Talk:Zhongdong, Ziyun County

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Reverted Article Title to "Zhongdong"

Reverting to original page name. "Dong" does mean "Cave," but "Zhongdong" is the name used by the sources cited, which are English-language newspapers, TV news, and a BBC documentary. China Daily, the English-language state newspaper of the PRC, uses "Central Cave" instead, but there's no usage precedent for "Zhong Cave." Basically, convention is to transcribe the whole name phonetically ("Zhongdong") or to translate the whole name's meaning ("Central Cave"), but there's no precedent for mixing the two methods.

With common, easily-translatable, single words, it's better to just translate. For example, it's Yellow River or Huang He but never "Huang River," because that would incorrectly imply that "Huang" is a proper name.

Also, since the article is more focused on the village in the cave than the cave itself, in that context "Dong" is part of the name. Comparably, the "Hai" in Shanghai or the "Kong" in Hong Kong are part of the city names, and are never translated as "Shang Ocean" or "Hong Harbor." Basically, city and town names are usually fully transliterated, not translated based on meanings. (Beijing/Peking, Harbin, Kunming, etc.)

(Though the China Daily article names the village as "Tajing," all the other sources simply name the village "Zhongdong," the same as the cave. I can't find any other sources that mention the name "Tajing"... if someone does, please update.)

From Wikipedia:Article titles:

"Wikipedia does not necessarily use the subject's 'official' name as an article title; it instead uses the name which is most frequently used to refer to the subject in English-language reliable sources."

Hi, I accept your argument that as the name for the village but as regards the cave itself, it should be Zhong Cave not Middle Cave. "Zhong" here is nominative and "Dong" in English means cave. It is unfortunate that this is a single syllable example - are you seriously suggesting that Furong Cave should be either Furongdong (which is an incorrect pinyin transliteration) or "Lotus Lotus Cave" (literal translation). The trouble with a lot of the "precedents" you cite is that they are done by people who don't speak Chinese or understand how to use pinyin properly for transliteration. And of course there is a "precedent" for mixing pinyin and English - lets start with the Beijing Exhibition Centre - Beijing is the nominative part. In the same way Zhong is the nominative part of Zhong Cave - not an adjective.

I have changed the two references to Middle Cave but left the rest as it is. Best Philg88 (talk) 00:50, 16 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Hello there! I haven't changed anything, since there's nothing incorrect with "Zhong Cave" beside my personal preference. We both agree that there's no reason to keep "Dong" except when it's nominative for the village. You're right that "Bejing" is nominative, so it's the "Beijing Exhibition Center." Where we disagree is, I think "Zhong" is used as an adjective and you think it's used as a nominative. Let me try to explain my logic. "White" in "The White House" is adjectival in use, although it's also part of the name. If you were conversing in Chinese and your Chinese friend referred to the White House as the "Wai-Ta 宮" ("White 宮") as opposed to the "白宮", you'd think it sounded funny. Is he wrong? No, but it sure sounds weird. That's how, as a Chinese speaker, "中 Cave" ("Zhong Cave") used in English conversation sounds like to me. It'll be even weirder because most people saying it will mispronounce 中. ("ZONGGGG?? JONGGG??? CHONG???" "ARRGH!") English takes foreign names and anglicizes them all the time, so it's not incorrect, but it's hard to get used to.

Though "Furong Cave" isn't wrong, for the reasons I've said above, I would personally translate it as "Hibiscus Cave." "Lotus Lotus Cave" is, of course, always wrong. 芙蓉 as a phrase means "hibiscus" (the mutabilis species, in particular), so translating the individual characters separately would be poor translation. Like "河马" is always "hippopotamus," not "river horse." Obviously, literal translation isn't effective all the time. I don't fault someone for translating the cave as "Furong Cave" as opposed to " Cotton Rosemallow Cave"!

Maybe we should use "Central Cave"? It's general Wiki policy to use the same translations as official, English language sources, like BBC & CCTV's "Zhongdong" and the state-run China Daily's "Central Cave." (My "Middle Cave" is wrong on that count, by my own logic. The LA Times and Reuters use it as sort of an informal translation in their article, but never declare the village to be named that.) ~Puddingpie (talk)

I think Zhong Cave (used only twice in the article), is fine. Zhong has many nuances of meaning in Chinese and in this case I don't think anyone knows what the correct one is. If you get into any other conversations like this please give me a shout. Best Philg88 (talk) 09:59, 17 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

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