Talk:List of flags of Gibraltar

Article title

The following discussion is an archived discussion of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the proposal was move the page from List of Gibraltan flags to List of flags of Gibraltar, per the discussion below. Dekimasuよ! 08:40, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

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The word 'Gibraltan' is wrong. --Gibnews (talk) 11:45, 18 March 2008 (UTC)

I don't think it is. Look at Gibraltarian people. Please don't copy and paste moves anyway, as you've messed up the page history now. --DWR^talk 01:49, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

Perhaps you two could compromise and put the article at List of Gibraltarian Flags? That seems to be the adjective that's actually in use. Orange Tuesday (talk) 13:13, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

As Gibnews pointed out the word 'Gibraltan' is not correct. Although it can be commonly used, it actually doesn't exist. The term Gibraltarian, refers particularly to the people of Gibraltar. As strange as it may seem, Gibraltar is in fact the correct adjective. --Gibmetal 77^talk 16:09, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

Hmm. I wasn't aware of that. How about List of flags of Gibraltar, then? It's just as correct as "List of Gibraltar flags", but it wouldn't sound wrong to people who don't know that "Gibraltar" is an adjective. Plus, that style of page name has precedent on Wikipedia (List of flags of Montenegro, List of flags of Romania, List of flags of Belarus, for example.) Orange Tuesday (talk) 20:06, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

I guess that would be a compromise, but the correct title would be List of Gibraltar flags. Just because the Union flag is most commonly known as the Union Jack doesn't make it right... --Gibmetal 77^talk 23:49, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

Where is the proof that the word "Gibraltan" doesn't exist by the way? Are you just making that statement up? If it is commonly used isn't it more likely that it does in fact exist? "List of Gibraltar Flags" sounds weird to people who don't know what the "correct title" is and sounds as strange as List of Japan Flags, List of Germany flags or List of United Kingdom flags. --DWR^talk 12:18, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

To a Gibraltarian the title of this page sounds as stupid as 'List of Pommie flags'. Gibraltar is a word which can be a noun and an adjective. The Gibraltar telephone directory (2007) has three pages of double columns of entities starting at The Gibraltar Amateur Drama Association and ending with The Gibraltar Yacht registry there are NO entries for anything prefixed with Gibraltarian and the word Gibraltan is simply not in use in the territory, its considered gross. --Gibnews (talk)

Just because it may sound strange to some, doesn't mean we should give it a different name. List of Japan flags would most certainly not be correct, but List of Gibraltar flags is. --Gibmetal 77^talk 16:11, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

Name Change

For the reasons given above, the name needs to be reverted to the original title. --Gibnews (talk) 14:52, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

Here's the way I see it.

• The word Gibraltan exists, and most laymen would probably be able to understand it as the adjective form of Gibraltar, but it's certainly not common. The word returns a scant few thousand hits on google, and is barely used on Wikipedia at all. Furthermore, it doesn't seem to be used officially. It doesn't show up anywhere on the Gibraltar government website, for example.
• The word Gibraltarian sounds like an adjective for Gibraltar, and even gets used like it occasionally on Wikipedia (e.g. Gibraltarian cuisine) and in certain dictionaries, [1]. But the consensus among Gibraltarians appears to be that it's just a noun used to refer to the people of Gibraltar.
• The word Gibraltar appears to be the official adjective form. The CIA World Factbook lists it as the adjective of the territory, but I'm not sure how common a usage it is outside of Gibraltar. Dictionary.com, for instance, doesn't seem to recognize that "Gibraltar" can be an adjective. [2] Plus, as this whole debate has shown, it leads to confusion. The word sounds weird to people who don't know that it's an adjective, even though it's correct.

Therefore, I have to say that the easiest solution, one that would please everyone, would be to move the page to List of Flags of Gibraltar and have all the other versions redirect there. Not only is it exactly as correct as "List of Gibraltar flags", and more correct than "List of Gibraltarian flags" or "List of Gibraltan flags", but it offers no room for confusion at all. And it wouldn't even be special treatment or compromise for this page. Almost all of the Gibraltar-related pages on Wikipedia are at "X of Gibraltar" instead of "Gibraltar X", and there are many pages like this one that are at "List of flags of X" instead of "List of X flags". No one loses this way. Orange Tuesday (talk) 18:08, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

I agree. I've looked through lots of Gibraltar-related articles on Wikipedia and they all seem to follow that pattern (i.e. Politics of Gibraltar, Military of Gibraltar, Culture of Gibraltar, Demographics of Gibraltar, History of Gibraltar). It makes more sense to most English-speaking people (a lot of whom don't live in Gibraltar and therefore probably don't know what the correct terminology is). --DWR^talk 18:35, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

Fair enough, List of flags of Gibraltar would be "acceptable", whereas Gibraltarian or Gibraltan are definitely not. However, by using "Gibraltar" as the adjective on some pages on wikipedia, we would in a way minimise this confusion by giving this correct term more usage... --Gibmetal 77^talk 19:06, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

We would indeed, but we probably shouldn't, as such promotion is contrary to Wikipedia policy. That's not to comment on whether the proposed move is a good idea, it's just to say that this particular reason has a problem. Andrewa (talk) 04:06, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

Unlike French or Spanish there is no academy who determine the use of the English language, and online user contributed dictionararies are as reliable as their contributors. If you search the following authorative websites

• http://www.gibraltar.gov.gi
• http://www.gibraltar.gov.uk
• http://www.chronicle.gi

You can see the context in which the words are used:

• Gibraltar as a noun and adjective
• Gibraltarian describing the people
• Gibraltan conspicuous by its abscence

A word, as Humpty Dumpty said - 'it means just what I choose it to mean, neither more nor less.' Wikipedia should use words in the way they are accepted in the context that is the subject of the article and not try and enforce a missconceived artificial usage which is not accepted in the territory in question. --Gibnews (talk) 14:02, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

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