Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Korea-related articles

Establishing MOS:DATETIES

Moved from Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Korea (2024 Rewrite & Proposal)

 – seefooddiet (talk) 08:20, 3 October 2024 (UTC)

Something that's bugged me over time is that we previously didn't have a recommended MOS:DATEFORMAT per MOS:DATETIES. I just realized I think I can prove that SK/NK have one; to my understanding it's Month, Day, Year.

Below is a quick survey of various Korea-related English-language sources below, mostly from WP:KO/RS#R. Surprisingly all of the ones I looked at use MDY formatting.

• Korea.net ([1])
• Seoul Metropolitan Government ([2])
• The Chosun Ilbo ([3])
• The Dong-A Ilbo ([4])
• The Hankyoreh ([5])
• KBS World ([6])
• The Korea Herald ([7])
• Korea JoongAng Daily ([8])
• The Korea Times ([9])
• The Korea Economic Daily ([10])
• Yonhap News Agency ([11])

I checked 2-3 articles from each source, and they all used MDY.

This seems to hold even for these North Korean sources:

• The Pyongyang Times ([12])
• KCNA ([13])
• Rodong Sinmun ([14])

I think there's a reasonably compelling case that we should recommend MDY. I'll add it to the MOS for now, if you dispute it please post here. 104.232.119.107 (talk) 11:26, 31 July 2024 (UTC)

I'm sorry to say that I think the MDY proposal as currently formulated seems to be WP:OR. As you already highlighted, Korean dates typically written in the format YYYY-MM-DD. To recommend MDY as a standard for English-language sources related to Korea, we would need reliable secondary sources that explicitly instruct Koreans to use the MDY format when writing in English. Are there any? The list of websites using MDY could be considered primary sources or data points: to claim that Korean sources prefer MDY format when writing in English, one would ideally need secondary sources that analyze and discuss this preference explicitly, rather than inferring it from a collection of examples.

MDY is very much a US-only thing. When doing a very quick search on Naver I could see recommendations on writing MDY for English when the audience was American, and DMY for European audiences. Though I didn't spend long looking, I don't think we're in a position to make the recommendation for MDY. By contrast, YYYY-MM-DD is an acceptable format in the wider MOS for references, so could recommend that I think.

Great that we've included a section on lunar calendar too. I've been struggling to find a site that will convert old (pre-1900) dates to Gregorian calendar or explains how to do it. Is anyone aware of one?Nonabelian (talk) 22:23, 1 August 2024 (UTC)

Lunar calendar converter I linked on WP:KOREA's resources section seefooddiet (talk) 07:20, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

MDY works because it is the observed status quo in the majority of South Korean-related articles. DMY usage is minimal and mostly observed in BLP articles, often due to the subject originating from UK-related countries or because the article was already written in British English, both of which fall under strong ties. Another observation for DMY usage is when the article was already using that format, so it was retained. While YYYY-MM-DD is an acceptable format for citations only, when an article is using either MDY or DMY, it is also tagged with {{Use mdy dates}} or {{Use dmy dates}}. These templates automatically render dates [in citations] in the specified format, regardless of the format they are entered in the wikitext. For consistency and maintainability, we should stick to a single style, which, as mentioned at the beginning, should be MDY, as per the nomination. — Paper9oll (🔔 • 📝) 06:09, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

For these kinds of policies there will always be degrees of OR in proposals in creating and evaluating them. But I think the argument that the evidence is not strong enough is reasonable. However, I suspect there's a reason MDY is being used so consistently in English-language sources from both Koreas. After 30 mins of searching I can't find any guidance on it (not even sure which govt ministry would produce this guidance, if any). seefooddiet (talk) 07:20, 2 August 2024 (UTC)

As a heads up, I'm going to retract the strong recommendation to use MDY dates by default, and replace it with a softer recommendation based on common practice. seefooddiet (talk) 00:36, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

I have noticed that there's inconsistency on South Korean-related article, To point out, most South Korean politician used the DMY format while other category of South Korean article used the MDY format. Usage of MDY is pretty much a US-only thing 81.78.168.51 (talk) 16:23, 5 October 2024 (UTC)

Can you clarify whether you're talking about a specific article or a category of articles? The DMY format is used for the lead sections and infoboxes of WP:BLP articles. The discussion has recently met a consensus that MDY should be used for the body and refs of South Korea-related articles. 00101984hjw (talk) 16:43, 5 October 2024 (UTC)

I hate to be reactive instead of proactive here, but I fail to really see how the specific wording here is consistent with WP:DATETIES, with the operative passage even being cited here. There's no reason to prefer MDY nor to switch articles to it, as no English-speaking date preference is at issue. Remsense ‥ 论 06:22, 16 October 2024 (UTC)

Hm, on a regrettably late closer read you may be right.

However, two other thoughts:

• I don't think there's anything in Wikipedia's guidelines that prohibits our expressed preference for MDY.
• If it is the widespread practice of both countries to use MDY when writing English, there may be a separate argument for using MDY.

I'm on the fence though. I'll hold off from further MDY conversions until we reach a conclusion. seefooddiet (talk) 07:05, 16 October 2024 (UTC)

There's a recent discussion you may want to check out in the MOS:DATE talk archives. This is me serving as the messenger in large part; I just wanted to make sure everyone was fully aware of the previous deliberations of this particular passage—I certainly wasn't! Remsense ‥ 论 07:27, 16 October 2024 (UTC)

Thanks for the heads up. It looks like this overrules my suggestion, and invalidates our use of MDY. I'll start fixing all of this soon argh. seefooddiet (talk) 09:41, 16 October 2024 (UTC)

@00101984hjw @Paper9oll @Explicit See the above thread with Remsense; I don't think we should prescribe MDY or even American English (MOS:TIES has similar wording to MOS:DATETIES); think it goes against consensus established at the main MOS. If nobody has any objections, I'll go ahead and revert our preference back to none. seefooddiet (talk) 19:52, 16 October 2024 (UTC)

Fair enough. — 00101984hjw (talk) 20:13, 16 October 2024 (UTC)

Cool with it. — Paper9oll (🔔 • 📝) 05:31, 17 October 2024 (UTC)

I would argue that the MOS should direct editors to use American English and date formats, unless the subject has strong ties to a country that uses other variants of English, like Son Heung-min. There's The dominance of American English by The Korea Herald that supports this position. Additional support: Experiences of non-North American teachers of English in American English-dominant Korean ELT and Complex perceptions of Korean English-speakers. Anecdotally, having lived in South Korea for over eight years myself, American English is the standard. I work with and know nationals from countries that use other variants of English, and they all have the same experience: they must use American English. I don't see a particularly strong reason to encourage editors to use a neutral stance on the topic when South Korea clearly has a preference. ✗plicit 14:39, 1 October 2024 (UTC)

I feel the same way. The only entities I know of in South Korea that may use non-American English are international schools that follow British curricula. Everything else I've interacted with in South Korea has used American English. @98Tigerius @00101984hjw do you have any thoughts on this? Otherwise the only opposing voice so far is Nonabelian, and they've largely stopped contributing to Wikipedia in the last month. May be able to get this passed. seefooddiet (talk) 19:55, 1 October 2024 (UTC)

I think it’s safe to say MDY is the better option here. It appears to me as well that Korean sources prefer the format in English articles, and Korea definitely has had a stronger American influence throughout its history. — 00101984hjw (talk) 21:16, 1 October 2024 (UTC)

Oh hm wait. Forgot about North Korea. I don't know how prevalent non-American English is there, but at the very least we may be able to get a MDY recommendation passed for both Koreas given evidence in my original post. We'd have to demonstrate prevalence of non-American English in NK before we'd be able to recommend English variety guidance for NK-related articles. seefooddiet (talk) 19:59, 1 October 2024 (UTC)

It appears that both KCNA Watch and The Pyongyang Times prefer the MDY format.([15]https://kcnawatch.org/) — 00101984hjw (talk) 21:27, 1 October 2024 (UTC)

Yes, mentioned in original post seefooddiet (talk) 21:39, 1 October 2024 (UTC)

I did a quick Google search and found Ask a North Korean: What is English-language education like in the DPRK?, which reads, "If North Korea hates the U.S. so much, why would its citizens study English? It’s true that North Korea describes the U.S. as a mortal enemy, as invaders and wild dogs with whom it cannot live under one sky. Perhaps that’s why people in North Korea are taught British English, not American English." Unseen part of North Korea [VIDEO] also states, "Except the English we learn is British English, not American English." ✗plicit 00:14, 2 October 2024 (UTC)

Yeah makes sense. The use of MDY on their sites is odd. Does anyone have a VPN or live outside the US? Can you tell us if the date format changes to DMY? seefooddiet (talk) 00:25, 2 October 2024 (UTC)

I got hold of a VPN and gave it a try. It seems like they genuinely seem to prefer MDY. Also [16] This link uses "humor" instead of the British "humour".

I think we should ask for MDY for both Koreas. I think we can recommend American English for South Korea-related articles, but abstain from commenting on North Korea–related ones for now (until more evidence is gathered). Does this sound good? @00101984hjw @Explicit seefooddiet (talk) 09:45, 2 October 2024 (UTC)

Sounds good to me — 00101984hjw (talk) 12:13, 2 October 2024 (UTC)

I guess so. For now, articles about South Korean subjects should use MDY format, while articles about North Korean subjects should remain status quo. ✗plicit 08:14, 3 October 2024 (UTC)

Length of the MOS

Moved from Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Korea (2024 Rewrite & Proposal)

 – seefooddiet (talk) 08:20, 3 October 2024 (UTC)

I just made some section deletions (sorry 😥) due to concerns over the MOS's length. Even after the deletions, it's longer than the Chinese and Japanese manuals. Granted, our romanization is more complicated than theirs, but still think we should continuously push for concision. Please feel free to undo or edit anything I write as well; I don't take it personally. Just want to make this draft as robust as possible; such total rewrites are a rare opportunity. seefooddiet (talk) 06:10, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

I just trimmed much of the family name hatnote/footnote section; sorry again... It strongly overlaps with the Template:Family name explanation, so I just decided to just link to the template in lieu of repeating the explanation. The examples also add length to the article; people can click on the template doc pages to see examples. seefooddiet (talk) 06:40, 7 August 2024 (UTC)

Needs to explicitly state that people should not get hanja from Chinese-language sources

Moved from Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Korea (2024 Rewrite & Proposal)

 – seefooddiet (talk) 08:20, 3 October 2024 (UTC)

In Wikipedia, these are sometimes found in hanja names of people:

• Chinese-language transcription (whose Korean reading does not match the hangul name)
• Simplified Chinese characters

Chinese-language sources are unreliable for Korean hanja names because they "make up" one when the actual hanja is not known.

Another issue is that some people think the hanja parameter of a Korean-related template must consist of hanja only, even though some names do not have hanja. Such people get hanja from Chinese-language sources and blindly replace the hangul in the hanja parameter.

This page should state at least the following:

Do not get hanja from Chinese-language sources.

1. Chinese-language sources are unreliable for Korean hanja names because they "make up" one when the actual hanja is not known.
2. Some names do not have hanja (hanja is not a requirement in names). In such cases, only the surname is written in hanja (e.g. hangul: 김빛나, hanja: 金빛나). Do not blindly replace the hangul in the hanja parameter of a Korean-related template.

172.56.232.61 (talk) 08:53, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

The rule sounds good to me. Side note, but I'm a little worried about the word "blindly"; it typically reads a little harsh in English. If you'd like, you can just write comfortably without worrying about tone, and I can go and edit the addition later.

I've been meaning to rewrite much of the MOS anyway, due to #Article naming conventions vs romanization in body. seefooddiet (talk) 17:35, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

About "blindly": I tried to say "don't do that without thinking".

You can simply revise what I wrote above and add it to the page. 172.56.232.109 (talk) 18:33, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

Thank you for bringing this issue to light. I went ahead and added it to a new subsection called "Sourcing Hanja"; this should probably be resectioned at some point. I slightly reworded your second provision, and I think that the first provision could also be edited (particularly the "make up"), but I don't know how to approach it. Dantus21 (talk) 19:34, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

I may rewrite the guidance for Hanja altogether today; the main ideas will be preserved but I will change the ordering and placement of the information seefooddiet (talk) 20:07, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

I just saw your Hanja MOS rewrite and I gotta say it looks great! Dantus21 (talk) 00:19, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

Yeah, your rewrite looks great! Thank you. 172.56.232.253 (talk) 20:05, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

Recent changes, Aug 7 (UTC)

Moved from Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Korea (2024 Rewrite & Proposal)

 – seefooddiet (talk) 08:20, 3 October 2024 (UTC)

Hello, I've recently made some significant changes so want to slow down and give a high-level summary of them.

• Rewrote lead
• Shortened prose for explanations/policies that exist on other pages. I tried to display prominent links to those pages instead.
• Completely rewrote the Hanja section.
  • Mostly kept existing logic, made some additions
• Mostly rewrote Article layout section.
  • Added significant amount of guidelines; I don't suspect they are/hope they aren't controversial. They're already common practice for our articles.
• Created a Naming guidelines section
  • Rules that apply to all Naming conventions, unless overridden in the Naming conventions section.
  • Check out the Avoid redundant English names section. I'm not sure we should keep this; it's more just a pet peeve.
• Overhauled Naming conventions other than the people name section
  • People name section is pending discussion.
  • Logic should mostly be the same, except for province names. I'll make a separate post about that.
  • Moved formatting titles of works into this section from Romanization section.
• Rewrote Wiktionary links section with help of the original author (172 IP user)

I recommend you reread the sections I described above to understand what has changed. I tried to make everything uncontroversial. If you see anything you disagree with, please let me know ASAP so we can address it or potentially revert to an earlier version. I'm trying hard to balance not stepping on any toes while still writing quickly.

TODO:

• Templates section
• Misc copyediting
• Discuss Romanization conventions and people naming conventions
• Copyedit or revise both those sections depending on discussion

Sorry for my disorganized editing style; just kind of the way I write 😓 seefooddiet (talk) 07:16, 7 August 2024 (UTC)

Nonabelian Dantus21 Paper9oll. Paper9oll, as you edit a lot on pop culture, I'd appreciate some of your insights on the article layout section. To my understanding it should be mostly what's already practiced right now. seefooddiet (talk) 07:38, 7 August 2024 (UTC)

@Seefooddiet Is there a particular aspect you feel is missing and would like to see improved? I couldn't think of any at the moment, but I can add more if there is a direction provided. Otherwise, I have no objection to the current state of the Article Layout section. — Paper9oll (🔔 • 📝) 09:24, 7 August 2024 (UTC)

Not particularly, the goal was actually to be minimally intrusive and reflect current practice, so hearing that you think it's acceptable is a relief! seefooddiet (talk) 17:59, 7 August 2024 (UTC)

Having did a readthrough of most of it, here's what I have to say.

• English word section looks good, but maybe make a more explicit guideline for what words should be italicized (or not) as I feel this could be a slippery slope for interpretation. For example, you could specify dictionaries to check (like Cambridge or Oxford) and specifying a ratio of dictionaries with the word (like 3:2) that could indicate to not italicize. Perhaps I'm overcomplicating stuff
  • Added guidance seefooddiet (talk) 20:09, 7 August 2024 (UTC)
• Merge use korean language terms section to english words section
  • Will think through how to regroup, article layout still needs work overall. seefooddiet (talk) 20:09, 7 August 2024 (UTC)
• What does "topics related to korea as a whole" mean for RR? Does it mean for names like Joseon? Why single out personal names for MR?
  • I was not the primary author of this section, and haven't touched it much. Pending discussion as I'm also uncertain about parts of it. seefooddiet (talk) 20:09, 7 August 2024 (UTC)
• By the romanization template, does that mean that an article will have a consistent romanization throughout (I think I might not understand the extent of it)?
  • Likewise with above; has complicated implications. Like in a MR article, should we write "Soŭl" for Seoul? Is that desirable? seefooddiet (talk) 20:09, 7 August 2024 (UTC)

    • I’m still unsure what to do here (I might make a post about romanizations soon), but whatever it is Seoul should be the exception, because according to this ngrams Soul was/is almost never used, even in cases before RR existed. Dantus21 (talk) 05:45, 10 August 2024 (UTC)

      The situation is quite complicated; I'm currently researching the situation and discussing it actively with the IP user. I'm currently working on Romanization of Korean to share what I've learned with others.

      I'm considering publishing an WP:ESSAY on the situation for future readers. Still doing the background research though.

      We're joining into a debate that has lasted over a century, and how we rule on may have a significant impact on how others spell Korean terms. Complicated situation, but fun given the real impact we may have seefooddiet (talk) 05:56, 10 August 2024 (UTC)

      By any chance where are you discussing this with the IP (if you want to share)? I’d be interested in helping out too, although my Korean is admittedly not too great. Dantus21 (talk) 06:15, 10 August 2024 (UTC)

      Via email; we're discussing in a mix of Korean and English. Most things of substance we discuss on Wiki directly for public viewing; it's usually questions about Wiki policy that we discuss privately. This talk page and links to other discussions match our current understanding of romanization. seefooddiet (talk) 06:44, 10 August 2024 (UTC)

      Interesting disclosure here. I'm concerned on the statement it's usually questions about Wiki policy that we discuss privately. For transparency and accountability, could you please elaborate on the types of policy discussions that occur privately? Are these primarily clarifications, or do they involve substantive (regardless of depthness) discussion about changes to Wikipedia's policy? Do they align with the Wikipedia's policy on consensus pertaining to off-wiki discussions? — Paper9oll (🔔 • 📝) 07:14, 10 August 2024 (UTC)

      Yes they do. It's usually questions about how policies work. They're usually shallow questions; when there's anything of substance we go to wiki. I would hope there's no reason to be suspicious; you know me and intentions here are clearly good seefooddiet (talk) 07:33, 10 August 2024 (UTC)

      I'm a little saddened by your comment. What even would either of us have to gain by conspiring here? Neither of us benefit from these policy changes and I've welcomed disagreement, and I've disagreed with the IP user both publicly and privately. I disclose my process as much as needed out of good faith. There's no "gotcha aha" moment here to be found. I'm remarkably boring; I'm reading 90 year old papers about linguistics. seefooddiet (talk) 07:41, 10 August 2024 (UTC)

      I'm just caught off-guard by such disclosure hence raising some alarms. Don't worry, this is all good-faith. Thanks for the clarification. — Paper9oll (🔔 • 📝) 07:49, 10 August 2024 (UTC)

• Hangul section looks good
• Already commented on Hanja section
• Article layout section looks good
• Template section looks good; maybe say something about not putting in context=old? Hunminjeongeum is barely used anyway and imo that name will cause more confusion; perhaps it might just be a pet peeve of mine
  • I need to expand guidelines around this infobox, will look into this and more. seefooddiet (talk) 20:09, 7 August 2024 (UTC)
• Naming guidelines look good; We should definitely keep the avoid redundant English names; most of the names are so uncommon that we should avoid tautologies when we can.
  • I'm still a little on the fence about it; I visited Gyeongbukgung a few weeks ago and they put "Gyeongbukgung Palace" all over the place. "Namsan Mountain" is also reasonably common. However, maybe this just falls under common name and are exceptions rather than a trend. seefooddiet (talk) 20:09, 7 August 2024 (UTC)
• Possible to break up naming conventions section or maybe even make a separate page?
  • I'm thinking the same thing; we originally intentionally tried to merge WP:NCKO into MOS:KO, but it's becoming so long that maybe unmerging is best. For now will keep on the same article, likely will split off later. seefooddiet (talk) 20:09, 7 August 2024 (UTC)
• Do common modified romanizations apply to ancient people and North Koreans?
  • Not primary author, I'm not sure about this part too. seefooddiet (talk) 20:09, 7 August 2024 (UTC)
    • Fair enough. FWIW I would support modified for South Koreans, but not for ancient people or North Koreans since I don’t think they generally use those modified spellings. Dantus21 (talk) 04:28, 9 August 2024 (UTC)
• I haven’t looked at administrative divisions yet, will look at soon.
• Geographic features, temples, and works in naming conventions section look good.
• I am ambivalent to the dates, wiktionary, and references section, but they generally look good.

I'll admit I didn't look at your specifications before rereading, so forgive me if I accidentally addressed something that you already planned to! Dantus21 (talk) 09:00, 7 August 2024 (UTC)

Thanks for the feedback 🙂 I'll edit your comment with subbullet responses seefooddiet (talk) 20:03, 7 August 2024 (UTC)

Romanization for North Korea articles...

Moved from Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Korea (2024 Rewrite & Proposal)

 – seefooddiet (talk) 08:20, 3 October 2024 (UTC)

Realizing the Romanization situation for North Korea is on shaky ground. I want to avoid discussion fatigue, but this bit is important.

The Romanization of Korean (North) ("NKR") differs from McCune–Reischauer in a number of ways. See [17]. Some examples:

• 전라도 NKR: Jŏlla-do vs MR: Chŏlla-do.
• 찔레골 NKR: JJilre-gol or Jilre-gol vs MR: Tchille-gol. Notice the second capital "J" and optional removal of second "J".
• 김꽃분이 NKR: Kim KKotpuni vs MR: Kim Kkotpuni. Notice the second capital "K".

Currently, we blanket recommend MR for all NK-related topics. Yet, as discussed in #Names hyphenation, we're considering borrowing elements of the official North Korean style for people names, and applying them to MR, when really those style elements are a part of NKR. I don't think this works.

I think these are our options:

1. Use NKR for all NK-related concepts.
2. Use pure MR for all NK-related concepts (i.e. for names, no spaces or hyphens between syllables by default).
3. Use MR for all NK-related concepts, borrow elements of NKR style rules (as proposed in #Names hyphenation) and apply them to MR.
4. Use NKR for people names only, use MR for everything else.

I think we should do either 1 or 2; think 3 and 4 are too confusing and arbitrary.

I'm leaning towards 2. 2 is closest to the current status quo, and is closest to international academic writings on Korea. It also is asking less of our users; we're already asking them to learn MR and RR, adding NKR is a lot.

But also arguments for 1: news articles on KCNA Watch use NKR (example). [Edit: also, I emailed NK News and confirmed that their style guide asks for NKR.] It also may seem like a political move to not use NK's preferred system (although SK's systems have long been ignored by the academic community and seemingly nobody's been bothered by our use of MR for NK thus far). seefooddiet (talk) 07:36, 27 August 2024 (UTC)

Freedom4U Yue Kanguole Dantus21 CountHacker Tagging users who may care about this issue. If you know other people who edit on North Korea, please tag them too. Sorry for so many discussions, we're getting closer to finishing this, just a few major open questions. seefooddiet (talk) 07:40, 27 August 2024 (UTC)

Relevant past discussions: 2003, 2004 pt 1, 2004 pt 2, 2006.

For NK, MR has been in place since the first version of the MOS/NCKO. I couldn't really find an adequate discussion of why NKR isn't used, but I'm maybe missing something. seefooddiet (talk) 18:05, 28 August 2024 (UTC)

One key detail in the AP Stylebook I just noticed is this: The style and spelling of names in North Korea and South Korea follow each government’s standard policy for transliterations unless the subject has a personal preference. Technically, the AP is asking its staff to use NKR for people's names. I'm not sure how closely they follow that guidance. For place names, it seems like NKR isn't being consistently applied: e.g. NKR and MR ("phyongan" and "pyongan"; 13 results for "Phyongan" vs 19 for "Pyongan"). You can observe similar for NKNews: 170 results for "Pyongan", 208 for "Phyongan".

I'm still leaning MR because of status quo and possible divided usage on MR/NKR. seefooddiet (talk) 07:16, 30 August 2024 (UTC)

Sorry for my late response! I’m no expert, but I’d say Option 2 by a long shot, as it seems to be what the majority of reliable sources seem to use. I wouldn’t worry about it being a political statement, since we’re just following what the sources do. If someone has a different take I’d be interested in hearing it though. — Dantus21 (talk) 04:23, 1 September 2024 (UTC)

I'm for option 2 too. --ChoHyeri (talk) 12:51, 1 September 2024 (UTC)

As an update I'm increasingly conflicted and need to do more research. I'm going to try and verify what other mainstream international newspapers use. So far I've verified that NK News and Associated Press both recommend NKR (with the latter recommending it for names). seefooddiet (talk) 08:17, 4 September 2024 (UTC)

I’m sure you already were thinking this, but also keep in mind what the newspapers actually practice too, as it seems like AP and NK didn’t strictly follow their own recommendations. Dantus21 (talk) 11:26, 4 September 2024 (UTC)

Going to investigate that as well. My example given was a possible common name situation seefooddiet (talk) 18:08, 4 September 2024 (UTC)

I've been doing some more thinking. Our rules are already incredibly complicated, and we're already asking for knowledge of at least 2 romanization systems. I suspect NKR actually does see a good amount of usage, but I'm loathe to overload our rules even more. Complication drives people away, and we need more editors. seefooddiet (talk) 05:04, 8 September 2024 (UTC)

Yale romanization

Moved from Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Korea (2024 Rewrite & Proposal)

 – seefooddiet (talk) 08:20, 3 October 2024 (UTC)

At present, our draft MOS discourages the use of Yale romanization of Korean, but I've become skeptical of this.

See Middle Korean; the Yale system is being used for this article. @Kanguole, have you seen if any writings on Middle Korean use MR instead of Yale? My impression is it's probably mostly Yale; if so we should reflect what the linguists are doing and not force MR into the situation.

I think we should allow Yale, but mention that its use should be limited to linguistics-related articles. seefooddiet (talk) 07:02, 1 September 2024 (UTC)

@Theo.phonchana @Malerisch @Remsense tagging some more users who may have relevant exposure to this topic. For context, we're currently working on rewriting MOS:KO. See the draft here. seefooddiet (talk) 07:07, 1 September 2024 (UTC)

It's standard practice in English-language works on Korean linguistics to use Yale for linguistic examples, e.g. Cho and Whitman Korean: A Linguistic Introduction, Lee and Ramsey A History of the Korean Language, Brown and Yeon (eds.) The Handbook of Korean Linguistics, Song The Korean Language, Sohn The Korean Language, Chang Korean. Kanguole 11:11, 1 September 2024 (UTC)

Pending additional participation, I think it'll be relatively safe to assume Yale is going to be acceptable. I may modify the MOS to reflect this. seefooddiet (talk) 18:49, 4 September 2024 (UTC)

I'm not sure about "Use only when used by source being cited". If a linguistics article cites English-language sources and Korean-language sources, the former will presumably use Yale for their examples and the latter no romanization. But we would want to be consistent within the article. Yale is designed to correspond directly to the Hangul spelling, so generating it requires less expertise than MR or RR. Kanguole 20:57, 5 September 2024 (UTC)

I'm not sure about it either. Part of my worry is what do we do with non-linguistics text on linguistics articles? Like Hangul author names, for example. Do we write author names in Yale? seefooddiet (talk) 21:10, 5 September 2024 (UTC)

In the texts I listed above, the usual practice is Yale for the examples and MR for all the names. (Sohn is an exception, using Yale for everything, so Sinla, Seycong and Ceycwu.) Kanguole 21:25, 5 September 2024 (UTC)

I think it's acceptable to use Yale romanization in linguistics articles, but I'm hesitant to make the rule a strict "use only Yale for linguistics articles". Not many people besides Korean linguists would be familiar with Yale, and we should keep in mind WP:TECHNICAL—unlike Korean linguistics tomes, the main readership of Korean linguistics articles on Wikipedia is probably not Korean linguists. Choosing the more esoteric romanization option, especially when there is not much obvious benefit, doesn't seem to follow that guideline. (I don't think converting articles like Korean pronouns and Korean postpositions to Yale is particularly helpful—do you really want to tell people that "I" in Korean is "ce"?) Wiktionary also uses RR. That said, Yale romanization can sometimes be useful for e.g. morphology or historical linguistics, so it should still be used when appropriate.

It looks like the de facto standard for some Korean linguistics articles is a "why not both?" approach: see Korean grammar or Korean verbs, where Yale is bolded and RR is in italics; maybe that option is preferable for some articles? Otherwise, deciding on a per-article basis could be the simpler option. Using Yale in Middle Korean is fine, for example. Malerisch (talk) 10:13, 9 September 2024 (UTC)

My wording of the Yale guidance was unclear; what I meant to imply was that using Yale was acceptable for linguistics articles (particularly for linguistics examples), not that it should be the only system in use for such cases. I gave rewording it a shot, but still feeling meh about my wording.

@Kanguole makes a somewhat opposing point btw; they argued in favor of intra-article consistency.

I'm not sure what we should recommend. Maybe worth noting that the articles @Malerisch linked are all fairly poorly sourced; maybe we shouldn't be attached to the de facto current standards for such articles. But I do agree that Yale is inaccessible to most and that Wikipedia should be accessible. But I also agree that consistency is also nice. Difficult decision. Maybe should leave up to editors to decide on case-by-case basis, similar to WP:ENGVAR? But that also sounds bleh; three different potential romanization systems in use for a single topic, with no standards for what to use except for whatever individual editors prefer at the time??? At least for our other romanization guidelines it's reasonably clear what system to use; more difficult to figure out here. seefooddiet (talk) 17:38, 9 September 2024 (UTC)

Another thought; we don't really have the opportunity to apply a MOS:CONSISTENT-like guideline (prescribing intra-article consistency) with romanization because we romanize on a term-by-term basis.

Maybe I lean towards Malerisch's argument then, but I'm still skeptical of just letting people decide which romanization system to use (potentially all three in the same article) based on mostly personal taste. seefooddiet (talk) 10:36, 10 September 2024 (UTC)

Tentative thought: Yale for historical linguistics, RR for modern linguistics? seefooddiet (talk) 03:59, 12 September 2024 (UTC)

Hmm, that could work. Malerisch (talk) 02:03, 27 September 2024 (UTC)

I think RR is not suitable for modern linguistics. Consider the following example:

• The word dongnip 'independence' is composed of dok 'alone' and rip 'to stand'.

Ordinary readers would have difficulty understanding this.

To get around this, you could use the RR letter-by-letter transliteration (doglib, dog, lib), but this system is functionally yet another separate romanization system. We shouldn't complicate things even more by introducing a fourth romanization system. I'd argue that for linguistics, we should only use Yale. 172.56.232.137 (talk) 07:52, 28 September 2024 (UTC)

I don't really agree with this. Yale romanization also has the flaw of leading readers to believe that 독립 is pronounced "toklip", as readers unfamiliar with Yale would naturally expect it to represent pronunciation rather than just the underlying morphology. Assuming that this is actually a linguistics example, adding a short explanation about Korean pronunciation changes would suffice to dispel any confusion.

Would you also argue that Hepburn romanization would similarly be unsuitable for Japanese, which has sound changes like rendaku?

• The word tegami 'letter' is composed of te 'hand' and kami 'paper'.

Malerisch (talk) 09:10, 28 September 2024 (UTC)

Furthermore, RR letter-by-letter transliteration, if it's needed, is explicitly allowed by the RR standard; it's technically not a separate system. Malerisch (talk) 09:46, 28 September 2024 (UTC)

I think the key word in the IP user's comment for RR letter-by-letter is functionally.

Note that in the current draft MOS we currently discourage its use at all (ctrl+f "letter-by-letter"). That is open to discussion btw; I agree with excluding it because it's so rarely used and because of the functionally argument. seefooddiet (talk) 09:52, 28 September 2024 (UTC)

Okay, fair enough on "functionally". I do agree that letter-by-letter romanization shouldn't normally be used. Malerisch (talk) 09:59, 28 September 2024 (UTC)

Well, the pronunciation-based RR has the flaw of leading readers to believe that 물고기 (mulgogi) is pronounced [물고기] (instead of [물꼬기]), as tensification is not reflected. The MR system indicates tensification by using the voiceless letter instead of the voiced letter (mulkogi; cf. 불고기 [불고기] pulgogi). So if you think showing pronunciation is important, we should probably use MR.

I think I can criticize more on RR, but I won't do that (at least for now).

For everthing else, I think you're right. I don't think I have a good counterargument to that.

(However, I personally don't think an orthography (including a romanization system) has to show pronunciation perfectly (in other words, personally I am okay with "toklip"), but I won't go into that.) 172.56.232.61 (talk) 03:46, 30 September 2024 (UTC)

While RR, MR, and Yale all have flaws, I think the use of RR is probably best for discussions of the contemporary Korean language mostly because it's the most recognizable system to the users of Wikipedia. Also, I imagine most people engage with the learning of Korean through books that use RR.

In short, I think I like Yale for examples of historical Korean and RR for contemporary Korean. seefooddiet (talk) 04:20, 30 September 2024 (UTC)

I went ahead and WP:BOLDly added recommendations to use Yale for historical linguistics and RR for contemporary linguistics. If you oppose this, please comment. seefooddiet (talk) 04:46, 30 September 2024 (UTC)

Well, personally I am still skeptical about this, but I am not going to argue about this (at least for now). 172.56.232.215 (talk) 07:41, 1 October 2024 (UTC)

I think it's unlikely there'll be significant changes to these linguistics articles quickly, so you have some time to develop an argument. seefooddiet (talk) 08:25, 1 October 2024 (UTC)

Infoboxes on Law

Moved from Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Korea (2024 Rewrite & Proposal)

 – seefooddiet (talk) 08:20, 3 October 2024 (UTC)

Should articles on South Korean laws use template:infobox Korean name like the kowiki, or template:infobox legislation like most other enwiki articles on laws and Shutdown law? 00101984hjw (talk) 03:51, 2 September 2024 (UTC)

I think you can/should have both infoboxes. Infobox legislation would go first, then infobox Korean name. It doesn't appear that Infobox legislation has a parameter for embedding a child template, so they'll likely need to be kept separate; otherwise we generally recommend the two infoboxes are combined, as is done here Maebongsan (Yeongwol). seefooddiet (talk) 04:00, 2 September 2024 (UTC)

Romanization section

Moved from Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Korea (2024 Rewrite & Proposal)

 – seefooddiet (talk) 08:20, 3 October 2024 (UTC)

Gave this section a rewrite. Before and after.

Change log:

• Most of the logic is the same, optimized for concision.
• Added Yale romanization to what we use.
• Changed examples for romanizations; I'm still not happy with them though. The previous examples referred to province names that are governed by our naming conventions and used English words mixed in, so wasn't 100% clear. They also didn't illustrate the use of diacritics. Please feel free to swap them out again, I'll be thinking of better examples.
• Added rules about the use of MR/RR.
• Added a section to Naming guidelines on strict romanization vs naming conventions; this affects the romanization guidelines.

I will make more additions to this in near future. As a heads up, I'm currently writing a companion essay for romanizing Korean on Wikipedia. It provides more detailed explanations of our various choices. When I complete the first draft of the essay, I'll move it under the WikiProject Korea namespace, so that it belongs to the community and can continue to be updated. seefooddiet (talk) 06:14, 5 September 2024 (UTC)

Please add in observed WP:STATUSQUO also otherwise once this draft goes live, there may be unexpected misinterpretation causing issues, including but not limited to, article's content, moving of articles, etc. I'm not particular on anything unless concerning on South Korea BLP-related topics. — Paper9oll (🔔 • 📝) 08:29, 5 September 2024 (UTC)

Could you rephrase? Sorry, I don't understand what your message means. seefooddiet (talk) 08:41, 5 September 2024 (UTC)

@Seefooddiet I meant other than emphasizing on WP:COMMONNAME on RR. — Paper9oll (🔔 • 📝) 09:33, 5 September 2024 (UTC)

I'm still confused, sorry. Btw I saw that you thanked me for an edit; I've since changed that text that you thanked me for. You may want to check the page again, RR no longer mentions WP:COMMONNAME.

Are you requesting we mention what used to be done? There's so many changes in this MOS that I think mentioning the previous standards may be cumbersome. Furthermore, the MOS is about reflecting current consensus, not necessarily what used to be done. seefooddiet (talk) 09:38, 5 September 2024 (UTC)

@Seefooddiet Oh ... didn't saw that changes. Saw that it's now pointing to "Strict romanization vs naming conventions" which included my intention above hence I don't think we need to mention as per observed status quo (within English Wikipedia) and/or current consensus. However, I still need thinks that mentioning WP:COMMONNAME may be beneficial ... then again, WP:RM often lumps together a bunch of policies hence mentioning COMMONNAME may be redundant. In case, I'm being confusing, my only concerns is including but not limited to, article titling, name in opening sentence, Infoboxes (including but not limited to |name=, |birth_name=, |other_names=. Excluding {{Infobox Korean name}}), name in list/list of. — Paper9oll (🔔 • 📝) 09:59, 5 September 2024 (UTC)

The romanization section is about romanization, not about English-language spellings. The two topics are separate; WP:COMMONNAME is more about English-language spellings.

To clarify, this is what the updated guidance is for South Korean people:

• Unless a WP:COMMONNAME or personal preference name is known, use RR (with hyphen in given name) for the article title, article body (including in the opening sentence), and infobox header (both in the header for {{infobox person}} and any of its variants, and the header for {{Infobox Korean name}}). For parameters like birth_name=, you should use this spelling too.
  • This is the English-language spelling I'm talking about.
• However, any time a template asks you for RR (namely {{Korean}} or {{Infobox Korean name}}), do not include the hyphen in the personal name. Only strictly apply RR, which normally discourages such hyphens.
  • This is just romanization.

It's unfortunately confusing. Romanizing Korean sucks. seefooddiet (talk) 10:08, 5 September 2024 (UTC)

@Seefooddiet Yes correct, your understanding (particularly point 1, not much concern on point 2) is aligned with my concerns. — Paper9oll (🔔 • 📝) 10:34, 5 September 2024 (UTC)

Romanization notice

Moved from Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Korea (2024 Rewrite & Proposal)

 – seefooddiet (talk) 08:20, 3 October 2024 (UTC)

@Nonabelian I just realized that by the current MOS, the romanization method notice may be counterproductive.

We currently determine which romanization system is used on a term-by-term basis, and not by entire articles. See also the "Same terms for article titles and in the body" section. For example, if we're writing about a Joseon-era cookbook (its title should use MR) and tteokbokki comes up, we should use the modern RR spelling for tteokbokki.

I propose we don't use the templates. We could possibly reword them to align with the MOS, but the explanation would be complicated enough (especially given that the naming conventions section modifies pure romanization) that it may be better to just point to the MOS itself. seefooddiet (talk) 04:30, 8 September 2024 (UTC)

It's been two weeks and Nonabelian hasn't been active for a while. I'm going to remove the template from the MOS. If you come back Nonabelian and would like to discuss this, please lmk. seefooddiet (talk) 11:21, 22 September 2024 (UTC)

Also Nonabelian, I'm sorry, I may remove the romanization help section altogether. My reasoning is this:

1. We're planning on adding an automatic romanization module in near future, which would make this obsolete.
2. The instructions are pretty lengthy, precise, and involve what is functionally coding. I have a gut feeling that few will ever follow these instructions; they're in a sea of a very long MOS. Furthermore, the people this section is meant for are possibly lazy; RR and Hangul are both fairly easy to learn (even if mistakes are made).

Again, if you disagree with this please let me know. seefooddiet (talk) 08:59, 24 September 2024 (UTC)

Addresses

Moved from Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Korea (2024 Rewrite & Proposal)

 – seefooddiet (talk) 08:20, 3 October 2024 (UTC)

To-do item, figure out a standard formatting for South Korean addresses. seefooddiet (talk) 06:35, 13 September 2024 (UTC)

Actually maybe not, at least for now; maybe too precise. seefooddiet (talk) 08:37, 16 September 2024 (UTC)

Redoing references section

Moved from Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Korea (2024 Rewrite & Proposal)

 – seefooddiet (talk) 08:20, 3 October 2024 (UTC)

Now that the people naming section is rewritten, we're almost done with the first draft of the MOS. I think the last major thing left is the references section.

I want to give the section a rewrite. It's pretty lengthy and complicated; I doubt many will want to read or follow it at present. If this isn't executed well, even fewer people would be willing to write WP:GAs and WP:FAs because they'd need to digest these rules. seefooddiet (talk) 03:42, 24 September 2024 (UTC)

Oh and a reminder that I want to split off the naming conventions sections back into WP:NCKO. Otherwise the documents are way too long. seefooddiet (talk) 07:10, 24 September 2024 (UTC)

@00101984hjw @Dantus21 @Freedom4U @CountHacker

Would it bother anyone if we just deleted the current references section from the MOS altogether? I should have thought of this earlier before I sent out that RFC to write it... My mistake.

I think there's no real obligation on Wikipedia to romanize titles or author names; the Chicago Manual of Style asks for it but we don't have to follow that. Also, this level of precision in reference formatting is a lot of work for little gain; it only hurts people who are trying to get GA or FA by making them do all this. seefooddiet (talk) 02:13, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

I have complicated feelings about this.

While I believe articles adhering to the current ref section would be helpful for the general English speaking reader or article reviewers, it's definitely tedious to provide translated titles and names for every reference, especially considering that the use of the |mask1= parameter itself is pretty unorthodox. And to be fair, most Korean refs on the Enwiki don't even cite |newspaper= or |website= so I think it may be a little too early for such a scrupulous guideline.

Nevertheless, I think such practices should be encouraged, especially on sources for {{sfn}} references. Similarly to what we did for the Sejong the Great rewrite. -- 00101984hjw (talk) 02:39, 27 September 2024 (UTC)

I have more or less the same feelings.

However, my main concern is how few editors we have. Really the purpose of all our rules is to make editing easy by providing structure. Currently they're precise because they're meant to solve tedious debates that were boring and often reached divergent standards, which caused confusion. However, if the rules become tedious in themselves without significantly solving tedious confusions then I think they become harmful. Also, our main priority should be to maximize the amount of information in the bodies of articles. Ref format is a secondary priority imo. seefooddiet (talk) 03:19, 27 September 2024 (UTC)

Maybe we could just leave the tedious parts as recommendations for now? -- 00101984hjw (talk) 03:34, 27 September 2024 (UTC)

Hmm.. if we kept it I'd want to significantly simplify and condense it. I'll take a shot at it and tag you when I have something if that's ok. seefooddiet (talk) 04:12, 27 September 2024 (UTC)

@00101984hjw

This is my draft rewrite: User:Seefooddiet/MOS. My rationale for stripping it down so much:

• The general Wikipedia MOS is really sparse on how to handle the formatting of references. I suspect this is intentional.
  • Our present guidelines, even if all reworded to be optional, would be possibly the most restrictive and precise on the website by a wide margin.
  • If you think about it, all we need from a citation is being able to tell what is being referenced. Anything more is just bonus. That includes rendering Hangul names into Latin script; that may be helpful in discussions but doesn't necessarily strongly help people figure out what source is being referenced. They'll need the original Hangul for that.
  • I kept trans-title because there's already a clear parameter for that and clear consensus that using it is good practice. On the other hand, romanizing author names I haven't seen a consensus for.
• I don't really agree with a number of the choices in hindsight. E.g. providing both romanizations and translations. I'm not sure romanizations for titles should be put at all; they're not helpful to almost everybody, tedious to produce, and are a relic of academic practices (which we don't have to follow).
  • My perspective on the purpose of an MOS has also changed a lot over the course of writing this draft; I'm trying to simplify it.
• I'm too uncertain on what we should recommend for too many areas. Until we reach clear consensuses on things (unlike in the RfC done to produce this, which drew only a handful of people), I figure it's better to keep our guidance sparse, like the general MOS.

seefooddiet (talk) 06:50, 29 September 2024 (UTC)

I fully support the decision of keeping trans-title but deleting transliteration (although standardized referencing styles may prefer otherwise). I don’t see any reason why any reviewer would wish to know the pronunciation of a title rather than its translation.

Also, should usage of the author-mask1= parameter be mandatory? I haven’t seen a single non-Korean, non-sfn source reference that uses this parameter and I think this may be the biggest annoyance to many new editors. I guess it has inevitable roles for sources with the authors’ names in Hangul or Hanja, but would it really be necessary when the name is romanized in the source itself? We already know what transliteration the author prefers and I don’t think removing a single comma would make a big difference.

I wish citation templates had parameters like native-last= or native-author=… 00101984hjw (talk) 21:33, 29 September 2024 (UTC)

Per the wording in my draft, author-mask is regulated like this: rendering author names in English is optional -> if you do render author names in English, use author-mask. Thus, author-mask is optional.

However, I'm now second-guessing myself. I'm not sure how best to handle the format of the author masking and where to put Hangul or English. Check the draft again; I just modified it by deleting that regulation altogether. As per above, until we're certain I think it's better to just withhold guidance. seefooddiet (talk) 21:46, 29 September 2024 (UTC)

I WP:BOLDly went ahead and replaced the section. If anyone opposes this, please let me know.

With that, I think the first draft of the MOS is finished. seefooddiet (talk) 04:27, 30 September 2024 (UTC)

Wrapping up

Moved from Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Korea (2024 Rewrite & Proposal)

 – seefooddiet (talk) 08:20, 3 October 2024 (UTC)

I think the new MOS is ready for use. I'll probably continue editing it for clarity, but the major decisions I think have been made.

Next steps:

• I'll post a notice to WP:KO about this new MOS and will split this draft back into MOS:KO and WP:NCKO.
• I suspect many pages will be moved because of this new MOS. If you think a move will be uncontroversial, you can feel free to WP:BOLDly move it yourself; if there is any uncertainty I think you should open a move discussion instead.
• Any time a page gets moved, mentions of that page in other articles should be updated as well. For each successful move you make, I recommend you post a request on User:Seefooddiet/AWB requests. I'll then use WP:AWB to automatically update the spellings; this should reduce tedious work and the volume of edits that we have to make to update all these spellings.

Thanks for working on this, everyone! We've had the previous MOS, flaws and all, since 2004. I think this is the first time it received a complete overhaul; hopefully it should resolve confusions that we've had for decades. seefooddiet (talk) 04:53, 30 September 2024 (UTC)

I read the whole proposal once more, and I think we're set! The MoS can always be revised with consensus and the current draft seems to address all the major issues. I'm honestly surprised this thing hasn't gone through any major revamps for 20 years. It's somewhat disappointing, in a way. But anyways, excellent work! Cheers. -- 00101984hjw (talk) 04:51, 1 October 2024 (UTC)

Lunisolar calendar details

Relevant discussion happened here. Lunisolar calendar dates are often vague; giving a go at writing firmer practices in the calendar section. seefooddiet (talk) 19:25, 16 October 2024 (UTC)

RfC: MR for historical topics

Which romanization system do you think we should use for historical Korean topics, McCune–Reischauer (MR) or Revised Romanization of Korean (RR)? We currently use MR. seefooddiet (talk) 21:36, 17 October 2024 (UTC)

Opening an WP:RfC mostly to poll opinions from outside WikiProject Korea. If you're a regular at WPK, you've probably already voiced your opinion on this issue (e.g. here); unless you have something new to add, I encourage you to make this thread mostly for non-regulars.

For Korean topics significant before the 1945 division of Korea, we currently recommend the use of the McCune–Reischauer (MR) romanization system. While the use of this system is widespread amongst academics, it may be less popular amongst general audiences around the world. This is even true withiin South Korea, where Revised Romanization (RR) is the standard. North Korea doesn't even really use MR; they use a modified version. So it's basically only academics that use the system now.

Also, MR uses the breve diacritic (◌̆) that's hard to access on most keyboards.

Furthermore, RR is becoming increasingly popular in general, due to South Korea's pop culture. South Korean historical dramas are probably the largest source of article views for pre-1945 Korean history articles. Viewers of these dramas will like South Korean pop culture, thus probably only be familiar with RR.

At present, because of WP:COMMONNAME, numerous pre-1945 topics use RR anyway (see this recent failed move). As a result, we have a mix of MR and RR terms for pre-1945 topics; in the same article you can basically end up with half RR and half MR terminology (example, the title of this article; the person's name is per MR, the disambig per RR).

On the other hand, plenty of pre-1945 topics are basically only mentioned in academic writings.seefooddiet (talk) 03:58, 18 October 2024 (UTC)

Comments on RfC format

Shouldn't this be at Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions (Korean)? It also needs a more neutral phrasing of the question, with your own opinions separated from the question. Kanguole 22:51, 17 October 2024 (UTC)

Sorry, I toned down the wording. This affects both Naming conventions (Korean) and this MOS; maybe it should have been at NCKO but I think no significant difference. NCKO bases its romanization policy on MOS:KO. seefooddiet (talk) 23:44, 17 October 2024 (UTC)

That we separate (some but not all of) the language pages from naming pages (or have regional generalizations scattered here and there), with no central organization, is another problem. One place is as good as any as long as everyone is notified. SamuelRiv (talk) 03:26, 18 October 2024 (UTC)

Article naming policy is very different from questions of style within articles. Conflating them leads to confusion like the "consistency within an article" remark below. Kanguole 12:55, 3 November 2024 (UTC)

You should reformat your RfC to look more like the examples at WP:RfC -- put a clear neutrally-worded question(s) in bullets. Afterward that, you can expand on background, link to relevant discussions, etc. SamuelRiv (talk) 03:28, 18 October 2024 (UTC)

Discussion

• Comment.This is a tough call. I appreciate the complexity and importance of this work. I have some general thoughts.

  I have some familiarity with the issues regarding the two romanization systems but I'm not an expert in them or any Korea-related topics. My read of the situation is that it may not be workable to try to enforce a strong policy across all Korea-related articles on English Wikipedia. It seems reasonable to state a preference or default romanization system in borderline cases and provide some common guidelines, exceptions, and considerations, with examples. WP:COMMONNAME and other general naming guidance along with consensus on particular articles will often prevail in the ultimate decision. The Chinese naming conventions may be a good model. They default to pinyin but concisely describe important exceptions. Infoboxes provide flexibility to display multiple readings without interrupting the flow of the main article when that additional information has particular relevance. The chemistry folks also have a nice approach. There are clear, official standards which they typically adhere to but they provide for numerous exceptions following prevailing use by chemists and non-chemists where appropriate.

  Regarding sources, academic sources that are clearly good sources of information on the topic may not be the best reflection of common usage. I would be inclined to give more weight to predominant usage in widely circulated publications for a general audience in determine which name to use for an article.

  While it may not be possible to achieve uniformity across all English Wikipedia articles, consistency within an article should be a priority. Even here, there may be exceptions, but in general an article should not switch back and forth between the two systems. Editors wanting to update an existing article should generally adhere to the usage currently in place in said article. However, there may be cases where it's appropriate to use use certain common names in different systems within the same article. MYCETEAE 🍄‍🟫— talk 06:15, 18 October 2024 (UTC)

• For general reader utility, I would suggest we standardize on the most-used modern system, RR, but for topics pertaining to the applicable time range also provide MR, both in the lead and as a redirect, as needed, unless by chance some particular subject has no MR representation in the source material (e.g. a recent discovery from an earlier era, and only written about so far in RR sources). This is markedly similar to issues with Chinese rendering. For cases where a subject is overwhelmingly known by the MR version, then use that as the article title per WP:COMMONNAME. This would also be consistent with our treatment of Chinese. This is distinct from issues like Scottish Gaelic having an early-20th-century diacritic reform; the different versions are barely distinct, and the old style is not used in any modern source material, so need only exist as redirects and not be explicitly mentioned in the articles. Here, though, there is continued use of the older MR style, just as with Chinese names Laozi continues to appear in some souce material as Lao Tzu, and so on, and for some cases the older WJ transliteration style still dominates in English, though a faction of WP editors has moved them to "modernized" pinyin or pinyin-based spellings anyway (probably against policy), but even these often are not in full pinyin with the diacritics, those versions just existing as redirects (when people bother making them).  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  02:01, 26 October 2024 (UTC)

  The Chinese situation is quite different. English-language academic publications on China switched to pinyin in the 1980s, and its use is now near universal for all periods. The same has not happened with English-language academic publications on Korea, especially historical topics, where MR remains the norm. Kanguole 12:55, 3 November 2024 (UTC)

• Do you still intend to reformat this? I also don't see a polling section. Symphony Regalia (talk) 00:18, 8 November 2024 (UTC)

  Yes, I meant for this discussion to poll opinions from non-experts. I'm going to develop a more formal argument and propose it in near future. seefooddiet (talk) 00:53, 8 November 2024 (UTC)

Place of birth in people infoboxes (and its common romanization at the time)

Moved from Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Korea

 – seefooddiet (talk) 19:10, 25 October 2024 (UTC)

Can someone help provide some clarity on the following questions? (these may be more appropriate to post at the talk for the infobox but I figured I'd try here first)

• Template:Infobox says to "use the name of the birthplace at the time of birth" in the birthplace parameter. How does this guideline apply to romanization? For example, Busan was commonly romanized as "Pusan" until 2000, when MR was officially replaced with RR. Should the infobox for people born in Busan pre-2000 say "Pusan" instead because that is how it was commonly known at the time?
  • What about people born in the city from 1910 to 1945 under Japanese rule, when the city was officially "Fuzan"?
• For people born in Seoul under Japanese rule, should the place of birth be "Keijō" (as it was known in Japanese), or "Gyeongseong" (as it was known in Korean)?
• Similarly, what about people born in Incheon under Japanese rule, should their place of birth be "Jinzen"?

For the record (and just in case I've been mistaken), another very common one I've been correcting is the use of "South Korea" or "North Korea" in the place of birth parameter for people born from 1910 to 1945... I've been replacing it with "Korea, Empire of Japan" which seems to be the most common precedent from what is currently used on articles of high-profile people from the era. RachelTensions (talk) 00:32, 25 October 2024 (UTC)

1. It doesn't apply. Per WP:COMMONNAME, we follow current, not contemporary, romanization practices. We also have WP:KO-CONSISTENT. Thus we should use whatever the article title is, which is "Busan".
2. For "Korea, Empire of Japan", I've been meaning to open a discussion about this. I'm not sure what to do; it's not straightforward because the legality of the annexation is uncertain. De facto, Korea was a part of the Empire of Japan. But to my knowledge the annexation was made retroactively illegal after the annexation was lifted. "Korea, Empire of Japan" may give too much weight to one position in that debate.
3. For whether we use Japanese-language names for cities/provinces, we should use the most relevant article title verbatim. For Seoul during that period that'd be Keijō, although that page may need to be moved (see below). Many of the articles that use these Japanese-language names were created by Japan-oriented Wikipedia editors (which is fine; they didn't do anything wrong). However, they unilaterally used Japanese-language names instead of taking into consideration WP:COMMONNAME. To my knowledge nearly all current academic literature calls these places during the colonial period by their Korean names. So they may need to be moved.
   • For the Keijō article, I think there may be a case for renaming it to "Gyeongseong", based on common usage. Very few people know the name "Keijō", but due to Korean dramas (e.g. Gyeongseong Creature) probably a lot of people know "Gyeongseong".

seefooddiet (talk) 00:53, 25 October 2024 (UTC)

Thanks for the clarification.

Re: point number two, if not "Korea, Empire of Japan", then what? Couldn't be "Korean Empire" because despite the annexation (possibly) being declared retroactively illegal, the empire still ceased to exist. Using just "Korea" probably wouldn't be appropriate either because it referred to the geographical area, not any kingdom/empire/country/nation in specific.

FYI the reason I was asking is because I've been working through that list of 190 or so people who are referred to as just "Korean" in their lead sentence... (I'll provide an update on my progress in that thread a little later). In that trek, I've found that a lot of people born 1910-1945 have "South Korea" in their place of birth parameter despite "South Korea" not existing at the time. RachelTensions (talk) 01:12, 25 October 2024 (UTC)

I can think of a few alternatives:

1. Japanese Korea

2. Chōsen

3. Colonial Korea

Not sure which one would be best though. -- 00101984hjw (talk) 01:57, 25 October 2024 (UTC)

People born in Korea from 1910–1945 we should just do "Korea, Empire of Japan" for now, for the sake of consistency. Once we reach a decision on what format is best it'll be easy to use WP:AWB to swap everything if needed. A note just in case: for their nationality, we should put whichever Korea they ended up being a citizen of; however there are some edge cases. Some people were primarily notable before the establishment of South Korea, and died soon after the country was established, e.g. Kim Ku. For them, keeping just "Korean" is fine I think.

@00101984hjw Ultimately I think we should rope in people from WP:JAPAN and get their opinions too, I'm not sure we can reach a full solution on our own. Maybe a different thread. seefooddiet (talk) 01:59, 25 October 2024 (UTC)

If you're referring to the "nationality" parameter in infoboxes, MOS:INFONAT says that "In biographies, a |nationality= field should not be used."

As far as nationality in the lead goes, when the lead just says "Korean" I've been adjusting the wording to fit the country that they've established themselves in post-1945 which I think is a good rule of thumb.

In 99% of the cases it ends up being "South Korean" due to the relative rarity of the articles available on North Korean people... most North Korean bio articles we have are notable, at least in part, because they're North Korean, and therefore the previous editors of the articles made sure to say so in the lead. RachelTensions (talk) 02:18, 25 October 2024 (UTC)

No, I mean for putting their nationality in the lead. For people like Kim Ku, calling him "South Korean" doesn't feel appropriate, considering he only lived for a year after the establishment of the country and was even opposed to its creation for a period of time. You're right that in 99% of cases it will be straightforward, I'm just speaking about the 1% where it isn't. seefooddiet (talk) 02:22, 25 October 2024 (UTC)

Yeah I think MOS:CITIZEN covers the fringes: if the person is notable mainly for past events, where the person was such when they became notable. Describing Kim Ku as "South Korean" in the lead is probably not appropriate given his notability was established long before he, at least on paper, became a South Korean citizen, and he died shortly after the country's establishment. RachelTensions (talk) 02:30, 25 October 2024 (UTC)

Anyway, my questions are answered - I'll continue the clean up using the established precedent and if an alternative to "Korea, Empire of Japan" ends up becoming accepted then we can fix it with AWB after that discussion happens.

I'll also continue using "Keijō" until discussion happens resulting in the article's move to "Gyeongseong", in which case we can also fix with that AWB.

Thanks for your insights! RachelTensions (talk) 02:36, 25 October 2024 (UTC)

@RachelTensions just remembered where the guidance was for modern place names, WP:MODERNPLACENAME seefooddiet (talk) 18:43, 25 October 2024 (UTC)

Nationality and ethnicity

Wanted to put this bit about nationality and ethnicity into the MOS to save future debates. Related discussions: Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Korea#Wording of dual citizenship in lead sentences, Talk:Krystal Jung/Archive 1#Lead. We recently reached a consensus that, per MOS:ETHNICITY, the ethnic identifier "Korean-American" is generally not appropriate for use in the lead (except for if their ethnicity is relevant to their notability). Instead, we recommend the use of "South Korean and American", instead of "South Korean-American".

@RachelTensions @Geraldo Perez @DragonFury @Paper9oll @Btspurplegalaxy @Evaders99 tagging all participants so that they're aware. seefooddiet (talk) 18:34, 25 October 2024 (UTC)

For Korean people from historical states that are unambiguously considered to be Korean (e.g. Silla, Joseon, Goryeo, Baekje, etc), I think it's probably fine to describe them as "Korean".

For states with disputed identities like Goguryeo, I think it may be more appropriate to say "X was a Goguryeo general", unless if you can demonstrate consensus in reliable sources that they are considered "Korean". @00101984hjw I'd appreciate your weighing in on this point. seefooddiet (talk) 19:04, 25 October 2024 (UTC)

I think the wording "unambiguously considered to be Korean" could cause some trouble in the future. I'm sure you're aware of the sheer acrimony Koreans and Chinese have over the Goguryeo and Balhae controversies. These are just my two cents, but I'm concerned that nationalistic (or peculiarly anti-Chinese) Korean readers may blame this decision for Bothsideism.

In that sense... per WP:ETHNICITY... I think it may be more appropriate that we only clarify figures from Goryeo or later as "Korean", and state figures from the Three Kingdoms period (including Unified Silla) and prior as nationals of their corresponding kingdoms. Some reasons why:

1. Korea did not exist as a geographically united state before Unified Silla. According to my brief research about the issue, while Silla, Baekje, and Goguryeo did share similarities and some sense of ethnic homogeneity, the concept of a unified ethnic Korean state did not exist during this period.

2. While Unified Silla did attempt policies to integrate conquered territories and populace ([18]) (according to NamuWiki Silla also propagandized ideas that the three kingdoms were ethnically united as "Samhan" states but unfortunately the source for this is from a book) these policies ultimately failed.

3. Goryeo is where the word "Korea" came from. It was also the first unified Korean state which managed to maintain stability.

But anyways, that was my personal proposal; I'm fine with the original plan. It just feels off to exceptionalize Goguryeo considering the article summary for the state literally says it's Korean. -- 00101984hjw (talk) 20:57, 25 October 2024 (UTC)

I was going to suggest labelling people from before Sillan unification with the kingdom they came from – it's more informative and involves less back-projection – but extending that to pre-Goryeo also makes sense. Kanguole 21:18, 25 October 2024 (UTC)

Unified Silla was merely of a period of Silla's history, not a separate nation. Labelling post-unification Sillans separately as "Koreans" feels somewhat idiosyncratic imo. -- 00101984hjw (talk) 21:35, 25 October 2024 (UTC)

Fair enough. Your Goryeo suggestion seems reasonable. I would be opposed to applying it to the Three Kingdoms. Kanguole 22:14, 25 October 2024 (UTC)

I think that makes sense. We can set the boundary as Goryeo and after. I'll WP:BOLDly add something to the MOS; if anyone disagrees please say so and we can revise it. seefooddiet (talk) 23:33, 25 October 2024 (UTC)

Be careful that "North Korean" is used when appropriate when making changes. Geraldo Perez (talk) 19:22, 25 October 2024 (UTC)

Family trees

Moved from Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Korea

 – seefooddiet (talk) 20:49, 6 November 2024 (UTC)

Almost every article on a royal figure from the Joseon dynasty has a long, unreferenced, overly excessive family section consisting of a bullet list of every relative, ancestor, and offspring. These most likely originate from a direct translation from the kowiki article. I would be delighted if there was a better way to format them, but currently it seems like these lists are just another chronic case of WP:TOOMUCH. I believe such detailed lists would find little use for readers outside of East Asia.

I suggest we delete all of these lists and replace them with more content on the infobox or a simple {{ahnentafel}}. If no one opposes this, I will go ahead and start imposing WP:BOLD on all of them. -- 00101984hjw (talk) 22:52, 23 October 2024 (UTC)

A few months ago I pruned probably over a hundred of these trees. I pruned them to just nuclear families: father, mother, siblings, children. I wasn't 100% thorough though; there may be trees that still have more than that. If you spot any, at the bare minimum they should be pruned to just the nuclear family.

I'm conflicted on total deletion. On the one hand, they're unreferenced. But nuclear families often aren't too much information for personal life sections. While I'm skeptical that some of these will ever be sourced at the current rate (many have been unsourced for 10+ years), I think these nuclear family trees are minimally harmful and somewhat useful for people. seefooddiet (talk) 00:22, 24 October 2024 (UTC)

I just moved this discussion over from WT:KOREA. I'm going to add something to the MOS to discourage this practice, so that it's easier to cite something instead of explaining it each time. seefooddiet (talk) 20:50, 6 November 2024 (UTC)

Unsourced hanja epidemic

Moved from Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Korea

 – seefooddiet (talk) 22:43, 6 November 2024 (UTC)

Am I off base or does there seem to be a lot of unsourced hanja in BLPs? I just clicked through about 100 articles and of the articles that had Hanja name in the infobox, only one of them was sourced. For some names there could be hundreds of different combinations... surely this should be sourced in every instance. Are people just guessing?

I find it hard to believe we have a reliable source for most of these... where are people pulling these from? RachelTensions (talk) 04:23, 28 October 2024 (UTC)

Yes, it's not great but since it's generally minimally harmful it doesn't bother me so much in comparison to other issues on the WikiProject. For comparison, plenty of non-Korean BLPs have unsourced birth dates. For articles with higher page views I think we could make more of an effort to source the Hanja. seefooddiet (talk) 07:34, 28 October 2024 (UTC)

I'm wondering if sources even exist for a lot of them... In many instances (especially for younger people), unless someone has stated somewhere what their Hanja are, I'm not sure where that information would be published reliably. RachelTensions (talk) 15:33, 28 October 2024 (UTC)

I'm not sure; I have seen celebrities disclose it (sometimes in their autograph or on TV when introducing themselves). Some, even if they don't directly give the Hanja, give enough info abt the meaning of their names to allow for figuring out what Hanja they use.

We do need to be mindful about MOS:HANJAHANZI though; this has happened a number of times that I know of on enwiki seefooddiet (talk) 17:20, 28 October 2024 (UTC)

For whatever reason, it is very common for non-English names everywhere to be unsourced. As seefooddiet says, not great, but not considered a significant problem. Sometimes people guess, sometimes someone might know and not think it needs a source. CMD (talk) 08:31, 28 October 2024 (UTC)

I am pretty sure that a lot of hanja names on Wikipedia are actually from Chinese-language sources, which are known to "invent" Chinese-character forms for native Korean names and unknown hanja names.

I sometimes remove Chinese-character forms that are clearly from Chinese-language sources (examples: #1, #2), but I am quite sure that there are lots of undetected ones. 172.56.232.61 (talk) 03:25, 29 October 2024 (UTC)

I have a feeling a vast majority of them are either completely made up by people just looking for something to put in the empty "hanja" parameter, or pulled from Chinese sources that invent their own.

What are the chances that people who use completely fabricated stage names like Baekho (singer), Cha Eun-woo or Eunhyuk even have hanja versions of those names in the first place? RachelTensions (talk) 03:52, 29 October 2024 (UTC)

Unless a person stated what the hanja for their name is, any hanja for a name should be considered unreliable. This includes stage names. 172.56.232.61 (talk) 04:16, 29 October 2024 (UTC)

Fwiw I think people generally take these Chinese characters from other language Wikipedias or from Namuwiki.

• For Baekho, the only mention of those Chinese characters on his namuwiki page is from a Taiwanese interview on YouTube. It's not clear from there whether he gave the video makers his Chinese characters or if they made them up.
• For Cha, that hanja is present on his Namuwiki article, with no real source for it.
• Eunhyuk's Hanja on the Chinese Wikipedia is sourced to this Chinese-language page.

So at least 2/3 of those examples probably implicitly came from Chinese-language sources lol... unreliable per MOS:HANJAHANZI.

I agree we should treat unsourced Hanja with skepticism. I think we should allow tagging unsourced Hanja as citation needed, and sometimes deleting them. Mass deletion I think would be inappropriate, as some of these names are probably correct and these are minimally harmful. seefooddiet (talk) 04:19, 29 October 2024 (UTC)

Is there some (unspoken?) rule about not using {{citation needed}} tags in infoboxes? RachelTensions (talk) 04:32, 29 October 2024 (UTC)

No, I just worded it weirdly. I meant "We should handle this by tagging with CN in most cases, although deletion may still be acceptable" seefooddiet (talk) 04:35, 29 October 2024 (UTC)

And then there's Taeyeon, who, according to her infobox, uses "金泰耎" as hanja for "Kim Tae-yeon" but inexplicably uses the entirely different hanja "太妍" for just "Taeyeon"... RachelTensions (talk) 15:25, 30 October 2024 (UTC)

namuwiki shows yet another set of hanja and says that 太妍 is the Chinese-language transcription. Think deletion in these scenarios is ok seefooddiet (talk) 19:09, 30 October 2024 (UTC)

I'll just tag it and see what happens, if it's still nonsense in a few days I'll take it out RachelTensions (talk) 19:14, 30 October 2024 (UTC)

I just moved this over from WT:KOREA; I'm going to reword the MOS to encourage the sourcing of Hanja. seefooddiet (talk) 22:44, 6 November 2024 (UTC)