Talk:Pin Malakul

Stylized foreign names
Is there a way that you can re-stylize your major Thai/English differences so that I could read your article more easily? I began looking at Pin Malakul from the perspective of a peer review and decided that before I continued...perhaps I should drop you this note, first.

Written this way&mdash; "Mom Luang Pin Malakul was born on 24 October 1903 to the Chao Phraya Phrasadej Surendradhibodi (Mom Rajawongse Pia Malakul) and Thanpuying Sa-ngiam[nb 1] (maiden name Vasantasingh)."

&mdash;the Thai/English differentiation is difficult. However if you re-stylize it this way&mdash; "Mom Luang Pin Malakul was born on 24 October 1903 to the Chao Phraya Phrasadej Surendradhibodi (Mom Rajawongse Pia Malakul) and Thanpuying Sa-ngiam[nb 1] (maiden name Vasantasingh)."

I may understand the sentence a little better...yet, to be quite truthful, I haven't the foggiest idea what this sentence means either way?? Your footnote [nb 1] does little to help. Anne Teedham (talk) 19:39, 17 November 2008 (UTC)


 * All the words you italicized are people's names and/or titles. I understand how the Thai titles and honorifics make the sentence difficult to comprehend, but I'm not sure how to address the issue without providing an overly long explanation which would divert attention from the subject topic either.


 * It would be possible to italicize only the titular parts, giving


 * Mom Luang Pin Malakul was born on 24 October 1903 to the Chao Phraya Phrasadej Surendradhibodi (Mom Rajawongse Pia Malakul) and Thanpuying Sa-ngiam[nb 1] (maiden name Vasantasingh).


 * But although Manual of Style (text formatting) says to italicize foreign terms, I don't think it applies when those terms are part of a person's name, which these are. Consider, for example, "Tokugawa Shogun", which is not italicized, even when the word shogun is when it occurs separately.


 * The "Chao Phraya Phrasadej Surendradhibodi" part is the office title of his father (whose birth name is Pia Malakul). Try comparing with "Chancellor of the Exchequer Sir Winston Churchill". The difference is that such dated Thai title-holders adopt the title as their name and are known by it, and their birth names are only provided as clarification in parentheses. This is the Thai practice, though, and I am not sure how English scholarly works treat the issue.


 * Consider a stripped-down version substituted with non-corresponding English titles:


 * Sir Pin Malakul was born on 24 October 1903 to the Lord Phrasadej-Surendradhibodi (Sir Pia Malakul) and Lady Sa-ngiam (maiden name Vasantasingh).


 * The essence of meaning in both sentences are the same. You say, though, that the footnote does little to help. Perhaps expanding the footnote to be more comprehensive would be the best answer. --Paul_012 (talk) 05:34, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

Paul, I can understand this: "Sir Pin Malakul was born on 24 October 1903 to Lord Phrasadej-Surendradhibodi and Lady Sa-ngiam." If you can write it like that in Thai, then I can understand it. For example, Mom Luang Pin Malakul was born on 24 October 1903 to Phraya Phrasadej Surendradhibodi and Thanpuying Sa-ngiam[nb 1]. This is sufficient information. But the rest of that sentence is overwhelming to a reader. It is almost as if you wrote it thus: Mon Luang Pin Malakul était né le 24 octobre 1903 au seigneur Phrasadej-Surendradhibodi (Mom Rajawongse Pia Malakul) et Thanpuying Sa-ngiam (premier nom Vasantasingh).[nb 1]

You wrote: "I understand how the Thai titles and honorifics make the sentence difficult to comprehend, but I'm not sure how to address the issue without providing an overly long explanation which would divert attention from the subject topic either."

If you want someone to read your article after the first word, you will find a good way. I, too, doubt that providing an overly long explanation is the key. Anne Teedham (talk) 15:49, 18 November 2008 (UTC)
 * I'm having a bit of a snit with all these horrifics too. Here try this on for size. "Mom Luang Pin Malakul (hereafter referred to as M.L. Pin) was born on 24 October 1903 to Mom Rajawongse Pia[nb 2] (M.R. Pia) and Thanpuying Sa-ngiam Malakul.[nb 3]"


 * Or better yet: insert the necessary clarification at the beginning of the next paragraph as soon as you begin using the abreviations M. L. and M. R.. I gave up as soon as I encountered M.L. Pin and M.R. Pia.  I said, whaaaat??? Who are they?  You might even consider dropping the initials in favor of simply Pin and Pia.  Very easy to understand. ThsQ (talk) 19:11, 20 November 2008 (UTC)


 * I was prety unsure how to deal with the honorific titles. Sources originating in Thailand and UNESCO almost always universally use them, but I'm not sure whether this fits in an academic context, even if it appears to be the most common usage. --Paul_012 (talk) 04:02, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

Assessment for WP:BIOGRAPHY
I'm going to give this article a C-Class rating for now. I've identified several areas which could do with citations, and ideally the list of awards and honours should be referenced as well. These are my only real concerns, though; once addressed I wouldn't hesitate to give this a B-Class rating. Nice work! PC78 (talk) 16:50, 24 November 2008 (UTC)


 * I've addressed the tags and added references for almost all the honours. --Paul_012 (talk) 15:41, 30 November 2008 (UTC)


 * Good enough for me. I've changed the rating to B-Class. PC78 (talk) 16:04, 8 December 2008 (UTC)