Talk:North Rhine-Westphalia

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 * teeerrejelwejrteke 2603:6000:DC04:C500:5553:91CD:C800:89EE (talk) 09:42, 28 February 2024 (UTC)

Osnabrück
I deleted the sentence:


 * The northern part of the former Westphalia including Osnabrueck|Osnabrück is a part of Lower Saxony.

Osnabrück was a part of Westphalia before 1815, but afterwards these northern parts were divided between Oldenburg and Hanover and did never become a part of the Prussian province of Westphalia. I will add more details on this to the Westphalia article. -- Cordyph —Preceding undated comment added 15:01, 17 January 2003

name
Shouldn't this article be either called Northrhine-Westphalia or North-Rhine-Westphalia? Or does the English language allow to write things like that (it looks rather strange)? -- Sandman 10:04, 21 Sep 2003 (UTC)

Sandman is right. The correct translation is North-Rhine Westphalia. North and Rhine linked by - and with a space to Westphalia. I don't know who initiated the new spelling. Any dictionary (Webster's, Oxford) can tell you that. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Singularity Rider (talk • contribs) 20:51, 7 April 2011 (UTC)


 * I suggest Nordrhein-Westfalen and redirect for the most common tries to translate it to English. German Wikipedia has a tendency to gkddelftleekfekelesleltleleoriginal names and I like it. Horst Emscher (talk) 19:48, 27 September 2013 (UTC)

It should definitely be "North-Rhine Westphalia", because the country consists of "Nordrhein" and "Westfalen". So "North" and "Rhine" have to be connecticated. The current writing "North Rhine-Westphalia" would mean "Nord Rheinwestfalen", so the nothern part of a region called Rheinwestfalen, which doesn't exist. Stefan Roth, 07:02, 08 Dec 2018 UTC — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2A02:908:1069:B340:513E:F129:3FFE:FD7D (talk)

I agree that this is poorly translated. The best option without changing the spelling is to change the punctuation instead. Specifically for ambiguous cases like this in English, the en dash (–) can be used: " ". Nicole Sharp (talk) 01:04, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

However, the official translation by the German federal government from German to English is to use the hyphen ("North Rhine-Westphalia") and not an en dash. I would suggest using the official translation even if it it might be ambiguous in English (there are many other commonly used but otherwise ambiguous placenames in English, such as "United States"). Nicole Sharp (talk) 01:04, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

List of major cities
As far as I know, cities with more than 100,000 inhabitants are referred to as "major cities".

Iserlohn is not and has never been a major city - it has always had less than 100,000 inhabitants (some 90,000 plus). Witten has had more than 100,000 inhabitants once, but at present time, it has only some 99,000 plus. Therefore, it is no longer a major city. So I took Iserlohn and Witten off the list. I've added Moers (Kreis Wesel), which is a city near Duisburg that (still) has a little more than 100,000 inhabitants. All the information that I give here can easily be checked by visiting these city articles in the German Wikipedia. (Check the box at the right: "Einwohner" means "Inhabitants" - the present numbers are listed there).

I've also corrected the alphabetical order. By the way, the official name of the city of Mülheim is "Mülheim an der Ruhr". The name "Mülheim" is common for German speakers, but actually incomplete. I have NOT changed that, since I do not know if the link would still work then. Maybe, someone would first have to change the name of the Wikipedia article called "Mülheim" into "Mülheim an der Ruhr". I don't know how to do that.

--79.253.219.218 (talk) 22:58, 15 November 2010 (UTC)

Someone was too fast!
Minister President Peer Steinbrück is still in office! The Jürgen Rüttgers will be elected by the new Landtag soon - there is no direct election of the Minister President in NorthRine-Westphalia! --85.74.154.165 20:20, 22 May 2005 (UTC)

Districts ?
Are the German "Kreise" really to be called "districts" in English language ? What about "counties" ? As the "Regierungsbezirke" are Bezirke, these should be called "districts" in English language - any oher opinion ? Henning-GM 1 July 2005 21:40 (UTC)


 * There seems to be no standard translation of "Kreis" - when I joined WP years ago User:Cordyph had already started with the Kreise of northern Germany, and he had used the word "district" at first. You are right that county is the equivalent of a Kreis, but that doesn't mean it has to be the translation. The bad thing about "District" is that it's both used for "Kreis", but also for "Stadtbezirk" (otherwise also called borough). However moving and changing all occurances of district to county (or whatever else) would be quite a task - there are 400 Kreise, plus much more references to them. andy 1 July 2005 21:47 (UTC)

A Pleeding for counties:

The correct description for a Landkreis seems to be County. The Deutscher Landkreistag calls itself German County Association. This really makes sense. In the context of the EU the federal system of Germany is structured as follows: 1)	municipalities, which are local self-government bodies 2)	counties, which are also local self-government bodies 3)	districts, which are only an administrative level of the administration of the Bundesland, therefore they are better called “regional district” 4)	federal states also called regions in the European context or land This wording is used in the European context by the German County Association, the German Association of Town and municipalities and the German Association of Cities which are the official representatives of the local government bodies. This Nomenclature makes a clear differentiation between the self-government bodies, which are granted by the German constitution and the merely administrative level of the regional district. According to this definition the kreisfreie Stadt should be called County Borough. The term County Borough, even though it is now historical, describes perfectly the fact that this is a city or town independent to a county and with the self-governance competencies of a county. Therefore I have changed this article. --Gereonmc (talk) 17:19, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

official english name
The official name is North-Rhine/Westphalia (see: ) Can the article be renamed to this? --ALE! 13:03, 15 September 2005 (UTC)


 * Whether official or not, the most common spelling is "North Rine-Westphalia". I can't see anything beneficial in the "official" spelling -- on the contrary, the slash indicates that Westphalia was an alternative name for North Rhine. Hence, I'd keep it as it is. -- H005 19:41, 4 January 2006 (UTC)


 * Then let's leave out the slash. The way it is written now reads as "North [something]", which is wrong as "North" only applies to "Rhine". "North-Rhine Westphalia" would be a perfectly proper English compound name that used the hyphen to denote what "North" is associated with. 134.130.4.46 21:08, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

I just saw North Rhein-Westphalia at the BBC's website. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/country_profiles/1053880.stml Has anyone seen something like this before? --M9IN0G 19:55, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

The reference on the official name North-Rhine/Westphalia mentioned above changed to http://www.auswaertiges-amt.de/diplo/de/Infoservice/Terminologie/Bundeslaender/Englisch.pdf --araffals 19:28, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Since this Wikipedia only uses the official names of public entities, and since there exists an official translation for Nordrhein-Westfalen, this article should be renamed to North-Rhine/Westphalia. The current article name as well as the mentioned BBC-version are simply wrong. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Henning Blatt (talk • contribs)


 * That depends if you trust an "English" translation by a German. I've worked in the translation industry long enough to know that I wouldn't.


 * "BBC-version" is wrong too

"North Rhine-Westphalia" is completely wrong. I think noone disagrees. So I suggest to move the article to North-Rhine/Westphalia or al least to North-Rhine Westphalia. Opinions? Henning Blatt 14:42, 1 February 2007 (UTC)
 * The current status quo is fine as is. Think about the alternatives:
 * North-Rhine Westphalia sounds like Northern Westphalia on the Rhine (Nord-Rheinwestfalen)
 * North-Rhine-Westphalia just doesn't look that great.
 * North Rhine/Westphalia lets the unknowing reader think the place has two names. (Nordrhein / Westfalen)
 * North Rhine-Westphalia still gives the best rendition of the German name imo, namely "North Rhine" (Nordrhein) - "Westphalia" (Westfalen), which is as close to the original meaning as it gets.
 * Besides, heck, if people can't agree on anything, just move the whole mess to NRW and be done with it. :P
 * doco ( ☏ ) 15:52, 1 February 2007 (UTC)

Question - is it the case that all German lander have an OFFICIAL English language name as well? If not, then surely the page heading should be the German language name, with perhaps the English version in brackets if in popular usage. Any thoughts?


 * Yes, please read http://www.auswaertiges-amt.de/diplo/de/Infoservice/Terminologie/Bundeslaender/Englisch.pdf . BTW the official name of this Land is now North Rhine-Westphalia, so no further action is needed. --ALE! (talk) 08:23, 13 October 2008 (UTC)

--- The "official name" mentioned here seems to be just a lazy translation by a German with no sense for syntax or for the English language. The first level division here is between NR and W, only the second level is between N and R. Thus "N R-W" is just plain wrong, whereas "N-R W" would be fine. Someone needs to protest against this blunder by the German Foreign Ministry and, while this blunder persists, make it clear that they can't be taken seriously as a source of name translation. -- Hartmut Pilch 87.163.96.112 (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 20:06, 11 January 2012 (UTC).

The official translation from German to English by the Press and Information Office of the Federal Government of Germany is "North Rhine-Westphalia". See my comment and link from the previous discussion on this topic (these two discussions should be merged). Nicole Sharp (talk) 01:09, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

Pader
The link to the river Pader points to the wrong page. There is actually no page for the river Pader. Should this link be deleted?

No, but changed. Will do so in a moment. -- H005 19:41, 4 January 2006 (UTC)

History
sorry if this doesnt belong here, but I'm not good at posting official stuff so I'd just like to mention that someone should post about the battle in the Teutoburg Forest under history in this article.

May 22, 2005 state election results
Is this important enough for a Wiki article? I am not sure ... --Weissmann 12:43, 25 October 2006 (UTC)


 * The current parliament belongs into the article, but a list with just the number of seats for each party and a short mention of the changes to the previous elections is IMHO enough. The detailed table and the graphic much better fit into the sub-article on these elections, were they are already anyway. andy 20:37, 25 October 2006 (UTC)

BTW, I fixed the results - the FDP entry was missing a pipe character. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.44.229.67 (talk) 16:48, 30 January 2009 (UTC)

population density
northrhine westphalia (to my knowledge) has the highest population density in all of europe (if you disregard Monaco). It has 529persons/km2, which is higher than South-Korea. A comparision with Taiwan would also be nice: same area, comparable population, both are highly industrialised. --  ExpImp talk con 02:44, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

Was denn Nun, wieviele Schulden hat denn NRW?

 * 118.000.000.000 Euro Landesschulden Christlich Demokratische Union Freiheitliche Partei Deutschland


 * http://www.wdr.de/themen/politik/nrw03/lrh/080602.jhtml?rubrikenstyle=politik
 * 151.758.000.000 Euro Landesschulden Christlich Demokratische Union Freiheitliche Partei Deutschland

194.66.226.95 (talk) 10:17, 3 June 2008 (UTC)
 * http://www.destatis.de/jetspeed/portal/cms/Sites/destatis/Internet/DE/Presse/pm/2008/06/PD08__203__713,templateId=renderPrint.psml

language problems
I suggest that a native English speaker edit this article. The meaning of the German-English isn't always clear.124.197.15.138 (talk) 19:56, 21 November 2009 (UTC)
 * Might help to be a little more precise. —mnh·∇· 01:28, 27 November 2009 (UTC)

The state consists of five administrative regions
whoever wrote this then goes on to say the state has three parts?? gosh what kind of parts??

would the author of the article give a proper definition and accounting of the divisions of the state as recognized by the german govt. and drop the 'depending on the concept used' crap and add the previous portions of the state in a historical section or a separate page. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Sthomper (talk • contribs) 12:11, 6 April 2010 (UTC)


 * The state was formed from Rheinprovinz, Westfalen and Lippe-Detmold. 3, U C? Horst Emscher (talk) 19:54, 27 September 2013 (UTC)

Shouldn't this article be either called Northrhine-Westphalia or North-Rhine-Westphalia? Or does the English language allow to write things like that (it looks rather strange)?
are you confused about the title? get a german map and change it if it isnt correct??

are you the english kaiser anyway??

no. just a liar. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Sthomper (talk • contribs) 12:14, 6 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Why are you so confused about it? Besides from any arguments given above, I like to explain it to you, though I'm not a native speaker. The name consist of two parts.
 * a.) the northern parts of Rhineland. Like in "Northern Ireland" or in "North Carolina" cardinal directions and regions are neither connected with hyphens in the English language nor the words are merged. This holds true for other prefixes like "New" (New Delhi, New York) or "Old" in most cases.
 * b.) the second part is Westphalia. If not connected by words like "and" (e.g.: Bosnia and Herzegovina) or "upon", geographical names that describe unified or joined regions are often connected with hyphens. This imitates exactly the state's name in German, too. Examples in the English language: Baltimore–Washington Metropolitan Area, Minneapolis – Saint Paul, Ark-La-Tex
 * Hope you got my points. I'm not saying that these are strict rules, but North Rhine-Westphalia is far from beeing an extraordianary wording.--TUBS (talk) 09:56, 16 July 2010 (UTC)
 * besides that: the land was founded by declaration of the British administration after WWII under the name of North Rhine/Westphalia, as one can read in the original 1946 document, which doesn't mean that this is the official translation.--TUBS (talk) 09:59, 16 July 2010 (UTC)
 * The common name in English source is North Rhine-Westphalia, as in Britannica and supported by many other sources. They can be detaile dhere if there is further confusion. Grandiose (me, talk, contribs) 21:31, 7 April 2011 (UTC)

According to Wikipedia, hyphens "are mostly used to break single words into parts, or to join ordinarily separate words into single words". I think the "separate words into single words" applies here. In the title of this section, it's called "Northrhine". These two words are usually seperated like in North Carolina, South Carolina, North Dakota and South Dakota. Kingjeff (talk) 21:07, 10 April 2011 (UTC)

Politics section
The politics section is proportionally long - also considering that it has a seperate article. The subsections Responsibility of the Landtag and Legislation as well as Election system and Latest election results seem want to be grouped or structured differently. Maybe some sentences want to be outsorced into the specific article? --ZH2010 (talk) 17:20, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

Any section that also has it's own article should be condensed while the article on the specific section should be more detailed. Kingjeff (talk) 17:59, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

Architecture
Ok, i have just grouped the whole lot of architecture images into 3 groups. dont know if thats well representative for all regions. --ZH2010 (talk) 22:45, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

Demographics
I just wanted to point out to someone more versed than I that there is an issue with the demographics chart. When I try to sort it (i.e.: by population), it makes it so that the map next to the table is duplicated for each entry. 75.175.8.228 (talk) 02:59, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

Religions
The section "demographics -> religion" just doesn't make any sense at all. The text states that according to a study of Ruhr Universität Bochum there are 2.78% Muslims among the NRW population. The table to the right of this article instead says that there are 8% Muslims. Also, the sum of the table equals to 101% without any explanation given. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.136.34.105 (talk) 07:14, 8 October 2014 (UTC)

External links modified
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/* Protection for possible nuclear disasters */ removal
I completely deleted this section because it was shoehorned into the "Economy" section for no apparent reason and was poorly written. Furthermore, nothing about these nuclear reactors is mentioned in the German version of this page. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 10788dbeb (talk • contribs) 21:45, 28 August 2016 (UTC)

External links modified
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 * Added archive https://archive.is/20070813225024/http://www.wirtschaft.nrw.de/witelegramm/indikatoren/wachstum/index.php to http://www.wirtschaft.nrw.de/witelegramm/indikatoren/wachstum/index.php
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Cuisine and Traditions Sections
Hi Wikipedians!!! I edited this source earlier in the year but didn't paraphrase and had incorrect citations. I am now republishing this information but need your help to check me! I want to help this article and learn from my earlier mistakes. I added a table to the cuisine subsection and will be adding in information about the holiday traditions of Karneval. Thanks! Nurreea (talk) 16:24, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

spelling of name
There have been several discussions on this page where mostly Germans have been upset by the spelling and nobody has bothered to explain this to them. Germans aren't used to open compounds and are confused by them. And it didn't help that we had an incorrect/sloppy hyphen (as in the CIA World Factbook) instead of the more precise en dash (as in carefully edited publications like Encyclopaedia Britannica). (If you're German: https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halbgeviertstrich, not https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Viertelgeviertstrich) --Espoo (talk) 00:21, 20 December 2018 (UTC)
 * I've reverted the undisclosed move, a WP:RM should be opened to generate consensus if the title should be changed. S.A. Julio (talk) 16:45, 20 December 2018 (UTC)

There are three separate discussions open on this topic. They need to be merged together into a single discussion topic. Nicole Sharp (talk) 01:11, 7 January 2024 (UTC)

Climate data
None of the related articles have climate data, as seen in articles such as Overijssel. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 46.226.49.229 (talk) 14:12, 1 April 2019 (UTC)

Requested move 8 May 2020

 * The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion. 

The result of the move request was: Not moved per a relatively broad consensus that, whatever title the best one is, the proposed title ain't that. Red  Slash  17:22, 21 May 2020 (UTC)

North Rhine-Westphalia → North-Rhine Westphalia – The original name is "Nordrhein-Westfalen", reflecting the two constituent regions of the state – the English translation should hence do the same. The current title, which suggests "North" as a modifier to "Rhine-Westphalia", probably resulted when Germans simply kept their native language's hyphen in the same position and split "North Rhine" without regard to the misleading result of "North" prefixing some nonexistent entity "Rhine-Westphalia". This problem is also discussed here, with an awkward suggestion to combine a hyphen with a slash.

Two blocks on this very Talk page point to this situation as well, including a suggestion to simply use the native name, which I'd consider the second best alternative – this seems to be applied to most other geographical entities in Wikipedia, like French departments. Either way, I guess it will be okay to note the wrong spelling as a popular alternative in the article.

What is also pointed out above is that the German Foreign Office prescribes the existing title for official use. Prescribing an error to the German bureaucracy needs not be a reason for Wikipedia to copy this, and as a constituent entity of the Federal Republic, the state's name is not the federation's to change. Admittedly, the state website and Langenscheidt's dictionary use the same, but I would still argue that they just adhere to the Foreign Office's erroneous guidance. I am aware that I am arguing correctness against popularity here, and also that the argument does not count that Wikipedia would essentially undo the popularity argument by way of setting the example. Urs Enke (talk) 23:26, 8 May 2020 (UTC)
 * Comment I'd rather support a move to the German name, because the translation looks wrong whatever way, - the hyphen has a different meaning in English than in German and we can't change that. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 10:35, 9 May 2020 (UTC)
 * Oppose creating a new confusing name. The existing confusing name is at least standard by current dictionaries + guides.  I'm OK with all variants redirecting to Nordrhein-Westfalen :)  But the English-language string used to describe the name of the region in English, within the article, should still be "North Rhein-Westphalia" so long as that's the standard explicitly used by German dictionaries and government. – SJ +  15:00, 9 May 2020 (UTC)
 * Weak support. The nominator has a point, "North Rhine-Westphalia" looks like it means the northern part of "Rhine-Westphalia", a region that does not exist. The native German name "Nordrhein-Westfalen" conveys the correct name, a union of "North Rhine" and "Westphalia". The English name should reflect that. J I P  &#124; Talk 12:43, 10 May 2020 (UTC)
 * Oppose per SJ. --Khajidha (talk) 21:09, 11 May 2020 (UTC)
 * Oppose - The majority of sources use the current name. The new name makes it confusing. Interstellarity (talk) 13:10, 13 May 2020 (UTC)


 * Oppose. Personally I'd favour using the native name, but if we have to translate this is the commonest version. I would read it as it's meant to be read (i.e. "North Rhine" and "Westphalia") without any confusion, although that may be because I know what the native name is. -- Necrothesp (talk) 14:56, 13 May 2020 (UTC)
 * Comment. The pedantically correct spelling is North Rhine–Westphalia (also used by Britannica), with an en dash instead of the hyphen, and I think that would also alleviate the ambiguity concerns. I suppose it is too late to introduce it as an alternative target, but we might revisit the issue. Now, MOS:ENDASH is a bit messy (and always has been). We had a similar back and forth at Talk:Friuli Venezia Giulia (which eventually ended up without any hiphen). No such user (talk) 10:41, 14 May 2020 (UTC)
 * Comment: Hold on! Now me myself getting confused. Alas, the current name is misleading and sound more like it is a "Northern" geo part of "Rhine-Westphalia". So i would like to go with the Comments above. Perhaps renaming the article to original German name would be better. I am not an english language pro but the most correct english name will be "North Rhine and Westphalia" - it's all about to avoid a word "and" ^-^—46.114.107.49 (talk) 15:54, 15 May 2020 (UTC)
 * Oppose per SJ. comrade waddie96 (talk) 13:27, 18 May 2020 (UTC)
 * North Rhine–Westphalia per . – wbm1058 (talk) 13:45, 19 May 2020 (UTC)
 * at 18:33, 26 February 2010 moved page North Rhine-Westphalia to North Rhine – Westphalia (ndash)
 * at 06:11, 27 February 2010 moved page North Rhine – Westphalia to North Rhine-Westphalia over redirect (A double-barelled name is hyphenated, not dashed. Previous move was a misreading of WP:DASH. See WT:MOS (Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Archive 114) for discussion. )
 * at 06:19, 27 February 2010 moved page Baden–Württemberg to Baden-Württemberg over redirect (Double-barelled compund names are hyphenated, not dashed. Previous move was a misreading of WP:Dash. See WT:MOS for discussion. )
 * at 00:02, 20 December 2018 moved page North Rhine-Westphalia to North Rhine–Westphalia over redirect (en dash, not hyphen, see Encyclopedic Britannica and Dash)
 * at 16:38, 20 December 2018 moved page North Rhine–Westphalia to North Rhine-Westphalia over redirect (revert undiscussed move, a WP:RM should be opened instead)
 * Britannica uses a dash for North Rhine–Westphalia but a hyphen for Baden-Wurttemberg – wbm1058 (talk) 14:46, 19 May 2020 (UTC)
 * The problem with a dash here is that dashes convey a loose connection between two separate things, not a permanent thing that happens to be named after two things. North Rhine-Westphalia is a single land, not two separate ones. That said, typographically, the dash may be more useful to indicate that the "North" goes specifically with the "Rhine" in the name. The proposed move is just plain wrong in being unused by other sources, so I oppose as proposed. I could live with the dash for purely typographical reasons. oknazevad (talk) 16:47, 19 May 2020 (UTC)

Discussion

 * How I interpret the different forms:
 * North-Rhine Westphalia: the North-Rhine region of Westphalia (North-Rhine modifies Westphalia – incorrect)
 * North Rhine-Westphalia: the North region of Rhine-Westphalia (incorrect)
 * North Rhine–Westphalia: either the "partnership" of two things "North Rhine" and "Westphalia" or a single "hyphenated" entity NorthRhine-Westphalia (correct)
 * The dash is for rather than, because the "North Rhine" element is itself a compound. – wbm1058 (talk) 18:13, 19 May 2020 (UTC)


 * The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Orphaned references in North Rhine-Westphalia
I check pages listed in Category:Pages with incorrect ref formatting to try to fix reference errors. One of the things I do is look for content for orphaned references in wikilinked articles. I have found content for some of North Rhine-Westphalia's orphans, the problem is that I found more than one version. I can't determine which (if any) is correct for this article, so I am asking for a sentient editor to look it over and copy the correct ref content into this article.

Reference named "AIP": From Dortmund Airport:  From Munich Airport:  From Düsseldorf Airport:  From Frankfurt Airport:  

I apologize if any of the above are effectively identical; I am just a simple computer program, so I can't determine whether minor differences are significant or not. AnomieBOT ⚡ 08:06, 29 July 2020 (UTC)

Map is wrong
The north rhine/westphalia map in the page's main info box shows only NRW's exclaves in belgium. I would fix it myself, but I dont know how to yet.

Thanks, Jbermingham123 (talk) 18:55, 16 August 2021 (UTC)jbermingham123


 * Now the map just shows all of Germany without even marking which bit is westphalia. 2601:1C2:5000:1472:69D2:FB4C:58EF:55D7 (talk) 17:26, 22 August 2021 (UTC)

Requested move 28 October 2021
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 * The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion. 

The result of the move request was: No consensus to move either - I wish I could give you guys some closure on this, but both the numerical weight and the basis in policies/guidelines are roughly equal here. The move arguments were based particularly MOS:DASH/MOS:PREFIXDASH/MOS:CAPS, whilst the oppose arguments were based primarily on WP:COMMONNAME and MOS:ENBETWEEN. Of the two arguments the oppose arguments were marginally more persuasive given the importance of WP:COMMONNAME given that it stems ultimately from WP:NPOV, but not sufficiently to make this a consensus not to move taking into account the numerical votes. I did consider a re-list, but !voting has slowed such that it seems unlikely that a more clear consensus would appear, with no votes in the past four days. My advice for further proposals to move this, if any further are to be brought, is to come up with a better rebuttal, if possible, for the arguments based on WP:COMMONNAME. Alternatively a move to another title such as the DE-language name might be explored if suitable basis for it could be found in WP:COMMONNAME and WP:CRITERIA. (non-admin closure) FOARP (talk) 16:34, 11 November 2021 (UTC)

– This form was previously suggested by several commenters at Talk:North Rhine-Westphalia, but that discussion was closed without reaching a conclusion about it. These articles seem to have been moved to these names without a clear discussion of the hyphen/dash question (especially Bà Rịa-Vũng Tàu Province, for which I found no discussion at all). In addition to the merger-hyphen/dash question currently under discussion at Talk:Baden-Württemberg and previously considered at Talk:Brown–Forman, these titles have another reason to use an en dash, which is that they each involve a compound in which one of the elements contains a space. The title indicates a joining of North Rhine with Westphalia, not the northern part of a place called Rhine-Westphalia. The hyphen here is thus justified by a similar rationale as in MOS:PREFIXDASH. Please also especially see the comments of SMcCandlish and Quondum at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Archive 221 (13 March – 14 April 2021). —⁠ ⁠BarrelProof (talk) 16:10, 28 October 2021 (UTC)
 * North Rhine-Westphalia → North Rhine–Westphalia
 * Bà Rịa-Vũng Tàu Province → Bà Rịa–Vũng Tàu Province


 * Support – The hyphen has many roles in English punctuation, but joining two region-name parts this way is not one of them; that's the role of an en dash (in styles like ours where a distinction is made via different glyphs for those roles). So yes, let's fix it, mainly for the first reason.  It doesn't matter whether such a distinction is not made in some other styles, or some other languages.  Dicklyon (talk) 19:38, 29 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Support per MOS:DASH. There is no such thing as "Rhine-Westphalia", much less a North of it. Dashes exist for a reason, even if expediency driven styles like journalism and bureaucratese tend to replace them with hyphens because they're a key on the keyboard.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  03:22, 3 November 2021 (UTC)
 * Support—this should not be controversial. MOSCAPS. <b style="color:darkgreen">Tony</b> (talk)  04:45, 3 November 2021 (UTC)
 * Oppose  For North Rhine-Westphalia I have previously explained on Talk:Baden-Württemberg and Talk:Mecklenburg-Vorpommern that German states use hyphens not dashes. Sources that use the hyphen are Google Maps, the official website , the European Union , The Times , The New York Times , The Guardian , The BBC and The Washington Post . Although both Britannica and Columbia use the dash, use of the hyphen predominates. As for Bà Rịa-Vũng Tàu Province the only notable sources I have found are Google Maps and Vietnamplus both of which use the hyphen (though interestingly without any diacritical marks). Furthermore as the North Rhine-Westphalia hyphen vs dash debate looks like a continuation of the Baden-Württemberg hyphen vs dash debate I would like to invite all users from that discussion who have yet to comment on this page to leave their opinions, notabaly User:No such user, User:Markussep, User:Kusma and User:Future Perfect at Sunrise. Ale3353 (talk) 15:54, 3 November 2021 (UTC)
 * Oppose for the same reasons as Baden-Württemberg: "North Rhine-Westphalia" is a single entity (MOS:ENBETWEEN, MOS:DUALNATIONALITIES) and English usage apparently favours the hyphen (WP:NCUE). Markussep Talk 16:05, 3 November 2021 (UTC)
 * Oppose per MOS:ENBETWEEN. Also note that the problem people are trying to solve seems to be the space between "North" and "Rhine", and a dash instead of a hyphen won't fix that. (Going for the local name would fix that issue, but I think WP:NCUE will win here). —Kusma (talk) 17:56, 3 November 2021 (UTC)
 * Also procedural oppose to joining the totally unrelated Vietnamese province with the German state. —Kusma (talk) 17:58, 3 November 2021 (UTC)
 * These exhibit the same issue and have been discussed together in prior article naming discussions, so I see nothing wrong with having them discussed in a single RM request. Both also have the issue of coupling a spaced phrase with a hyphen in a combined place name, similar to MOS:PREFIXDASH. I half-expected someone to make the opposite comment – i.e., that instead of having several separate RMs that involve dashes vs. hyphens, there should be one larger combined discussion. —&#8288;&#8202;&#8288;BarrelProof (talk) 22:30, 3 November 2021 (UTC)


 * Support per MOS:PREFIXDASH: Instead of a hyphen, when applying a prefix or suffix to a compound that includes a space or a dash (but not per MOS:ENBETWEEN, it's a red herring). Since I mentioned Britannica on the Baden-Württemberg RM (that I opposed) as a good role model to follow, it does the same (essentially, as PREFIXDASH): North Rhine–Westphalia, German Nordrhein-Westfalen, i.e. dash in English version, hyphen in German (possibly because those are single words in German); but Rhineland-Palatinate, with a hyphen. Note that it is a purely typographic convention to facilitate readability, and has little to do with "common name". We should also eventually fix Bourgogne-Franche-Comté (see its talk), Drobeta-Turnu Severin, Centre-Val de Loire and others. No such user (talk) 08:44, 4 November 2021 (UTC)
 * I don't think MOS:PREFIXDASH applies here, there are no prefixes or suffixes in these names. Markussep Talk 09:38, 4 November 2021 (UTC)
 * You're right, on retrospect; striking that part. I was imparting my wishful thinking into that wording. But I still maintain (I've just realized I !voted in the above RM a year ago) that it's the "pedantically correct" styling, and that we have a gap in MOS that should be addressed. (I would not oppose reverting to Nordrhein-Westfalen and avoiding the problem entirely). No such user (talk) 11:00, 4 November 2021 (UTC)


 * Support per nom and arguments. I believe the best way to solve problems here would be to move to the original German name which is close enough to not be misunderstood: Nordrhein-Westfalen, which visibly shows that the Rhine doesn't belong connected to Westphalia. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 08:59, 4 November 2021 (UTC)
 * Support both as it seems the style manual for joining two things should apply to place names (as in Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Archive 221 mentioned above), and especially in this case as otherwise it appears that Rhine-Westphalia is a place of which we are interested in the northern part. --Mgp28 (talk) 01:37, 5 November 2021 (UTC)
 * That was an interesting discussion you quoted. I agree with User:Jarmihi's point of view there: North Rhine-Westphalia is a single entity, not a relationship between two separate entities, hence a hyphen. I admit the point here is not as strong as in the Baden-Württemberg case since English usage seems to be divided here. I wonder whether Britannica has a publicly available style book that explains their choices. Markussep Talk 08:07, 5 November 2021 (UTC)


 * Oppose per Ale and Markuss. "North Rhine" and "Westphalia" are not regarded as separate entities that are being juxtaposed together, rather this is a single long-standing state name, and the WP:COMMONNAME is very clearly to use a hyphen it all such state names per the myriad sources that Ale provided above in evidence. The MOS may suggest using a longer dash, but this should not be done when the usage is sources is so overwhelmingly to use a hyphen - we always make an exception where the proposed form is virtually unheard of. &mdash; Amakuru (talk) 17:50, 5 November 2021 (UTC)
 * Support per nom and No such user. Havelock Jones (talk) 21:18, 6 November 2021 (UTC)
 * Comment Most of the comments here seem to be talking exclusively about North Rhine-Westphalia. I agree with User:Kusma; North Rhine-Westphalia and Bà Rịa-Vũng Tàu Province should not be joined in an RM. Ale3353 (talk) 09:49, 7 November 2021 (UTC)


 * Oppose per WP:COMMONNAME. On Google Scholar a search for "North Rhine–Westphalia" Germany, the proposed title, gets an estimated 58,200 hits, while "North Rhine–Westfalia" Germany gets about 3640; "Nordrhein-Westfalen" Germany gets an estimated 79,100. Examination of the first fifty results/five pages (1, 2, 3, 4 and 5) of the first search yields the following:
 * "North Rhine–Westphalia" 3
 * "North Rhine-Westphalia" 39 (using either character #45, hyphen-minus, or #8208, hyphen)
 * "North Rhine Westphalia" 3
 * "North-Rhine Westphalia" 4
 * "North-Rhine-Westphalia" 1
 * Similar analysis for the third search gives:
 * "Nordrhein-Westfalen" 43
 * "Nordrhein Westfalen" 1
 * not immediately verifiable on the search result page 6.
 * It seems that (1) the present title is the by far the most common of the many translations, and (2) that the actual name of the place is both more used and more consistent in English usage. If the page is moved, it should be to Nordrhein-Westfalen. Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 13:36, 7 November 2021 (UTC)

<div style="padding-left: 1.6em; font-style: italic; border-top: 1px solid #a2a9b1; margin: 0.5em 0; padding-top: 0.5em">The discussion above is closed. <b style="color: #FF0000;">Please do not modify it.</b> Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
 * Alternative proposal: North Rhine-Westphalia → Nordrhein-Westfalen – Per my analysis above, which seems to show that this is in fact the common name in scholarly English-language sources. Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 13:59, 7 November 2021 (UTC)

Requested move 7 November 2021
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 * The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion. 

The result of the move request was: procedural close. Please wait for the RM of 28 October 2021 to close before opening a new requested move. – wbm1058 (talk) 05:59, 9 November 2021 (UTC)

North Rhine-Westphalia → Nordrhein-Westfalen – Per my analysis above, which seems to show that this is in fact the common name in scholarly English-language sources. Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 13:59, 7 November 2021 (UTC)
 * Procedural remark: I don't think it is proper to have more than one RM open at the same time. If you want to suggest a different title than what was proposed in the other RM, just suggest it within the discussion without opening a second RM. I suggest that someone close this duplicate RM as a procedural close (without prejudice, of course). I would do it myself, but I am the proposer of the open RM and thus may be too closely involved for some to consider that proper. —⁠ ⁠BarrelProof (talk) 17:10, 7 November 2021 (UTC)
 * Makes sense to me,, though I'm not aware of any actual prohibition. To any uninvolved person: would you kindly close, delete or disable this second move request as "closed at request of nominator following procedural objection" or something? My alternative proposal for the page title stands, however. Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 19:49, 7 November 2021 (UTC)
 * the instructions say "Do not create a new move request when one is already open on the same talk page. Instead, consider contributing to the open discussion if you would like to propose another alternative." My bot isn't flagging this as malformed; it's just ignoring (or not noticing) the second RM, except for the message it's writing to the console (which only I can see): "Requested name outside template: Nordrhein-Westfalen does not match name in template: North Rhine–Westphalia" – that's one of only two such messages currently on the console, the other is: "Requested name outside template: 2022 census of Ireland does not match name in template: 2022 Census of Ireland" at Talk:2022 Republic of Ireland census, because this edit wasn't made in two places (the template parameters, as well as outside of the template).
 * There is a big section Multiple requested move sections on the same page at the top of my bot's talk which has been there for a long time as I've left open the possibility of supporting this. WP:RM/CM used to say "Do not put more than one move request on the same article talk page, as this is not supported by the bot that handles updates to this page." That was changed by this edit (edit summary "the bot reason is not as important here as what to do instead"). I'm not sure whether there's a consensus one way or the other on this; I could try to support multiple open RM discussions on the same page if that's desirable, or I could make the bot report this as outright-malformed. I suppose I can see if I can detect it first (may need to implement better regex, then once detected I can probably handle it either way. That console message, which is from a syntax-check, indicates the bot is sort of finding the second request, but conflating it with the first request (in the syntax check). – wbm1058 (talk) 00:47, 9 November 2021 (UTC)
 * I think that allowing multiple RMs to be open on the same page at the same time would just be too confusing. Alternatives to a proposed title are already routinely discussed within RM discussions. Allowing multiple open RMs would also require some judgment or guidance about when it should be done – it would provide what I consider an inappropriate opportunity to seemingly raise the level of one commenter's suggestion to a higher priority, and where would it stop? Would it stop at two? Six? Too confusing. I am happy with the instruction "Do not create a new move request when one is already open on the same talk page." —&#8288;&#8202;&#8288;BarrelProof (talk) 01:12, 9 November 2021 (UTC)
 * OK, I've updated the bot to report this as a malformed request. And, since it's now reported as malformed, I can close it. – wbm1058 (talk) 05:54, 9 November 2021 (UTC)
 * OK, I've updated the bot to report this as a malformed request. And, since it's now reported as malformed, I can close it. – wbm1058 (talk) 05:54, 9 November 2021 (UTC)

<div style="padding-left: 1.6em; font-style: italic; border-top: 1px solid #a2a9b1; margin: 0.5em 0; padding-top: 0.5em">The discussion above is closed. <b style="color: #FF0000;">Please do not modify it.</b> Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

A Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion
The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion: Participate in the deletion discussion at the nomination page. —Community Tech bot (talk) 14:03, 23 January 2023 (UTC)
 * North Rhine-Westphalia location map 02.svg