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How strict are we being about characters that aren't normally used in English these days?

For example, should Mānuka honey (the Māori word is pronounced something like a thoroughly anglicized Monica; it doesn't represent the long a sound that most Americans will expect) use the macron, or should the page title by Manuka honey without it? Should Gylfi Þorsteinsson Gíslason use the Icelandic Thorn (letter) or the English transliteration or be at Gylfi Thorsteinsson Gíslason (which I think is the standard transliteration)? WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:32, 19 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I think the answer is that it should really depend on the norms of the source language, vis à vis its borrowing into English. As someone who's cleaned up plenty of diacritics used in a maximalist fashion, I do feel bad when I remove their use in the context of languages where they are both commonly seen in English-language sources, and important if one wants to unambiguously represent the original vocabulary in the English loanword—though of course, their utility is inherently limited, as this is an English language encyclopedia.

I think the major thing that's become increasingly clear is that it's largely no longer a rendering issue: the vast majority of devices used by readers are capable of displaying these characters. Remsense诉 00:48, 19 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

WP:COMMONNAME ought to be the applicable guidelines. On the theory that, as a consumer product, its common name is influenced and/or reflected by its labeling, I looked through a list of manuka honey products on Amazon (US) and it was split, so that didn't help. As for any name with "Þ", I'd say the vast majority of English speakers wouldn't know what to do with that if they saw it, let alone know how to write or print it, so it seems unlikely that the native form is the one we should use here, just as we list the Chinese Communist Party general secretary under Xi Jinping, not under 习近平; nor, for that matter, under Xí Jìnpíng, since English speakers don't by and large reflect Mandarin tones in their rendering of Chinese names and words.

On the other hand, "é" is largely familiar to English speakers, found in words like "café", "née", "divorcée", and "naiveté" (sometimes "naïveté!"), and thus "Beyoncé" is commonly seen and is the title of that singer's article here. Largoplazo (talk) 00:59, 19 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I suggest we apply the same criteria as MOS:CAPS; consistently capitalized in a substantial majority of independent, reliable sources. BilledMammal (talk) 18:05, 19 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

In the article tolon'omby, I have an issue: the current title is said to be the name with broader geographical usage in Madagascar, but the name savika, which is said to be local to the region of Madagascar where this article's topic originates and is most practiced, is the name more commonly used in literature. The French and Malagasy Wikipedias use Savika as their article titles. Neither name is uncommon in literature. Zanahary (talk) 01:31, 7 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Another editor recently italicized the title of the article Cult. I disagree. Debating by edit summaries, and by discussion (Talk:Cult § Italics or not italics for title) has gone nowhere. I think the other editor is reading WP:ITALICTITLE and MOS:WAW too literally because the Cult article starts out, "Cult is a term". However, the article covers far more than just defining a word (unlike how Orange (word) does). Though the article also discusses "cult" as a word, it mainly discusses far broader concepts (my opinion from browsing the article). Also comparing to the previously-discussed-here article Gay which is quite comprehensive though still focused on discussing the word as a word—the article Cult is not focused in like manner.

I'm interested in input by those who frequent this policy article and have more experience in how WP:ITALICTITLE has been applied in the past.   ▶ I am Grorp ◀ 03:25, 10 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I can see how ITALICTITLE can be interpreted to support their argument, but I don't believe it should apply to the 'words as words' section of ITALIC. I'd advocate removing the link from ITALICTITLE to ITALIC:

Use italics when italics would be necessary in running text; for example, taxonomic names, the names of ships, the titles of books, films, and other creative works, and foreign phrases are italicized both in ordinary text and in article titles.

I realize there might need to be some additional work done to make that an all-inclusive list (not just ships, but air and spacecraft; court cases; some mathematics), but I think it's currently overbroad and, to keep it meaningful, should be reserved for a limited set of circumstances. Star Garnet (talk) 04:31, 10 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@Star Garnet: I think I see. So you're recommending not italicizing titles of "words" articles, as well as "clarifying" the current ITALICTITLE wording. Here's an idea, how about where WP:ITALICTITLE currently links to the entire section MOS:ITALICS, change it to be more clear which of the ITALICS subsections ITALICTITLE it is meant to include.

For example,

• include the sections: Names and titles, Foreign terms, Scientific names
• and exclude the sections: Emphasis, Words as words, Quotations, Variables

Clarifying something like this might well help to reduce all the talk page 'asking' while not needing to have an exhaustive list at ITALICTITLE (because all the detail is already exhaustively covered at ITALICS).   ▶ I am Grorp ◀ 18:42, 10 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, I believe that something along those lines would be a good outcome. Star Garnet (talk) 19:29, 10 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@Grorp My opinion: The article is about cults, not about the word cult, though it has a section about the word. The article title identifies the subject of the whole article, not just the subject of a section. So treating the title as words-as-words would imply that all the material that's about cults themselves is off-topic. I don't see how it can possibly belong in italics. Musiconeologist (talk) 14:33, 24 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry, that should have gone on the article's talk page. I'll just note here that even dictionaries don't generally italicise the titles of their entries, every one of which is about a word or phrase. Musiconeologist (talk) 15:58, 24 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I checked the 3 discussions as mentioned in the footnote "h" [1], and no one was arguing for or against "words as words". They debated ship names, book titles, and foreign words. Examples such as "orange", "gay" and "cult" were not even on anyone's radar. The result of the discussions was to make this edit to WP:ITALICTITLE which is substantially similar to what we see today, but without the wikilink to MOS:ITALIC. Even in the flurry of microedits in the week that followed, a link to MOS:ITALIC was not part of the paragraph at the time (September 2010).

However, 4 months later (December 2010), an editor made an edit which inserted the wikilink to what is now known as MOS:ITALIC but no one seems to have noticed it at the time. A month later, that editor was indef blocked for disruption (nonresponsive, and too many edits too fast, such as using an indiscriminate bot). They reverted his last 300 edits [2] which wasn't enough to catch this one. (That editor was averaging over 300 edits per day!)

I can conclude, therefore, that "words as words" was never intended to be included in the meaning of ITALICTITLE through consensus process. Possibly the link to MOS:ITALIC also wasn't intended, and certainly there was no active consensus to make the edit.

I recommend the wikilink be removed. It might well reduce the number of "asks" on this talk page, and might reduce some of the debating on individual pages. At any rate, removing the wikilink would be closer to the original consensus results.   ▶ I am Grorp ◀ 07:58, 11 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@Star Garnet: I just re-read your original comment and that's what you said, too. (blush) I missed that, but we both came to the same conclusion in separate ways.   ▶ I am Grorp ◀ 08:02, 11 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@Star Garnet: Do you think we should make that change (remove the wikilink)?   ▶ I am Grorp ◀ 13:12, 17 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I'd certainly be on board, but I don't know how wide of consensus would be needed for that change. It wasn't added by consensus, but it's stayed for over a decade. With that said, nobody else watching this page seems to have a strong enough opinion to chime in. Star Garnet (talk) 20:22, 17 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I strongly feel that no change is needed here or to MOSITALIC. The change is needed in any article that begins "Foo is a term for..." Articles should almost never start that way. "A cult is a..." That's how you start that article. "Orange is a colour..." etc. Italicising words as words is very useful and taking that out of the MOS would be highly detrimental to so many articles. Primergrey (talk) 00:45, 18 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@Primergrey Strongly agree. Without it, people will be "correcting" italics to quote marks, or to roman type with no typographical indication at all, and anyone who wants to use italics that way will have a constant battle on their hands to keep the text properly formatted. "Some instances of the word word were in italics and some weren't, so I've made them all the same". Or you write "In that sentence, a plural is singular" and it gets turned into "a plural is singular" and subsequently has its grammar erroneously repaired . . . Musiconeologist (talk) 16:28, 24 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Your feedback is requested at Talk:Ahomisation#Neologism as title. Thank you. Mathglot (talk) 03:14, 30 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I saw that the Fellini film 8½ has "½", which seems to be a special character, and the title should be 8 1/2. Am I wrong? I was surprised to see that there has never been a discussion to move it. I consider myself pretty keyboard-savvy but don't know of a way to make ½ when browsing the Internet. EDIT: Same concern with 9½ Weeks. Erik (talk | contrib) ^{(ping me)} 15:41, 14 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]

1) For navigation, just use 1/2 – it will redirect anyway. 2) To type ½ on a desktop – use Compose key, on some mobile keyboards – long tap on the digit 1, in Wikipedia source editor – "Special characters → Symbols". —⁠andrybak (talk) 16:39, 14 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Gotcha, and I found a more direct answer: MOS:FRAC mentions that Ranma ½ is okay to have, so that logic applies to these films' titles too. Erik (talk | contrib) ^{(ping me)} 17:05, 14 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I have been warned that this topic will not be well received. I have worked for decades in Quality Management. Wikipedia The Free Encyclopaedia. Is a title and you have therefore capitalised it. Why do these same rules not flow through the site? All page titles should be capitalised, no? My example was Chinese Water Torture. This should be capitalised as the page title, but continually when in use as it describes a specific person, place, organisation, or thing? I thought that this describes the rules well? https://writer.com/blog/capitalization-rules/ I haven't gone to edit anything as I await advice or concuss from the administrators. This is my first time here so hope I have done this correctly? Thanks. 2A0A:EF40:833:2101:5446:6A9:57E3:A13 (talk) 19:14, 17 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]

One principle I recall from quality management (which, by the way, you had no reason to capitalize!) is that it often doesn't matter which approach an organization chooses to accomplish something as long as it chooses an approach and sticks to it. The approach at MOS:NCCAPS is the approach used for titles (and section headings) here. Largoplazo (talk) 20:22, 17 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]

My thoughts from a document design perspective:

• Capitalisation within article titles loses information. In some cases, the information which distinguishes between two different articles. So it's undesirable for that context. Readers need to be able to see the difference between a word used as a common noun and the same word used as a name. For example (I've not checked whether their articles both exist) a red dwarf and the TV comedy Red Dwarf.
• Different capitalisation conventions apply for different things. The way a book title is treated on its title page might differ from the treatment of a chapter title, a section heading within a chapter, etc. Maybe the chapter title is all in in uppercase at the start of the chapter, but lowercase in running heads within the chapter where it serves a different purpose. Library catalogues use sentence case for book titles regardless of what the book itself does, but bibliographies typically don't. And so on.
• I don't like the capitalisation of The Free Encyclopaedia, but I don't think it's being used in the same way as an article title, more like a slogan or name or trademark, so I don't really see a clash of style.

—The important thing is that each kind of text is consistently presented, and is clearly distinguishable from other types of text when necessary. (If it's done well, the reader will be unaware of it and simply find it easy to navigate and read the text.) Musiconeologist (talk) 21:22, 17 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]

The disparate treatment between the title of the website and the title of things within the website is comparable to the use of italics to denote book or magazine or album titles versus the use of quotation marks to denote chapter or article or song titles. It's actually normal to use contrasting styles. Largoplazo (talk) 22:26, 17 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Exactly—maybe also comparable with designing a book cover or title page differently from its contents? It's all part of making things which are different look different. (For myself, I'd like book subtitles to be in sentence case to distinguish them from the titles, but we don't do that one IIRC.) Musiconeologist (talk) 23:03, 17 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]

On the talk page for Adolphe Schloss I am suggesting that the title be changed to 'The Schlosse Collection'. Presumably this would mean it would no longer come under the biographies heading. If you have an interest, please comment on the talk page. Rjm at sleepers (talk) 09:08, 4 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]