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You're adding a new paragraph, Francis, and your wording sounds to me like it goes against the "most common" principle which is why I made that slight change. Maybe you can explain why you prefer your original wording. - Haukur 10:36, 4 January 2006 (UTC)
For articles on people some minor practical exceptions are contained in Wikipedia:Naming conventions (people)
Okay, so it's an exception from the "common names" principle. But what makes it a "minor and practical" one? Can I call my Norse mythology guideline a minor practical exception too? :) - Haukur 10:59, 4 January 2006 (UTC)
This doesn't mean that the people NC should deliberately choose a formulation that is in opposition to the "names and titles" NC. -- Francis Schonken 11:13, 4 January 2006 (UTC)For articles on people some minor practical exceptions are contained in Wikipedia:Naming conventions (people) - these are however hardly sufficient to cover the complexities for naming royals and other nobility: hence Wikipedia:Naming conventions (names and titles), and several other nobility-related Naming Conventions guidelines, contain many detailed exceptions.
I put in a request that Thomas F. Bayard (1828-1898) be moved to Thomas F. Bayard, Sr.. In Talk:Thomas F. Bayard (1828-1898)#Requested move, stilltim opposed this and wrote that:
I think that stilltim has a point, especially when you deal with political families in which you need to distinguish between several individuals with the same name and nearly the same occupation. We can still have occupational disambiguators as redirects—as somebody has written, redirects are cheap—but the article itself should use the dates of birth and death as the parenthetical disambiguator, if one is needed. Moreover, it avoids clashes when an individual has engaged in several occupations, and it's not certain which one should dominate. In short, I propose the following rule to replace the current rule on parenthetial disambiguation:
Comments?
— DLJessup ( talk) 04:59, 10 January 2006 (UTC)
This should certainly not be unconditional policy. The Bayards were mostly Ametican politicians, so occupation does not disambiguate them well. But consider the essentially occupational split of William Morris (disambiguation), which is much clearer than dates. (I'm sure there are better examples.)
For the Bayards, I would prefer, and seriously recommend, doing what is customary for non-royal English families: find a good complete genealogy, and distinguish by (parenthesized) roman numerals. Dusambiguating by dates should be the last resort, not the first, if only out of kindness to the readers. Septentrionalis 06:52, 10 January 2006 (UTC)
I see several objections on this page, and absolutely no support from anyone except its creator. That clearly isn't a consensus. Nor is it clear what its intended scope is with regard pre-existing NC pages that overlap with it. More plausible descriptors for this would seem to be "proposed guideline", "rejected guideline", or "essay". In full anticipation of a reponse freely using the word "nonsense", Alai 04:04, 24 January 2006 (UTC)
I don't know if this is the right venue to discuss this, but I have noticed two problems with the naming convention on wikipedia for Dutchmen whose family name starts with the word "Van" (eg Marco van Basten):
Please let me know where shall we have the above issues resolved. Thanks. -- Pkchan 16:52, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
(edit conflict, sorry, if this repeats most of Eugene's answer:)
Tx for the extra clarifications! Of course, in English wikipedia the "principle of least surprise" is best applied for what the majority of the visitors of the English encyclopedia would expect.
As far as the upper case/lower case v's are concerned Belgium and the Netherlands apply *exactly* the same rules (it's only the sorting that is different), apart from maybe the old rule that nobility have a lower case - that applies to, for example, "d'Udekem d'Acoz" (nobility) or "D'Hondt" (no nobility), but I think the system is no longer in use, and even don't know whether it ever applied to van/Van. As I said some Belgian archives use the Dutch sorting system (I assisted in designing a database system for an archive in Antwerp once, they required *two separate fields* for the last names, one for the "van"/"vanden"/"vander"/"van de"/... etc., if applicable; the sorting was done on the other surname field.
See also the three points I just added to Wikipedia:Categorization#Category sorting -- Francis Schonken 19:09, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
Martin Van Buren was New York Dutch, and alphabetizing him under B is violation of established usage. The same should apply to other American names of the same class, even when written separately, whatever is done about Belgian or Dutch names; and usually, as with Vanderbilt, they are written solidly. Septentrionalis 17:42, 11 March 2006 (UTC)
Many people are baptised and given more than one christian name (or similar for people of other religions), but then only one of the names are acctually used together with the surname. In the article about the person, all the names ought to be mentioned, but what is the best way of presenting them?
One example: Swedish olympic skier Anja Pärson's full name is Anja Sofia Tess Pärson, but noone calls her that (with the possible exception of letters from the Tax Authority). The article's name should of course be Anja Pärson, since this is what she is known as, but what is the best way of presenting the other names? I suggest the best way is to begin the article with the full name but with only the used names in bold letters, like this: Anja Sofia Tess Pärson. And Tony Blair should then be presented not as Anthony Charles Lynton Blair (as he is now) but as Anthony Charles Lynton (Tony) Blair on the page about him.
That's my opinion. What do you think? John Anderson 10:52, 24 February 2006 (UTC)
After a recent (friendly) dispute over an article name, I think this guide could use a little more clarification about widely used nicknames being okay for article titles. It seems that we name articles after a public person's nickname if they are almost exclusively known by that name, e.g. Prince (artist) and Madonna (entertainer). These are not exactly pen or stage names, as is kind of already adressed, it just left me a bit confused. Correct me if I'm wrong, but this page doesn't seem to explicitly say what to do with nicknames... it lead to some confusion with a less obvious example.
So uh, maybe I still sound a bit confused. I'll take a stab at improving the examples after I think about it a bit more, but I'd like to hear people's thoughts first. -- W.marsh 23:38, 22 March 2006 (UTC)
Dozens of famous people of Indian origin have been known by two initials plus their last name, where those first two initials are used in place of the first name. Just a few examples include P.C. Sorcar, V.S. Naipaul, and A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada. In each of these cases, the official spelling and punctuation of their names does NOT include a space between the first two initials. That is, P.C. Sorcar is correct, while P. C. Sorcar is not. Becuase of this usage amongst so many notable persons, I would propose that the Manual of Style specifically allows the correct usage in article names and articles. Thanks. Abpatak 05:57, 7 April 2006 (UTC)
Tx! - Re. the issue of whether to write "X.Y.<space><rest of name>" or "X.<space>Y.<space><rest of name>" I maybe should clarify a bit:
So,
-- Francis Schonken 08:17, 9 April 2006 (UTC)
Page moves I've been moving pages that are titled "X.Y. Lastname" and "X.Y. Lastname" to "X. Y. Lastname" for two reasons:
I'm going to continue unless I get a compelling reason to do otherwise. Let me know what you think. - Justin (koavf)· T· C· M 15:04, 23 August 2006 (UTC)
I must admit that I rarely if ever see spaces added. I always see J.F.K. never J. F. K. , F.D.R. not F. D. R. Similarly Irish people write of
W.T. Cosgrave, not W. T. Cosgrave.
FearÉIREANN
\
(caint) 23:52, 2 September 2006 (UTC)
What was the result of this discussion? There should definately be a mention of this in this naming convention page, which should also clarify that South Indian initials are not the same as Western initials. South Indians do not generally use surnames, but instead the two/three initials denote name of birthplace and father, and the full name is the personal name. -- Soman 13:07, 8 June 2007 (UTC)
There is no logic in NOT presenting a name the way it is actually used. I've been debating about a Tampa Bay Devil Rays pitcher, J.P. Howell. He is not known as J. P. Howell. Anywhere. It is always J.P. Howell, anywhere you see it. Except here. This makes no sense to me. Name of MLB players should be taken from the official league website, and on there it is J.P. Howell, like it is anywhere else. This "style" should not overrule the way his name actually is. Chris Nelson 21:15, 28 June 2007 (UTC)
Hi, does anyone know of a precedent for this particular issue? There's a researcher by the name of Danah Boyd (or depending who you ask, danah boyd), who when interviewed or quoted in major media (NY Times, USA Today, NPR, Fox News, etc.), has her name spelled as Danah Boyd. However, she is requesting (in rather strong terms) that her Wikipedia bio have the spelling that she personally prefers, which is "danah boyd". So, which version should the Wikipedia article title use? -- Elonka 22:41, 16 April 2006 (UTC)
Though I am sure that there is one somewhere, I cannot find any concrete recommendation on the use of regular titles (e.g. Ms., Mr., Fr., Rev.) within articles. I came to think of this when I found these articles:
Nevermind that these articles are likely to be in breach of other guidelines. It does not seem very attractive to list names with titles in the manner that has been done. rxnd ( t | € | c ) 10:08, 29 April 2006 (UTC)
The guideline states
Ordinals Examples: * Henry VIII (for monarchs this is usually combined with the previous, so the page name is actually Henry VIII of England) * Henry Ford II (Grandson of Henry Ford) * Martin Luther King III Disambiguation: only when naming the ordinal explicitly is the commonest way to refer to the person.
However I've encountered several cases when ordinals are used when the individual in question never used such format in their lives. For instance see the Josiah Wedgwood (disambiguation) page. As far as I know none of the Josiah Wedgwoods ever used ordinals and note that they aren't even in strict father son order (and the first and most famous Josiah Wedgwood doesn't have an ordinal). The same happens with the Joseph Frys and Joseph Storrs Frys (see Fry Family (Chocolate). Admittedly most of these don't yet have separate articles (and may never do so). In both cases many of the people with the same name are in the same business (pottery for Wedgwoods and chocolate making for Frys) so occupation disambiguation doesn't help. Yet I don't think wikipedia should be creating an usage that doesn't already exist. I would prefer dates in such cases. Do others have other suggestions?
Afaik, the family tree issue is non-relevant. Compare Johann Strauss III, Sextus Julius Caesar I etc... only the format of the name that is usually used for disambiguation between people with the same name. If it's an ordinal, then it's an ordinal; if it's something else, then it's something else; if there's no *usual* disambiguation format, then use a parenthical disambiguator. -- Francis Schonken 07:11, 26 August 2006 (UTC)
I would suggest revising the current section on nicknames, stage names, et. al. Specifically the sections relating to wrestler B.G. James. B.G. James is incorrectly listed as a stage name, when in fact it is really a character name. The characters on wrestling shows are generally trademarked by the companies, and most wrestlers are forbidden from portraying that character for another company. WWF (now WWE) actually sued WCW over this multiple times. Proper practice here should be to index the individual wrestlers under their real names, NOT their character names, especially since most wrestlers portray multiple characters over the course of their careers. Character names should generally redirect to the wrestler who plays the character, unless there is a particular reason for giving the character its own page separate and apart from the wrestler (c.f. Doug Ross, George Clooney). Indeed, in the example given, B.G. James is indexed under his real name (Brian Gerard James), which makes it that much more strange that the guideline seems to suggest using the character name instead.
I wanted to mention (half of you probably saw it already via your watchlists to some extent) that I sort of went on a rampage just now changing as many NJ-related names with "Jr." or "Sr." in them to not have commas. Therefore, Thomas Kean, Jr. became Thomas Kean Jr.. I did this for two main reasons:
I hope this isn't a big deal, but it just seems more fitting, and I think it looks better. One other thing to keep in mind is that when doing it in reverse name order, use the comma. Kean, Thomas, Jr., not Kean Jr., Thomas. // MrD9 04:43, 28 February 2006 (UTC)
I have seen it both ways on Wikipedia, and ironically, William Strunk Jr. has no comma (well, maybe it's not that ironic... I will, however, submit it to MOS (prob. tomorrow). I simply thought removing them would be much easier than trying to go thrhough them adding commas, and if anyone's strongly opposed, I'll go back and revert/remove/add-in-commas. // MrD9 23:47, 1 March 2006 (UTC)
I ended up having time today, so the proposal. // MrD9 00:24, 2 March 2006 (UTC)
Has anything become of this discussion? Wikipedia:Naming_conventions_(people)#Senior_and_junior still notes "In the case of senior/junior the most common format, that is, adding ', Sr.' or alternatively ', Jr.' after the name, is preferred." (Among other concerns listed above, according to whom is this "the most common format?") Alan smithee 20:33, 6 July 2006 (UTC)
It may also be useful to point out in the policy that the titles of most of our articles on baseball players from Latin America retain the accents on the accented letters in the players' names. Our ice hockey articles, like the Petr Prucha example already cited in the policy, tend to use more Americanized spellings. -- Idont Havaname ( Talk) 01:24, 19 July 2006 (UTC)
My proposal is to permit middle names to appear in the title when the article for that title has not been created yet (red title). It doesn't have to be in the title itself, it could just be shown in the pop-up window. That could provide an instant disambiguation or knowledge of a fact that otherwise could not be found elsewhere on the Wikipedia. This is specially useful for sports database, where the chance for two names to coincide is extremely high. -- Arinsau 09:00, 2 August 2006 (UTC)
Could we agree on a convention concerning the naming of sub-articles for people. For example should we use the format "... of someone" (like Early life of Jan Smuts) or "Someone's ..." (like Isaac Newton's early life and achievements)? CG 19:29, 9 September 2006 (UTC)
Suggestions if and to what we should rename this article would be appreciated. The person, from royal family, was never given any surname or nickname, and was the daughter of King of Poland and Grand Duke of Lithuania - but Jadwiga of Poland is already taken...-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk 22:53, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
What is Wikipedia's purpose? To be an adjunct of a famous person's marketing arm? To tell the facts as is?
I'll go for the second option, that factual accuracy is important at Wikipedia.
If so, why do we play into marketing efforts and use incorrect names for famous people for article titles? For example, why is the article named Paul Reubens but not his actual name, Paul Rubenfeld? How about Tom Hanks versus Thomas Jeffrey Hanks? Or Demi Moore versus Demetria Gene Guynes?
If someone types the stage name into the search engine, a simple redirect can direct the person to the proper page.
Nova SS 02:53, 4 October 2006 (UTC)
We have an article about a Swedish nobleman with the obviously inappropriate article title of Axel von Fersen, Jr., but I have no idea what the article should be called. Can someone who knows how Scandinavian nobles called themselves help out? - Jmabel | Talk 03:33, 30 October 2006 (UTC)
I have witnessed several debates about the people whose nickname is so "conjoined" with their real name to the extent that they're seldom if ever referred to without it. See:
etc.
I think that an addition to section "Nick names, pen names, stage names, cognomens" is called for, in order to justify that, relatively common but also relatively opposed practice; current wording of the section is not clear enough. I suggest ammendment along the lines:
Note, however, that many pages in scope of Wikiproject professional wrestling don't match it; they may be listed as exception or changed to fit. Opinions welcome in any case. Duja ► 10:24, 2 November 2006 (UTC)
Does the article Helmuth von Moltke the Elder follow with the Elder/Younger guidlines? The elder was not referenced in his time as the elder. Should the article be moved to "Helmuth Graf von Moltke", since he is more renouned as a Count than as an Elder? Xlegiofalco 22:23, 10 November 2006 (UTC)
This page is woefully lacking in guidance with regard to those huge numbers of people known by various versions of their names, whether this occurs in different fields of activity (stage names, pen names, etc.), in different times (after a change of residence), and in different languages or whatever, and especially names that have been Anglicized. This is very common, something that applies to thousands of articles on Wikipedia and needs much more than what is available now.
People move. They often use different versions of their name after they move, adapting to the conventions, the language, and the alphabet or other writing system in the place to which they have moved. Other people are known because of competitions in which they participate, because of books they write, and so on. Sometimes an author's name will appear differently on books translated to another language than it did in the original publication. The English-language versions will have the greatest effect on how a person is known in English.
Usually it is the last version used for the person's name, not the first, which will be most relevant to how they are generally known, especially for people who lived in the past two or three centuries.
Up above, there are many people who take issue with both User:195.70.32.136's and Novasource/Nova SS's ideas about "birth names" and some magical "correctness" inherent in them. The notion that this would automatically be the proper choice for the one slot available for an article's title has been resoundingly rejected not only in the discussions above, but in many other discussions spread throughout Wikipedia. Many have made it clear that this is not supposed to be the Wikipedia policy, including, it looks to me, like the following editors at least:
#Wikipedia articles about people are badly titled
#Pseudonyms: is Wikipedia about marketing or correctness?
It is time for those who follow this page to get out of their ivory towers, get off their duffs and get out in the trenches where real editors such as User:Mibelz are making real moves of articles on the same nonsense notion of some "correct" name being the person's birth name (but in the spelling conventions common in some 20th century version of some foreign language, not necessarily any spelling ever actually used).
Reverting these moves is under discussion at Talk:Árpád Élő. Is anybody ready to back up the platitudes discussed here with some work out in the trenches to see that standard naming conventions practices are followed? Gene Nygaard 20:10, 18 November 2006 (UTC)
I did not find this addressed on this page or on the main naming conventions page (the closest thing I found was a related discussion on this talk page that did not come to a conclusion). I am wondering if it is ever appropriate to have a nickname appear in quotation marks, and if it is sometimes appropriate, when. I think that when it is decided, it should be added to the naming conventions page for people. My opinion is that the nickname should not appear in quotations unless the person's name is almost always written that way. I think that very few names would qualify. Finally, I think that double quotes (") should be used. -- Kjkolb 12:34, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
I have come across two articles about famous people who either have heritage or birth in non-English speaking countries, who are not known to use accents in their names currently, but in whose articles editors have chosen to spell their names with accents. Richard Ramírez and Roman Polański. There isn't much question that in their ancestral languages the names would be spelled with accents/diacriticals. Nor is there any question that they do not use them now. Should Wikipedia correct subjects who "misspell" their own names? Should we add some language to the guideline to cover these types of cases? - Will Beback · † · 01:36, 6 January 2007 (UTC)
PS: I see there has been some discussion on this matter at Talk:Jennifer Lopez#Diacritic/accent mark on her last name. - Will Beback · † · 01:50, 6 January 2007 (UTC)
Generally I have used, for example, (actor), (musician), (politican), (footballer) or (cyclist). That is, a word describing what the person IS (or what they are best known for being.) I have seen people use (baseball) and (basketball) lately. This would imply that the person is a baseball etc. I have never seen a musician or politician disambiguated by (music) or (politics). For consistency, shouldn't we use (baseballer) or (basketballer) ?? -- Chuq 04:20, 13 March 2007 (UTC)
I'm sure this is a FAQ, but if somebody who knows these guidelines inside out could help save me trawling through page after page:
Asian people known in their country by Lastname Firstname are nonetheless named Firstname Lastname on the English Wikipedia? i.e. Lee Ji-hyun (family name Lee) should actually be Ji-hyun Lee.
Correct? Incorrect? Not as simple as all that? :) -- kingboyk 20:57, 27 March 2007 (UTC)
I have noticed that on Wikipedie generally Chinese people (Such as Mao Zedong) are listed with their surname followed by their given name as is the convention in China. However the Japanese people that I looked up (such as Akira Kurosawa) are listed with their given name followed by their family name despite the fact that in Japan the family name is always given first. Does anyone know why this is? Is it because the Japanese names are more recognisable to English readers in that format?
If the stage or pen name has capital or lower case letters that do not fit standard English do we use there capitals and lower cases or do we use standard English ones? and also do we use the same conventions when its not a page name and just refering to the person as we use when it is a page name in this context Shimonnyman 22:41, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
As Justine Henin-Hardenne is now divorced and goes by Justine Henin, is there an alternate example for the one currently used on the page? -- Fbv 65 e del / ☑t / ☛c || 21:39, 29 April 2007 (UTC)
The section "nick names, pen names, stage names, cognomens" might need some updating/correction. Two of the examples currently differ in citation and reality. ENeville 15:54, 24 July 2007 (UTC)
There seems to be some dispute about whether we should use "actress" as a parenthetical for people who have to be disambiguated (examples: Savannah (actress), Grace Park (actress), Jane Seymour (actress), Kate Walsh (actor), Jane Kennedy (actor), Anne Lockhart (actor)). Both conventions are used in modern English, but I think "actor" might be gaining ground. Should this be treated as an American/British English sort of issue? I'm worried that needless page move disputes might result without a clear rule here. Cool Hand Luke 03:54, 16 August 2007 (UTC)
I see there's no single rule for writing Uzbek names in Wikipedia articles. Names of Uzbek persons are transliterated from Russian, but Uzbek language uses latin script, so there's no need to transliterate. -- Abdullais4u 08:50, 24 August 2007 (UTC)
I understand the reasoning behind naming articles by the most common name. However, isn't this an encyclopedia? Shouldn't we use real names instead of stage names? For example, Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson's page is currently titled The Rock (entertainer), but I think it should be Dwayne Johnson, because that's his real name. I understand that we want more people to find wikipedia, but isn't seeming more like an encyclopedia more important? I thought that was the goal of Wikipedia. 70.109.106.170 19:25, 19 September 2007 (UTC)
I see this guideline, and think that it is US-centric:
For abbreviated names (if these are the most used) every abbreviation is followed by a point, and every point is followed by a single space. Punctuation marks are generally discouraged in article names (see below): if the version with the first and middle names written in full is used nearly as often as the version with abbreviated names, prefer the version with these names written in full.
Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style#Acronyms_and_abbreviations is flexible on dots, and I think this submanual should reflect that by not insisting on dots and spaces in name initials. Tony (talk) 13:35, 11 October 2007 (UTC)
In view of the current debate at MOS talk, I propose that the text here be changed to soften the insistence on dots and spaces. I will do so next week, unless compelling arguments are put against such a move. Tony (talk) 00:56, 12 October 2007 (UTC)
Keep a minimal version at least. In the interest of consistency, I would very much like to see the project page specify that the format with spaces and dots (or even some other one for that matter) be a format that should always exist, either in the article name or in a redirect or disambiguation page going to the article. Gene Nygaard 18:03, 18 October 2007 (UTC)
Examples: John F. Kennedy, Thomas John Barnardo, Annie M. G. Schmidt
For abbreviated names (if these are the most used) every abbreviation is followed by a point, and every point is followed by a single space. Punctuation marks are generally discouraged in article names (see below): if the version with the first and middle names written in full is used nearly as often as the version with abbreviated names, prefer the version with these names written in full.
An abbreviation of a first or last name (or omitting punctuation marks and spaces as described above) is only possible if this can be considered as a well established and generally used subject's name or nickname, see section about pen names, nicknames and cognomens below. In all of these cases, use forenames (whether middle name, first name or another given name) as most usual: for some people not the first name, but another forename is usually written in full, for example, F. Scott Fitzgerald.
Adding middle names, or their abbreviations, merely for disambiguation purposes (that is: if this format of the name is not the commonly used one to refer to this person) is not advised.
I suggest the following as a replacement for this confusing, disorganised and disputed text:
In deciding whether to use initials or words—and if initials, their formatting—three matters should be considered, in this order: (1) the preferences of the named person; (2) standard usage in the literature; and (3) the acceptable formattings in the variety of English used in the article. The possible formattings on Wikipedia are as follows.
*Pointed and spaced (M. P. K. Halliday).
*Pointed and unspaced, except that the last initial is followed by a single space (M.P.K. Halliday).
*Unpointed and unspaced, except that the last initial is followed by a single space (MPK Halliday).
Punctuation marks are generally discouraged in article names (see below): if a version with the first and middle names written in full is used nearly as often as the version with abbreviated names, prefer the version with these names written in full.
Tony (talk) 09:03, 24 October 2007 (UTC)
It's not long and the talk page is moribund—it would benefit from being subject to a larger talk page. Tony (talk) 00:27, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
"2.34 People
and Mormons, and Old Norse, and Legistlation in the UK;
yet much more significant aspects are cordoned off into subpages? Doesn't make sense. Tony (talk) 01:38, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
![]() | This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
Archive 1 | Archive 2 | Archive 3 | Archive 4 | Archive 5 | → | Archive 10 |
You're adding a new paragraph, Francis, and your wording sounds to me like it goes against the "most common" principle which is why I made that slight change. Maybe you can explain why you prefer your original wording. - Haukur 10:36, 4 January 2006 (UTC)
For articles on people some minor practical exceptions are contained in Wikipedia:Naming conventions (people)
Okay, so it's an exception from the "common names" principle. But what makes it a "minor and practical" one? Can I call my Norse mythology guideline a minor practical exception too? :) - Haukur 10:59, 4 January 2006 (UTC)
This doesn't mean that the people NC should deliberately choose a formulation that is in opposition to the "names and titles" NC. -- Francis Schonken 11:13, 4 January 2006 (UTC)For articles on people some minor practical exceptions are contained in Wikipedia:Naming conventions (people) - these are however hardly sufficient to cover the complexities for naming royals and other nobility: hence Wikipedia:Naming conventions (names and titles), and several other nobility-related Naming Conventions guidelines, contain many detailed exceptions.
I put in a request that Thomas F. Bayard (1828-1898) be moved to Thomas F. Bayard, Sr.. In Talk:Thomas F. Bayard (1828-1898)#Requested move, stilltim opposed this and wrote that:
I think that stilltim has a point, especially when you deal with political families in which you need to distinguish between several individuals with the same name and nearly the same occupation. We can still have occupational disambiguators as redirects—as somebody has written, redirects are cheap—but the article itself should use the dates of birth and death as the parenthetical disambiguator, if one is needed. Moreover, it avoids clashes when an individual has engaged in several occupations, and it's not certain which one should dominate. In short, I propose the following rule to replace the current rule on parenthetial disambiguation:
Comments?
— DLJessup ( talk) 04:59, 10 January 2006 (UTC)
This should certainly not be unconditional policy. The Bayards were mostly Ametican politicians, so occupation does not disambiguate them well. But consider the essentially occupational split of William Morris (disambiguation), which is much clearer than dates. (I'm sure there are better examples.)
For the Bayards, I would prefer, and seriously recommend, doing what is customary for non-royal English families: find a good complete genealogy, and distinguish by (parenthesized) roman numerals. Dusambiguating by dates should be the last resort, not the first, if only out of kindness to the readers. Septentrionalis 06:52, 10 January 2006 (UTC)
I see several objections on this page, and absolutely no support from anyone except its creator. That clearly isn't a consensus. Nor is it clear what its intended scope is with regard pre-existing NC pages that overlap with it. More plausible descriptors for this would seem to be "proposed guideline", "rejected guideline", or "essay". In full anticipation of a reponse freely using the word "nonsense", Alai 04:04, 24 January 2006 (UTC)
I don't know if this is the right venue to discuss this, but I have noticed two problems with the naming convention on wikipedia for Dutchmen whose family name starts with the word "Van" (eg Marco van Basten):
Please let me know where shall we have the above issues resolved. Thanks. -- Pkchan 16:52, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
(edit conflict, sorry, if this repeats most of Eugene's answer:)
Tx for the extra clarifications! Of course, in English wikipedia the "principle of least surprise" is best applied for what the majority of the visitors of the English encyclopedia would expect.
As far as the upper case/lower case v's are concerned Belgium and the Netherlands apply *exactly* the same rules (it's only the sorting that is different), apart from maybe the old rule that nobility have a lower case - that applies to, for example, "d'Udekem d'Acoz" (nobility) or "D'Hondt" (no nobility), but I think the system is no longer in use, and even don't know whether it ever applied to van/Van. As I said some Belgian archives use the Dutch sorting system (I assisted in designing a database system for an archive in Antwerp once, they required *two separate fields* for the last names, one for the "van"/"vanden"/"vander"/"van de"/... etc., if applicable; the sorting was done on the other surname field.
See also the three points I just added to Wikipedia:Categorization#Category sorting -- Francis Schonken 19:09, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
Martin Van Buren was New York Dutch, and alphabetizing him under B is violation of established usage. The same should apply to other American names of the same class, even when written separately, whatever is done about Belgian or Dutch names; and usually, as with Vanderbilt, they are written solidly. Septentrionalis 17:42, 11 March 2006 (UTC)
Many people are baptised and given more than one christian name (or similar for people of other religions), but then only one of the names are acctually used together with the surname. In the article about the person, all the names ought to be mentioned, but what is the best way of presenting them?
One example: Swedish olympic skier Anja Pärson's full name is Anja Sofia Tess Pärson, but noone calls her that (with the possible exception of letters from the Tax Authority). The article's name should of course be Anja Pärson, since this is what she is known as, but what is the best way of presenting the other names? I suggest the best way is to begin the article with the full name but with only the used names in bold letters, like this: Anja Sofia Tess Pärson. And Tony Blair should then be presented not as Anthony Charles Lynton Blair (as he is now) but as Anthony Charles Lynton (Tony) Blair on the page about him.
That's my opinion. What do you think? John Anderson 10:52, 24 February 2006 (UTC)
After a recent (friendly) dispute over an article name, I think this guide could use a little more clarification about widely used nicknames being okay for article titles. It seems that we name articles after a public person's nickname if they are almost exclusively known by that name, e.g. Prince (artist) and Madonna (entertainer). These are not exactly pen or stage names, as is kind of already adressed, it just left me a bit confused. Correct me if I'm wrong, but this page doesn't seem to explicitly say what to do with nicknames... it lead to some confusion with a less obvious example.
So uh, maybe I still sound a bit confused. I'll take a stab at improving the examples after I think about it a bit more, but I'd like to hear people's thoughts first. -- W.marsh 23:38, 22 March 2006 (UTC)
Dozens of famous people of Indian origin have been known by two initials plus their last name, where those first two initials are used in place of the first name. Just a few examples include P.C. Sorcar, V.S. Naipaul, and A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada. In each of these cases, the official spelling and punctuation of their names does NOT include a space between the first two initials. That is, P.C. Sorcar is correct, while P. C. Sorcar is not. Becuase of this usage amongst so many notable persons, I would propose that the Manual of Style specifically allows the correct usage in article names and articles. Thanks. Abpatak 05:57, 7 April 2006 (UTC)
Tx! - Re. the issue of whether to write "X.Y.<space><rest of name>" or "X.<space>Y.<space><rest of name>" I maybe should clarify a bit:
So,
-- Francis Schonken 08:17, 9 April 2006 (UTC)
Page moves I've been moving pages that are titled "X.Y. Lastname" and "X.Y. Lastname" to "X. Y. Lastname" for two reasons:
I'm going to continue unless I get a compelling reason to do otherwise. Let me know what you think. - Justin (koavf)· T· C· M 15:04, 23 August 2006 (UTC)
I must admit that I rarely if ever see spaces added. I always see J.F.K. never J. F. K. , F.D.R. not F. D. R. Similarly Irish people write of
W.T. Cosgrave, not W. T. Cosgrave.
FearÉIREANN
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(caint) 23:52, 2 September 2006 (UTC)
What was the result of this discussion? There should definately be a mention of this in this naming convention page, which should also clarify that South Indian initials are not the same as Western initials. South Indians do not generally use surnames, but instead the two/three initials denote name of birthplace and father, and the full name is the personal name. -- Soman 13:07, 8 June 2007 (UTC)
There is no logic in NOT presenting a name the way it is actually used. I've been debating about a Tampa Bay Devil Rays pitcher, J.P. Howell. He is not known as J. P. Howell. Anywhere. It is always J.P. Howell, anywhere you see it. Except here. This makes no sense to me. Name of MLB players should be taken from the official league website, and on there it is J.P. Howell, like it is anywhere else. This "style" should not overrule the way his name actually is. Chris Nelson 21:15, 28 June 2007 (UTC)
Hi, does anyone know of a precedent for this particular issue? There's a researcher by the name of Danah Boyd (or depending who you ask, danah boyd), who when interviewed or quoted in major media (NY Times, USA Today, NPR, Fox News, etc.), has her name spelled as Danah Boyd. However, she is requesting (in rather strong terms) that her Wikipedia bio have the spelling that she personally prefers, which is "danah boyd". So, which version should the Wikipedia article title use? -- Elonka 22:41, 16 April 2006 (UTC)
Though I am sure that there is one somewhere, I cannot find any concrete recommendation on the use of regular titles (e.g. Ms., Mr., Fr., Rev.) within articles. I came to think of this when I found these articles:
Nevermind that these articles are likely to be in breach of other guidelines. It does not seem very attractive to list names with titles in the manner that has been done. rxnd ( t | € | c ) 10:08, 29 April 2006 (UTC)
The guideline states
Ordinals Examples: * Henry VIII (for monarchs this is usually combined with the previous, so the page name is actually Henry VIII of England) * Henry Ford II (Grandson of Henry Ford) * Martin Luther King III Disambiguation: only when naming the ordinal explicitly is the commonest way to refer to the person.
However I've encountered several cases when ordinals are used when the individual in question never used such format in their lives. For instance see the Josiah Wedgwood (disambiguation) page. As far as I know none of the Josiah Wedgwoods ever used ordinals and note that they aren't even in strict father son order (and the first and most famous Josiah Wedgwood doesn't have an ordinal). The same happens with the Joseph Frys and Joseph Storrs Frys (see Fry Family (Chocolate). Admittedly most of these don't yet have separate articles (and may never do so). In both cases many of the people with the same name are in the same business (pottery for Wedgwoods and chocolate making for Frys) so occupation disambiguation doesn't help. Yet I don't think wikipedia should be creating an usage that doesn't already exist. I would prefer dates in such cases. Do others have other suggestions?
Afaik, the family tree issue is non-relevant. Compare Johann Strauss III, Sextus Julius Caesar I etc... only the format of the name that is usually used for disambiguation between people with the same name. If it's an ordinal, then it's an ordinal; if it's something else, then it's something else; if there's no *usual* disambiguation format, then use a parenthical disambiguator. -- Francis Schonken 07:11, 26 August 2006 (UTC)
I would suggest revising the current section on nicknames, stage names, et. al. Specifically the sections relating to wrestler B.G. James. B.G. James is incorrectly listed as a stage name, when in fact it is really a character name. The characters on wrestling shows are generally trademarked by the companies, and most wrestlers are forbidden from portraying that character for another company. WWF (now WWE) actually sued WCW over this multiple times. Proper practice here should be to index the individual wrestlers under their real names, NOT their character names, especially since most wrestlers portray multiple characters over the course of their careers. Character names should generally redirect to the wrestler who plays the character, unless there is a particular reason for giving the character its own page separate and apart from the wrestler (c.f. Doug Ross, George Clooney). Indeed, in the example given, B.G. James is indexed under his real name (Brian Gerard James), which makes it that much more strange that the guideline seems to suggest using the character name instead.
I wanted to mention (half of you probably saw it already via your watchlists to some extent) that I sort of went on a rampage just now changing as many NJ-related names with "Jr." or "Sr." in them to not have commas. Therefore, Thomas Kean, Jr. became Thomas Kean Jr.. I did this for two main reasons:
I hope this isn't a big deal, but it just seems more fitting, and I think it looks better. One other thing to keep in mind is that when doing it in reverse name order, use the comma. Kean, Thomas, Jr., not Kean Jr., Thomas. // MrD9 04:43, 28 February 2006 (UTC)
I have seen it both ways on Wikipedia, and ironically, William Strunk Jr. has no comma (well, maybe it's not that ironic... I will, however, submit it to MOS (prob. tomorrow). I simply thought removing them would be much easier than trying to go thrhough them adding commas, and if anyone's strongly opposed, I'll go back and revert/remove/add-in-commas. // MrD9 23:47, 1 March 2006 (UTC)
I ended up having time today, so the proposal. // MrD9 00:24, 2 March 2006 (UTC)
Has anything become of this discussion? Wikipedia:Naming_conventions_(people)#Senior_and_junior still notes "In the case of senior/junior the most common format, that is, adding ', Sr.' or alternatively ', Jr.' after the name, is preferred." (Among other concerns listed above, according to whom is this "the most common format?") Alan smithee 20:33, 6 July 2006 (UTC)
It may also be useful to point out in the policy that the titles of most of our articles on baseball players from Latin America retain the accents on the accented letters in the players' names. Our ice hockey articles, like the Petr Prucha example already cited in the policy, tend to use more Americanized spellings. -- Idont Havaname ( Talk) 01:24, 19 July 2006 (UTC)
My proposal is to permit middle names to appear in the title when the article for that title has not been created yet (red title). It doesn't have to be in the title itself, it could just be shown in the pop-up window. That could provide an instant disambiguation or knowledge of a fact that otherwise could not be found elsewhere on the Wikipedia. This is specially useful for sports database, where the chance for two names to coincide is extremely high. -- Arinsau 09:00, 2 August 2006 (UTC)
Could we agree on a convention concerning the naming of sub-articles for people. For example should we use the format "... of someone" (like Early life of Jan Smuts) or "Someone's ..." (like Isaac Newton's early life and achievements)? CG 19:29, 9 September 2006 (UTC)
Suggestions if and to what we should rename this article would be appreciated. The person, from royal family, was never given any surname or nickname, and was the daughter of King of Poland and Grand Duke of Lithuania - but Jadwiga of Poland is already taken...-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk 22:53, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
What is Wikipedia's purpose? To be an adjunct of a famous person's marketing arm? To tell the facts as is?
I'll go for the second option, that factual accuracy is important at Wikipedia.
If so, why do we play into marketing efforts and use incorrect names for famous people for article titles? For example, why is the article named Paul Reubens but not his actual name, Paul Rubenfeld? How about Tom Hanks versus Thomas Jeffrey Hanks? Or Demi Moore versus Demetria Gene Guynes?
If someone types the stage name into the search engine, a simple redirect can direct the person to the proper page.
Nova SS 02:53, 4 October 2006 (UTC)
We have an article about a Swedish nobleman with the obviously inappropriate article title of Axel von Fersen, Jr., but I have no idea what the article should be called. Can someone who knows how Scandinavian nobles called themselves help out? - Jmabel | Talk 03:33, 30 October 2006 (UTC)
I have witnessed several debates about the people whose nickname is so "conjoined" with their real name to the extent that they're seldom if ever referred to without it. See:
etc.
I think that an addition to section "Nick names, pen names, stage names, cognomens" is called for, in order to justify that, relatively common but also relatively opposed practice; current wording of the section is not clear enough. I suggest ammendment along the lines:
Note, however, that many pages in scope of Wikiproject professional wrestling don't match it; they may be listed as exception or changed to fit. Opinions welcome in any case. Duja ► 10:24, 2 November 2006 (UTC)
Does the article Helmuth von Moltke the Elder follow with the Elder/Younger guidlines? The elder was not referenced in his time as the elder. Should the article be moved to "Helmuth Graf von Moltke", since he is more renouned as a Count than as an Elder? Xlegiofalco 22:23, 10 November 2006 (UTC)
This page is woefully lacking in guidance with regard to those huge numbers of people known by various versions of their names, whether this occurs in different fields of activity (stage names, pen names, etc.), in different times (after a change of residence), and in different languages or whatever, and especially names that have been Anglicized. This is very common, something that applies to thousands of articles on Wikipedia and needs much more than what is available now.
People move. They often use different versions of their name after they move, adapting to the conventions, the language, and the alphabet or other writing system in the place to which they have moved. Other people are known because of competitions in which they participate, because of books they write, and so on. Sometimes an author's name will appear differently on books translated to another language than it did in the original publication. The English-language versions will have the greatest effect on how a person is known in English.
Usually it is the last version used for the person's name, not the first, which will be most relevant to how they are generally known, especially for people who lived in the past two or three centuries.
Up above, there are many people who take issue with both User:195.70.32.136's and Novasource/Nova SS's ideas about "birth names" and some magical "correctness" inherent in them. The notion that this would automatically be the proper choice for the one slot available for an article's title has been resoundingly rejected not only in the discussions above, but in many other discussions spread throughout Wikipedia. Many have made it clear that this is not supposed to be the Wikipedia policy, including, it looks to me, like the following editors at least:
#Wikipedia articles about people are badly titled
#Pseudonyms: is Wikipedia about marketing or correctness?
It is time for those who follow this page to get out of their ivory towers, get off their duffs and get out in the trenches where real editors such as User:Mibelz are making real moves of articles on the same nonsense notion of some "correct" name being the person's birth name (but in the spelling conventions common in some 20th century version of some foreign language, not necessarily any spelling ever actually used).
Reverting these moves is under discussion at Talk:Árpád Élő. Is anybody ready to back up the platitudes discussed here with some work out in the trenches to see that standard naming conventions practices are followed? Gene Nygaard 20:10, 18 November 2006 (UTC)
I did not find this addressed on this page or on the main naming conventions page (the closest thing I found was a related discussion on this talk page that did not come to a conclusion). I am wondering if it is ever appropriate to have a nickname appear in quotation marks, and if it is sometimes appropriate, when. I think that when it is decided, it should be added to the naming conventions page for people. My opinion is that the nickname should not appear in quotations unless the person's name is almost always written that way. I think that very few names would qualify. Finally, I think that double quotes (") should be used. -- Kjkolb 12:34, 4 December 2006 (UTC)
I have come across two articles about famous people who either have heritage or birth in non-English speaking countries, who are not known to use accents in their names currently, but in whose articles editors have chosen to spell their names with accents. Richard Ramírez and Roman Polański. There isn't much question that in their ancestral languages the names would be spelled with accents/diacriticals. Nor is there any question that they do not use them now. Should Wikipedia correct subjects who "misspell" their own names? Should we add some language to the guideline to cover these types of cases? - Will Beback · † · 01:36, 6 January 2007 (UTC)
PS: I see there has been some discussion on this matter at Talk:Jennifer Lopez#Diacritic/accent mark on her last name. - Will Beback · † · 01:50, 6 January 2007 (UTC)
Generally I have used, for example, (actor), (musician), (politican), (footballer) or (cyclist). That is, a word describing what the person IS (or what they are best known for being.) I have seen people use (baseball) and (basketball) lately. This would imply that the person is a baseball etc. I have never seen a musician or politician disambiguated by (music) or (politics). For consistency, shouldn't we use (baseballer) or (basketballer) ?? -- Chuq 04:20, 13 March 2007 (UTC)
I'm sure this is a FAQ, but if somebody who knows these guidelines inside out could help save me trawling through page after page:
Asian people known in their country by Lastname Firstname are nonetheless named Firstname Lastname on the English Wikipedia? i.e. Lee Ji-hyun (family name Lee) should actually be Ji-hyun Lee.
Correct? Incorrect? Not as simple as all that? :) -- kingboyk 20:57, 27 March 2007 (UTC)
I have noticed that on Wikipedie generally Chinese people (Such as Mao Zedong) are listed with their surname followed by their given name as is the convention in China. However the Japanese people that I looked up (such as Akira Kurosawa) are listed with their given name followed by their family name despite the fact that in Japan the family name is always given first. Does anyone know why this is? Is it because the Japanese names are more recognisable to English readers in that format?
If the stage or pen name has capital or lower case letters that do not fit standard English do we use there capitals and lower cases or do we use standard English ones? and also do we use the same conventions when its not a page name and just refering to the person as we use when it is a page name in this context Shimonnyman 22:41, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
As Justine Henin-Hardenne is now divorced and goes by Justine Henin, is there an alternate example for the one currently used on the page? -- Fbv 65 e del / ☑t / ☛c || 21:39, 29 April 2007 (UTC)
The section "nick names, pen names, stage names, cognomens" might need some updating/correction. Two of the examples currently differ in citation and reality. ENeville 15:54, 24 July 2007 (UTC)
There seems to be some dispute about whether we should use "actress" as a parenthetical for people who have to be disambiguated (examples: Savannah (actress), Grace Park (actress), Jane Seymour (actress), Kate Walsh (actor), Jane Kennedy (actor), Anne Lockhart (actor)). Both conventions are used in modern English, but I think "actor" might be gaining ground. Should this be treated as an American/British English sort of issue? I'm worried that needless page move disputes might result without a clear rule here. Cool Hand Luke 03:54, 16 August 2007 (UTC)
I see there's no single rule for writing Uzbek names in Wikipedia articles. Names of Uzbek persons are transliterated from Russian, but Uzbek language uses latin script, so there's no need to transliterate. -- Abdullais4u 08:50, 24 August 2007 (UTC)
I understand the reasoning behind naming articles by the most common name. However, isn't this an encyclopedia? Shouldn't we use real names instead of stage names? For example, Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson's page is currently titled The Rock (entertainer), but I think it should be Dwayne Johnson, because that's his real name. I understand that we want more people to find wikipedia, but isn't seeming more like an encyclopedia more important? I thought that was the goal of Wikipedia. 70.109.106.170 19:25, 19 September 2007 (UTC)
I see this guideline, and think that it is US-centric:
For abbreviated names (if these are the most used) every abbreviation is followed by a point, and every point is followed by a single space. Punctuation marks are generally discouraged in article names (see below): if the version with the first and middle names written in full is used nearly as often as the version with abbreviated names, prefer the version with these names written in full.
Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style#Acronyms_and_abbreviations is flexible on dots, and I think this submanual should reflect that by not insisting on dots and spaces in name initials. Tony (talk) 13:35, 11 October 2007 (UTC)
In view of the current debate at MOS talk, I propose that the text here be changed to soften the insistence on dots and spaces. I will do so next week, unless compelling arguments are put against such a move. Tony (talk) 00:56, 12 October 2007 (UTC)
Keep a minimal version at least. In the interest of consistency, I would very much like to see the project page specify that the format with spaces and dots (or even some other one for that matter) be a format that should always exist, either in the article name or in a redirect or disambiguation page going to the article. Gene Nygaard 18:03, 18 October 2007 (UTC)
Examples: John F. Kennedy, Thomas John Barnardo, Annie M. G. Schmidt
For abbreviated names (if these are the most used) every abbreviation is followed by a point, and every point is followed by a single space. Punctuation marks are generally discouraged in article names (see below): if the version with the first and middle names written in full is used nearly as often as the version with abbreviated names, prefer the version with these names written in full.
An abbreviation of a first or last name (or omitting punctuation marks and spaces as described above) is only possible if this can be considered as a well established and generally used subject's name or nickname, see section about pen names, nicknames and cognomens below. In all of these cases, use forenames (whether middle name, first name or another given name) as most usual: for some people not the first name, but another forename is usually written in full, for example, F. Scott Fitzgerald.
Adding middle names, or their abbreviations, merely for disambiguation purposes (that is: if this format of the name is not the commonly used one to refer to this person) is not advised.
I suggest the following as a replacement for this confusing, disorganised and disputed text:
In deciding whether to use initials or words—and if initials, their formatting—three matters should be considered, in this order: (1) the preferences of the named person; (2) standard usage in the literature; and (3) the acceptable formattings in the variety of English used in the article. The possible formattings on Wikipedia are as follows.
*Pointed and spaced (M. P. K. Halliday).
*Pointed and unspaced, except that the last initial is followed by a single space (M.P.K. Halliday).
*Unpointed and unspaced, except that the last initial is followed by a single space (MPK Halliday).
Punctuation marks are generally discouraged in article names (see below): if a version with the first and middle names written in full is used nearly as often as the version with abbreviated names, prefer the version with these names written in full.
Tony (talk) 09:03, 24 October 2007 (UTC)
It's not long and the talk page is moribund—it would benefit from being subject to a larger talk page. Tony (talk) 00:27, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
"2.34 People
and Mormons, and Old Norse, and Legistlation in the UK;
yet much more significant aspects are cordoned off into subpages? Doesn't make sense. Tony (talk) 01:38, 10 November 2007 (UTC)