Talk:Capitonym

MArch

Hows about MArch (Master of architecture) in addition to March and march? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 210.84.22.140 (talk • contribs)

I'd say no - MArch is an abbreviation, whilst the other examples on the page are words in their own right. --Neil (talk) 12:32, 26 August 2010 (UTC)

Capitals in the uncapitalised column

I note with incredulity that several words in the column of examples of words that should not carry capitals, had them. I am amazed that someone let this through. I have fixed them - "cuban", "german" and so on. Liam Proven (talk) 11:42, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

Poetic usage

"..., which this poem must be read in the context of".

Is that correct English? I honestly do not know. And, in any case: is that sensible English? Mariano 05:18, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Does this word exist?

With Google I only get 2170 hits, and in the first page many are clones of this articles. If this word does exist, then List of case-sensitive English words should be merged here, else this article should be merged there. (Also, I think that we should exclude proper names, else the list could become endless, as I pointed out on Talk:List of case-sensitive English words.) --Army1987 10:47, 11 November 2006 (UTC)

I have performed an exhaustive search, and while the term capitonym is in Richard Lederer's Crazy English, it is not to be found in either the Merriam-Webster or Oxford English dictionaries. I'm not particularly keen on the longer title, but it seems that capitonym is too rare. See here : http://wordsmith.org/chat/lederer.html. Also reading farther, he states that all these words are types of heteronyms, so maybe the whole thing should be moved there.

71.102.186.234 03:54, 26 November 2006 (UTC)

It certainly does exist and, while a type of heteronym, is significantly different. violet/riga (t) 19:56, 19 December 2006 (UTC)

If it "certainly does exist" somebody needs to find a legitimate citation. I am unable to find any legit sources to back up this word. The alternative would be to bring this word into common usage. I've never heard it before. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.91.137.155 (talk) 23:24, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

Merge

I completed the merge from List of case-sensitive English words into this page. I was unsure which page to merge into because of the uncertainty that "capitonym" is a real word (see above discussion). I chose this one because it has versions in other languages. Any feedback welcome. -- Techtonic (talk) 18:53, 11 August 2007 (UTC)

Astronomical terms

As per the Wikipedia manual of style, should not `Sun', `Moon' and `Earth' be included in this list as within an astronomical context? The logic runs like this;

• `Earth' is the name of a planet, which in a manner akin to the names of the other planets should be refered to with a capital, whereas `earth' is a synonym for dirt, soil, etc.
• A `moon' is a natural satellite, whereas the `Moon' is Luna, Diana, the natural satellite of Earth.
• The `Sun' is specificaly the star of Earth's solar system, whereas a `sun' is merely a star at the centre of a solar system.

Also its disputably not an English word, but `Sol' (the name of Earth's sun) and `sol' (the period of a `day' on Mars) could also qualify. --Neo 19:23, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

Have to be careful really. Gwyneth Paltrow named her baby "Apple" but that doesn't mean we should now include that one. Are astronomical names the same? I think this article would be best served by us giving a few examples rather than trying to comprehensibly list all of them. violet/riga (t) 11:48, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

Sol is indisputably an English word, as are those others; however, I agree that there is no need to add them to this list right now. Eebster the Great (talk) 03:46, 16 December 2008 (UTC)

See "Polish."

An extremely rare case of two English words, distinguished in writing only by a capitalization, that are pronounced differently.

Q: If it's an extremely rare case, why do we have a table festooned with "See 'Polish.'"?
A: We don't because I replaced 'em with a simple note that the terms have "different pronunciations".

– 74  06:03, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

Inclusion criteria

1. The number of placenames that are also ordinary uncapitalised words is huge. I can find dozens in my UK road atlas without even trying. Should all placenames be removed from this table? Or should "notable" examples (e.g. "China"/"china") be retained? How do we decide if an example is "notable"?

2. What about company names? Again, there are huge numbers of examples. Is there any reason why pairs such as "Fiat"/"fiat" and "SEAT"/"seat" deserve listing, while others, such as "Apple", "Acorn", "Apricot", "Spar", "Omega", "Pace", and hundreds of others, do not?

3. Ditto for the names of publications? Is there any reason why Time and Life magazines deserve mention, but not, for example, Mail, Express, Hello, Closer, Vogue, Company, and so on and so on.

81.129.129.137 (talk) 13:30, 13 December 2009 (UTC)

• I see that the inline comments in the article are of the opinion that such words should not be included, so I've just deleted them. 81.157.197.45 (talk) 21:05, 20 December 2009 (UTC).

2022

I'd like to see the world cities and countries that are capitonyms (not necessarily every little village and hamlet). Is listing them really too long? I don't know it all but I have trouble going beyond this list: China, Turkey, Shanghai, and Nice. Jayxmn (talk) 16:49, 6 December 2022 (UTC)

Start of Sentence?

The article fails to mention how the lower case capitonyms are to be used when they start a sentence since English grammar dictates the first word is to be capitalized. e.g. "May I have another cookie?" -- I am NOT referring to the Month 'May', but 'may' as permission. Michael.Pohoreski (talk) 21:48, 30 August 2011 (UTC)

Really?

Some of these entries, like that for 'Truth', are pretty silly, as capitalizing any abstract noun would give additional meaning compared to the lowercase equivalent. I seek justice/Justice, you are evil/Evil, etc. Maybe remove and add a small subsection noting the ease with which capitalizing a word gives it additional meaning. Mr0t1633 (talk) 06:37, 22 June 2012 (UTC)

Yeah the inclusion of "Truth" struck me too as really silly. The only people I've ever seen do that are religious zealots and conspiracy theorists in the middle of rants. I looked around though, and apparently the Chicago Manual of Style says "Words for transcendent ideas in the Platonic sense, especially when used in a religious context, are often capitalized: Good; Beauty; Truth; the One". I'll go add some explanation and a reference to this. But I still think it's silly, especially since it's still entirely subjective. WillieBlues (talk) 15:58, 19 July 2012 (UTC)

"Different pronunciations"

It would be nice to know what they are. I happen to pronounce both b/Bolognas the same (much as in Italian). Some IPA would be nice. Rothorpe (talk) 03:22, 6 March 2015 (UTC)

The alternate spelling "baloney" is common in the U.S. for the meat product and expecially for the "nonsense" meaning, but not for the city in Italy. AnonMoos (talk) 06:17, 7 December 2022 (UTC)

Turkey & turkey

Does anyone else think it's funny that turkey was mentioned as the meaning of "peru" in the Other section but no one thought to add Turkey/turkey in the English word list? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 184.250.55.137 (talk) 06:39, 6 April 2019 (UTC)

"Turkey"/"turkey" violates the 'no place names' rule noted before the list. But because it's likely to be commonly thought of as an example, I noted it (along with "China"/"china") when noting the 'no place names' rule. 2001:470:82E9:0:C01A:7ED9:2238:200B (talk) 12:10, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

Calories / calories

Would Calories be a good fit for this list? A capital-C Calorie (a.k.a., large calorie or kilocalorie, the one that appears on the "nutrition facts" on foods) is equal to one thousand lowercase-c calories (small calories or thermochemical calories). — Preceding unsigned comment added by 108.178.100.74 (talk) 14:13, 24 June 2019 (UTC)

Not for the list shown in the article -- it falls under the case of "Pairs in which one word is simply a secondary meaning of the other". HalJor (talk) 15:02, 24 June 2019 (UTC)

Sherpa

For purposes of the list in this article, a qualifying statement is present: "Pairs in which one word is simply a secondary meaning of the other – e.g. Masonry (secret society), which is in essence a peculiar use of the word masonry (wall building) – are omitted." The term Sherpa keeps appearing in this list, paired with sherpa (in the sense of a mountain guide or porter). But the relationship between these terms is similar to that of the Masonry example. To keep the list a reasonable length and to give clear examples where the word pairs are very distinct, "Sherpa" should not be included here. HalJor (talk) 15:36, 26 June 2019 (UTC)

I wonder if this has something to do with a recent episode of Last Week Tonight about climbing Everest, which specifically mentions the word "capitonym" in reference to Sherpa/sherpa. Eman235/talk 16:05, 26 June 2019 (UTC)

Whaddaya know, I was right! Eman235/talk 13:39, 27 June 2019 (UTC)