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Merge proposal: Town car and Coupe de Ville into Sedanca

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Overview

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The articles in question began here, in Town Car body, in February 2008:

I moved it to Town car in what was then called a "cut and paste merge" in July 2008:

The first objection raised to the use of "Town car" came more than three years later, in November 2011:

In December 2011, Coupe de Ville was expanded from a redirect into a stub:

This was not a content fork, it described a different form of semi-open car that was not covered in the "Town car" stub.

These articles evolved very slowly together until a week ago, when the "Coupe de Ville" article was heavily expanded. The current version of the article asserts that both the semi-open car earlier referred to as a "coupe de Ville" and the car with the open driver's compartment and fully-closed passenger compartment earlier referred to as a "town car" were called "coupes de Ville":

As a result, there are now two articles, Town car and Coupe de Ville, that are about the same topic.

Sincerely, SamBlob (talk) 02:05, 13 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Proposal

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I hereby propose that the articles Town car and Coupe de Ville be merged into a new article: Sedanca.

The scope of this new article would include both the Sedanca, the type of car originally referred to in the Coupe de Ville article, and the Sedanca de Ville, the type of car referred to in the Town car article.

These definitions of "Sedanca" and "Sedanca de Ville" come from Culshaw, David; Horrobin, Peter (2013) [1974]. "Appendix 5 - Coachwork styles". The Complete Catalogue of British Cars 1895 - 1975 (e-book ed.). Poundbury, Dorchester, UK: Veloce Publishing. p. 483. ISBN 978-1-845845-83-4. {{cite book}}: External link in |chapterurl= (help); Unknown parameter |chapterurl= ignored (|chapter-url= suggested) (help)

This would result in one unified article on a diverse topic instead of two competing content forks.

Sincerely, SamBlob (talk) 02:05, 13 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Discussion

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Please discuss the proposal in this subsection. Sincerely, SamBlob (talk) 02:05, 13 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]

  • Oppose Thanks for opening this SamBlob, I think its worth debating even if we just clarify-up the terms. I know some editors think that such a debate may be opening up a can of worms, but we do need clarity. I oppose this merge on three levels (1) WP:ENGVAR as I tried to point out on the articles on Town car and Coupe de Ville with the Terminology sections, there are regional differential uses of the various terms depending on where you are in the world, even in the English speaking zones. I searched for Sedanca at the time, which was then redirected to Town car, but as a Brit the term seem better covered by refs to Coupe de Ville. It also seems to me that this regional diversity is complicated by manufacturers using said terms to their marketing advantage, making a single catch-all more difficult (2) Current coverage/depth of articles - I think there is a lot more that we can/should do re depth of articles - as you point out SamBlob, they are presently poorly referenced. Keeping the terms separate at present should better allow the required development. Coupe de Ville is a French term, so a lot more could be added re origins; where as I know that the term Town car is North American, how did it originate (we presently have no explanation). Also the term was still used until recently, why market in North Americsa under what is a classical terms in modern times? I also can't see clearly from available refs see how we as Brits adopted using the Spanish term Sedanca (its an age of books issue over lack of refs, I guess presently?)(3) What would we redirect it to? Which ever term we redirected to, would have to cover all points/terminology and hence use a term that many users from where ever they came would seem foreign to. North American's could get really confused if we redirected the terms Coupe de Ville, Sedanca and Town car into one article, where there are clear market differentials. Even the basic list-type guides on various car enthusiast websites accept the differential, as do the dictionary's. We would hence seem to be creating a universal article/possible new precedented research on the chosen term, when the referenced pref is a differential. Rgds, --Trident13 (talk) 04:48, 13 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]
You are most welcome. I think just about every glossary on coachbuilding styles is prefaced by a disclaimer stating that the names of the styles have been used and misused quite widely and quite wildly by coachbuilders, car manufacturers, and the general public.
Regarding objection #1: Wikipedia:Content forking in a nutshell: "Articles should not be split into multiple articles just so each can advocate a different stance on the subject." There should not be different articles developed for different points of view, not even when the points of view relate to the direction from which one looks at the Atlantic Ocean.
Regarding objection #2: Wikipedia:Article size addresses the question of how big an article can get before it should be split, and Wikipedia:Summary style addresses how an article should be split when it gets to that size.
Regarding objection #3: I've already indicated where it would redirect to: Sedanca. According to Culshaw and Horrobin, the term "Sedanca" on its own means the two-door coupe de Ville while the term "Sedanca de Ville" means the four-door "town car" with the fully-enclosed passenger compartment. A well organized article, with a lead section that properly summarizing the article and with thoughtfully written section titles, should lead the relevant parties to the familiar terms they're looking for.
I here put forward two points of speculation: One is that the term "Coupé de Ville" is not entirely French, but is the French term "coupé" applied to the Spanish term "Sedanca de Ville", indicating a cut-down version of a Sedanca de Ville. (If the term were French, would it not be "Coupé du Ville" instead of "Coupé de Ville"? On the other hand, I don't know of Spanish having "Ville" instead of "Villa"...) The other is that the Americans got the term "town car" by determining that "de Ville" means "of a town" and whatever that word at the beginning of the phrase is means "car". As I said, this is just speculation and can't actually go into the article unless it is confirmed by reliable sources. Sincerely, SamBlob (talk) 19:38, 13 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Counter-proposal

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I have since acquired another source document, which complicates the picture greatly. It turns out that not even the term "Sedanca" has a clear definition. While Culshaw & Horrobin states that "Sedanca" is for the two-door version with front entry and no division and "Sedanca de ville" is for the four door version with the fully enclosed passenger section with doors and division, the new source claims "Sedanca" for the four door with the fully-enclosed passenger section and "Sedanca coupé" for the two door version without the division.

As a result, I suggest a counter-proposal. Since the term "coupé de ville" is used almost universally (albeit to mean different versions to people in different areas), the merge should be to "Coupé de ville".

In any case, however, I intend to include a table with a list of terms in the first column, the regions where the term means one type in the second column, the regions where the term means the other type in the third column, and a fourth column for notes on each term.

Sincerely, SamBlob (talk) 02:07, 6 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]

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