELLITES"), not the issue being raised here at the moment. And even so, this discussion could be used to modify that section of this guideline. It confounds me as to why you two are so vehemently opposed to such a minor style change. Clearly, Jinnai and myself believe that the strict interpretation of WP:ALBUMCAPS is impeding our ability to provide articles that are verifiably correct and we are seeking to ignore that rule and come up with our own for this project. WP:IAR is a policy and we are seeking to apply it to come up with separate guidelines to govern titles such as "Journey through the Decade" because a single lower case letter (when it also clearly is referenced within other songs on the EP) should not cause this much drama.—Ryulong (竜龙) 20:51, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

Yes. Well, as far as I've observed, if the titles are English, then English capitalizations should be used, no matter the geographical origin. ALBUMCAPS is a guideline that is not meant to have loopholes or exceptions for the English language. Also, when you say, "It is clearly allowed under WP:MOSALBUMS that this manual of style can come up with its own methods of stylization for song and album titles by Japanese artists", which section of MOSALBUM permits that? Can the relevant section be quoted? To be honest, though, I'm tired of this. Backtable Speak to meconcerning my deeds. 21:09, 13 November 2011 (UTC)
ALBUMCAPS cannot trump TITLE. The former is a WikiProject guideline and the latter is policy. NOR can it trump ENGLISH because again the former is a WikiProject guideline and the latter is a widely accepted guideline.∞陣内Jinnai 22:02, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

In titles of songs or albums in a language other than English, the project standard is to use the capitalization utilized by that language, not the English capitalization. If you are unsure about the capitalization standards of other languages, check with a reliable third-party source, foreign-language Wikipedias or the appropriate WikiProject and language Manual of Style.

I am fairly certain that this means the Japanese manual of style can develop its own capitalization rules. While the titles may be written using the English language, the fact that they are Japanese subjects relegates matters of page titling to this MOS.—Ryulong (竜龙) 23:08, 13 November 2011 (UTC)
That snippet of text refers to "language[s] other than English". The statement says so itself. No matter where English is used, and therefore where English titles are used, the ALBUMCAPS regulations apply to the titles. It doesn't matter whether the titles were created in USA, Japan, Portugal, Saudi Arabia, or elsewhere; if English titles are used in any location, then there is an encyclopedically correct way of capitalizing the English subtitles. Same goes for other languages that use capitals and lowercases; they have their own system of what should be capitalized and what shouldn't. Also, what text snippets of WP:TITLE would permit capitalization according to sources as opposed to according to English language customs? Backtable Speak to meconcerning my deeds. 23:51, 13 November 2011 (UTC)
For TITLE, one the most basic: WP:COMMONNAME.∞陣内Jinnai 23:58, 13 November 2011 (UTC)
Reading over WP: TITLE, the page seems to only cover general policy on choosing a name for an article; nothing in there seems intended to cover something so specific as capitalization standards for published works. Instead, it repeatedly(including one of the five principles, Consistency) points to the specific-topic naming conventions. The relevant one in this case, WP:Naming conventions (music), in turn describes standard English practices for capitalization: "capitalize words that are not coordinating conjunctions (for, and, nor, but, or, yet, so), prepositions (in, to, over), articles (an, a, the), or the word to when used to form an infinitive. Note that short verbs (Is, Are, and Do) and pronouns (Me, It, and His) are capitalized."--Martin IIIa (talk) 15:17, 14 November 2011 (UTC)
Again, there is nothing on that page that forbids exceptions to be made. And this RFC is seeking to develop an exception based on the usage by the primary editors of the subject area, rather than individuals who come across these pages, and unilaterally decide that no exception should be made and they should be made to fall in line with the general style guides. It is because of these editors that Journey through the Decade was moved to Journey Through the Decade, and then make it impossible to move back without creating a consensus to allow for this exception.—Ryulong (竜龙) 20:36, 14 November 2011 (UTC)
"there is nothing on that page that forbids exceptions to be made" But no good reason has been given to make that exception. The only reasons that I've seen given are something along these lines: "they're a Japanese band, therefore we should ignore English capitalization rules" and "some websites list it that way, therefore we should go by their capitalization". The policies/guidelines that have been mentioned above were created to avoid these sorts of discussions: here's the way Wikipedia does it, because we want Wikipedia to be consistent. To refresh, these include WP:ALBUMCAPS, Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Japan-related articles#Capitalization of words in Roman script, Wikipedia:Manual of Style (capital letters)#Composition titles, and Wikipedia:Naming conventions (music) (I think that's all of them). All of them say the same thing: English titles use English capitalization rules.
WP:COMMONNAME is meant for articles that could conceivably have two significantly different article titles (a couple quick examples stolen from that page: Bill Clinton (not William Jefferson Clinton), H. H. Asquith (not Herbert Henry Asquith), Rhode Island (not State of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations), Heroin (not Diacetylmorphine)). A different capitalization hardly applies here. Keep in mind, there's nothing wrong with having Journey through the Decade as a redirect to Journey Through the Decade.
WP:IAR? says "A rule-ignorer must justify how their actions improve the encyclopedia if challenged." The reason I'm opposed to this change is because it makes Wikipedia inconsistent, and inconsistency is not an improvement to the encyclopedia. The justifications given have not outweighed that negative.
Finally, in order to make these changes, whether a few exceptions or a change to the project itself, consensus needs to be reached. And frankly, I'm not seeing much in the way of consensus here. MrMoustacheMM (talk) 05:38, 15 November 2011 (UTC)
Again, a consensus is what is being sought here. Jinnai and I have both explained why an exception should be made. There is no ambiguity between sources that means we should go with our internal conventions. No one outside the English Wikipedia uses the form that WP:ALBUMCAPS is effectively forcing all editors to comply with.
I find it entirely un-Wiki like to have to go through this bureaucracy and change things from the top down to change an exception to our guidelines into an acceptable form, rather than just making an exception, but editors can't seem to think that way. WP:MOSALBUMS, WP:ALBUMCAPS, and MOS:CT should not be modified first in order to change a page title. If it is clear that reliable sources format the title a particular way, and it is in English, it is not all capitals, it is not all lower case, it does not have random non-language characters, why shouldn't that form be used, just because it has one word that is not capitalized and it is not one of the 18 words that we do not capitalize?—Ryulong (竜龙) 05:57, 15 November 2011 (UTC)
Well, obviously, there is nothing new to be said in this conversation, and that is why I've lost interest in the discussion (not that I was interested in the first place). Capitals are not that big of a deal, and shouldn't have caused this much pseudo-drama. The ALBUMCAPS guidelines exist for a reason, and that is to instill consistency in the titles (is that what we're seriously arguing about?). In life, one should not expect to get their way 100% of the time; when a person poses ideas, the ideas can either be accepted or rejected. When the idea is accepted, that is good news for the person. But if the idea is rejected, the person can either work toward making the idea better or, if that's out of the question, get over it and stop hitting the dead horse.
"No one outside the English Wikipedia uses the form that WP:ALBUMCAPS is effectively forcing all editors to comply with." Again with that vague terminology. You're basically stating that zero individuals outside of Wikipedia use the system. Since that system is an academically verifiable system for the English language, it has been instilled on Wikipedia. If it wasn't academically reliable, it wouldn't be a guideline here. If nobody ever uses it, then why is the structure so widespread and accepted?
What this simply boils down to is a refusal to take "no" for an answer. As I previously stated, nobody gets everything that they want in life (yes, I fully mean "nobody" and "everything" in this context). It happens with me as well. It's one thing if you are crusading for a serious cause you believe in (such as, say, issues concerning gender, health, ethnicity, freedom of speech, and/or so on), but this is about freaking capital and lowercase letters of the alphabet. Really? What's going to be accomplished if the exception was granted? I guess it's nothing more than the allowing of a few more lowercase letters in titles. You've involved too many editors in this alternate capitalization fiasco, and time and time again, the sought-after results were not achieved. As good faith as your effors may be, I feel that it is disruptive, due to the amount of time you've involved others in this. Sometimes, "no" just has to be taken for an answer, and that's that, as displayed by the two move requests of yours that were rejected. Now, I've said everything that I want to say, and I don't want to repeat myself any further; I stand by all of what I have said, and I don't want to be further embarassed. Backtable Speak to meconcerning my deeds. 08:27, 15 November 2011 (UTC)

Section break

Pointing out my use of hyperbole to immediately throw my claim out as a logical fallacy is getting bothersome. I get it. "Everything" and "nothing" are shit terms to use in debate. So let me try to phrase things differently.

I will refuse to take "no" for an answer because I believe that the application of ALBUMCAPS is incorrect. From what I can infer, ALBUMCAPS was developed to determine when not to capitalize a word in an album or song title in cases where it is sometimes common for Every Word In A Title To Be Capitalized. This is why "Welcome To My Nightmare" and "Stuck On Repeat" are improper, but "Welcome to My Nightmare" and "Stuck on Repeat" are correct. I can understand the utility of the guideline in these cases (and why My Best of My Life was a poor example to bring up). However, ALBUMCAPS, in my opinion, should not be used to say that "Journey through the Decade", "Leave all Behind", or "I sing by my soul" are improper for article titles. If we have a clear case that these forms are found in the majority of reliable sources, a form that is not "start case", not all capital letters, and not all lower case letters (possibly not including sentence case), but a clearly selective choice as to what words are and are not capitalized, why can that form not be used?

And in conclusion, my two move requests for Journey Through the Decade to be moved back to Journey through the Decade were not rejected. They were closed as "no consensus", which is "let's not do anything about this", not "closed as do not move ever". I am getting tired of seeing "no consensus" mean "one side is right and the other is wrong". If that were the case, a more definitive term would have been used in its place.—Ryulong (竜龙) 10:19, 15 November 2011 (UTC)

"From what I can infer, ALBUMCAPS was developed to determine when not to capitalize a word in an album or song title in cases where it is sometimes common for Every Word In A Title To Be Capitalized." — Not true. ALBUMCAPS was developed to promote consistency across Wikipedia, and to help make Wikipedia consistent with the rules of English capitalization as defined by widely-accepted academic style guides. Thus Brand New Eyes is correct while brand new eyes is incorrect, and "Say It Ain't So" is correct while "Say it ain't so" is incorrect. Thus Journey through the Decade, Leave all Behind, and I sing by my soul are incorrect, regardless of whatever sources you care to point out that use those wrong capitalizations: That is not how the rules of English capitalization are set, and it is why we follow the rules of standard English regardless of the preferences of trademark owners. It is apparent to me from the course of this discussion that pretty much every "rule" (guideline, MOS, etc.) pertaining to capitalization is against you on this, and I remain unconvinced that we should make exceptions for these Japanese artists when it is clear that we apply these rules to every other English album/song title across the board regardless of where the artist is from. --IllaZilla (talk) 16:03, 15 November 2011 (UTC)
"but a clearly selective choice as to what words are and are not capitalized" – You still have not shown any evidence supporting this. All you've shown is websites that have copied the capitalization shown on the cover. Nowhere have you shown that this is "a clearly selective choice". To me it looks like someone picked which words to capitalize randomly, due to a lack of understanding of general English capitalization rules (ie someone who does not speak English as their first language). Again, bring us an interview with the band stating that this was their preferred capitalization, and you might have a case.
Also, I linked to WP:CONSENSUS in the hopes that it would be read, but apparently it wasn't, so allow me to provide yet another quote from a policy: "Consensus among a limited group of editors, at one place and time, cannot override community consensus on a wider scale. For instance, unless they can convince the broader community that such action is right, participants in a WikiProject cannot decide that some generally accepted policy or guideline does not apply to articles within its scope." (WP:CONLIMITED) I understand that the desire here is to change consensus, but the "broader community" remains unconvinced, as your reasons are simply not good enough to ignore several policies and guidelines. As Backtable suggested above, why not leave that poor dead horse alone already? I bet if you put this much effort into improving the content of several of these articles, you'd have some good article candidates ready before long. MrMoustacheMM (talk) 16:37, 15 November 2011 (UTC)
@IllaZilla: The ALBUMCAPS consistency still determines what words should not be capitalized, which is basically just prepositions, the articles, and conjunctions. "Journey through the Decade" and "Leave all Behind" are only "wrong capitalizations" because our internal rules say they are wrong. And songs and albums are not subject to MOSTM, from what I have been told in previous discussions.
@MrMoustacheMM: If it is not a selective choice, why did Gackt choose "Journey through the Decade" over "journey through the decade", "JOURNEY THROUGH THE DECADE", "JoUrNeY tHrOuGh ThE dEcAdE", etc., and why are the B-sides titled "J.t.D"? And the development of case-by-case exceptions to the guidelines is exactly what consensuses should determine. And the "broader community" is most definitely not you three editors from WT:ALBUMS who came over here because Aspects notified you I had started a discussion here. I have made this an RFC, but it seems that was useless because no one ever contributes to these anymore.—Ryulong (竜龙) 19:53, 15 November 2011 (UTC)
And if a certain form is persistently used by the artist, news agencies, and other related media, why shouldn't the English Wikipedia follow suit? It should be clear from this that this is a selective choice to use that name, and an interview where the artist says something about it should not be the onus for setting up the exception.—Ryulong (竜龙) 23:17, 15 November 2011 (UTC)
I have brought this discussion up on the administrators' noticeboard for incidents. I have posted there so that this discussion can end and all parties involved can move on with their lives. Anyone can feel free to post there, as long as the frivolous argument of capitals and lowercases doesn't continue. Thank you. Backtable Speak to meconcerning my deeds. 01:42, 16 November 2011 (UTC)
I'm afraid to say this, but it is a terribly dickish move to bring this to ANI just to shut me up. I have provided arguments to change a guideline, and all you have been telling me is that I am wrong, and I should shut up.—Ryulong (竜龙) 02:18, 16 November 2011 (UTC)

Personally, I have a problem with the RfC being started when a discussion was already started at WP:ALBUMCAPS and that Ryulong failed to notify the WikiProject or the editors involved that this RfC had been started. It smacks of WP:FORUMSHOP. The sentence "Again, a consensus is what is being sought here." seems weird to me when it ignores the consensus at WP:ALBUMCAPS that just happened.

As for changing articles from the top down instead of from the bottom up, do you have any other examples besides Journey Through the Decade, where pages were actually moved based on non-standard English capitalizations? Two request moves for the same article that failed does not help your case. Aspects (talk) 09:07, 16 November 2011 (UTC)

Again, those requests did not fail. They closed as "no consensus" which is "no decision can be determined, so nothing should be done". Stop equating "no consensus" with "one argument won and one lost". And there was no consensus at WT:ALBUM. It was just 4 people unwilling to change.
Regardless, the discussion at ANI is showing that the ALBUMCAPS and other MOS-is-set-in-stone editors (such as yourself) are in the minority, and some sort of guideline needs to be changed. Where this discussion will further take place is another issue in itself.—Ryulong (竜龙) 09:34, 16 November 2011 (UTC)
I would like to address a few arguments made yesterday by Ryulong:
  1. The ALBUMCAPS consistency still determines what words should not be capitalized, which is basically just prepositions, the articles, and conjunctions.
    Not true. WP:ALBUMCAPS describes both which words to capitalize and which not. Trying to argue the prescriptive intent of the guideline ("From what I can infer, ALBUMCAPS was developed to determine when not to capitalize a word in an album or song title in cases where it is sometimes common for Every Word In A Title To Be Capitalized") is weasely, and even if this were correct (it isn't) it doesn't change the fact that ALBUMCAPS and all the other MoS guidelines are against you in this matter of capitalization.
  2. Journey through the Decade" and "Leave all Behind" are only "wrong capitalizations" because our internal rules say they are wrong.
    Wrong. "Our internal rules" were not pulled out of thin air, or made up on a whim. Here I will quote from A Manual for Writers of Term Papers, Theses, and Dissertations (6th edition) by Kate L. Turabian, one of the foremost style guides for academic English since 1937 and which reflects and complements The Chicago Manual of Style (emphasis added):

    Titles of Works:
    4.5 In giving titles of published works in text, notes, reference list, or bibliography, the spelling of the original should be retained, but capitalization and punctuation may be altered to conform to the style used in the paper. In most scientific fields, sentence-style capitalization is used (see 4.9). In the humanities and many of the social sciences, however, it is customary to capitalize titles headline style, according to the rules given in 4.6–8.

    Headline-style capitalization
    4.6 In the titles of works in English, capitalize the first and last words and all other words except articles, prepositions, to used as part of an infinitive, and coordinating conjunctions (and, but, or, nor, for):
    Economic Effects of War on Women and Children
    "What It Is All About"
    How to Overcome Urban Blight: A Twentieth-Century Problem
    Note that the subtitle, following a colon, is capitalized the same way as the main title.

    Turabian, Kate L. (1996) [First edition published 1937]. A Manual for Writers of Term Papers, Theses, and Dissertations. Revised by John Grossman and Alice Bennett (6th ed.). Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press. pp. 65–66. ISBN 0-226-81627-3.

    (4.7–9 refer to capitalizing compounds in titles, titles of works published in earlier centuries, and using sentence-style capitalization in reference lists for the titles of books and articles.)
    So no, these titles are not wrong merely because Wikipedia says so, they are wrong because the leading style guides of academic English say so (which is why Wikipedia says so).

  3. And songs and albums are not subject to MOSTM, from what I have been told in previous discussions.
    Wrong again. MOS:TM is regularly invoked to apply to names of artists and titles of works. An album or song title is a trademark in the same was that the title of Time magazine or the film Seven are trademarks, and that is why we present them this way rather than as TIME or Se7en. A crux of your argument is that we should present titles the same way they are presented on the works themselves; In other words, that we should treat them as trademarks. If the titles of books, magazines, films, and other creative works fall under MOS:TM, then so do the titles of albums and songs. I would like to see these "previous discussions" where you "have been told that songs and albums are not subject to MOSTM", because they obviously are.
--IllaZilla (talk) 23:50, 16 November 2011 (UTC)
In case you did not see, the thread on WP:ANI is showing that the greater community, outside of those who originally participated in this discussion and the one at WT:ALBUMS, believe that we should use the musical artist's form over setting up an internal consistency. Editors such as Baseball Bugs, Jinnai, Beyond My Ken, Purplepumpkins, ElKevbo, and The Bushranger all believe the MOS should be modified in these cases, if not outright ignored. I will be contacting them to request their further input here, and if possible restart this RFC in a better venue that covers the entire project.—Ryulong (竜龙) 00:21, 17 November 2011 (UTC)
Ryulong, I asked you this before, but in your response you went off on a tangent. So I would like to ask again, "As for changing articles from the top down instead of from the bottom up, do you have any other examples besides Journey Through the Decade, where pages were actually moved based on non-standard English capitalizations?" Aspects (talk) 01:13, 17 November 2011 (UTC)
I cannot think of any such examples due to the inflexibility of editors who will oppose any such application of WP:IAR to our titling guidelines, but it should not be required for me to do so. However, brian d foy and DJ OZMA were both moved to their current titles because it was recently determined that the individual is not subject to MOS:TM and therefore their articles' title should reflect the personal and/or professional usage of the subject.—Ryulong (竜龙) 02:13, 17 November 2011 (UTC)
Where this came to MY attention is the song Everybody Works But Father, which an editor insisted on lower-casing the "but" due to our MOS. The notion that our MOS somehow overrides actual usage is absurd. It defies the rules requiring reliable sources. Our MOS is a guideline for writing articles, not for telling the world that someone titled something the wrong way and that we know better. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 02:13, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

This seems like a strange place to hold this discussion. In fact, it undermines the proposal to change or selectively ignore the MOS as related to album titles. I would have sympathy if a strong argument were being presented that the album title capitalization is a deliberate and important decision by the artist(s) as it costs us nothing to honor their wishes in this matter. But that argument doesn't seem to be very compelling in this particular discussion.

Ignoring the tactical mistakes made in this emotional and messy RfC, I come down on the side of changing or selectively ignoring the MOS on this matter when (a) it costs us nothing, (b) it causes no confusion for readers, and (c) there is compelling evidence that non-standard capitalization is indeed the norm among the reliable sources discussing the album. If we can honor the creative wishes (Europeans may think of "moral rights" related to creative works) without any cost to us then we should do so. Since articles will be found in the search engine(s) regardless of their capitalization, I don't see any harm coming from this decision. But I can understand the opposing argument for uniformity and there is merit to that argument, too, so this is not a completely straight-forward decision or one in which I am going to expend considerable energy. ElKevbo (talk) 04:30, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

Well, the discussion can surely move elsewhere to handle changing WP:ALBUMCAPS and WP:CT wholly. I notified you, and the others who took part in the ANI discussion because there was surely no sort of consensus being formed here from the 4 editors who only deal with WP:ALBUMS and the 2 who only deal with WP:MOS-JA.—Ryulong (竜龙) 04:34, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

Would it be appropriate to move this thread back over to WT:ALBUMS at this point, as any consensus to change things would be done on that page (as well as WP:CT)?—Ryulong (竜龙) 05:28, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

I already made my view known on the ANI discussion, but due to this discussion being spread across so many pages I'll state my view on this page too. In short, I concur with Ryulong with my reasoning being the same as that already given by User:ElKevbo above. -- purplepumpkins (talk) 07:28, 17 November 2011 (UTC)
The main dicussion, for better or worse, has been made here. It would do more harm at this point to move the discussion. You can blame Ryulong for this if you want, but what's done is done.
As for the capitalizations, I am fine with the wording for the most part at ALBUMCAPS being used as the default backup plan when RSes disagree or when the stylizations make it hard to read (capitalizing each word does not rise to that level). I'd prefer titles that are clearly sentances that go so far as to use standard sentance punctuation be treated as sentances though if there is diagreement.∞陣内Jinnai 23:04, 17 November 2011 (UTC)
Sorry, but I disagree. The way that the artist wrote the title -- even if it appears to be a sentence -- should take precedence over our style guidelines for sentences, because they are not actually sentences, but titles. (And how many songs or albums are we talking about that meet that criteria anyway? Titles that are sentence-like would seem to be rather rare.) Beyond My Ken (talk) 05:20, 18 November 2011 (UTC)
I believe he is referring to song titles written in the sentence case, like "I sing by my soul" by Faylan.—Ryulong (竜龙) 05:45, 18 November 2011 (UTC)
Chipping in here...here's another example, British metalcore band Bring Me The Horizon...or is it Bring Me the Horizon? The band itself gives its name as Bring Me The Horizon, but Wikipedia's article doesn't have "the" as "The", even though that is how the band itself capitalises it. I might be befuddled here, but isn't applying a different name to something that is already named just because we think that's how it should be, kinda, y'know, original research? If somebody, or a group of somebodies, has given themselves a name, or has created something that they have given a name, why does anybody think it's acceptable for Wikipedia to say "nope, your name is actually this other thing - because we say it is"? - The Bushranger One ping only 07:42, 20 November 2011 (UTC)
Well, yes, that is the case. The same case goes for the Underneath, angela, defspiral, Florence + The Machine, Ke$ha, etc. However, this would require eliminating WP:MOSTM completely.—Ryulong (竜龙) 08:18, 20 November 2011 (UTC)
...Which is not going to happen. This is just about the most nonsensical argument I've ever read. Following the standard rules English capitalization, as laid out in widely-accepted academic style guides that have set the standards for many decades, is not original research by even the wildest stretch of the imagination. Bushranger, you are way off the mark: By following a standardized style guide, we are in no way telling entities that their name is something other than what they say it is, merely how these names are typeset for our encyclopedia. --IllaZilla (talk) 09:39, 20 November 2011 (UTC)
Consensus can change. Why do we need to change the typsetting? Can the fact that these are unique entities (musical artists and their work) not excuse them from the style guides that clearly are not widely accepted?—Ryulong (竜龙) 09:48, 20 November 2011 (UTC)
The style guides clearly are widely accepted. These are the same standards we use for articles about films, books, TV shows, magazines, video games, sports teams, political organizations...basically all proper nouns. There are literally hundreds of thousands of articles that follow the standards, and they are recognized and accepted not only on Wikipedia but codified in guides like the Chicago Manual of Style, which is the primary style guide for every academic institution I have ever been a part of (undergraduate and post-graduate). Why some editors get all in a twist about band names and album titles following the same style standards as all other proper nouns, and want to treat them as "unique entities" so that they can ignore standard rules of style, is truly baffling. Consensus can indeed change, but consensus in one small corner of the project at one time cannot override the longstanding and consensus-based standards that are in accepted project-wide and have been so for years. --IllaZilla (talk) 10:16, 20 November 2011 (UTC)
I also wish that people would stop confusing typesetting with naming. Typesetting is a matter of branding, not naming, which is why I keep bringing up MOS:TM. The name of the band Bring Me the Horizon is not affected by capitalizing the t in the (that is, one would still pronounce the name the same way regardless of how it were capitalized), just as the name of Time magazine is not changed by using normal capitalization even though it typeset as TIME on the publication's cover. A brand/trademark is not the same thing as a name. --IllaZilla (talk) 10:22, 20 November 2011 (UTC)

IllaZilla, are you ignoring the fact that people outside of WP:ALBUM do not think that the strict "never ignore this" mindset of the manual of style in this case is not what is wanted anymore? Ignoring the fact that band names have been brought into this discussion, this "typsetting" issue is still at hand when it comes to the titles of albums and songs. Unless there is some sort of wide ambiguity as to how the name of the album or song should be written in external sources, making songs such as "Journey through the Decade", which is universally referred to by that name throughout the recording community (and saying that all of the sources are just copying the wrong style used on the cover is a terrible dismissal of the clear choice someone made in capitalizing "Journey" and "Decade", but not "through" or "the") exist on the English Wikipedia at "Journey Through the Decade" is counterintuitive to common sense, and the consistent belief that the manual of style is written in stone and any sort of deviation from the consistency must be eliminated and any attempts to make an exception to the norm be quashed.—Ryulong (竜龙) 20:48, 20 November 2011 (UTC)

Are you ignoring the fact that the style standards of WP:ALBUMCAPS are the exact same standards used for every title of every other work??? Songs, books, films, magazines, newspapers, etc. etc. etc. all fall under the same standards. Albums do not get some kind of special exception just because you think that some album not using proper capitalization equates to some deliberate choice on someone's part, or some sort of artistic statement. You also continually ignore the fact that Wikipedia did not make up these standards. These are the standards used throughout the English-speaking world in encyclopedias, reference words, academic journals, etc. etc. That is precisely why Wikipedia follows the same standards. If you would like to write your own style guide for the English language, publish it, and try to get it to become the most widely-accepted set of standards in the English-speaking world, you're welcome to try. But you don't get to overhaul the English language from some little corner of Wikipedia just because you're upset about a couple of Japanese album titles. --IllaZilla (talk) 21:26, 20 November 2011 (UTC)
(edit conflict)IllaZilla: I don't think the assertions that this won't change reflect the consensus gained here and at the misplaced ANI board. It's clear that enough people think its a WP:COMMONSENSE exception.∞陣内Jinnai 21:28, 20 November 2011 (UTC)
"the clear choice someone made in capitalizing "Journey" and "Decade", but not "through" or "the"": You still have provided no evidence proving this. What looks like a "clear choice" to you looks to me like a random decision made by someone who is probably barely familiar with English, and even less familiar with English manuals of style.
Ignoring the opinions of several experienced editors who agree that the Wikipedia-wide MOS applies in this situation does not mean that consensus has changed here. Some agree one way, some agree the other, but no consensus has been gained to allow this exception.
Invoking WP:COMMONSENSE is a good idea. Common sense says to follow the manual of style created to make a consistent encyclopedia and used across hundreds of thousands of articles, instead of making random exceptions. MrMoustacheMM (talk) 03:03, 21 November 2011 (UTC)
When this was brought to WP:ANI, at least six other editors came forward to comment on it and say that they did not agree with the current manual of style. And while you are right that the vision of what should be done is subjective, the fact of the matter is that the majority of the sources out there use a particular typesetting, and common sense should dictate that we don't make up our own capitalization rules when a known form exists. It does not matter if Gackt doesn't know how Chicago or the APA or whoever decides to capitalize titles of things. He chose the title "Journey through the Decade". Just like Avril Lavigne chose Sk8er Boi, Alice Cooper chose Welcome 2 My Nightmare, and hundreds of other musicians chose titles that aren't proper English in any way shape or form. Why is it because Gackt is Japanese that we don't follow his stylistic choice in picking a song title just because one word doesn't have a capital T in it?—Ryulong (竜龙) 03:13, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

Wider Discussion?

I think this needs a wider discussion. There is probably not enough to say there is consensus one way or the other here, even including ANI, although the majority of the total number of editors who agree do seem to think its a reasonable exception. However, I'm fine with you saying that's not enough to say its a consensus. If that's the case though, myself and Ryulong (i believe) contend that if this were brought to a wider audiance, it would gain a consensus. You don't it seems. The way to resolve that by bringing this to a wider consensus in a neutral manner.∞陣内Jinnai 03:34, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

"He chose the title "Journey through the Decade"." I notice you completely ignored my statement that you have no evidence that he chose anything. You continually assert that Gackt chose this, but have not yet backed it up with any form of evidence. Maybe his label chose it, maybe the graphic artist chose it, or maybe no one "chose" it at all, and it was a typo. Maybe Gackt even thinks it's wrong. Maybe he doesn't care at all. But until you provide some sort of evidence showing that he "chose" it, please stop claiming this, as it is simply an assumption you have created.
Jinnai, that sounds like an excellent idea. Should a significantly larger group of editors agree that an exception is warranted, then so be it. Where do you propose to bring this up to get a larger number of editors involved? MrMoustacheMM (talk) 23:11, 22 November 2011 (UTC)
Fine, there is no source to state it was a conscious choice. There is no source that the title was formed with any conscious choice. The fact still remains that the "through" form is prevalent in all of the reliable sources, and "Through" appears nowhere other than the English Wikipedia. And I would have thought the ANI thread would have provided a large enough audience to not just set up an exception for any particular page, but to eliminate the strictness of the ALBUMCAPS style guide and let it only be applied if there is some sort of ambiguity as to how the titles of artistic works are typeset. And the fact that this should be listed at WP:RFC should be getting a wider audience, but no one has been involved in this aside from the current parties (regulars of WP:MOS-JA and WP:ALBUM) and those from the ANI discussion that I had contacted.—Ryulong (竜龙) 23:29, 22 November 2011 (UTC)
Some other places? WP:V, WP:MOS. Possibly WP:RS, WP:NOR. Probably some active WikiProjects that heavily use albums in their articles (ones I'm familiar with would be WP:TV, WP:Films, WP:Animation, WP:Anime, WP:Video games).∞陣内Jinnai 23:39, 22 November 2011 (UTC)
The only one of those that would be applicable would be WP:MOS, or more specifically WP:MOSCAPS. V, RS and NOR don't apply here, as this is directly a manual of style issue, not a sourcing issue (it was an issue with WP:ALBUMCAPS, part of the wider MOS, that started this discussion in the first place). I don't agree with any of those WikiProjects, as WP:ALBUMS is the most relevant "active WikiProject that heavily uses albums in their articles" to this discussion (I know, you didn't get the answer you wanted there). So maybe it should be brought up at WP:MOSCAPS. I'd also suggest WP:Naming conventions (music), but there doesn't seem to be much activity there, so I don't think we'd get much discussion going with new editors.
If a new discussion is brought up there, leave a message here telling us, instead of sneakily going off and starting up a discussion without bringing in involved editors (like was done when the discussion on this page was started, and someone else had to come along and let us know). MrMoustacheMM (talk) 02:48, 23 November 2011 (UTC)

Naming order for fictional characters

What is the naming order for fictional characters who "were born" before 1868, is it family before given or given before family? I'm talking about modern manga and anime, not about "mythology and folklore". Xfansd (talk) 03:05, 15 December 2011 (UTC)

I think it should be the same as the real people's name rules. This is at least how I've set it up for one such example on the pages I work on.—Ryulong (竜龙) 03:19, 15 December 2011 (UTC)
I think that's best too. Can you just add something like that to this article so people will know in the future, or does it have to be further debated first? Xfansd (talk) 02:00, 17 December 2011 (UTC)

What constitutes what we call the revised/modified Hepburn system?

User:Unnecessary stuff has found publications by the Library of Congress that do not use the form of Hepburn romanization that User:Mujaki claims is what is in reality the "revised" or "modified" system of Hepburn romanization. Discussion on how we should deal with Hepburn romanization is welcome on its talk page.—Ryulong (竜龙) 09:44, 16 December 2011 (UTC)

My contention has been that for the most part, most non-scholarly RSes use a modified version of revised Hepburn (not to be confused with modified Hepburn) that does not use macrons. Further, scholarly use of macrons is inconstant at best, even by sources that use them (ie some words use macrons properly, but they'll drop them on other irregardless of whether they are common English words like Tokyo or less common words like daimyo). Therefore imo the most common form used today is a variation of revised hepburn that simply drops the use nacron and its become increasingly more common.∞陣内Jinnai 18:23, 16 December 2011 (UTC)
Well, we're trying to determine what is the traditional system and what is the revised/modified system. Apparently, the traditional system does not refer to the first edition of the Hepburn dictionary, but one of its subsequent editions, and the revised/modified system refers to the system employed by the Kenkyusha company dictionaries, rather than one of the subsequent editions of Hepburn's dictionaries.—Ryulong (竜龙) 23:39, 16 December 2011 (UTC)
There are a bunch of mini- (and some not so mini-)discussions with him. Which section specifically asks about that and if so, how will it affect this page?∞陣内Jinnai 03:49, 17 December 2011 (UTC)
The most recent thread on Talk:Hepburn romanization—Ryulong (竜龙) 03:50, 17 December 2011 (UTC)
Okay. Although I would like to know where it says a specific version of Hepburn is used by the Library of Congress. This official government source does not state what version.∞陣内Jinnai 04:24, 17 December 2011 (UTC)

THE MODIFIED Hepburn system of Romanization as employed in Kenkuysha's New Japanese-English Dictionary (Tokyo, 1931; American edl, Cambridge, Harvard University Press, 1942) with further modifications as listed in Cataloging Service Bull. 119:33-41, Fall 1976.

—Ryulong (竜龙) 04:29, 17 December 2011 (UTC)
I found later editions of the Cataloging Service Bulletin that cover Japanese. This uses ā for あゝ, and doesn't cover it but fixes some errata. So it seems that ああ is ā and ええ is ē, but いい is not ī if we go with the ANSI form.—Ryulong (竜龙) 04:45, 17 December 2011 (UTC)
Here's an HTML copy of the rules, where Ë is ō, Õ is ū, and ± is ā it seems.—Ryulong (竜龙) 04:47, 17 December 2011 (UTC)
2009 update. Basically says to follow Kenkyusha's 3rd edition.∞陣内Jinnai 04:59, 17 December 2011 (UTC)
That's no different from the 1997 document, actually. However, the 4th and 5th editions of the Kenkyusha use a different scheme than the 3rd edition. The 3rd seems to use ā and ē, while the 5th uses aa and ee and also does not identify おお as ō, but rather as oo. See some discussion at wikt:Wiktionary:Beer parlour#Japanese transliteration - traditional or revised Hepburn transliteration? where I have been raising similar issues on Wiktionary's undefined system.—Ryulong (竜龙) 05:08, 17 December 2011 (UTC)

Romanization of Japanese terms or names including latin characters

Resolved

Should it be Monkey D. Luffy (モンキー・D・ルフィ, Monkī D. Rufi or Monkī Dī Rufi)? Goodraise 13:19, 6 April 2012 (UTC)

It should be Monkey D. Luffy (モンキー・D・ルフィ, Monkī Dī Rufi). Darth Sjones23 (talk - contributions) 14:16, 6 April 2012 (UTC)
Okay. I'd also like to know why. And can we incorporate that into this guideline somewhere? Goodraise 14:22, 6 April 2012 (UTC)
Because it is not clear what the "D" is read as. It could stand for something that is not just the English letter D.—Ryulong (竜龙) 19:22, 6 April 2012 (UTC)
Thanks. Goodraise 19:59, 6 April 2012 (UTC)

Worth adding information on linking to Wiktionary?

Linktext and Wiktionary templates may be useful to many people. LittleBen (talk) 07:26, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

Changing Emperor in List of Emperors of ... articles to lower-case emperor and back again

There is a discussion here that people might like to join in. LittleBen (talk) 16:26, 20 July 2012 (UTC) MiszaBot II (talk) 06:44, 23 August 2012 (UTC) -->

Ruby

Ruby is now supported in IE, Safari, and Chrome—and two extensions are available to add support to Firefox. May be time to change this? LittleBen (talk) 03:20, 23 August 2012 (UTC)

Kyu and dan grades

Hi there. I've been working on Judo-related articles, and I'm wondering what the convention here is for Romanizing kyu and dan grades. For example, I have seen 初段 rendered as both 'Shodan' and 'Sho-dan', and I'm wondering if I should use a hyphen or not. CanadianJudoka (talk) 07:42, 8 September 2012 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by CanadianJudoka (talk • contribs) 07:40, 8 September 2012 (UTC)

"Names of emperors", with regard to Meiji and Taishō Emperors

Just reading about the Taishō Emperor, and I have a question. The article states that he, '[h]aving ruled during the Taishō period[,] ... is now known as Emperor Taishō[, but a]s this is not a personal name, more accurately he should be referred to as "the Taishō emperor".' I agree with this statement, since the "posthumous names" of these Emperors were originally conceived of as era names and are overwhelmingly used as such in Japan today, without necessarily any regard to the Emperors in question. This, however, raises the issue of whether the articles on him and his father should be renamed accordingly. I know in English they are sometimes (erroneously) called by these names as though they were personal names, and Wikipedia should use English, but if it is the case that the articles should be named according to their inaccurately translated English names, should that not at least be stated on this page? elvenscout742 (talk) 05:52, 10 September 2012 (UTC)

Also I just checked: while the Emperor Meiji article doesn't say anything as drastic as that, the order "Meiji Emperor" appears 10 times in the article, while "Emperor Meiji" appears 13 times. However, this includes the article name, opening line, and text box header, and three other occurrences in similar fashion. So if these six instances are disregarded (if the article were moved and the style altered accordingly, they would go the other way) the article is already overwhelmingly geared toward the "Meiji Emperor" wording. elvenscout742 (talk) 06:07, 10 September 2012 (UTC)

Non-standard readings of kanji

I've been encountering an issue that I believe we should cover in some form here.

It is quite obvious when it comes to pop culture that sometimes names of items will be written a certain way (possibly with kanji), but then there is a reading (normally would be given in furigana in print in Japan) that is completely different from any on'yomi or kun'yomi reading of those kanji.

While it is not a standard practice as put forward by this manual of style, I have been including the intended reading of the kanji (or in rare cases hiragana) in parentheses after the phrase that is read in an idiosyncratic way, such as "Ace" (A（エース）, Ēsu), "Eight" (∞（エイト）, Eito), "Fantasy" (幻想（ファンタジー）), and "Ikura" (いとくとら（いくら）). I've found the pages on Saint Seiya to be particularly problematic in this regard, as a particular editor has been editing the pages to treat everything as some massive fansite and exclude katakana readings of characters' names when things like かじき座 is supposed to be read as ドラド and トナカイ座 is supposed to be read as カリブー.

As the state of the pages before I went to them show that they already do not comply with various other manuals of style (fictional events written in the past tense, poor formatting, etc.), I am proposing that at least this bit gets added to this manual of style, stating that if a Japanese reader needs to be informed of a particular idiosyncratic reading, particularly if it so extreme that a combination of hiragana and or kanji are read in a specific way that in no way would ever match their standard readings, that we should include that same information in some form.—Ryulong (琉竜) 10:23, 9 September 2012 (UTC)

I agree[10]. I think there are many terms like them in music -e.g., 哀歌(Erejii - Elegy; e.g.哀歌 (エレジー)), 前奏曲(Purerudo - Prelude; e.g.雨だれの前奏曲), 輪舞/輪舞曲(Rondo; e.g.輪舞曲), etc. "理由" called "Wake", "本気" called "Maji" and so on are known too. Recently many parents name their children special reading names called "Kirakira name" (キラキラネーム) or "Dokyun name" (DQNネーム) -e.g., 大宙(Ten), 希星 (Kirara), 月 (Akari), 虹実 (Nanami) etc. It seems a school teacher could not read one-third of his children's names at first.[11]
Incidentally, there are lots of established and special readings such as ateji (当て字), ateyomi (当て読み), jukujikun (熟字訓) and hanjimono (判じ物) from ancient times. -e.g. 明日(Asu/Ashita (tomorrow); Myonichi in on'yomi), 姉妹 (Kyodai (brothers); Shimai (sisters) in general), 煙草 (Tabako - tabaco (cigarette/cigar)); Enso in on'yomi), 氷島 (Aisurando (Iceland); Hyoto in on'yomi means an iceberg), 鞄 (Kaban - 夾板 or kabas (bag)), 麦酒 (Biiru - beir (beer); Bakushu in on'yomi), 小鳥遊 (Takanashi (family name); Little birds play (小鳥(が)遊(ぶ)), then there is no hawk (鷹がいない-鷹なし-たかなし)) etc. In Man'yōshū, "山上復有山" reads "ide" because the form of "出" is just like the combination of "山" on "山".--Mujaki (talk) 15:59, 18 September 2012 (UTC)

Article titles

  • I see that there's an article on Tokyo, but another article on Tōkyō Station. Isn't that ridiculous? The Japan-related MoS doesn't seem to recommend that consistency is preferable (macrons in the lede—the first sentence—is surely the "standard"?) Surely no respectable English source would write it as Tōkyō Station.
  • A little more research shows a lack of consistency in a number of articles: Omuta, Fukuoka was moved to Ōmuta, Fukuoka in 2007. The city's web site is here. Kōchi Airport likewise (2010). There seem to be quite a few articles about Japan with macrons in the article title. Surely nowadays most newspapers and books do not show Japanese names with macrons. It seems to be Wikipedia "standard style" to explain the pronunciation (and use macrons) in the lede... and not use macrons in the article title. LittleBen (talk) 11:36, 13 September 2012 (UTC)
There are several links to macron-related discussions in the archive box above. You might be interested in reading through those discussions to see how we got where we are today. Dekimasuよ! 22:23, 16 September 2012 (UTC)
Move the pages to the common names without macrons. Easy enough.—Ryulong (琉竜) 22:55, 16 September 2012 (UTC)
Sould not move without consensus. There are some previous discussions as Dekimasuよ! said. e.g., Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Japan-related articles/Prefectures and macrons.--Mujaki (talk) 15:52, 18 September 2012 (UTC)
WP:COMMONNAME doesn't need consensus.—Ryulong (琉竜) 19:42, 18 September 2012 (UTC)
Don't you know "大牟田" is write as "Ōmuta" in English reliable sources such as the Encyclopædia Britannica[12] that is one of the most reliable sources? And the WP:CON is a part of the Five Pillars in Wikipedia. "大分"(県) is written as "Ōita" per previous consensus, and the place name should be spelt in conformity with the consensus. Of course, an exceptional consensus have priority over general consensus and a previous consensus can be changed or invalidated by new consensus. Some AT for place name ware chanded per consensus for the place. If the article titles must be spelled in the most general spelling in English sources, "Romanization" in MOS-JP is generally nonsense because the modified Hepburn is not in common use in theses, newspapers, books, magazines, web sites and so on.---Mujaki (talk) 19:06, 20 September 2012 (UTC)
My argument is for the Tokyo Station page.—Ryulong (琉竜) 00:35, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
I think WikiProject Trains in Japan is appropriate for discussion page of Japanese stations. Kyoto and Kyōto Station, Osaka and Ōsaka Station, Kobe and Kōbe Station etc. - Hepburn Romanization says "Railway Standard (鉄道掲示基準規程 Tetsudō Keiji Kitun Kitei?),[8] which follows the Hyōjun-shiki Rōmaji. All JR railways and other major railways use this type for station names."--Mujaki (talk) 21:39, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
The "Railway Standard" is simply another Hepburn style in use in Japan. It does not cover the common English language names of the cities which are included in the station names.—Ryulong (琉竜) 02:52, 22 September 2012 (UTC)
Do you want to lose consistency for each stations? Or do you think only "Tokyo station" should be given special treatment?--Mujaki (talk) 04:18, 22 September 2012 (UTC)

If a common English language name devoid of macrons exists for the location in question, be it Tokyo, Osaka, Kyoto, Kobe, etc., then we should give the train station a similarly titled page. It should be "Tokyo Station", "Osaka Station", "Kyoto Station", "Kobe Station", etc. and not "Tōkyō Station", "Ōsaka Station", "Kyōto Station", "Kōbe Station", etc. I thought I made myself clear about that.—Ryulong (琉竜) 06:47, 22 September 2012 (UTC)

For train stations, we've generally been going with the official English/Rōmaji signage at the station because it is very easily verifiable just by looking at the signs (or pictures of them). For example, File:Tokyo Sta no10 nameplate .png, File:JR Tokyo Keihintouhoku and Yamanote Line.JPG, File:Tokyo-tokaido.JPG, and File:Tokyo-Station-2005-7-21 5.jpg. ···日本穣? · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe · Join WP Japan! 07:06, 22 September 2012 (UTC)
  • Quote: "For train stations, we've generally been going with the official English/Rōmaji signage at the station because it is very easily verifiable just by looking at the signs (or pictures of them)". But surely none of the subways use macrons (including Marunouchi line Tokyo station, for example)? Newspapers never use macrons for names. JR West doesn't appear to (use macrons on Osaka). Note that the Wikipedia article on Osaka station uses macrons on the top half of the page and no macrons on the bottom half.
  • I have already pointed out that the Omuta web site does not use macrons. Neither the Oita city nor the Oita prefecture web sites use macrons either. Are there any official prefecture or city web sites in Japan that use macrons?
  • Remember, I'm suggesting non-macron article titles here, this is how names are most commonly written in English—in English newspapers, magazines like Time etc. (macrons will still appear in the Wikipedia article lede to indicate pronunciation). Just because Britannica uses macrons doesn't mean this is the "most widely-used style". Most English native speakers surely could not remember a name with macrons—i.e. could not remember where the macrons go. LittleBen (talk) 12:58, 22 September 2012 (UTC)
That's exactly whe we've been going with the official signage at the stations. Different publications will have different ways of writing the names, but the signage is pretty much permanent and doesn't generally change unless the name of the station changes. The official signs are a very stable and reliable source for the information. ···日本穣? · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe · Join WP Japan! 16:28, 22 September 2012 (UTC)
  • Maybe you didn't read my subway map example that suggests that Tokyo station on the Marunouchi line under JR Tokyo station does not use macrons, unlike JR Tokyo? LittleBen (talk) 04:37, 23 September 2012 (UTC)
  • Actually, I did read it. Please reread what I wrote, paying especial attention to where I mention publications versus official signage. ···日本穣? · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe · Join WP Japan! 19:05, 23 September 2012 (UTC)
  • Looking at the official site, it appears that you are correct that Tokyo Metro doesn't use macrons in their signage. However, unless you are suggesting a separate article just the subway station, there's no valid reason to change the article because every other railway which uses that station does use macrons in their signage. ···日本穣? · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe · Join WP Japan! 19:29, 23 September 2012 (UTC)
  • Surely that is a nonsense argument, because it would cost too much money to change all the signs that JR East created five or ten years (or more) ago—even though JR knows that styles have changed. The same applies to Britannica—if it wants to change all its Japan-related articles at the same time to be consistent with modern publishing standards then it would simply cost too much money.
  • Surely JR East's current styles are more relevant, like here, here and here (listing at least all the most significant JR East stations).
  • It appears that none of the railway lines in Japan use macrons on the latest versions of their official web sites—or can you find any exceptions? LittleBen (talk) 20:42, 23 September 2012 (UTC)
  • Today I confirmed (with a photo) that Maronouchi-line Tokyo station does not use macrons. The Keiyo line still uses them on stations, but I haven't yet checked the web site. LittleBen (talk) 15:35, 26 September 2012 (UTC)
Well...As Nihonjoe said, Tokyo Metro doesn't use macrons. Marunouchi line is a railroad line of Tokyo Metoro. Here is a picture of board at Keiyo line, and JR-E and JR-C generally use macron on their board.
In other viewponts - "Tokyo Sta." is used for the road sign[13]; The long vowels are not generally indicated on the Japanese roadsign standard by MLIT [14]. And the map standard by GSI generally use macronless form too (note: long vowels are indicated by circumflex if need) [15].--Mujaki (talk) 16:38, 30 September 2012 (UTC)

Language templates

  • The MOS:CHINA has a useful tip for embedding kanji in English Wikipedia: Template:Linktext can be used to allow readers to look up kanji in Wikipedia. So instead of Tokyo (東京, Tōkyō, "Eastern Capital") we can write Tokyo (東京, Tōkyō, "Eastern Capital"). I propose to add this as a recommendation under MOS:JAPAN#Templates (currently Sec. 5.1) if there is agreement.
  • Here I wrote a short piece related to accessibility and Wikipedia guidelines on embedding foreign languages in English Wikipedia. This information does not seem to be widely known, so I propose to add a link to this as well. LittleBen (talk) 10:57, 12 September 2012 (UTC)
Thanks. I'm not sure I understand what linking to individual kanji would help the reader understand about the topic as a whole. A link to the Japanese Wikipedia might help in some circumstances: 東京. Dekimasuよ! 07:02, 13 September 2012 (UTC)
Yeah, linking to the individual kanji isn't really that helpful. The basic reader doesn't need to know the ins and outs of the characters to understand anything about the topic. They might have a greater importance in Chinese, but even then I don't see it on use on Chinese articles that often either.—Ryulong (琉竜) 07:07, 13 September 2012 (UTC)
  • It's used for Pearl Buck's Chinese name. I'm just suggesting it as an option—I'm not suggesting that it be "compulsory". It's surely useful to know the meaning (origin) of the characters in somebody's name—as a conversation starter, a mnemonic, or whatever. ;-) LittleBen (talk) 11:40, 13 September 2012 (UTC)
(Not support)"東京" is one term; LittleBen's proposal is just like writing as "word" for English term. "Tokyo" is less unsatisfactory than other many cases such as "Aichi" (愛知), "Akita" (秋田) and so on. "Tokyo" comes from "Eastern Kyo (as the place name; Kyo-no-miyako, Kyoto)" or "Eastern Capital"[16], but "Aichi" (愛知) is ateji of "Ayu-chi" meaning "gushing out - place" or "tying the hem - place"[17], "Akita" is also ateji for "鰐田" or "飽田"[18]...-Mujaki (talk) 16:03, 18 September 2012 (UTC)

Classify Japanese as an Altaic language?

Discussion is here and here. (Multilingual support template category naming).   LittleBen (talk) 11:37, 24 October 2012 (UTC)

Jingu and -gu

Without intending to stir anything up, can someone explain the reasoning behind the naming convention for shrines here? I am looking particularly at Ōsaka Tenman-gū, which used to be at Ōsaka Tenmangū Shrine. I see that the current name is the correct one per the MOS, but the shrine itself calls itself "Ōsaka Tenmangū Shrine" in English on its homepage (tenjinsan.com), and -gū seems to mean "shrine" just as much as jingū does. If this is just to prevent doubling as in the case of Fookawa River, Ōsaka Tenman Shrine still seems a better, and more easily understood, solution than the current title. Dekimasuよ! 23:39, 13 October 2012 (UTC)

I also note that this doesn't seem to be consistent in application (yet?)--e.g. Tomioka Hachiman Shrine. Seems to fit WP:SURPRISE as well as the hated WP:ENGLISH better. Dekimasuよ! 23:42, 13 October 2012 (UTC)
  • I'd agree that hyphenating "-gu" or "-tera" is not the way that such names are usually written in English in newspapers, web sites, and other such sources. (A macron in Ōsaka is also not the usual way of writing it, either). This is not likely to change, because the trend is surely towards simplifying writing systems, not the other way around. LittleBen (talk) 01:01, 14 October 2012 (UTC)

I see a discussion from seven years ago at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Japan-related articles/Archive 4, but there wasn't really any explanation for the distinction between -gū and jingū even then. I'm tempted to revise the section; the -taisha distinction also seems unnecessary to me, since there's a standard translation for this as well. Dekimasuよ! 02:20, 14 October 2012 (UTC)

  • It feels natural to break up romanized Japanese words into groups of two or three syllables like Meiji Jingu, Fushimi Inari taisha (or Fushimi Inari-taisha, but I'd agree that the hyphen seems unnecessary and unnatural). There are a few four-syllable two-kanji words (Yokohama, Kamakura, Shizuoka, Fukuoka) but words with five syllables (three kanji) (like Akihabara) that are written as one romaji word are relatively rare.
  • The use of macrons in the Ōsaka Tenman-gū article is an inconsistent mess, isn't it? We should have an RfC to update this MOS. Macrons are mentioned here in the MOS, and in the Article titles discussion above. LittleBen (talk) 02:51, 14 October 2012 (UTC)
天満宮 (天神神社, 北野神社, and 菅原神社) are the name used by shrines dedicated to Sugawara no Michizane as their deity. See ja:神社#主な信仰, ja:天神信仰, and ja:天満宮. Why don't you ask User:Gryffindor who moved the article title the reason of his move and invite him to join the talk? Oda Mari (talk) 16:40, 14 October 2012 (UTC)
  • I left a note, but there are a number of complaints about various undiscussed moves on the user's page, and the user does not appear to have responded to them. LittleBen (talk) 23:49, 14 October 2012 (UTC)
Not true User:LittleBenW, check your facts before making statements like that. Gryffindor (talk) 05:46, 15 October 2012 (UTC)
Sorry, guys. I didn't mean it. Oda Mari (talk) 09:44, 15 October 2012 (UTC)

If "-gu" means "shrine", then it should be replaced accordingly I think. So "Meiji Shrine" and "Ōsaka Tenman Shrine"? Gryffindor (talk) 10:24, 15 October 2012 (UTC)

  • I don't think that doubling up (i.e. explaining this) is necessarily a problem (though this could be part of the lede—first sentence of the article—rather than part of the article title); most English speakers won't know that "gawa/kawa" means river or that "gu/jingu/taisha" mean (different types of) shrines. I don't think the "gu/jingu/taisha" can be omitted, because they are part of the formal name—surely "Tenman" without the "gu" is never used, and "Izumo" without the Taisha" is a place, for example. Likewise for Meiji Jingu. It may a good idea in general to try to avoid mixing Romaji and English in a title, except—for English-language disambiguation—when using brackets around the English. The English explanation can appear in the lede.
  • For stations, on the other hand, maybe the reverse is true—a plain English title like "Tokyo station", with the "eki" in the lede. LittleBen (talk) 13:28, 15 October 2012 (UTC)
I would certainly not double with Japanese and English. That would be like calling it "Nihonbashi Bridge" or "Edojo Castle" or something strange like that. If "gu/jingu/taisha" translates as "shrine", wherein lies the problem? Gryffindor (talk) 07:03, 1 November 2012 (UTC)
  • The problem with your argument is that Nihonbashi (like Shimbashi and Kyobashi) is no longer thought of as the name of a bridge, it's a district. Likewise you won't hear many Japanese talking about "Edo-jo"; there's nothing much left of it. The area—where the remnants are—is now called Tokyo Imperial Palace. LittleBen (talk) 09:02, 1 November 2012 (UTC)
There is no problem with my argument, because I am referring with Nihonbashi to the structure, not the district. Likewise with Edojo Castle we could argue that castles in general should be called Osakajo Castle or something like that. I would say the same principle should apply to the Shinto shrines. Or go all Japanese, such as Tōdai-ji. Gryffindor (talk) 08:13, 4 November 2012 (UTC)

Princes and Princesses of Japon and titles

Prince Akishino, Prince Hitachi, Prince Mikasa, etc are substantive titles not first name. AND THEY ARE INHERITABLE. So there could be Prince Hisahito of Akishino becoming Hisahito, Prince Akishino if Fumihito, Prince Akishino dies before his elder brother, Crown Prince Naruhito.

According Wikipedia:Naming_conventions_(royalty_and_nobility)#Royals with a substantive title and Wikipedia:Naming_conventions_(royalty_and_nobility)#Other royals, there should be :

A DISCUSSION IS NEEDED, several moves have occured in the past and a DEFINITIVE style convention is needed. The fact that the titles are mostly used should not be a distortion to global convention. "The Prince of Wales", "The Duke of Cambridge" are also frequently used. And the conventional name Charles, Prince of Wales and Prince William, Duke of Cambridge are nevertheless respected. Your Opinion ? Mimich (talk) 16:01, 15 November 2012 (UTC)

Have you thought about the implications of WP:COMMONNAME?—Ryulong (琉竜) 15:03, 16 November 2012 (UTC)

Ruby

I noted that the Manual of Style for China says nothing bad about use of <ruby>, so why can't we use it here? AJF (talk) 19:01, 2 December 2012 (UTC)

Because it doesn't work in the major browsers.—Ryulong (琉竜) 06:37, 3 December 2012 (UTC)

Personally used

The No. 1 criteria for personal names is now, "Use the form personally or professionally used by the person, if available in the English/Latin alphabet." This sounds we should call people up and ask them how they want their names romanized, and I'm sure no wants to do that. Many people use different spellings in different contexts, so this question can be quite murky and it isn't our job to sort it out. We should follow the usage of the best available English-language sources: Film references for actors, sports references for sports people, standard histories for historical figures, etc. Kauffner (talk) 14:04, 18 December 2012 (UTC)

Personal use means "Look at their official website/social media profile for a spelling". The subject of the article would always be a reliable source on how to spell their name (and don't bring up the Cat Stevens issue). We shouldn't rely on other places' manuals of style which may vary in their ways of spelling people's names when we just go with how the subject presents themselves publically.—Ryulong (琉竜) 14:10, 18 December 2012 (UTC)
Celebrity Web sites are created by management agencies. If it's in Japanese with some perfunctory material in English, I wouldn't count that as much of a source for romanization. Even it is a well-done site, why would it be a better source than, say, movie credits? Kauffner (talk) 16:36, 18 December 2012 (UTC)
Whatever apparent preference of the actor or whoever represents him or her should be given first preference as we here at Wikipedia are not here to decide how someone's name ought to be spelled or written. To take some examples, until it was discovered otherwise Shin-ichiro Miki and Romi Park were located at "Shin'ichirō Miki" and "Romi Paku". As their official profiles use the previously stated English spellings, we at Wikipedia follow suit. A translated film credit or a translated book is still subject to some other group's manual of style, whereas we should try to stick with the most accurate and verifiable form which comes from the subjects themselves.—Ryulong (琉竜) 04:40, 19 December 2012 (UTC)
Also, it probably needs to be pointed out that when it comes to macron-usage, the management agencies (and in the case of English websites, freelance translators) probably don't care either way. In fact, the subjects themselves probably don't much care either. elvenscout742 (talk) 07:45, 23 December 2012 (UTC)
I have a CD somewhere in my collection that has a macron in one space and a non-Hepburn form in another so it's clear there's a deliberate choice going on.—Ryulong (琉竜) 10:18, 23 December 2012 (UTC)
If it's a Japanese CD, chances are the English lettering was just included to "look cool". I would consider such a case, if it was being used as a source for spelling on Wikipedia, to indicate either that (1) it doesn't matter to the subject, so we should default to Hepburn, or (2) the subject in at least one place supports the use of Hepburn. Anyway, when I translate stuff online, unless it is for something formal (like an encyclopedia article...) I will usually just leave out the macrons because I can. I don't mind partially outing myself by claiming myself the translator behind several of these. Please note that in Volume 30 I tried to use macrons throughout but got lazy with the header, which I copy-pasted from a past one and so "Ganbaro" lacks a macron. Volume 29, on the other hand doesn't use macrons at all, even when using the same word as 30. I would like to fix these past issues for internal consistency, but since I'm only the translator, not the webmaster, it's "difficult" (ちょっと難しい, chotto muzukashii) to go back and change them, and since there are so few foreigners in Iwate the general consensus is that it doesn't really matter. The same is true of Japan as a whole -- it doesn't matter. However, on Wikipedia we have the opportunity for internal consistency, and we probably shouldn't let outside "sources" being lazy and dropping macrons from time to time get in the way of that. (As an aside, my translation of Volume 29, since it was published by the Iwate Prefectural Government, technically qualifies as a reliable source; the logic I have seen used around here recently, given the existence of one reliable source, would probably demand that Tarō, Iwate be moved to Taro, Iwate!) elvenscout742 (talk) 11:56, 23 December 2012 (UTC)
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