Talk:Fremantle Prison/Archive 2

Archive 1

Archive 2

Main Cell Block RFC

The following discussion is an archived record of a request for comment. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.

This RFC included the discussion above, it would be hard to separate the discussion on the topic from the question. The consensus finds that Main Cell Block is a proper noun when referring to the specific building. AlbinoFerret 02:20, 23 April 2015 (UTC)

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Is "Main Cell Block" a proper noun – i.e. should it be capitalised? (see also previous discussion above) - Evad37 [talk] 06:05, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

Projects and WT:MOSCAPS notified: [1][2][3][4][5] - Evad37 [talk] 06:17, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

Note: I have requested closure at WP:ANRFC - Evad37 [talk] 00:46, 23 April 2015 (UTC)

• I would suggest that it is a proper noun in this context. It is named Main Cell Block because it is the main cell block. It might also have been called First Cell Block or Primary Cell Block or Cell Block A or Large Block or Swan Block or Henderson Block—but it wasn't. Even though it was named based on common words main, cell and block, its name is Main Cell Block, just as Fremantle Prison is capitalised as a proper noun even though prison is a common noun used to describe jails generally. —sroc 💬 06:35, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

• I would write "Fremantle Prison Main Cell Block" and "main cell block". Just as we write "Ohio State University" and "university", even when the latter is referring to the former. Primergrey (talk) 03:32, 26 March 2015 (UTC)

Ah, but compare:

• "Fremantle Prison" (name) and "prison" (generic);
• "Ohio State University" (name) and "university" (generic);
• "Main Cell Block" (name) and "cell block" (generic), rather than "main cell block".

—sroc 💬 09:08, 27 March 2015 (UTC)

I see where you're coming from, but the MOS is clear that even when discussing a specific prison, for example, it is still referred to as "the prison" if its full name is not being written. Primergrey (talk) 17:38, 27 March 2015 (UTC)

Yes, but if "Main Cell Block" is the name, then it should be capitalised, whereas the generic words "the cell block" or "the block" would not. —sroc 💬 06:19, 28 March 2015 (UTC)

That's begging the question; you're assuming that "Main Cell Block" is the name. But some of us are contending that this is a description of a feature of something with a proper name (Fremantle Prison), and others are contending that it perhaps does have a proper name, but that it's Fremantle Prison Main Cell Block.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  14:31, 28 March 2015 (UTC)

I see what you mean: the question is whether it goes by the name "Main Cell Block" or if it is merely described as "the main cell block". I would think that if it is predominantly referred to as "Main Cell Block" (rather than "original cell block" or "front cell block" or "first cell block" or "primary cell block" or any other equally accurate name), then this suggests it is the name it has taken on, whether or not it is officially named as such. If it is variously referred to by a variety of names, then this would suggest that "main cell block" is, indeed, just a generic descriptor.

Even if one were to argue that its full name is "Fremantle Prison Main Cell Block", this does not mean that "Main Cell Block" does not also function as a proper name. Consider the University of Notre Dame Australia School of Law, which could also be referred to simply as the School of Law when the context makes the university clear; "School of Law" serves as a proper name even though it is a descriptive name and even if there is also a more complete name available. —sroc 💬 13:14, 29 March 2015 (UTC)

• If "Main Cell Block" is a proper name, most instances of "the Main Cell Block" ought be changed to "Main Cell Block". Generally proper names do not require a leading article (grammar). (The consistent use of such an article is a clue that the term is not a proper name.) The Mitch Ames (talk) 12:22, 27 March 2015 (UTC)
• Lower case. A cell block is not a discrete enough entity to warrant a proper name, unless they went out of their way to very clearly give it one (e.g. "O'Hare Cell Block"), which they did not; they simply gave it a descriptive label. See Proper name, and external reliable sources on proper names. The closer something is to a description rather than arbitrary name, the less likely it is to be a proper name. This case is entirely descriptive. Capitalising "Main Cell Block" is like capitalising "Ninth Floor South Hallway" in the context of a hotel. The name of the hotel is a proper name. A description of some segment of the hotel is not, even if some people connected with the hotel tend to think of it as one. Capitalising this as "Main Cell Block" is government style, not Wikipedia style. Governments capitalise all sorts of things important to them, in intra-government contexts, as do the specialists in almost all fields in works internal to their fields. WP does not emulate this (even if some journalists do). See WP:Specialist style fallacy for why, and for why the arguments in favor of doing so are logically faulty. See the RFC WP:BIRDCON, the culmination of over eight years of time wasted by specialists trying to force ungrammatical capitalisation on the encyclopedia to match the house style of some journals in their field, for a strong precedent against doing so.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  14:31, 28 March 2015 (UTC)
  • I find it odd that you think an entire building "is not a discrete enough entity to warrant a proper name, unless they went out of their way to very clearly give it one". Is there some non-subjective cut-off point between things that can have proper names that are also descriptive – e.g. Beach Road that runs along the beach – and those that can't? I don't see anything along those lines in the Proper name article that you link; in fact, one of the examples is "I believe Rose lives on Floor 3 of the Main Building.   [Main Building is the name of the building, Floor 3 names the third floor, and Rose names a person]". - Evad37 [talk] 02:51, 29 March 2015 (UTC)
    • The word "prison" appears in lower case despite the contextual meaning of Freemantle Prison. This seems to me to be exactly the kind of "unnecessary capitalization" the MOS advises us to avoid. Primergrey (talk) 04:49, 29 March 2015 (UTC)
    • (edit conflict) Evad37: Then the Proper name article has been edited to include an incorrect example (and I've disputed it at that article, as the example is unsourced nonsense).

      No, there is no non-subjective cut-off point in all cases, or discussions like this would not occur; the point of such discussions is, precisely, to form a consensus among editors when the answer isn't already self-evident. Some descriptions become proper names, and some proper names are descriptive when created, but note the difference between "I live on Beach Road" and "I live on the beach road". Compare to "He was incarcerated in Main Cell Block" vs. "He was incarcerated in the main cell block". This article refers to it as the main cell block, with "the"; that's a distinguishing, non-metaphoric description, not a name. Our article uses this Beach/beach example, but you don't seem to have understood it. You skipped this part: "as a proper name, Beach Road may have nothing to do with the beach; it may be any distance from the waterfront" (e.g., it could have been named after someone whose surname was Beach). What cinches this case this RfC is about is that this arbitrariness does not apply to the prison's main cell block; it is and must be the actual cell block that is "main" or primary. Contrast this with some prison's "Maine Cell Block", an arbitrary name perhaps from the US state or someone's surname.

      There is no particular reason to treat descriptively labelled individual buildings of a complex as proper names. You just want to. Having space between one building and another, instead of that constituent part of the prison sharing a wall with another, doesn't magically make its description a proper name. For WP purposes, no, this one non-notable building among many in a prison (that is notable only as a whole) is not a discrete entity, any more than your left elbow is separate from you, and is your Left Elbow.

      To modify the hotel example to refer to separate buildings: The south tower of a hotel is the south tower of the hotel, not the South Tower of the hotel, even if employees capitalise it that way in internal memos. There can be conventional exceptions, but only when pretty much all reliable sources agree to treat them as such, e.g. the South Tower of the World Trade Center, a [once] massive landmark that co-dominated the New York City skyline, and thus naturally lent itself to having its descriptive label treated as a proper name. Thus also cases like "the Rocky Mountains". Nothing like that applies to one building in a prison, a building unknown to much of anyone but its staff and inmates. The implied reasoning that they and their opinions (assumed - we have no source) to treat it as a proper name are enough to make it, one would naturally lead to the incorrect conclusion that my upstairs bathroom is proper-named the Upstairs Bathroom just because I named it that and think of it as a name not a description. If I gave it an arbitrary name, like Lavatorianaland, or an evocative or metaphoric but partially descriptive one, like the Tiny Bathroom of Doom, those would be proper names; but purely, literally descriptive labels are not. See again the Rocky Mountains example. All mountains are rocky, so this is an evocative name, not a distinguishing label.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  15:31, 29 March 2015 (UTC)

Thank you for your further explanation – although I'll note that telling me "you just want to", linking to WP:ILIKEIT, was quite unnecessary – in this and the previous discussion above, I have not been arguing based on on personal preference. Questioning arguments I don't fully understand has nothing to do with WP:ILIKEIT. But I digress. Regarding Beach Road, the article does say that "as a proper name, Beach Road may have nothing to do with the beach; it may be any distance from the waterfront", but doesn't appear to preclude the possibility that Beach Road may well run along the beach – "may have nothing to do with the beach", not "does not...", "can not...", "will not...", or "must not...".

Anyway, if I'm understanding you correctly, names/terms can either be:

• Arbitrary, or evocative or metaphoric but partially descriptive – proper names that should be capitalised, e.g. O'Hare Cell Block, Tiny Bathroom of Doom, Beach Road (if named after Joe Beach)
• Literally descriptive, but capitalised in pretty much all reliable sources – should be treated like proper names and capitalised – e.g. South Tower of the World Trade Center, West Wing of the White House (presumably, I haven't actually looked at usage in sources), Beach Road (if it runs along the beach, so that it is literally the beach road)
• Literally descriptive, and not capitalised or not consistently capitalised in all reliable sources – not proper names, and should not be capitalised – e.g. the south tower of [some hotel], the science library at [some university], the beach road (for some other road that just happens to run along the beach)

(a) Is that correct (assuming "all reliable sources" is a wide range of sources so that it isn't a case of WP:Specialist style fallacy)? (b) Where does "a discrete enough entity" fit in? Are the 'rules' any different if something is or isn't a discrete enough entity? - Evad37 [talk] 04:59, 30 March 2015 (UTC)

• Lower case - Not a proper noun. The word "main" in this case is just being used to describe the "cell block" as being the "main" one. Isaidnoway (talk) 21:44, 29 March 2015 (UTC)
• Sounds to me as though it should be capitalised, based on the second bullet point in Evad37's list above. I don't know Fremantle Prison but, from the discussion, it seems to be that Main Cell Block should be capitalised in the same way as South Tower or West Wing — it's a definite article, the Main Cell Block, the one and only. Imho :o) — OwenBlacker (Talk) 11:17, 4 April 2015 (UTC) (via the feedback request service)

Whether it is a "definite article" is irrelevant - it's whether it is a proper name that matters.

If "one and only" was the criteria we'd need to capitalise "six-hectare (15-acre) site" (there's only one of them at Fremantle Prison) etc - and in fact everything that appeared after each instance of the word "the". Mitch Ames (talk) 12:13, 4 April 2015 (UTC)

• To clarify my position, so my replies to SMcCandlish aren't misinterpreted, I favour lower case per my last post in the previous discussion (my replies were about me trying to understand his arguments, not about supporting capitalisation in this case) - Evad37 [talk] 23:59, 8 April 2015 (UTC)
• Both, depending on usage (summoned by LegoBot) - I'm not familiar with this topic, but it is apparent from reading various sources that "Main Cell Block" is the proper name for this prison's primary detention building, or main cell block. The fact that it is a horribly generic title is unfortunate and confusing, but it is a proper title when used in the context of referring to that building specifically. For cases in this article where it is necessary to refer to Main Cell Block as the prison's main cell block, I suggest rewording to refer to it as the primary cell block, or central detention building, or something else to limit the confusion. For comparison:

• "Centre Block is the central/middle main building of the Canadian parliamentary complex ..."
• "Main Street, Letterkenny is the main street an important thoroughfare in Letterkenny ..."
• I can't come up with a third example at the moment

Ivanvector (talk) 15:34, 9 April 2015 (UTC)

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

Henry Wray

The article text currently has exactly one mention of Wray:

Construction of the northern wing followed, however, the Crimean War saw the Royal Engineers recalled. Prisoners were left to finish the building, under the direction of Wray.

with no link, and nothing to indicate who he was.

I considered this simple addition:

Construction of the northern wing followed, however, the Crimean War saw the Royal Engineers recalled. Prisoners were left to finish the building, under the direction of Royal Engineer Henry Wray.

However this does not make sense given the preceding "... Royal Engineers recalled ...". If Wray was a Royal Engineer, was he recalled or not?

I checked History of Fremantle Prison#Construction but it doesn't help, with:

Construction ... supervised by ... Royal Engineer lieutenant Henry Wray, who had arrived with another convict ship. ...

Works rapidly progressed following the arrival of Wray in 1851 with the Royal Engineers, ...

... [1857] ... the Crimean War saw Royal Engineers recalled. Prisoners were left to finish the building, under the direction of Wray ...

It has the same "problem" - the REs were recalled, leaving work to the convicts, supervised by an RE.

Some rewording may be required (in both articles) to state explicitly that while the Royal Engineers were recalled, Wray was not included in that recall. Mitch Ames (talk) 09:09, 7 August 2015 (UTC)

@Mitch Ames: Per ref #23 (Building The Convict Establishment) p.8, "the Royal Engineers were called away to fight in the Crimean War. Henderson was in England on leave and Captain Wray stayed behind as Acting Comptroller-General to see the construction completed." Going offline atm, will fix later (or feel free to edit them yourself). - Evad37 [talk] 11:06, 7 August 2015 (UTC)

Done. [6][7] Mitch Ames (talk) 11:55, 7 August 2015 (UTC)

Introductory paragraph & onions

There is a sentence in the first para 'Growing onions discontent culminated in a 1988 riot...' I think this may refer to union issues but maybe I'm wrong? Kitbag (talk) 21:18, 30 October 2015 (UTC)