Talk:La Vie parisienne (operetta)

Move discussion in progress

There is a move discussion in progress on Talk:La Vie Parisienne which affects this page. Please participate on that page and not in this talk page section. Thank you. —RMCD bot 02:31, 29 August 2016 (UTC)

It seems to me that the recent page move from La vie parisienne to La Vie parisienne (operetta) is not in accordance with WP:OPERATITLE in the change of capitalisation. This work is explicitly mentioned in that guideline in sentence case. I accept that a disambiguator may be needed, but the article ought to be moved to La vie parisienne (Offenbach), La vie parisienne (operetta) or La vie parisienne (opera). I would prefer the first. -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 23:55, 5 September 2016 (UTC)

@Michael Bednarek: this capitalisation was supported by both respondents on the move request. In particular, SMcCandlish brought the following evidence:

The COMMONAME of the opera (in English sources) is difficult to determine, and it shows up as La vie parisienne, La Vie Parisienne, and La Vie parisienne. On this I would be inclined to trust opera/music-specific scholarly sources in English, per WP:OPERATITLE. Grove Music Online gives La Vie parisienne for the original and later adaptations (source link, subscription required: [1]).
WP:DIFFCAPS is not really satisfied with a difference this minor, so the titles should be disambiguated, as proposed.

I have no particular opinion on this, and could relist the discussion if necessary, but maybe you and SMcCandlish could also work this out here? Thanks  — Amakuru (talk) 14:50, 6 September 2016 (UTC)

Thank you for responding. I read those points, after the move, and didn't find them convincing. WP:OPERATITLE is very clear on this; in fact, it uses this very work, in lower case, as an example. SMcC himself admits that it "is difficult to determine" and found La vie parisienne in his research. Anyway, I've raised the matter at WT:WikiProject Opera#La vie parisienne (where the RM should have been mentioned when it was initiated) and we came to the conclusion to move the article to La vie parisienne (operetta) as soon as I've lined up the ducks of templates and incoming links; probably tomorrow. There's no relisting or admininistrative action required. Thanks again, Michael Bednarek (talk) 15:16, 6 September 2016 (UTC)

@Michael Bednarek: Respectfully, it is not for you or the WikiProject to make that determination - the move request process exists to handle cases like this, and ensure that they receive wide attention. The result of the discussino was to move to ths current title, La Vie parisienne (operetta). Ordinarily, relisting would be the best option here, but given that there was a second article involved (La Vie Parisienne (magazine)), while the dispute centres on this one only, I suggest your best option is to simply open a fresh new move request at WP:RM, and propose that this article be moved to La vie parisienne (operetta), as you wish. Then we may alert the opera wikiproject as well as the participants in the earlier discussion, and a full debate can be held. Note that SMcCandlish asserts that Grove Music uses the present title, so it is by no means a given that the all lower case title is the correct one. Thanks  — Amakuru (talk) 16:28, 6 September 2016 (UTC)

@Michael Bednarek, AjaxSmack, and Amakuru: In researching this, I find that's it's a much bigger conflict than an RM over one title (see RfC proposal below). The fact that we have an internal wikiproject advice-page essay at WP:OPERATITLE that provides an example doesn't make the example correct or make it a rule. That essay conflicts directly with MOS:FRANCE, a guideline (i.e., a rule). Contesting the move at WP:MR would fail, because the closer's action doesn't appear to have been faulty; what's alleged is that the rationales were. As a potential re-RM, it would probably be speedily closed as disruptive if it did not provide a very solid source-based and/or WP:P&G-based reason for the challenge, and a wikiproject advice page isn't one, thus the rationales in the original RM weren't actually faulty. I only assert strongly what the title of the magazine should be; (it's a modern-ish publication that can be consulted directly, and the RS agree, with near-uniformity, that it's La Vie Parisienne, whether we (or current French style) like that or not.

For the operatic work – the kind of thing we apply a consistent title to following some current system – I only looked at Grove Music Online (which says La Vie parisienne) in the original RM, and some search results which were inconclusive. Let's check other RS directly: New Hart's Rules (AKA Oxford Style Manual) has a chapter on this stuff, but I don't have access to my copy right now. According to Chicago Manual of Style (16th ed., 2010) and Writing About Music: A Style Sheet 3rd ed. (D. Kern Holoman, U. of Calif. Pr., 2014), the French rule is to "capitalize through the first substantive". On the other hand, the stylesheet for the Sacred Music Journal (Church Music Assn. of America, 2008) says "capitalize only the first word of the title or subtitle plus whatever words would be capitalized in a sentence, i.e. proper nouns in French and Italian, all nouns in German". "Style: A Brief Guide for Music Students" (School of Music, Trinity College Dublin, 2010). There are clearly two [at least!] warring styles here. The style sheet of the Notes journal (Music Library Assn., 2016), which favors sentence case, explicitly deprecates the Grove/Chicago/Holoman style (excessive emphasis in original): 'In French, do not use the alternative style in which the first substantive (noun or noun form) and any preceding article are both capitalized ("La Musique et l'amour"), as used in some journals, such as the French Review.' This Notes-deprecated style is the same Imprimerie nationale style preferred by MOS:FRANCE, fr.Wikipedia, and many other sources.

Given that there are conflicting systems, Wikipedia needs to pick one, or people will continue to fight about this stuff on an article-by-article basis. It is not a good situation for WP:OPERATITLE to indefinitely conflict with the site-wide MOS:FRANCE guideline, per WP:LOCALCONSENSUS policy (and it means the OPERATITLE argument will always lose if someone cites MOS:FRANCE). The sentence-case style appears to be more consonant with current scholarly publications, versus general style guides trying to tell them what to do, but also in conflict with some major publishers, so it is not a cut-and-dry matter. Sentence case would also be consistent with MOS:CAPS's general overriding principle that when in doubt, we use lower case. I would strongly suggest an RfC at WT:MOSFRANCE, advertised at WT:MOSCAPS, WT:MOS, WP:VPPOL, and directly at the higher-level literature, music, and fiction wikiprojects' talk pages, and that of WikiProject France, since it is possible that the "first substantive" rule is actually dominant and might be preferred site-wide. I doubt it, because it's unnecessarily complicated. I also don't see that MOS:FRANCE ever went through the WP:PROPOSAL process; it appears to be to simply be a WP:PROJPAGE that was labeled a guideline without objection back in the days that that was typical. That doesn't mean it's not a guideline (it's been accepted as one for years), but it does strongly suggest that insufficient discussion happened about some of the rules in it, and that changing one of them to agree better with the broader MOS:CAPS and with English-language journals' treatment of French titles isn't an insurmountable goal, especially if other wikiprojects like WP:OPERA want to see the change. The talk page at WT:MOSFRANCE indicates that these issues have come up before, too, though in less specific terms. I'm not presently willing to do this RfC myself, because I'm a bit tired of recent style disputes.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  18:02, 6 September 2016 (UTC)

"...The RM should have been mentioned [at WT:WikiProject Opera] when it was initiated." My bad as the nominator. If it matters, I'm fine with another RM discussion. —  AjaxSmack  01:22, 7 September 2016 (UTC)

There have been discussions about the spelling of French operas before at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Opera; see Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Opera/archive toc. It was always acknowledged that different styles exist, with "caps for 1st word + 1st noun" (Imprimerie nationale method) probably most used, but sentence case and "caps for every important word" can be found, too: La Fille du régiment, La fille du régiment, La Fille du Régiment. It was decided to use a system that is a) closely aligned to existing and immutable Wikipedia preferences; b) is supported by reputable sources like Grove, Oxford Dictionary of Opera, Viking Opera Guide (and Chicago 14th ed (1993) apparently too), and even the BnF. MOS:FRANCE also acknowledges these problems and permits other systems. To avoid these quandaries, WP:OPERATITLE has been formulated and followed for many years in many articles. As SMcC observed, the history of MOS:FRANCE doesn't elevate it from a project page to stone tablets; it's application is inconsistent (Le Rouge et le Noir). There is no absolute right way in this matter and these discussions are unnecessary. Threatening valuable content creators, who have been using WP:OPERATITLE for a long time because it works, with LOCALCONSENSUS is counterproductive (does "the community" really care how vie is capitalised?) and will drive them away. Note that the name of the article in question was La vie parisienne before the move request. The substance of the request was WP:DIFFCAPS and adding disambiguators was helpful. Changing case was fraught and unnecessary. I dispute that the proposed page move, Vie to vie, needs a new RM or even RfC; that was the article's original name and should not have been changed. -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 03:59, 7 September 2016 (UTC)

I also agree that it should be La vie parisienne. It looks terribly jarring to capitalize Vie but not Parisienne. I missed the whole discussion, but isn't the operetta clearly the primary article for this name? -- Ssilvers (talk) 15:12, 9 September 2016 (UTC)

It is, however, the way it is styled at French Wikipedia,[2] and in lots of sources. Apparently capitalising the first main word and not subsequent ones is one way of titling French titles. Like I said above, rather than relisting the whole discussion (which included the magazine, now uncontroversially housed at La Vie Parisienne (magazine)), it would probably be best to start a new WP:RM entry here, with no prejudice against either form, and let the issue be hashed out properly.  — Amakuru (talk) 15:22, 9 September 2016 (UTC)

The French Wikipedia, articles in the purview of WP:FRANCE, and usage in French publications and institutions are inconsistent in their application of capital letters. (Referring to the French Wikipedia here is particularly questionable – their name for the magazine is fr:La Vie parisienne (magazine)). The issue has been hashed out several times (linked above), and there is a working and accepted solution at WP:OPERATITLE. The RM at Talk:La Vie Parisienne (magazine) addressed the old situation where La Vie Parisienne was the name of the magazine and La vie parisienne was about the operetta, and, according to WP:DIFFCAPS, disambiguators were suggested for both. That was fine. Changing the case of vie in Offenbach's work was an overextension of the original move request and arguments to change the case were weak, and have been admitted to be weak by their proponents. The operetta ought to be moved back to a name consistent with WP:OPERATITLE, and that's not a controversial move because it restores the situation as it was before. -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 02:56, 10 September 2016 (UTC)

User:Michael Bednarek: As there has been no further discussion and no strong objection here to your proposed title, please consider moving the article per WP:BOLD or opening a new RM discussion. —  AjaxSmack  13:26, 22 September 2016 (UTC)

I object to the title, as it was not the one agreed in the recent RM, and the capitalization issue was expressly addressed there, with reasons why this capitalization is correct. A fresh RM is the best way forward, to thrash out the issue once and for all.  — Amakuru (talk) 13:34, 22 September 2016 (UTC)

​Sorry I misread your comments above. Would you prefer a single RM or a policy page discussion? —  AjaxSmack  13:59, 22 September 2016 (UTC)

User:Amakuru's recollection of the original RM and the discussion here is incorrect. In both places, evidence showed that the spelling La vie parisienne for the operetta satifies WP:COMMONNAME. The case for the magazine is different. It was also shown that this spelling of the operetta title is consistent with WP:FRANCE and is strongly supported and implemented by WP:OPERATITLE. The RM was about adding disambiguators, and the change of case for Offenbach's work should never have happened, nor should my move to the original spelling have been reverted. -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 02:24, 23 September 2016 (UTC)