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Untitled

For related discussions, see WP:NZ, Wikipedia:Naming conventions (places)#Place names in New Zealand Wikipedia:Naming conventions (landforms)) and Wikipedia talk:WikiProject New Zealand/Archive1#Macrons.

Although it's not about the title of articles, the discussion at Māori names (NZ notice board) is likely to be of interest to anyone watching this page.-gadfium 19:55, 20 May 2007 (UTC)

Salient discussion at WT:PLACES

Please see Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions (places)#Places in New Zealand.—Nat Krause(Talk!·What have I done?) 17:23, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

Lakes disambiguation

Most titles of articles about lakes are disambiguated in the form "Lake name (disambiguator)", e.g. Seneca Lake (New York), in accordance with the convention at WP:LAKES#Multiple lakes with the same name.

A few lakes of New Zealand use the form "Lake name, disambiguator", e.g. Lake Rotoroa, Waikato. For consistency, I'd like to change it to Lake Rotoroa (Waikato) and not the general convention here. Redirects would still be available.

BTW: List of lakes in New Zealand offers a lot a lakes in need of articles. -- User:Docu

  • Oppose. As with all other such landforms, national conventions take precedence. The main reason that Seneca Lake (New York) is at that title is because using parentleses is the standard disambiguation convention for the United States. If you check other countries where the standard form of disambiguation is "Landform, Country", you will find that that is used for the lakes as well. Rather than moving the current pages to new titles that would clash with the NZ naming conventions, why not have disambiguation pages at your proposed names, rather than changing the system in use. This is what is done by the rivers WikiProject (as noted at Wikipedia:Naming conventions (places)#Place names in New Zealand - there's no reason why the same could not also be done with lakes. Grutness...wha? 23:02, 18 November 2007 (UTC)
Do you have a sample of lakes other than those in New Zealand using that convention? -- User:Docu
I've only ever seen the comma regularly used with populated place names--geography/landform "place names" (note that Wikipedia:Naming conventions (landforms) is relevant here, not Wikipedia:Naming conventions (places), and the former has no [documented, anyway] 'New Zealand exception') use parenthetical disambiguation in all countries I've ever edited. IMHO it is helpful to have (only) populated places use an exceptional form, to make them easier to distinguish. EG Category:Lakes of Sweden v. Category:Cities in Sweden, Category:Lakes of Russia v. Category:Cities and towns in Leningrad Oblast, Category:Lakes of Chile v. Category:Cities in Chile (I gave up looking for examples in Africa). To the best of my knowledge, the majority of populated place articles use the comma, and an overwhelming majority of landform articles use the parens. Ravenna1961 (talk) 06:19, 19 November 2007 (UTC)
I'm not entirely sure why you think lakes aren't places, and therefore wouldn't be covered by the naming conventions for places. Nor would I regard, for example, English rivers as "populated places", except maybe by fish, despite the fact that - for example - there is River Avon, Hampshire and River Avon, Warwickshire. England also uses the comma to disambiguate lakes, e.g., Little Britain, Buckinghamshire. I don't know of how many countries use a similar system for rivers and lakes, I just know that New Zealand and England clearly do and there are likely to be others, and in cases like these the national conventions take precedence over any worldwide convention for particular landforms, in exactly the same way that national spelling conventions apply for article names - especially when (as it states at Wikipedia:Naming conventions (landforms)) an overall convention is not yet finalised with regards to lakes, whereas it has been used for New Zealand for a considerable time. Grutness...wha? 11:19, 19 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Oppose. It seems to me that the only justification I can think of for changing the New Zealand naming conventions is that [[Lake Rotoroa (Waikato)|]] is fractionally quicker to type than [[Lake Rotoroa, Waikato|Lake Rotoroa]] when you're editing a page. Now, even as someone who regularly works on New Zealand geography articles, that seems like an incredibly weak and insubstantial reason to do a mass change that violates national conventions. The attempt to justify a change based on enforcing naming conventions for other countries upon New Zealand articles is not a justification at all as it is inconsistent with the principle of respecting national spelling conventions. - Axver (talk) 00:55, 20 November 2007 (UTC)
    Actually, [[Lake Rotoroa, Waikato|]] works too.-gadfium 05:36, 20 November 2007 (UTC)
Oh, it does? I wasn't aware of that and I've never seen it used in any of the articles I've edited (or at least I don't recall seeing it). Thanks for letting me know. Well, with that justification gone, then I cannot see any reason to change the New Zealand conventions. - Axver (talk) 08:43, 20 November 2007 (UTC)
Comment This seems to grow entirely out of proportion. There are about 12 articles about lakes in New Zealand that don't follow the usual convention for lakes "lake name (disambiguator)". Little Britain, Buckinghamshire may be an additional case that just hasn't been corrected, but there are hardly any other lakes than the 12 in New Zealand that are titled different. Some articles use the form "lake name, disambiguator", but this mainly as there are about the locality named for the lake rather than only the lake itself. -- User:Docu
Reply to comment. I agree that it's grown out of all proportion, especially since all the articles you're complaining about already follow the naming convention for New Zealand lakes perfectly, given that the usual and accepted convention for New Zealand lakes is "Lake name, Disambiguator", as is implicit in the details on Wikipedia:Naming conventions (New Zealand) and Wikipedia:Naming conventions (places)#Place names in New Zealand. Little Britain, Buckinghamshire seems to follow the convention for the United Kingdom, too (it's used in Scotland as well as England, hence Loch Burn, Watten, for example - which, like Little Britain, directly refers to the body of water, not to some locality named for the lake). The main point remains: if one country uses a specific naming system, then that system is used for that country's articles - exactly the same as when different terms or spellings are used in different countries. If all articles about Britain which use UK English spelling were changed to American spelling, it would offend a lot of people. Instead, local styling is used for such articles, to conform with local naming conventions. Similarly, local styling is used where particular countries have other local naming conventions - like with the way geographical feature articles are named. Grutness...wha? 12:34, 20 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Oppose. As there is no strict policy over-riding national convention and as New Zealand convention is "Lake name, Disambiguator", I too see no good reason to change this. kabl00ey (talk) 07:31, 22 November 2007 (UTC)

New Zealand categories

A question more than anything——why do most subcategories of Category:New Zealand people use "New Zealand" instead of "New Zealander" as an adjective, as in Category:New Zealand criminals? If this is a "by nationality" category, shouldn't the demonym be used, which I think is "New Zealander", so shouldn't it be Category:New Zealander criminals. You see Category:French criminals, not Category:France criminals and Category:Canadian criminals, not Category:Canada criminals, so why this? Or has it been agreed that "New Zealand" should be used as the demonym? I'm curious if this has been discussed before. Snocrates 21:32, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

"New Zealand" is both a noun and an adjective. So there are New Zealand mountains, just as there are French mountains (not "France mountains", because France is not an adjective). In "Category:New Zealand criminals", New Zealand is being used as an adjective, not a demonym. "New Zealander criminals" is similar to "Frenchman criminals"; it's ugly and wrong. -- Avenue (talk) 22:22, 12 December 2007 (UTC)
That makes sense to me; and you're right that using "New Zealander" in some instances sounds awkward. Thanks! Snocrates 22:58, 12 December 2007 (UTC)
An added note, "New Zealander" is acceptable as the noun form - in fact it is probably the commonest noun form (other than the slang "Kiwis"). So people from New Zealand are either called "New Zealand people" or "New Zealanders". Grutness...wha? 23:23, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

What is a place?

The page is written as if the convention applies to geographical features only. What about buildings, theatres, churches, clubs, societies - does the same convention apply? Schwede66 (talk) 03:39, 22 December 2009 (UTC)

That's a good point. I don't think there's a general convention for any of these things, but the rule of thumb for buildings, urban parks, and streets seems to be "Foo, X", where X is the name of the city or town where these features are (e.g., Moray Place, Dunedin, Athletic Park, Wellington). Clubs and societies, I think, use brackets "Royal Society for Foo (New Zealand)". In both cases there's only dabbing if there's any need to - a building or club which has a unique name worldwide isn't dabbed at all (e.g., Auckland Harbour Bridge, Whare Ra). Grutness...wha? 01:10, 23 December 2009 (UTC)

Lead section

The article was missing a lead and I've drafted one. Feel free to amend it further - I'm certainly not wedded to the words that I've come up with. I do think, though, that the draft can put this into context with the global policy.

In addition, I've provided a section on how to go about page moves. I hope this is useful. Schwede66 03:03, 28 February 2010 (UTC)

Draft change to conventions

Following a discussion it is proposed that the New Zealand naming convention be amended as below. The gist of the change is that we will follow the convention used for the majority of countries of disambiguating geographical features via parentheses rather than with a comma. Thus only populated places will remain comma-disambiguated. (level 3 heading substituted here to keep everything in one section)

Place names in New Zealand

New Zealand place names are written simply as the place name, unless confusion is likely to occur with duplicated names within the country or outside it. It should be noted that in almost all cases the New Zealand Geographic Board includes the type of geographic feature (e.g. Lake, Stream, Island) as part of the name, a proper noun.

This guideline applies to named populated places (cities, towns, suburbs, settlements, stations (large sheep farms)), natural landscape features (including but not limited to lakes, rivers, streams, glaciers, wetlands, headlands, mountains, hills, ranges, plains) and man-made features (dams, roads, railways, parks, mines).

  1. No disambiguation required – If a New Zealand place name is unique (or likely to be unique) in the world, then it alone is used as the article's title - (for example, Otorohanga). This form is also used if the New Zealand place is not likely to be confused with places with the same name overseas, by virtue of its relative prominence (for example, Dunedin). Confusion has to be likely, not merely possible: for example, Wellington, the capital, is known all over the world, whereas the other 30 or so places with the same name have fairly local significance only.
  2. Disambiguation required for populated place – For populated places, if confusion is likely with places outside New Zealand, then the format "Placename, New Zealand" is used (for example, Amberley, New Zealand). Suburbs are treated in the same way as towns with regard to their naming.
  3. Disambiguation required for non-populated place – For geographic features, if confusion is likely with places outside New Zealand, then the format "Placename (New Zealand)" is used, irrespective of the type of location (for example, Mount Hopkins (New Zealand)).
  4. Disambiguation required for features within populated places – If the places are features of specific cities or towns, such as parks, buildings, or streets, the name of the town or city is used (for example, Stuart Street, Dunedin). This does not apply to suburbs, however, which are treated as populated places in their own right.
  5. Disambiguation required for more than one NZ place name – Since most places in New Zealand have unique names, the standard convention (where it is necessary to distinguish a place in New Zealand from one elsewhere) is simply to use the form "Placename, New Zealand" or "Placename (New Zealand) (depending on type). In those rare instances where two places in New Zealand have the same name then the following rules are used:

Discussion

(propose any tweaks to the above here) dramatic (talk) 04:40, 8 November 2010 (UTC)

Great stuff. I've introduced a bold heading to each of the four main cases, as this gives a faster overview of what each case is all about. In my opinion, it makes it a bit easier to understand the difference between the various scenarios. What do you think?
And two more thoughts;
  • We should take the opportunity to build in the 'What is a place?' discussion above, and
  • "Note however that this does not apply to suburbs, which are treated in the same way as towns with regard to their naming." – this sentence doesn't quite fit where it currently is and we could work that information into item number 2. Schwede66 17:45, 8 November 2010 (UTC)
Thanks - I've attempted to incorporate both those ideas. dramatic (talk) 04:47, 9 November 2010 (UTC)
  • Is there any reason other than "most places do it" for changing from the comma system to parentheses? It seems a pretty arbitrary reason for a change - especially since many of the countries most like NZ do not use this system (e.g., the United Kingdom, which uses the "River Foo, England" naming as standard, and several other Commowealth countries do likewise. Furthermore, in general that system is not used in New Zealand in general. Unless anyone can come up with a better reason for doing it than that it seems like a lot of work to change to a system less appropriate for New Zealand, and I'm baffled as to why it should be being considered. I strongly oppose these changes. AFAIK this has not been discussed anywhere and seems to have been rushed through without any attempt and finding out whether this is what is wanted - why is that? Grutness...wha? 11:13, 9 November 2010 (UTC)
    • Just found the discussion. Great that no-one thought to announce here that there was a discussion somewhere else about changing the naming conventions - a discussion which logically should have been here. Wouldn't it have made more sense to let people who watch this page know that there was a discussion going on about the naming conventions, given that this is the talk page for the naming conventions? :/ Grutness...wha? 11:33, 9 November 2010 (UTC)
James, apologies for starting this a bit arse-about-face. Its because it started small and grew big, and at the time I was focussed on the WikiProject Rivers naming conventions page rather than here, which I wasn't even watching (I would have thought that more people would be watching WPNZ talk than this page, anyway, so I certainly wasn't trying to hide it).dramatic (talk) 18:57, 9 November 2010 (UTC)
I guess it would be a good idea to have some conventions in place as to where discussions should be had. I'm happy to draft something when I get round to it. James' sentiment is of course correct; this discussion should have been on this page from the start, and a notice on the WPNZ talk page would have been the appropriate tool to attract the attention of the much larger watchlist that page is likely to have. But hindsight is a marvellous thing, isn't it? Schwede66 21:20, 9 November 2010 (UTC)
I think the logic flow is: In general, wikipedia disambiguates by parentheses, with populated places being an exception because many countries regard the region as being part of the common name and because the need to disambiguate towns is very common. Other natural features come under the general rule. Looking at disambiguation pages, it is very obvious that New Zealand is an exception to the rule. So I asked myself "on what grounds?" and really failed to find any. I, too, have had need to disambiguate Waiau River, but I used "the Waiau River in Canterbury" rather than a comma. Similarly, if people feel it is necessary to clarify Shenandoah River as not being the one Glenn Campbell sang about, "Shenandoah River in New Zealand" is a more typical usage than "Shenandoah River, New Zealand". Obviously "in" isn't suitable usage for article titles. Also, there are very few cases of significant features with ambiguous names withing New Zealand (Waiau, Hope -a re there any more?)
Secondly, there is a benefit in treating towns differently from natural features - it is more evident to anyone familiar with Wikipedia naming that Little River, Mount Cook, Evans Bay and Lake Tekapo are towns rather than natural features. The vast majority of people using Wikipedia have never come across this naming convention page, therefore we are creating an element of surprise. (The reverse effect happened to me - it was the reverting of my move of Alexander River (Western Australia) to what I mistakenly thought was the norm that sparked all this off).
Lastly, I don't think this will impact search. Many people searching for Hope River or Waiau River will be unaware that there is more than one anyway. They will find a disambiguation page. And if they are aware, I think it is more common to type something like "Waiau River Canterbury" rather than to punctuate it. And don't forget, if we do all these moves, there will still be redirects from the comma versions. dramatic (talk) 18:57, 9 November 2010 (UTC)
It is worth noting that Wises New Zealand Guide simply has five successive entries "Waiau River" - which is, after all, the name of each one. Also, remember that our choice of disambiguator for multiple occurrences within New Zealand is arbitrary - the Modern-day region. How many people would think of Fiordland rather than Southland for the southernmost Waiau River, or Nelson or Nelson lakes rather than Tasman (a name with very little colloquial usage) for the Hope River? If our disambiguation is merely following a rule, more reason to separate it with parentheses rather than make it look like a natural name. dramatic (talk) 20:42, 9 November 2010 (UTC)
Yeah, I suppose. I think i was more pissed off with finding out that a discussion was a fait accompli than the change itself. It still seems more natural to me to use the comma, but it does make a certain amount of sense. However, if you're talking of expanding this from just rivers to other features as well (which you seem to be), then some of the discussion in the first item on this talk page is worth taking on board. Ironiocally, I think part of the reason this rule came about was because of the relative lack of need to disambiguate towns in NZ - past governments and people have gone to great lengths to make it unnecessary to disambiguate place names within the country (a problem which still leads to confusion over where the "real" Palmerston is). Multiple suburbs with the same names exist in different cities (e.g., Burnside and West Harbour), but actual towns with the same name in NZ are extremely rare. Given that the comma didn't imply a town name (since there was no town disambiguation required), it was used for pretty near everything. Grutness...wha? 23:52, 9 November 2010 (UTC)
It certainly isn't a fait accompli. I would happily revert the few pages I moved (West Coast rivers) until this discussion is closed, but I fear it could waste some admin time (some of the redirects have history). dramatic (talk) 07:58, 10 November 2010 (UTC)
A suggested "tweak" BTW - point 4's last point needs to stand alone and be expanded. It's worth noting that that rule is being used (and a good thing too, IMO) even if its the only place in NZ but still requires dabbing because of places overseas with the same name. We have Logan Park, Dunedin, for instance, even though there are no other Logan Parks in NZ with articles. It's also worth noting that this rule is not used for suburbs. Perhaps this needs to be spelt out in a separate point? if so, I'd move point 4 to point 5 and include a new point 4:
4. Disambiguation required for features within populated places – If the places are features of specific cities or towns, such as parks, buildings, or streets, the name of the town or city is used (for example, Stuart Street, Dunedin). This does not apply to suburbs, however, which are treated as populated places in their own right.
Grutness...wha? 00:08, 10 November 2010 (UTC)
I think I've managed to include what you suggested dramatic (talk) 01:21, 12 November 2010 (UTC)
Good question. That one will need thinking about. by the way - I hope no-one minds - I added a brief explanation of what happens if one of the dabbed places is not in a region (i.e., in the outlying islands) to point 5. It rarely arises, but it's better to have it codified. Grutness...wha? 09:16, 12 November 2010 (UTC)
Well I've discovered that we already have a reasonable number of articles at the dual name. Incidentally, as part of his cleanup of my list article, Avenue actually read through the full 98 pages of the NZGB Framework and found that dual names should have spaces surrounding the slash. I think that this makes them much easier to read, especially if either name itself contains multiple words. It also look smuch less like a sub-article. I've moved a few pages, but noticed that Aoraki / Mount Cook redirects to Aoraki/Mount Cook. dramatic (talk) 10:54, 13 November 2010 (UTC)
Seems like a simple reveersing of the redirect would make sense there. Grutness...wha? 22:01, 13 November 2010 (UTC)

Draft addition to conventions

Dual and alternative place names

Since the 1980s, the New Zealand Geographic Board has changed the names of a number of New Zealand places to include the original Māori name of the place as well as the European name used for the last 100-200 years. Many of these renamings have been the result of Treaty of Waitangi claim settlements. The revised names take two forms:[1]

  1. Dual names consist of an English name and a Māori name separated by a slash, e.g. Stewart Island / Rakiura. The dual form must be used in official documents, but otherwise people are free to use English name, Māori name or the dual form. Dual names are seldom, if ever, used in speech, but their use in written communication is gaining acceptance. Note that some early dual names used an English (Māori) River format. Many, but not all, of these have since been renamed to the slash format. Articles should be listed at Wikipedia:Articles with slashes in title#Dual_place_names_in_New_Zealand to help distinguish them from subpages.
  2. Alternative names have two forms with equal weight, e.g. Wanganui and Whanganui. People are expected to use one or the other but not both together. (In the case of Whanganui and Wanganui, the decision included a directive that Government bodies would use Whanganui, but this is not usually the case.)
  3. Changed names - there are a few instances where the Geographic Board have changed the name of a place, generally from an English name to a Māori one, without creating a dual or alternative name.

Convention for dual and alternative names

  1. Dual names. If there are sources which indicate that a dual name has usage beyond mandatory official usage, we should put the article at the dual name, with redirects from each of the component names. The redirects may require disambiguation, but it is highly unlikely that the dual name will be ambiguous. The date of renaming should be noted and sourced in the article. Links to the article need not use the dual name unless it is appropriate, and the dual name should not be used where historically inaccurate (e.g. a historical reference prior to the renaming). If sources do not support use of the dual name, the English name will almost certainly be the one in common usage.
  2. Alternative names: The article should be placed at the name which reliable sources indicate has more common usage. Considerable weight should be given to recent sources, since it often takes a good ten years after a renaming for a usage pattern to be established. Care should be taken to Disregard sources which use names erroneously (e.g. "Taranaki/Mt Egmont"). A redirect should be created for the name which is not used as the article title. If one name would require disambiguation while the other would not, the non-ambiguous name may be preferred. The date of renaming should be noted and sourced in the article. Links to the article may use whichever name is appropriate in the context.
  3. Changed names: The article should be placed at the name which recent reliable sources indicate has more common usage. Thus an article may be moved some years after a name is changed, reflecting a change in usage. The fact of the change should be prominently mentioned and referenced in the article.
  1. ^ [1] (Question What is the difference between alternative naming and dual naming?)

Discussion

Suggest tweaks and changes here. dramatic (talk) 05:25, 9 November 2010 (UTC)

To start with, I'd suggest a few copyediting tweaks to the proposed conventions:
  • Delete "We should" from the first sentence in (1).
  • Delete "Care should be taken to" from the third sentence in (2).
  • In the fourth sentence in (2), change "not used" to "less commonly used".
I've also made a few minor changes to punctuation etc that I hope are uncontroversial.
The preamble seems to imply that official place names never change from a English name to a Māori one, but only to a dual or alternate form. This is not correct; sometimes the Māori name does replace the English version. (For example, Whale Island -> Moutohora Island.) We should cover this possibility too. --Avenue (talk) 09:10, 9 November 2010 (UTC)
Do you think we should make it a third case (possibly putting it before the others since it is the simplest?) I would suggest that Wikipedia's name change would come some time after the official change once the new usage has been established according to sources. We also have some oddities in Alternative naming, such as Otututu (Rough) River. dramatic (talk) 20:34, 9 November 2010 (UTC)
Yes, describing it as a separate case is probably clearest. I agree with you about following usage, and not immediately reflecting the official name (although the official name should be mentioned in the article). And this is a separate point, but yes, we should acknowledge dual naming oddities briefly. --Avenue (talk) 13:00, 10 November 2010 (UTC)
For your third bullet point, what I meant was the alternative name which we don't use as the primary name for the article. Evidently this needs some clearer phrasing. dramatic (talk) 22:41, 9 November 2010 (UTC)
Perhaps my suggestion was unclear too. I meant "less commonly used in reliable sources", but "not used as the article title" is probably better. --Avenue (talk) 13:00, 10 November 2010 (UTC)
Should we mention macrons in Māori names here, or at least refer to the existing guideline on their use? --Avenue (talk) 09:10, 9 November 2010 (UTC)
We probably should - I think it would be wrong to Anglicise Dual names which contain macrons by dropping the macrons, although creating a redirect from the macronless version would be helpful.dramatic (talk) 20:34, 9 November 2010 (UTC)
Our existing guideline treats macrons in dual names differently from those in standalone Māori names. Personally I'm inclined towards maintaining consistency with that. There are also some dual names where both parts include macrons (e.g. Mahināpua Creek/Tūwharewhare, not that we have an article for that yet, and Lake Ōkataina/Te Moana i kataina ā Te Rangitakaroro), which makes things even more complicated. --Avenue (talk) 13:00, 10 November 2010 (UTC)
There are relatively few single names containing macrons, and the board would appear to have a policy of avoiding putting macrons in the official name of populated places (or if proposed, these receive sufficient objections to be rejected). Some places, e.g. Hue tē Taka Peninsula have no previous English name. Our policy is to use an English spellings of Māori names if sources exist for their common use: WP:COMMONNAME. I would say that for dual names there is no English version, hence we use the macrons. Mahināpua Creek/Tūwharewhare, is certainly an oddity! The village is still Mahinapua, and I know that the local pronunciation is Mahinəpua (if you'll excuse my Heath-Robinson phonetics).
Incidentally, I am compiling List of dual place names in New Zealand. dramatic (talk) 05:44, 11 November 2010 (UTC)

Railway stations?

I note that almost all NZ articles on railway stations take the titular form "Foo Railway Station". Other countries seem to use "Foo railway station". Is this a deliberate thing, and if so should it be mentioned on this page? Grutness...wha? 10:29, 10 November 2010 (UTC)

I have the gazetteer open in another tab at this moment, and yes, railway stations (and some Post Offices) have been named by the Geographic Board including the Railway Station bit as a proper noun. dramatic (talk) 04:37, 11 November 2010 (UTC)

Maori names - size tags

This is the code behind our convention for adding Maori names to geographical infoboxes:

In the infobox of a geographical article, the usual name is given first, followed by the Māori name as follows:

:<center><big>'''English Name'''</big></center>

:<center><big>'''''Māori Name''''' (''[[Māori_language|Māori]]'')</big></center>


I just want to remove any ambiguity here. The <big> tags and the <center> tags - are they part of the convention or not. The centering should be already coded into the various templates, so it's probably redundant anyway. But is the intended effect of the <big> tags that the Maori and non-Maori names are the same size, rather than that they must all be big, since it's probably better to let the template coding decide the size? If that's what's intended then maybe we could spell that out Kahuroa (talk) 19:56, 5 December 2010 (UTC)

Does usage trump convention?

Recently I moved the article on our highest mountain to Aoraki / Mount Cook, which follows both our naming convention and the recommendation of the New Zealand Geographic Board: "For the sake of clarity and ease of identification, a visible space is encouraged on each side of the forward slash of a dual name." NZGB policy framework, page 41.

This was reverted without discussion to Aoraki/Mount Cook by Article editor (talk · contribs) on the basis that the NZGB Gazetteer does not use spaces. (The Topographic Map (sheet BX15) does appear to include a space before the slash - but there is a line break following the slash). It would appear that the 93 place names which were changed by the Ngai Tahu Claims Settlement Act 1998 have been gazetted without spaces, since they were written that way in the Act. (I read somewhere that the NZGB were unhappy with the Act, as it also (in most cases) ignored their Māori-name-first policy). A Google test of usage is not possible, since Google ignores whitespace and the slash. As with many dual names, there are a wide range of misuse variants (e.g. Mount Aoraki/Cook), making it harder to determine what the most common usages are.

The NZGB policy does not say that an exception should be made for Act-specified names, so should we? dramatic (talk) 01:18, 8 March 2011 (UTC)

My 2 cents... The NZ Geographic Board should be taken with a grain of salt. I think "Convention" is usage despite what the NZGB has us believe. More too the point - English is English so what the NZGB has to say on how I should write a space is completely irrelevant. If it makes sense, it should be used. If one has to be official, then it is the Act. Whether the NZGB is happy with that means little. FlyingKiwi (talk) 08:56, 8 March 2011 (UTC)
In terms of what makes sense (which seldom holds sway here), I think that spaces make the names far more readable, and less likely to be confused with subpages. dramatic (talk) 10:49, 8 March 2011 (UTC)
I can agree with that. FlyingKiwi (talk) 13:12, 8 March 2011 (UTC)
The gazetteer seems to show the orthography of the dual names as they were gazetted. According to the gazetteer, the last three dual names gazetted (from 2010 and late 2009) all had spaces around the slash, and no earlier names did. So the NZGB now seem to be acting in line with their recommendation. Of course, the recommendation applies to all dual names with slashes, not just the three gazetted since late 2009. (BTW, the recommendation is on page 41 of the linked document, not 43 as it said above. I've taken the liberty of correctly that.)
I agree that it's difficult to establish the weight of common usage for the orthography of these dual names, so I don't think we should try to decide our orthography on that basis. Better to agree on either a convention, or on a particular source that we should follow. The NZGB has given us one of each. I'm not aware of a more authoritative source of official names than the gazetteer, and there's no point trying to devise a new convention when the NZGB's one seems sensible enough.
So I see our choice as whether we follow the New Zealand Geographic Board's current practice or the orthographies they officially gazetted. We currently follow the officially gazetted order of names, e.g. Stewart Island / Rakiura, even where this clashes with the NZGB's current naming practice, and I believe that's still appropriate. However, I see simplicity and consistency of orthography as more important than being formally correct, so I think it would be best to simply follow the New Zealand Geographic Board's current practice on orthography, and include spaces around the slash. --Avenue (talk) 11:44, 8 March 2011 (UTC)
Me again, is their a possibility of an alternate to slashes, such as Stewart Island (Rakiura) ?? FlyingKiwi (talk) 13:22, 8 March 2011 (UTC)
That's the format the NZGB used to use, but it's seen by some as implying that the name in parentheses is less important, so they are gradually replacing it. See the third bullet point, page 42 of the NZGB frameworks document linked above. --Avenue (talk) 14:49, 8 March 2011 (UTC)

This discussion seems to have stalled. Perhaps a vote will clarify whether there's some consensus. I think three options have been considered above. --Avenue (talk) 09:23, 16 March 2011 (UTC)

Include spaces around a slash

Use the officially gazetted orthography

Follow common usage

Admin help required

Interestingly, the article uses Mount Hopkins (New Zealand) as an example of naming conventions for unpopulated places, but it redirects to Mount Hopkins, New Zealand. This was changed in 2004 as a copy paste move. Could an admin please move the article and combine the edit histories? Schwede66 07:54, 26 June 2011 (UTC)

Naming convention for schools

If I apply the naming conventions, case 4 is applicable, isn't it. Going by that, what is currently named St. Andrew's College (New Zealand) should really be St. Andrew's College, Christchurch, but not St. Andrew's College, New Zealand. Without reading up on it, I would have thought it's the last case. Can you confirm that we do want to do this as per what I've said above? If the answer is 'yes', I propose to amend the description for case 4 to read "... features of specific cities or towns, such as parks, buildings, schools or streets, the name ..." (emphasis added by me). Schwede66 11:26, 9 August 2011 (UTC)

Could an admin please move Carmel College (New Zealand) to Carmel College, Auckland over a redirect? Schwede66 17:56, 26 December 2013 (UTC)
 Done-gadfium 19:17, 26 December 2013 (UTC)

Naming convention for suburbs

When disambiguation required for more than one NZ place name, and both places are the same type of place, the naming conventions tell us that we should use the official regional name as a dab. This makes sense when we are dealing with rivers or towns. It doesn't necessarily make sense if we are dealing with suburbs. Case in point is Lansdowne, Wellington, which is a suburb of Masterton. Not that you would know that from the dab; it implies that it's a suburb of Wellington. Schwede66 08:28, 7 March 2016 (UTC)

Given that nobody appears to have any problems with that (logical) change, I shall go ahead and implement that change. Schwede66 21:56, 18 June 2016 (UTC)

Dual names in Wikidata

Should the Wikidata labels for the volcanoes of the Auckland region which have dual names have just the English names under the English label, and the Māori names under both "Also known as" and as the Maori label?[dn 1]

I've made this change for Mount Eden, Taylors Hill, and Auckland Domain, for example, and I think it makes the most sense.

Should the rest be changed -- e.g. Waitomokia? See this SPARQL query for the list that would expand if this work were to be carried out. — Hugh 20:01, 28 September 2017 (UTC)

  1. ^ On a side note, where in the Mediawiki software is this label itself named? It should have a macron on the a, if there are no technical limitations.

(NB: I have moved this discussion from Talk:Auckland volcanic field.)

Template:Waikato

Any thoughts please about my question at Template_talk:Waikato#Mangatangi_River? When is a stream a river if the Geographic Board hasn't given it an official name and the sources differ? Johnragla (talk) 16:43, 24 November 2017 (UTC)

I suggest that this be discussed on the template talk page, as there's already some useful discussion there. Schwede66 20:38, 24 November 2017 (UTC)

Am I looking at the right talk page? Template_talk:Waikato#Mangatangi_River has one question raised in 2010 and 2 that i've added since. No one else has answered anything. Johnragla (talk) 23:31, 24 November 2017 (UTC)

Sorry. Template talk:Waikato; only just got round to answering right now. Schwede66 23:36, 24 November 2017 (UTC)

I've read it now and the suggestion seems good. Johnragla (talk) 23:38, 24 November 2017 (UTC)

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