Talk:Afon Mawddach

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Requested move 24 August 2019

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: No consensus. No prejudice against speedy renomination. (closed by non-admin page mover) SITH (talk) 21:23, 8 October 2019 (UTC)

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Afon Mawddach → River Mawddach – To use the name potentially more familiar to English-speakers as per WP:COMMONNAME and Wikipedia:Naming conventions (geographic names) Tk420 (talk) 21:02, 24 August 2019 (UTC) --Relisting. Steel1943 (talk) 22:12, 11 September 2019 (UTC)--Relisting. A1Cafel (talk) 02:58, 29 September 2019 (UTC)

Although I have seen this river referred to as the Afon Mawddach in Ordnance Survey maps I have seen it referred to as the River Mawddach in news sources such as the BBC, the Telegrath, Wales Online, and North Wales Live. I have also seen it called the River Mawddach by tourism agencies VisitWales and Visit Mid Wales. On the Google test I get about 48,000 results for 'Afon Mawddach' vs about 92,400 results for 'River Mawddach' although this should be taken with a pinch of salt as with other search engine checks. Tk420 (talk) 21:39, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

• Oppose - Afon Mawddach is what it is universally called in mid Wales. The fact that sources related to tourism use River Mawddach is hardly relevant.  Velella  ^{Velella Talk}   21:44, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

Although there are more searches for 'Afon Mawddach' than 'River Mawddach' according to a Google Trends comparison this should also be treated with caution as this is the same source that claims there are more searches for 'Aberdovey' than 'Aberdyfi' which could be the impact of its use in OS maps and on Wikipedia. I have seen 'Afon Mawddach' in the Fairbourne Railway's leaflet but that is only used in the section about the Barmouth ferry with the nearby body of water being referred to as the 'Mawddach Estuary' or just 'the Mawddach' the rest of the time. The souvenir guidebook of the Great Little Trains of Wales, of which the Fairbourne Railway is a member, avoids using either 'River' or 'Afon' for the Mawddach suggesting the use of either prefix is controversial. I have included tourism related sources as Barmouth, at the river's estuary, receives much tourism from England's West Midlands, which is predominantly English speaking, as it is one of its nearest seaside resorts. If you are to suggest the Welsh prefix is universally accepted in mid Wales you are going to have to provide evidence as according to Wikipedia:SOURCES reliable sources include university-level textbooks, books published by respected publishing houses, magazines, journals and mainstream newspapers. Tk420 (talk) 23:18, 25 August 2019 (UTC)

According to Wikipedia:Manual of Style#National varieties of English the use of words common to all varieties of English is preferred although there are allowances for local dialects (formal not colloquial) if there are strong national ties to a topic. I know the local variety of English contains loanwords from the Welsh language though this raises the question on whether the use of the word 'afon' in English is formal or informal. Tk420 (talk) 14:15, 9 September 2019 (UTC)

The article Welsh English describes there being at least four dialects of English within Wales (North Wales, Cardiff, South Wales Valleys and West Wales). According to the anglicisation article the preference for Welsh places names over similar-sounding anglicisations is more common in the west so the issue over whether to use 'River' or 'Afon' might be also be more of a west rather than mid-Wales matter. In the Aberdyfi vs Aberdovey dispute I had taken the liberty of asking someone who educated in Newtown, Powys which is in mid-Wales but they reckon the anglicised 'Aberdovey' is more familiar inland though I had not got a response for 'river' vs 'afon'. Tk420 (talk) 19:49, 23 September 2019 (UTC)

• Oppose - the OS map calls it "Afon Mawddach". Hogyn Lleol (talk) 08:40, 26 August 2019 (UTC)

That is only one source vs multiple news outlets which was cited as a reason in favour of moving the River Dovey article to River Dyfi and against moving Aberdyfi to Aberdovey although OS maps use the bilingual Afon Dyfi/River Dovey and Aberdyfi/Aberdovey. I would also like to point out that the paper OS maps use 'Afon Conwy' although the online version uses the bilingual Afon Conwy/River Conwy and the Wikipedia article for it is River Conwy. According to WP:COMMONNAME 'Wikipedia does not necessarily use the subject's "official" name as an article title; it generally prefers the name that is most commonly used (as determined by its prevalence in a significant majority of independent, reliable English-language sources)'. According to Wikipedia:WikiProject UK geography/How to write about rivers#Title "River X" is used generally for notable rivers in the UK and Ireland, yet many other watercourses are, quite properly, locally and cartographically named "X Beck", "X Water", "X Race" e.g.Trout Beck in the Lake District. However, there is currently no guideline on whether to use 'River' of 'Afon' in an article about a river in Wales. Tk420 (talk) 20:16, 26 August 2019 (UTC)

• Oppose The OS maps have used only Afon Mawddach since at least the 1960s. RGCorris (talk) 09:27, 27 August 2019 (UTC)

Without providing a reason? It is worth remembering that Wikipedia is not a democracy so the addition of 'Support' or 'Oppose' should not be thought of as a vote. Tk420 (talk) 12:35, 22 September 2019 (UTC)

• Support, now the 'elephant in the room' has been raised for discussion. Mawddach is the name of the river, 'Afon' is the Welsh word for 'River'. This is the English language Wikipedia after all, in contrast to Wicipedia Cymraeg which uses the suffix 'Afon' for English rivers such as Afon Medway and Afon Trent. Welsh Wikipedians will be justly proud of the Welsh language but there's no need to over-translate into Welsh. Sionk (talk) 18:26, 27 August 2019 (UTC)
• Further discussion I have started a Request for Comment over the wider 'River' vs 'Afon' issue on Wikipedia talk:WikiProject UK geography/How to write about rivers#RfC about the examples of local names in case anyone can offer any comments or suggestions. Tk420 (talk) 19:49, 23 September 2019 (UTC)

References

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The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

Use of English translation bracket

Just now the use of a bracket for the English translation seems unnecessary in an English-language article considering the first six words in the introduction (without the bracket) read 'The Afon Mawddach is a river'. For further discussion please see my entry in Wikipedia talk:WikiProject UK geography/How to write about rivers#Whether to include an English translation bracket in articles with non-English titles for more information. Tk420 (talk) 20:14, 11 October 2019 (UTC)

It's fairly common (and sensible) with with articles that have titles in Welsh (Afon Seiont, Afon Glaslyn, Afon Colwyn etc.). And as I've repeated endlessly (but no-one seems to hear) the word 'Afon' means 'river in Welsh, it's not the name of the river. Sionk (talk) 23:29, 11 October 2019 (UTC)

In Wikipedia talk:WikiProject UK geography/How to write about rivers#Whether to include an English translation bracket in articles with non-English titles I mentioned above User:BeenAroundAWhile brought an American perspective into the discussion pointing out 'we say Rio Grande but also Los Angeles River, using the local terminology for each. I suppose there is a similar usage in other countries with other rivers.' I checked the Rio Grande article and there is no bracket translating it into 'Great River' or 'Big River' although it is explained in the 'Names and pronunciation' section. Tk420 (talk) 19:44, 16 November 2019 (UTC)

That's an odd one, because I can't see any mention of the Rio Grande being known as the Los Angeles River, so I can't really comment. A river with a completely different English name wouldn't need translation from the non-English language name. Many articles about Mexican rivers call them "River", which avoids any problems (personally I had no idea Rio meant River in Spanish). Sionk (talk) 13:27, 18 November 2019 (UTC)

User:BeenAroundAWhile was referring to two different rivers as examples of different local terms within the United States. Tk420 (talk) 19:59, 18 November 2019 (UTC)