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Welcome to the MOS pit[Humor]


    Style discussions elsewhere

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    Add a link to new discussions at top of list and indicate what kind of discussion it is (move request, RfC, open discussion, deletion discussion, etc.). Follow the links to participate, if interested. Move to Concluded when decided, and summarize conclusion. Please keep this section at the top of the page.

    Current

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    (newest on top)

    Pretty stale but not "concluded":

    Capitalization-specific:

    This section is an excerpt from Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Capital letters § Current.[edit]

    Move requests:

    Other discussions:

    Pretty stale but not "concluded":

    Concluded

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    Extended content
    This section is an excerpt from Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Capital letters § Concluded.[edit]
    Capitalization-specific:
    2024
    2023
    2022
    2021

    CONFORM question

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    In Korean, the tilde "~" is used for number ranges, e.g. "1945~1946". If this is in the title of a Korean-language work being cited, do we convert the tilde to an endash (e.g. "1945–1946") per MOS:CONFORM? I don't know if we should. I feel like CONFORM is mostly for when works are English-language, but the current wording doesn't cover that. seefooddiet (talk) 06:24, 23 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

    I'd treat this analogous to embedded quotation marks in foreign-language quotations, about which the text says: "If there are nested quotations, follow the rules for correct punctuation in that language" (emphasis added). So typographical details in foreign-language quotations are not modified to fit English conventions (which would indeed be odd) but remain true to the surrounding language. So if year ranges in Korean are written like that, I'd preserve that verbatim too – every foreign-language title is effectively a short quotation from that language. Gawaon (talk) 09:40, 23 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Thanks for the reply, I agree with you. I think we should reword MOS:CONFORM to include that nuance. seefooddiet (talk) 09:55, 23 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    I agree with using the tilde in a non-English-language quote or title for the same reasons Gawaon expressed. If the quote or title is translated from Korean to English, I'd assume the date range would also be translated to English with an en dash. Whether it's worth adding one more thing to our already long Manual of Style is another question, unless it can be shown that this is a frequent problem. When it is used, I would mark it with a {{not a typo |~}} template because most people will not be aware of that convention. SchreiberBike | ⌨  17:19, 23 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    I think the wording could be adjusted to not add notable length, maybe a few characters but I don't think that's much to write home about. Currently the wording implies changes should be made regardless of the language of the source. If I started following this discussion, I'd be in violation of the letter of the MOS. seefooddiet (talk) 18:06, 23 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    "But... in English, ~ means "approximately". "The entity weighed ~100 tons". "Korean Person (1408~1479)" kind of indicates that her exact death year is unknown. Yes the spacing is wrong, should be "Korean Person (1408 - ~1479)". Yes we are not supposed to use ~ for that but rather use circa -"Korean Person(1408 - c. 1479)" and always do in my experience. Yes AFAIK ~ is not best standard English and we don't do that for anything. The reader does not know this. She does or might know that ~ means approximately. Herostratus (talk) 02:56, 24 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    It's true that ~ means "approximately" in English, but the Korean writing system is a separate system. It seems strange to bend Korean practices to English practices in fully Korean-language text. I'm not sure if that's what you're suggesting we should do btw; it's a little hard for me to understand what your overarching point is seefooddiet (talk) 05:41, 24 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Note that we're talking about citing the original titles of works written in Korean here. It has nothing to do with writing about Koreans or Korean topics in English. Gawaon (talk) 17:21, 25 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Ah, right, did not get that at first. Yeah for titles I can see a fair case for keeping the tilde... altho for titles do we not format them into title case (e.g. "Smith's article 'The day I became a genius' sucked...", would we not render that as "Smith's article 'The Day I Became a Genius' sucked..."? (Some publications use sentence case for titles, and wouldn't this be similar?) Not sure, asking. But keeping the tide in titles is OK too. Herostratus (talk) 01:58, 3 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    MOS:TITLECONFORM should address that concern seefooddiet (talk) 02:01, 3 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

    Dr and St as contractions

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    I see under Contractions, in addition to referring to the usual contractions like "don't" -- that have apostrophes, it refers to Dr. and St ("Contracted titles"). Is this a common use of the word "contraction"? I've never heard of it. I would call those abbreviations and abbreviated titles. Bryan Henderson (giraffedata) (talk) 05:40, 29 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

    This should be clarified, yes—contractions are morphologically different words, abbreviations are purely orthographical alterations of the same word. (They are still pronounced in full as doctor, saint. etc.) Remsense ‥ 论 07:43, 29 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

    Foreign terms

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    What should the MOS say about where to use templates like {{translation}} and {{literal translation}} for foreign titles and phrases? MOS:FOREIGN does not have a clear answer. 2001:8F8:172B:38CA:A4A9:AD59:7ACD:1803 (talk) 07:29, 29 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

    I think the answer is generally pretty simple: articles should be self-standing, so if the meaning of vocabulary readers would not be expected to know provides important context to the article topic, then an inline explanation should be included. This is precisely how English-language jargon is treated, and there's no conceptual difference when the obscure vocabulary happens to be in another language entirely. Remsense ‥ 论 07:51, 29 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

    Should we generally prefer romanizations over non-Latin script in running text?

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    MOS:ZH has a guideline that Chinese characters should not appear in running text, proposing that readers only comfortable with the Latin script should generally be able to read sentences aloud (omitting any parenthetical call-outs) without hiccups:

    Red XN His name was 刘仁静 (Liu Renjing).
    Green tickY His name was Liu Renjing (刘仁静).

    I think this makes a lot of sense, and the main § Spelling and romanization section (or if not, perhaps /Text formatting § Non-English-language terms) may benefit from including a point to this end. Many articles, here Epic poetry § Etymology, do the following:

    The English word epic comes from [...] the Ancient Greek adjective ἐπικός (epikos), from ἔπος (epos), 'word, story, poem'.

    Should we specifically recommend editors do the following instead?

    The English word epic comes from [...] the Ancient Greek adjective epikos (ἐπικός), from epos (ἔπος), 'word, story, poem'.

    Remsense ‥ 论 09:50, 31 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

    Consistency makes sense, and it is probably better for readers to read transliterations first. CMD (talk) 15:00, 31 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    My only worry is that those with little exposure to either the topic at hand or to language studies in general may not intuit that the native form is just that, if it is not given clear preeminence.
    Typically this may be lessened when forms appear in native–romanization order early, e.g. with the translated title topic in the lead sentence? Remsense ‥ 论 15:58, 31 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    I kind of expect Chinese to have transliteration first, potentially followed by characters, but I also expect Ancient Greek to have Greek alphabet first, possibly followed by a transliteration. Allowing Greek script but not Chinese script in the text may of course just reflect the bias of my somewhat classical education (and I kind of expect educated people to know Greek letters but not Chinese characters), but I would not want to have a rule that dictates we need to do it in the same way for all languages when this goes too much against scholarly convention. Consistency is always only local (if everything on Wikipedia follows the same rules it is usually inconsistent with the way everybody else uses the same words), so I do not value it very much. —Kusma (talk) 20:29, 31 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    I searched for a Greek example as a deliberate steelman, picking the least dissimilar non-Latin script. If anyone wants evidence in the wild I'll go find it, but also picture Russian, Hebrew, Arabic, Tamil etc. in your mind's eye.
    Essentially, I find myself making this fix across many articles. It often seems to read more amiably, even in Greek. Remsense ‥ 论 22:06, 31 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    It's hard to see any justification for transliteration not coming first. This is about basic accessibility for the vast majority of English-language readers. I'd go as far as saying the answer should be obvious to us all.DeCausa (talk) 22:16, 31 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Let the person making the sentence do what she thinks best. Nobody notices or cares if its done differently in different articles and neither is objecectively better. (Internal consistency within an article is different, but that is covered by the rule "For any debatable construction, if there is a consistent version used in the article, follow it" or whatever, which I assume we have such a rule or we had better have. Since the reader doesn't care or even notice, any rule about this particular issue would be solving a problem that doesn't exist, and just gives editors overly concerned about consistency justification for going around changing it to no gain. Herostratus (talk) 02:11, 3 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    I wouldn't've posted this barring the thesis that is there is a meaningful distinction, suggested by the fact that people generally read linearly, and interruptions of unfamiliar/functionally illegible elements in running text aggregate to make reading more difficult. If you don't think there's anything to that, that's fine, but I would appreciate acknowledgement that I'm not merely seeking to make more work for editors to do. Remsense ‥ 论 02:27, 3 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Fwiw I agree with Remsense; I think this is a problem that exists and that Latin script text should be preferred when possible. It's functionally a de facto rule already imo; putting non-Latin text first is an exception rather than the norm. I've seen few cases where non-Latin first could be justifiable. seefooddiet (talk) 03:18, 3 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    This might be in conflict with MOS:FOREIGNEQUIV; the example given there is is of a name that's fairly similar in anglicised form and when transliterated but some of our articles have greater differences, so we go from Rhodes to Helen of Troy to Metropolitan Cathedral of Athens.
    Even if it only applied to text after the first sentence, it might affect a lot of articles and peeve a number of editors when applied, so I'd suggest advertising it fairly widely and more clearly than the brief non-canvassingly neutral note I put at WT:CGR,[2] which I fear might not have made sense to anyone. Maybe an RFC? NebY (talk) 18:30, 3 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Yes, I very specifically mean running text, meaning not in brackets, including at the beginning of the lead. Remsense ‥ 论 19:06, 3 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Ah, thanks. NebY (talk) 20:16, 3 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

    I think that, specifically in the case of Greek etymologies of English words (example Icosahedron), it would be incorrect and misleading to state the transliteration as the root of the word, with a parenthetical gloss stating the actual form of the root. We should state the root itself in running text in Greek script with a Latin-script gloss. —David Eppstein (talk) 19:17, 3 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

    It would be awkward to formulate this rule with any cut-out, though it seems clearly incorrect if this were the case with, say, Hebrew. If people feel likewise I'm happy to drop this idea. Remsense ‥ 论 19:30, 3 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Hebrew characters in running text are an absolute requirement for some mathematics articles like continuum hypothesis. Greek characters in running text are similarly required for articles like pi and golden ratio. In these cases, the characters are mathematical notation rather than parts of words, but they are still non-Latin-script characters in running text. —David Eppstein (talk) 21:03, 3 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Well, of course. Maybe I didn't articulate my position clearly enough, but those cases are clearly entirely outside the bounds of what I mean to suggest. Remsense ‥ 论 21:11, 3 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

    I generally place the transliteration first when mentioning Greek words in running text, for the reason you've stated (reading without hiccups). I'm not necessarily sure that it should be explicitly recommended, though, and there are at least a few cases where I think having the Greek text first would be preferable. Stating, for example, that "the Greeks inscribed [insert transliteration here] on a tablet from ..." wouldn't be all that accurate, and particularly for more crude inscriptions the shapes of the letters might be important. Having the Greek text first would also be the better choice in a discussion of an ancient Greek manuscript's degeneration, or for illustrating a lacuna in a manuscript, and I could see that in some etymology sections editors might want to use the Greek text first. This isn't to say that it's not good advice in general (it is), but I suspect there might be more exceptions than initially thought, and editors in niche areas might find that such a guideline (if too absolute or all-encompassing) might be a source of irritation. – Michael Aurel (talk) 05:24, 4 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

    Maybe something as simple as Be mindful of the potential for non-Latin scripts to interrupt the flow of reading for those who are unable to decipher them. In running text, consider placing the native non-Latin terms inside parentheses when they are needed, with a corresponding romanization or translation placed outside the parentheses and forming part of the sentence. That's too wordy as a first pass, but I wanted to at least concretize a tad. Remsense ‥ 论 05:45, 4 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    As long as it isn't worded in a way that will encourage gnomes to go around changing every instance without thought. —David Eppstein (talk) 06:02, 4 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Trust me, that's my No. 1 priority here also. Remsense ‥ 论 06:03, 4 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Michael Aurel's exception examples are ones where the actual form of the written word is relevant, I would expect them to apply for Hebrew, Chinese, and other languages too. CMD (talk) 06:49, 4 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    If we do want to add something about this (and I wouldn't say I have strong feelings on whether or not we should), then a passage along those lines seems fairly sensible. – Michael Aurel (talk) 15:48, 4 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

    HTML inline quotation marks

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    Hello, I could not find any instruction on whether inline HTML quote marks are acceptable in source editing view. <q>quote</q>, which would render as quote.

    The way it renders depends on your browser settings, and can be configured through a stylesheet. That said, I'm not sure if there is a ready-made template to let editors manage the rendering (e.g. whether to use single or double quotes).

    I ran a search and could not find a previous topic on this, or any suggestions outside the MOS. There has been a recommendation in place since 2005 against curly quotes (WP:CURLY), after MediaWiki made it possible by moving to Unicode.

    The recommendation against curly quotes stands on the basis that they are difficult to type on a stanardcomputer keyboard.
    No such difficulty exists for HTML quotes. Users of source view are already familiar with HTML-like syntax e.g. <ref>.
    I would therefore like to propose that it should be deemed acceptable in the MOS to enclose quotes in a <q> element. Johnanth ✆|☑ 20:57, 31 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]

    Oppose because it breaks cut'n'paste. Compare:
    1. The man said, "Run, Billy!" (typed using the quote key)
    2. The man said, Run, Billy! (typed using <q>...</q>)
    Try to select the portion from "said" through "Run" in the browser (for me, desktop Firefox) and then paste it into various programs. The first approach gives me said, "Run (the literal chars I selected) pasted into a Word document and the same string pasted into this browser text-entry box. The second approach gives me said, Run (quote-char lost) in Word and said, "Run" (end quote-char added) into browser. DMacks (talk) 21:42, 31 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    I acknowledge DMacks's point, but that same behaviour makes <q>...</q> perfectly suitable to be used in {{DISPLAYTITLE}} for MOS:MINORWORKS that appear in quotes in running text, like song titles, short stories, etc.: Let It Be (song). Such a radical proposal would of course need very wide discussion. -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 00:40, 1 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    There is a brief mention at Help:HTML in wikitext#q: <q>...</q> is used to mark a short quotation. There has been very little implementation of this element in Wikipedia yet.
    How wary should we be of relying on HTML to convey meaning? For example, should we use it to distinguish actual quotations from indirect speech:
    1. Alice says it doesn't matter
    2. Alice says "it doesn't matter".
    NebY (talk) 12:20, 1 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Are you able to provide an excerpt from the official documentation for <q>? Jc3s5h (talk) 16:53, 1 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Is this[1] what you want? Did you want the entire thing? -- Shmuel (Seymour J.) Metz Username:Chatul (talk) 17:29, 1 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    I try to avoid using HTML in wiki mark-up and much prefer using templates like {{quote inline}}. Noted that this does have the same issue as <q>...</q> about cut/paste not copying the quote characters.  Stepho  talk  01:39, 2 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Thanks, I failed to find this template in my research. If we are happy with HTML inline quotes in principle, then this would be a valid alternative. Johnanth ✆|☑ 17:48, 3 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

    References

    1. ^ "HTML5: Edition for Web Authors - 4.6.7 The q element". W3C standards and drafts. W3C. Retrieved April 1, 2025. The q element represents some phrasing content quoted from another source.

    MOS:COLON sanity check

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    This diff represents correct applications of MOS:COLON, right? It just looks bizarre to me. Remsense ‥ 论 21:27, 9 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

    It looks bizarre to me too, but the capitalizations are correct per MOS:COLON. I'm not sure that many colons is necessary or even good writing though. Schazjmd (talk) 22:51, 9 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    That was my thought. I spent a lot of time hammering out this prose, and still am never quite sure when to use dashes versus colons in articles where a lot of statements qualified by lists are made. I guess I have a clearer sense not to use a colon when it would look this strange. Remsense ‥ 论 22:53, 9 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    I just realized that I avoid colons, except when introducing a list. Don't know if it's the influence of some childhood teacher or what, but using them between two independent clauses just reads wrong to me. I mean, I know it isn't technically wrong, just somewhere through the years I absorbed a disapproval of them. My personal quirk, I guess. Schazjmd (talk) 23:27, 9 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Unable to justify colons, I am left largely to use dashes, which I have previously feared I overuse. In these instances, semicolons don't read as connecting the two thoughts strongly enough—in dense, technical prose, those more explicit logical connections seem pretty conducive to easing reader comprehension. Remsense ‥ 论 23:33, 9 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    I agree that it matches MOS:COLON, but in my experience, lower-case is commonly used in such cases even when a complete sentence follows. So I would tend to make the "start it with a capital letter" rule optional for such cases. Gawaon (talk) 15:28, 10 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Remsense, I would disagree regarding the capitalisation after the colon in the example in some cases. As a general rule, shorter sentences are a more readable style. If it is indeed a complete sentence after a colon, it should probably be written as a separate sentence. Cinderella157 (talk) 23:51, 10 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    How do you feel about the current revision? I mostly replaced the problem colons with dashes, but also a semicolons and some splits into separate sentences. Remsense ‥ 论 00:16, 11 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    I think that many of those sentences where the dash is used could be split into a separate sentence following the dash (ie omit the dash). An exception would be where the dash is followed by for example. Just my thoughts. To your initial question, I would only cap after a colon where it was a complete sentence as a quote or perhaps: [T]he quote can be treated as if it were a complete sentence even if it was part of a longer sentence in the original text but end with a period or elipses as appropriate. Cinderella157 (talk) 02:07, 11 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Judging by Fowler (4th ed.), this is something which varies between British and American English: Note that in British English the word following a colon is not in capitals (unless it is a proper name), but in American English it is capitalized if it introduces a grammatically complete sentence. I live in a country where British English is predominant, and I wouldn't ever use a capital letter after a colon (except when needed for other reasons). – Michael Aurel (talk) 06:18, 11 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

    Is there a valid use for empty section headers?

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    T368722 proposes to create new Linter tracking for empty section headers (e.g. === ===). Are there valid uses for empty section headers that outweigh the negatives? Please respond at the original thread: Wikipedia talk:Linter#New lint category for empty headings. Thanks. – Jonesey95 (talk) 00:53, 10 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

    RfC on NCCAPS capitalization threshold

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    Procedural close: per several people below, the framing here will make it very difficult to determine consensus. Feel free to revert me if you like, but I strongly suggest starting a new RfC without simply inaccurate claims like Consensus is currently to treat the threshold for such as about 90%. Extraordinary Writ (talk) 17:10, 13 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

    The following discussion 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.

    Should the threshold for capitalization of article titles in NCCAPS be reduced? 🐔 Chicdat  Bawk to me! 10:43, 13 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

    Current wording

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    For multiword page titles, one should leave the second and subsequent words in lowercase unless the title phrase is a proper name that would always occur capitalized, even mid-sentence. (Consensus is currently to treat the threshold for such as about 90%.)

    Proposed wording

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    For multiword page titles, one should consider what sources use, particularly midsentence. If a substantial majority of sources (defined as about [depends on option]) leave the title capitalized, the title phrase can be considered a proper name in most cases. If that substantial majority is not reached, leave the second and subsequent words in lowercase.

    • Option A: Status quo; 90–95% capitalized.
    • Option B: 75–80% capitalized.
    • Option C: 2/3–70% capitalized.
    • Option D: 60% capitalized.

    Discussion

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    • Support, ideally option C or D as proposer. My reasoning is explained at this village pump thread. I originally supported a more radical version (instead of 70%/two-thirds, 51%), but the comments there and at the original discussion have persuaded me to adopt a more moderate stance with a greater chance of passing. TL;DR: Ignoring the vast majority of sources to uphold some editors' interpretation of grammar rules goes against the fundamental principles of Wikipedia. 🐔 Chicdat  Bawk to me! 10:43, 13 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
      In what way is the status quo a problem? · · · Peter Southwood (talk): 11:41, 13 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
      It ignores the majority of sources. If four out of five sources use uppercase, we use lowercase. This goes against our core principle of following the sources. 🐔 Chicdat  Bawk to me! 12:04, 13 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    • Oppose: There are no circumstances under which a word or phrase should be treated as a proper noun/phrase in a title but not in body text. Any guidance as to whether to treat something as proper, including consensus thresholds, ought to be at MOS:CAPS, more specifically at MOS:PROPERNAMES, not MOS:NCCAPS. Largoplazo (talk) 12:05, 13 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    • I'm confused by where the "Consensus is currently to treat the threshold for such as about 90%" comes from, since I can't find that in WP:NCCAPS. Gawaon (talk) 12:06, 13 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    • Bad RfC per Gawaon, there isn't any "status quo" 90–95% threshold in the relevant policies. Beyond that, Oppose having separate thresholds for title and body (which would only lead to inconsistencies), although I wouldn't be opposed to a RfC establishing a slightly lower threshold for both. Chaotic Enby (talk · contribs) 12:24, 13 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
      ^ This. The RfC based on so many wrong premises, not least of which is setting an arbitrary numerical threshold for something that shouldn't use one. It ought to be called off ASAP. Toadspike [Talk] 14:47, 13 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    • Oppose. Our MOS often incorporates best practice as seen in other style guides or in some sources, but like any style guide which provides a degree of consistency in publications, it has to dare to settle on choices which some will see as arbitrary or going against common practice elsewhere. We don't use the same spelling, units of measurement or representation of numerical values as our sources, switching from paragraph to paragraph or article to article; we follow our own MOS. This saves us from considering whether the sources are RS for style as well as content – this proposal would have us counting antique sources with modern ones, tabloid newspapers with academic journals, and British English with American and Indian. TL;DR: Wikipedia presents content in its own way, and that's fundamental. NebY (talk) 13:22, 13 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    • Oppose: First there absolutely should not be different criteria for capitalization in article titles than in running text (except for the first letter). It invites a mess and would be a major change which would benefit no one. Second, Wikipedia style is to capitalize for proper names and acronyms. That is the style we've chosen and as determining exactly what is a proper name is difficult, we use other sources as a guide to determine what is and is not a proper name. We don't just follow other publications' capitalization because other sources capitalize for other reasons. Many capitalize all headings or article titles. Many capitalize for importance in a topic area. Many sources capitalize for no apparent reason. I see no reason for change. SchreiberBike | ⌨  17:14, 13 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    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.

    Do honors/awards need to have notability?

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    For some reason I thought we expected them to have their own articles. Doug Weller talk 14:35, 13 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

    I would expect them to have their own articles if notable by general notability criteria. Why would they not? · · · Peter Southwood (talk): 17:43, 13 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    I think it should be stated in the MOS. Doug Weller talk 18:12, 13 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Why? Are they sufficiently different from other topics to need special guidance? · · · Peter Southwood (talk): 19:05, 13 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    For there to be an article about an award, it would have to meet general notability criteria. For an article about some other topic to mention an award does not require that. Perhaps that's the confusion here. SchreiberBike | ⌨  19:35, 13 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    I, and MOS:FILMACCOLADES, disagree. An award giver should have an article about their awards at the bare minimum, for an award to be included in an awards table. Gonnym (talk) 20:04, 13 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Does this apply in general, or just to films? SchreiberBike | ⌨  20:56, 13 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Definitely not. I see minor awards/honors used in biographies to make the person seem more important. I thought we don't allow that. Doug Weller talk 07:03, 14 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Do they actually make the person seem more important? I suppose they might, depending on the reader. Is it important to an encyclopedic article? My guess is it would depend on the context, but this is not really my field of interest or expertise. A basic rule of thumb might be "If you can wikilink it you can mention it, if not, have a good reason why it is worth mentioning". Cheers, · · · Peter Southwood (talk): 07:58, 14 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    In some instances I think the notability of the award and the award giver is collapsed into a single basis for notability, such that there should not be separate articles on the two. If there is an article on an award giver that substantially mentions the awards that they give (which is probably the case with some film critics organizations that give film awards), I think that would suffice. BD2412 T 21:04, 13 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    I really could use some context. The only more fully expressed questions underlying yours that I can come up with would belong at WP:N instead of here. Largoplazo (talk) 21:11, 13 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    An example:"In 1981, They Came Before Columbus received the "Clarence L. Holte Literary Prize". Sertima was inducted into the "Rutgers African-American Alumni Hall of Fame" in 2004. "
    No article for the "literary prize". Doug Weller talk 07:08, 14 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    I guess I can see how the question might be suitable here, if the question is whether to mention the award in an article about a person whose notability is established through other criteria. It just made me think of cases I've frequently encountered where a list of awards seems to be the article creator's basis for imputing signficance/notability, yet none of the awards are notable. That's why I had WP:N in mind. Largoplazo (talk) 11:57, 14 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    If this is a question about triva/cruft, then as a general rule they should be avoided. However, it is easy imagine how a non-notable honor/award (being awarded a scholarship?) might play a significant role in someone's life, and thus be worth a mention in a biography. Does Aurelian being named Restitutor Orientis count as an honor? What seems important is that the honor/award is remarked upon as significant by secondary sources. Sources from the subject or the award body shouldn't mean much. CMD (talk) 07:23, 14 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    I am pretty confident that in the last 10 years we had a centralized discussion that awards and honors (not just film) should be notable (not necessarily a standalone page, just being able to show that the general body of those awards could be documented with non-primary sources), as it was creating excessive fluff on some bio and other creative work pages to include every no-name award. Unfortunately, I can't find it easily. Masem (t) 12:16, 14 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Why in the world are the archives set up so you can't search them? I presume this can be fixed. Doug Weller talk 13:02, 14 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    I just rearranged the top boxes so that the search box is next to the archive list. Easier to find now? --jpgordon𝄢𝄆𝄐𝄇 14:34, 14 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Definitely, thanks. Doug Weller talk 14:43, 14 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Are you maybe thinking of the not-yet-a-guideline Wikipedia:Awards and accolades and its talk pages, or some discussion that led to it? NebY (talk) 14:43, 14 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Yes, that was the resulting page or at least the ideas I call discussed from that prior discussion. Masem (t) 14:46, 14 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    So maybe work towards making it a guideline? I know I, clearly mistakenly, remove awards etc if they don't have their own article or very clear notability. Doug Weller talk 15:24, 14 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

    Animal pronouns

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    Does the manual of style say anyting about pronouns for individual animals? Should we use 'it' or 'he/she'? I've had a look at a few featured articles (Laika, Easy Jet (horse) and Knut (polar bear)) which all use he/she pronouns but can't find anything on the manual of style or something. ―Panamitsu (talk) 02:51, 14 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

    From English personal pronouns: Animals are often referred to as it, but he and she are sometimes used for animals when the animal's sex is known and is of interest, particularly for higher animals, especially pets and other domesticated animals. -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 03:31, 14 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

    RfC on capitalization of titles in citations

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    As far as I can see nobody has linked to this RfC from a MOS page, but I think it would be of interest to people who care about the MoS. There is an RfC on capitalization of titles in citations at the source citation guideline talk page. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 23:40, 14 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

    @Mike Christie, it hasn't been linked from this page I think, but it has been linked at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Capital letters#Capitalization discussions ongoing (keep at top of talk page) (under other discussions). Hey man im josh (talk) 14:07, 15 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

    Conflict with guideline on citations

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    Just a note I started a thread at Wikipedia talk:Citing sources#Conforming citations to Wikipedia style regarding guidance which appears to conflict with MOS:CONFORMTITLE, MOS:CONFORM, and MOS:TMRULES, if anyone here is interested in participating. -- Beland (talk) 03:50, 15 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

    MOS feedback needed on FA Dementia with Lewy bodies

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    See discussion on talk. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 20:07, 19 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

    Proposal to clarify which MOS guidelines apply to citations

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    Presently guidance that clearly applies to citations is scattered among "Citing sources", "Manual of Style", subpages of "Manual of Style", and a host of guidance that might or might not apply to citations. When I think of any printed style guide I've ever seen, including "APA Style" and The Chicago Manual of Style, the table of contents makes clear it that there are separate parts, or chapters, to address citation style; the style used for everything but citations is addressed in different parts or chapters. I believe Wikipedia should do the same, and designate "Citing sources" as the primary home for citation guidance. Other pages that contain citation guidance should be listed within "Citing sources".

    I also suggest that "Citing sources" be added to the "Manual of Style" (MoS) sidebar within the "Manual of Style".

    I suggest accomplishing this by adding the following section:

    Citations
    Ordinarily, information about placing and formatting citations, and the content of citations, is found in the "Citing sources" guideline, as well as information about tools to assist with citations. That guideline states that

    Wikipedia does not have a single house style, though citations within any given article should follow a consistent style. A number of citation styles exist, including those described in the Wikipedia articles for Citation, APA style, ASA style, MLA style, The Chicago Manual of Style, the Vancouver system and Bluebook. Wikipedia has also created its own Citation Style 1 and Citation Style 2.

    Editors expect to find information about citation format and style in "Citing sources" and should not be expected to be aware of citation guidance contained in this guideline, or in subpages of this guideline (for example, "Manual of Style/Legal"). Whenever guidance in this guideline or subpages of this guideline about citations exists, that page should be listed in the "Citation style" section of "Citing sources".

    Jc3s5h (talk) 13:11, 22 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

    I don't think the last proposed paragraph is needed. If citation guidance is going to be centralized in one page (which can branch out to others), then any contravening guidance should be removed from other locations. Backlinks from other pages to the central page can be added. isaacl (talk) 17:20, 22 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    For context, see also Wikipedia talk:Citing sources#Conforming citations to Wikipedia style. I have suggested there that a definitive and comprehensive list is not feasible.
    That discussion was prompted by Wikipedia talk:Citing sources#RFC on consistent styles and capitalization of titles (please join), which in turn was prompted by Wikipedia talk:Citing sources#Capitalization styles of work titles, in which an editor claims that mismatched capitalization is fine within a single article, because some cited sources use Title Case and some use sentence case and some use unusual style choices, and therefore this revert from title case to leading case (i.e., even capitalizing little words like "Of") is justified, even though none of the other cited sources in that Featured List use leading case. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:24, 23 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    To respond more specifically to the proposal above:
    "Ordinarily", editors expect to find citation-specific content in WP:CITE and some general, widely applicable style advice (e.g., "avoid all-numeric date formats other than YYYY-MM-DD"). "Ordinarily", editors do not expect to find detailed information about style questions (e.g., MOS:FRAC, which rarely comes up in a citation, but which still applies if it does.)
    It is generally true that editors "should not be expected to be aware of" just about anything in the MOS, but that doesn't mean that the MOS doesn't exist or doesn't apply. About three-quarter million registered editors make 1+ edits each year. WP:MOS gets about a quarter million page views each year. Ergo, an actual majority of editors aren't reading WP:MOS. But "should not be expected to be aware of" doesn't mean that you're exempt from it; if you do your best to communicate about the source, and someone else invokes "OBSCURESTYLERULE § EXTREMELYRARE" and fixes it for you, then that's fine. There shouldn't be any sort of games about whether the MOS page says that it applies to citations, or if the WP:CITE page officially lists that MOS page in a designated section. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:33, 23 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    I agree with WhatamIdoing; their list of examples of MOS guidelines that apply to citations without specifically mentioning citations pointed out that a huge portion (maybe most?) of the MOS would need to be mentioned as applying to citations. I think it is enough to just point out that the MOS as a whole exists and should be followed in citations to the degree applicable, as we now do. Yeah, our pages are organized differently than other style manuals, but they are not crowdsourcing their rules from a worldwide community of volunteers.
    I have definitely found some places where cross-references are needed between specific guidelines that conflict or need to be kept in sync, and added them. There's probably room for improvement, though I know too much about the MOS to figure out what confuses newcomers the most. (Suggestions welcome.)
    I also agree it's fine and historically nearly ubiquitous that editors ignorant of the MOS make additions to articles and other editors come by and tidy it into compliance. I actually work a lot on automating this process as well as spell check, and I think we are improving our quality as time goes on. Simply the act of bringing existing contributions into compliance can also help a lot; most people just copy the style of what they see already written, and if that's already MOS-compliant they don't need to do a lot of MOS research to know what to do in most cases. (That's probably an argument for adopting a single house citation style.) -- Beland (talk) 01:21, 24 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Any tool that makes compliance easier will increase the likelihood of compliance. That is especially true of templates, since you can update them to accomodate changes in policy. -- Shmuel (Seymour J.) Metz Username:Chatul (talk) 13:37, 24 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

    My take: 99% of the time, no one will object (or care) if you edit an article to comply with an MOS. However, that leaves the 1% where someone does. When someone objects, my advice is to back off a bit … find out why they are objecting, and discuss it with them. Remember that all of our MOS pages start with a disclaimer that says “occasional exceptions may apply”. Blueboar (talk) 13:56, 24 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

    Spacing around n-dash and m-dash

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    Am I the only one that was taught the opposite of what the manual of style currently says about spacing around dashes? I was taught that there is no spacing around an n-dash (e.g., "pages 1–20"), but that there are spaces around an m-dash — as is demonstrated here. I ain't no English teacher, so I'll yield to anyone with that sort of certificate, but the current text of the manual of style seems mighty backwards to me. —Quantling (talk | contribs) 14:01, 22 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

    No, the MOS is correct and concurs with what you've been taught: An em dash is unspaced on both sides and An en dash is spaced on both sides. -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 14:23, 22 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    No, the MOS is correct. See Dash#En dash versus em dash. --𝕁𝕄𝔽 (talk) 14:27, 22 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Nevertheless, it is of course also correct that no spaces are used around en dashes in ranges just as "pages 1–20". Just to state the obvious. Gawaon (talk) 15:52, 22 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Ah, it appears that I was taught the method used by The New York Times — spaces around an m-dash, which is used for breaks in sentences, but no spaces around an n-dash, which is used for ranges. But other publishers, including Wikipedia, have chosen differently, at least in some cases. I guess that I will have to adapt. —Quantling (talk | contribs) 17:21, 22 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    What does NYT say about ranges of hyphenated page numbers, e.g., from A-5 to A-7? the template {{subst:page range|A-5|A-7}} yields A-5–A-7. -- Shmuel (Seymour J.) Metz Username:Chatul (talk) 18:44, 22 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    idk —Quantling (talk | contribs) 13:05, 24 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

    Why African-American culture but not Middle-Eastern cuisine?

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    MOS:HYPHEN at point #3, bullet one instructs editors to never insert a hyphen into a proper name with the example Middle Eastern cuisine, not Middle-Eastern cuisine. African American is a proper name but the practice on Wikipedia is to hyphenate when this is used as a modifier, Cf. African Americans but African-American culture. Is this covered somewhere in the MOS, and is this appropriate? African American is not really a case of MOS:DUALNATIONALITIES. African American culture seems more like Middle Eastern cuisine than Italian-Swiss newspaper but there may be a subtle distinction I can't quite put my finger on.

    The current (18t) edition of The Chicago Manual of Style acknowledges that this has been subject to debate and makes allowances for author or publisher preference here but ultimately advises against hyphenating terms like African American because hyphenation does not aid in comprehension. (8.40: Compound nationalities; see also 8.39 where African American culture is used as an example, and further examples at 7.96 – subscription required). --MYCETEAE 🍄‍🟫—talk 15:11, 22 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

    I should note this question was inspired by the ongoing discussion at Talk:African Americans#Requested move 20 April 2025. --MYCETEAE 🍄‍🟫—talk 15:13, 22 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    In "African American", "African" is an adjective, as can be discerned by comparing it to "Polish American" (not "Pole American"). So it's comparable to "high speed" > "high-speed chase" or "big box" > "big-box store", in which hyphens are used. I don't see why the capital letters would lead to a different linking punctuation mark to be prescribed. Largoplazo (talk) 16:14, 22 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Middle is also an adjective, with a secondary meaning/function as a noun. Its function in Middle East(ern) seems akin to its use as an adjective in middle seat or middle house in the row, except that eastern is also an adjective. The distinction I read in the MOS is that Middle East(ern) is a proper name, high speed is not. The Merriam-Webster entry for middle raises another example where middle can be part of proper names, in the names of historical language varieties like Middle Dutch. We wouldn't write the Middle-Dutch pronunciation of [X] or the Old-English word for [X]. We might write about a Swiss-German newspaper but not the Swiss-German language. I analyze the first example as combining two proper adjectives (Swiss and German) into a compound modifier (Swiss-German), while in the second example Swiss German is a distinct proper name. --MYCETEAE 🍄‍🟫—talk 18:11, 22 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    I suppose you could have a Swiss German–language newspaper (en-dash), but I digress… --MYCETEAE 🍄‍🟫—talk 18:20, 22 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    "African American" and "Middle Eastern" are simply not analagous. One can speak of a multitude of people as African Americans but not as Middle Easterns. The morpheme tree (ignoring the morphemic breakdown of "African" itself) in the first case is African + (America + -an), not (African America) + -an, whereas in the second case it's (Middle + East) + -ern, not Middle + (East + -ern). Largoplazo (talk) 16:16, 24 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Thank you. I do see a difference that rationalizes African-American although I'm not convinced it is best. Curious if you would prefer Middle-East peace over the unhyphenated form. Or Han-Chinese people, Native-American religion? --MYCETEAE 🍄‍🟫—talk 16:46, 24 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Also, your analysis treats African and American as two separate proper adjectives forming a compound modifier. However, African American is a distinct, two-word proper noun or adjective that is usually not hyphenated. In addition to Chicago, AP, MLA, APA, Merriam-Webster, Dictionary.com, and even OED use the unhyphenated form. How do we know when to derive a style from first principles following your analysis vs. when to follow MOS:HYPHEN's guidance against hyphenating proper names or widespread common usage and guidance against hyphenation? --MYCETEAE 🍄‍🟫—talk 21:23, 24 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    The only analysis in my previous comment is that "African American" and "Middle Eastern" are different constructions so they need to be considered separately, in contrast to your remark that African American culture seems more like Middle Eastern cuisine. They aren't, they're quite different. Largoplazo (talk) 22:05, 24 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Suppose there were an internet provider called High Speed. When referring to the company, we would write She upgraded her High Speed internet service not She upgraded her High-Speed internet service because High Speed is a proper name. Just as when referring to Quantum Fiber, you would not write They pay for Quantum-Fiber internet. We also do not always hyphenate other commonly recognizable compounds, for example High school diploma, Parkland high school shooting, NBA high school draftees. And while you could probably find instances where sources do hyphenate those, for the shooting, we would never write Marjory-Stoneman-Douglas-High-School shooting because the school is a proper name. --MYCETEAE 🍄‍🟫—talk 15:15, 24 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    I believe that "Middle East" is an Open compound. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:44, 23 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    But so is African American. --MYCETEAE 🍄‍🟫—talk 14:33, 24 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
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