Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Anthroponymy

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Splitting lists of names articles when clearly different names

Looking at articles about names, there's two clear sets that I would separate more on coverage/quality than saying they are different types. However, the differences cause a problem. First you have detailed articles with some etymology and anthroponomy (great), and then you have what are mere listicles of people with the name - or (the problem) a name with a different origin that is spelled the same. When I improved Agron (surname), for example, I wrote about both separately but it might be better to have multiple articles. Or look at the Romeu listicle, which has a given name of one origin and a surname of another all on the same page.

Surely it is more logical to split articles and listicles into separate articles for separate origins, so that these can (now or later) be developed into articles that actually encyclopedically cover the history and usage of the name without getting wires crossed. (And on the other hand, you'd expect examples like Walsh (surname) and Branagh to be merged for the same reason.) Kingsif (talk) 23:25, 21 June 2024 (UTC)

Hm, I feel kinda neutral towards this. I think that the system we currently have (one page for all variants/different etymologies) is fine in most instances, though if we have detailed histories about the different etymologies, the pages should probably be split as you said. Thing is, we often don't, so when we don't have substantial content about the history of the name, I feel that one page for any different etymologies should be fine, though I would agree that many pages currently don't delineate between etymologies well enough. On that last note, I think I'd feel naturally opposed to a merger between Branagh and Walsh, as they are cognates with drastically different spelling, though this brings up another problem: the thousands of pages which currently have nothing about etymology when such information is easily available. It'd be interesting to see others' opinions on this. AllTheUsernamesAreInUse (talk) 01:51, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

Cognates? Did you drop a "not"? —Tamfang (talk) 07:12, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

another problem: the thousands of pages which currently have nothing about etymology when such information is easily available - honestly, I might just start trying to solve that problem, and splitting/expanding/whatever where necessary. Kingsif (talk) 12:33, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

We need to bear in mind that surname pages are useful for, and used by, the reader who knows someone by surname only, doesn't care about the etymology of the name, but needs to find the philosopher / musician / footballer of that surname. They don't want to have to check multiple pages because there are several surnames of different origin which happen to be spelled the same way: all they know is the spelling used by their person. By all means provided lots of linkages between different pages, to help those readers who want to learn about the etymology of the surnames, but I think we should prioritise the reader who has read a source referring to "the important earlier work by Xyz" or "Xyz's innovative style" and needs to find the person in their subject area with surname "Xyz", especially if "Xyz" is a word which is also a common noun or placename so that a simple search on "Xyz" is not an easy solution. PamD 07:22, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

IMHO, List of people with surname Xyz should be the place for that (if there's too many to just put them all under a "people" subsection of Xyz (disambiguation)), and an article of Xyz (name) should be about the name. Kingsif (talk) 12:28, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

PamD, as always, brings up a good point. The separate list idea works with common names though in most instances I don't think there's enough people to justify separate lists.

Also in response to Tamfang, Branagh I believe is derived from Irish Breathnach, from which Walsh is also occasionally translated, so I guess not always cognates, but wouldn't they be in that instance? I'm not a linguist though so by all means correct me if I'm wrong. AllTheUsernamesAreInUse (talk) 20:49, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

On the "cognate" thing, I believe you are correct - etymologically related, but in different languages, potentially with significant differences. If I had to guess, Tamfang may have been thinking of cognates in terms of "false friends" perhaps? Kingsif (talk) 20:54, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

Two words are cognates if they have a common origin (which these obviously have not), regardless of their meaning. False friends are often cognates, but may also have only chance resemblance. —Tamfang (talk) 01:07, 24 June 2024 (UTC)

Would Breathnach not be the common origin? AllTheUsernamesAreInUse (talk) 05:15, 24 June 2024 (UTC)

No, Walsh is from a Germanic word meaning 'foreign'. —Tamfang (talk) 03:50, 25 June 2024 (UTC)

You know, this discussion might be interesting to have over at the Walsh talk page, as I think (with sources of course) people could discuss developing the lead/content there - though I'd also make sure we're all on the same page regarding how we're using "origin" and "etymology". Kingsif (talk) 11:55, 25 June 2024 (UTC)

The Dictionary of American Family Names states that one of the origins within Ireland for Walsh is a translation of Breathnach, from which Branagh is derived. So they're usually not cognates but in that instance wouldn't they be? Though I agree that if this conversation will continue for much longer it should probably be at the Walsh talk page. AllTheUsernamesAreInUse (talk) 19:01, 25 June 2024 (UTC)

Translation and cognate are separate concepts! —Tamfang (talk) 06:44, 26 June 2024 (UTC)

Ok, I kind of see now. I guess I'll take your word for it as you probably know much more about linguistics than me. AllTheUsernamesAreInUse (talk) 21:28, 26 June 2024 (UTC)

It's funny how often I somehow give that impression. —Tamfang (talk) 08:46, 27 June 2024 (UTC)

The problem with that is that it means extending the WP:NAMELIST navigation hole one step further - if we add more clicks into the navigation path it does seem to make the layout neat and orderly. But, it also risks losing many readers, as we make them click extra and as we bury the lede (many names are relevant because someone relevant is named that way, not the other way around). --Joy (talk) 05:57, 25 June 2024 (UTC)

I'd only advocate for a separate list if there's too many people to just have a subsection of whatever the top level article is (typically, the disambiguation). So, "move the list of people to the disambig rather than have it at the surname article" is another way of phrasing the same thought, I suppose. Kingsif (talk) 11:50, 25 June 2024 (UTC)

That's not typically what happens, though. There's Foo with a people list and nothing else, or there's Foo without a people list + Foo (surname) with a people list (extra 2 clicks plus scrolling to get to a biography) or a separate List of people named Foo (which in turn is horrendously bad for navigation because each biography is at least 3 clicks and probably a lot of scrolling away). --Joy (talk) 07:23, 26 June 2024 (UTC)

Discussion at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/John Taylor (given name)

 You are invited to join the discussion at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/John Taylor (given name). Should first–middle name pairs like "John Taylor" have a name page? —Bagumba (talk) 13:12, 8 July 2024 (UTC)

How to categorize surnames that aren't really surnames?

For example, most Indonesian people don't really have surnames (Indonesian_names#Naming_forms). Thoughts on how something like Arianto should be categorized? Thanks, ~WikiOriginal-9~ (talk) 16:59, 12 July 2024 (UTC)

Are you distinguishing between hereditary and non-hereditary surnames, or between surnames and family names? In some cultures, a surname is any name given to someone in addition to the necessary or traditional names chosen by one's parents. For instance, in ancient Rome, the core parts of someone's name might be Gaius Rubellius, the former chosen, the latter inherited, but in Gaius Rubellius Blandus, the last of these three is called a cognomen, literally "surname", because it's added to the standard nomenclature—although cognomina sometimes became hereditary as well, and we would call the gentile name Rubellius a surname in modern parlance. In fact such names probably came about as surnames, and are so described on rare instances. But surnames were often personal and belonged to only one person in a family, though other, unrelated persons might also bear the same surname.

In the page "Arianto", it seems clear that the name Arianto isn't a hereditary surname—that is, the bearers didn't receive it automatically because generations of their forebears were named Arianto. If it was simply chosen as an additional name at birth, then wouldn't it be treated as a "given name"? If there are instances where it's verifiably a family or clan name, or bestowed as some kind of honorific or epithet, then those instances might be classified as surnames. Are there any such instances? It's not clear that it is in any of the listed examples, but if it could be one, you could say that it's usually a "given name" because most Indonesians don't have surnames in the modern sense (or any sense?), but that it can also be a surname. You would be able to categorize it as both types, although you might wait until there's at least one example of it as a surname, if you're not sure. On the other hand, if you're only referring to it as a surname in the above question because it follows a "given name", but is simply an additional one, as in "Jean-Claude" or "Johann Wilhelm" or "Cindy Lou", then I wouldn't categorize it as a surname. Hope this is helpful! P Aculeius (talk) 18:36, 12 July 2024 (UTC)

Speaking as someone who has written a few dozen articles about Indonesians, I don't think there's any easy answer due to the sheer diversity in types of Indonesian names and naming customs. I think it requires some engagement with each person's case as for example some names that are not a family name in one generation became a family name in another generation, which may not be immediately evident. Dan Carkner (talk) 21:12, 12 July 2024 (UTC)

Sadly English Wikipedia has a long-standing issue (which extends to Wikidata and Commons) of not understanding the difference between modern family names and surnames. There has to probably be a big debate about this and a lot of work to fix it.★Trekker (talk) 21:01, 13 July 2024 (UTC)

Advice needed for possible merger of people named Gervais, Gervaise, Gervase or Gervas into single disambiguation page

These four names for people appear to be variants of the same root name with slight spelling variations. However, three of them have their own disambiguation pages, with people lists which sometimes overlap. I would like to consider moving all the real people page links into a single disambiguation page, as follows:

- No changes to disambiguation pages links for Places, Other uses or Fictional characters sections.

- Gervais (name): to be the main target page for disambiguation (it holds the most occurrences of the name).

- Gervaise (disambiguation): point current People section to Gervais (name). Move current list of people to Gervais (name).

- Gervase (disambiguation): create a new People section, pointing to Gervais (name). Move current list of people to Gervais (name).

- Gervas: create a new disambiguation page with a People section pointing to Gervais (name).

Can this WikiProject advise if this is the right approach? Masato.harada (talk) 14:24, 17 July 2024 (UTC)

Requested move at Talk:Jean Kelly (disambiguation)#Requested move 22 July 2024

There is a requested move discussion at Talk:Jean Kelly (disambiguation)#Requested move 22 July 2024 that may be of interest to members of this WikiProject. Reading Beans 02:48, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

Surname indexes by Duckmather

See contribs starting here for reference, but I found a lot of creations within this WikiProject by this user that go against the standards set by this project, including date range MOS violations, unsourced claims of origin, and unnecessary appending of the words "a" and "an" on some entries. At the moment, I cannot find the right words to remind Duckmather of this project's guidelines, and I also don't have time to go to all of their index creations and make these fixes. Is there someone in this WikiProject that is able to finish the job for me? Thanks in advance! Jalen Folf (Bark[s]) 16:37, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

May as well ping Duckmather to this discussion as well as refer the user to WP:APOS, which includes the standards for all our surname and given name indices. Jalen Folf (Bark[s]) 16:39, 3 August 2024 (UTC)

@JalenFolf: Some responses to these point by point:

• I'm assuming the date-range violations you speak of relate to MOS:RANGE, which specifies that one should not put spaces between year dates. If so, I'm fine with following this from now on; I think I thought that year ranges with spaces looked cleaner.
• The unnecessary appending of the words "a" and "an" might also some sort of MOS violation, I'm thinking, although I'm not seeing where. (I checked MOS:LISTS and Wikipedia:Stand-alone lists#Lists of people and neither specified this rule). If you can point where this rule is stated I'm also happy to follow it. However, I do think "a" and "an" make the page flow better when you read out loud though.
• As for the unsourced claims of origin, I've been following the principle that the people who bear its name represent its geography. For example, if a name has bearers who live in (say) the Bahamas, then it obviously follows that the surname can be found in the Bahamas. (C.f. WP:You don't need to cite that the sky is blue.) If this is too problematic I could just avoid mentioning countries in the lead though. Also, sources related to names are really hard to come across. Usually, googling brings up stuff like ancestry.com and houseofnames.com which seem iffy at best. If you know of any decent citeworthy sources (eg books or encyclopedias or whatnot) related to names, I'd be happy to cite them!

(A last point: I go by he/him pronouns and have been very upfront about this for ages. Please don't they/them everyone you don't know; it gets really annoying.)

Duckmather (talk) 04:10, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

@Duckmather: Referring to other editors as "they" is a useful way to avoid getting it wrong by using "he" or "she", and you can't really expect every editor to scan 60 userboxes on your page before mentioning you. Please learn to accept this.

On sources for names: if you are eligible to access Wikipedia:The Wikipedia Library, you can find full text access to titles like The Oxford Dictionary of Family Names in Britain and Ireland and Dictionary of American Family Names, which are better sources than the ones you've mentioned above. PamD 10:09, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

In the spirit of MOS:DABPEOPLE:

Do not include a, an or the before the description of the person's occupation or role

—Bagumba (talk) 11:54, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

Draft:List of given names derived from fiction

Draft:List of given names derived from fiction started as a conversion from a category that was deleted. It's just been rejected at AfC. I had given it citations from most of the linked articles on the given names, but Asilvering judged that they were not in-depth, reliable, secondary or independent. It still strikes me as a list worth having – would anyone here like to work on it? – Fayenatic London 09:56, 16 August 2024 (UTC)

It will only lead to eternal bickering. Would "Adam" or "Eve" be an acceptable entry in this list? Fram (talk) 10:27, 16 August 2024 (UTC)

I'm sure many of the sources are in-depth, reliable, secondary, and independent. The problem is they're not about the topic of the list - names first invented for fictional characters - but rather about individual names on that list. -- asilvering (talk) 06:44, 17 August 2024 (UTC)

@Asilvering: perhaps the template that you used should be revised, or tailored where it generates inappropriate descriptions of the issues.

I chose the sources as they confirm the criteria for inclusion in the list, i.e. that the name was invented in a work of fiction.

At least "Should You Name Your Baby Anakin? The Rising Popularity of a 'Star Wars' Baby Name" (Yahoo! Entertainment) and "So You Named Your Kid Daenerys. How's That Feel Now?" (New York Magazine) also address the topic of the list. The latter is about the dilemma of naming a child after a character in a current television series before it is known how the character finally turns out. – Fayenatic London 21:52, 18 August 2024 (UTC)

I would say that the template used does accurately describe the issue - there are no in-depth, reliable etc sources about the topic of the article. That NYMag article is, for example, entirely about people who named their kid Daenerys. -- asilvering (talk) 23:48, 19 August 2024 (UTC)

The problem with the list is that it is an "arbitrary" invention of Wikipedians: I suspect there are no serious sources that discuss this type of names, not just individual names. Although I do find this list interesting. - Altenmann >talk 17:02, 18 August 2024 (UTC)

I would simply have created the article with the sources you found, instead of submitting it to AfC. However, I think that if you did that now, someone would immediately nominate it for deletion, simply because some people don't think it should exist. I don't find there to be a problem with creating a list of things that can be individually documented using reliable, independent sources, just because you don't have a source that discusses such a list. That seems like formalism, perhaps pedantry. The list isn't "arbitrary" as long as it has reasonably clear criteria for inclusion: at least one reliable source has to state that a particular name was invented or at least popularized by a particular work of fiction (and not be clearly mistaken about this, in which case the source would not be reliable for that point). I would not include mythology under the heading of "fiction"; Adam, Eve, and other figures in the Bible do not have names coined by an author in the sense of this list. "Stella" can be included even though it's just Latin for "star", if nobody was using it as a name prior to said fictional use. If you can find any sources that would help overcome the objections of the other editors, you should probably use them to create the list instead of relying on someone else's judgment as to whether such an article should exist. P Aculeius (talk) 00:12, 20 August 2024 (UTC)

I am old to remember history: this rule you are calling "like formalism" was in response to a flurry of articles List of songs about New York, List of songs about weather, List of songs about suicide, List of songs about tequila (my fav :-), List of songs about love, ad inf.... See Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of songs about weather. --Altenmann >talk 05:22, 20 August 2024 (UTC)

I'm not referring to a rule. I'm referring to an argument that isn't a rule, and which didn't carry the day in the linked discussion. That 2007 discussion was closed without consensus, and it consisted entirely of lists of songs about various subjects, some of which still exist, though you wouldn't guess either of those things from your post. There isn't a rule stating that lists of things can't exist unless a reliable source describes them as a specific class of things. The main argument against including the various lists of songs was that they constituted indiscriminate collections of data, although a careful reading of WP:NOT provides only examples that are inapposite to that situation.

I would say that nothing useful can be drawn from that discussion here, because A) it is a very old discussion about a very different topic; B) the result was inconclusive; C) the principle argument was not the one being made here. Here the question is whether a list of personal names that appear to have been invented (as names) for works of fiction, only to become accepted and used as names by the general public, is sufficiently distinct as a topic and relevant to the subject of anthroponymy to remain an article. If it is, then this strikes me more as a "you don't have to cite that the sky is blue" situation: you don't have to cite that the contents of a list of things—all of which obviously fit the criteria to be in that list—constitute a list of those things.

If the phenomenon of invented names becoming popularly regarded as legitimate names to give people is itself noteworthy—and I think it is—then a list of such names is fair game for Wikipedia, although it could perhaps be merged with an article about that phenomenon, if one exists or is created. A stand-alone list would be suitable if the two together become too large to maintain as a single article. But for the time being, that may provide an "out": I'm sure there must be some sources discussing invented names in general, with or without a list. Such an article would surely be encyclopedic, and this list could be merged with it. P Aculeius (talk) 12:29, 20 August 2024 (UTC)

ancestry.com

It looks like ancestry.com introduced a paywall that blocks even the "Surname Meaning" sections (by blurring) (although it is snatched from Dictionary of American Surnames for all surnames). I guess we all have to borrow the book. - Altenmann >talk 17:24, 18 August 2024 (UTC)

• I believe it can be accessed through The Wikipedia Library. There's also Oxford Reference although it partially blocks out many definitions. AllTheUsernamesAreInUse (talk) 19:14, 18 August 2024 (UTC)
  • Yes, I see Ancestry in WPL partners. I established an access to http://www-ancestryinstitution-com.wikipedialibrary.idm.oclc.org/ but failed to find AHD. I did find "A dictionary of English and Welsh surnames"; it suggests "View Image" (of a page), but image links were not clickable for me. --Altenmann >talk 19:32, 18 August 2024 (UTC)

Requested move at Talk:Yi (Chinese surname)#Requested move 13 August 2024

There is a requested move discussion at Talk:Yi (Chinese surname)#Requested move 13 August 2024 that may be of interest to members of this WikiProject. Safari Scribe^{Edits! Talk!} 06:51, 20 August 2024 (UTC)

Requested move at Talk:Xu (surname 徐)#Requested move 13 August 2024

There is a requested move discussion at Talk:Xu (surname 徐)#Requested move 13 August 2024 that may be of interest to members of this WikiProject. Safari Scribe^{Edits! Talk!} 06:55, 20 August 2024 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Kim (surname)

Ther is a discussion regarding Kim (surname) that may be of interest to this project. Best, -My, oh my! (Mushy Yank) 23:03, 27 August 2024 (UTC)

Anthroponymy of formerly enslaved Africans in the Americas

This topic is missing from the discussion 83.42.143.2 (talk) 06:48, 31 August 2024 (UTC)

Is this topic is discussed in literature? --Altenmann >talk 21:14, 31 August 2024 (UTC)

Requested move at Template talk:Infobox Chinese/Japanese#Requested move 31 August 2024

There is a requested move discussion at Template talk:Infobox Chinese/Japanese#Requested move 31 August 2024 that may be of interest to members of this WikiProject. —TechnoSquirrel69 (sigh) 22:18, 31 August 2024 (UTC)