Talk:Vatslaw Lastowski

The spelling of the name

I reverted the recent @Kyoto Grand's edit [1]. Despite the existence of prejudice against the Belarusian Latin alphabet on Wikipedia, the name "Vacłaŭ Łastoŭski" is established and results in many hits on books.google.com

Vacłaŭ himself was the author of many Belarusian books, which had been printed using the Latin script. And it's disrespectful towards him to distort his name. The title page scan from the picture also coincidentally shows the correct Belarusian spelling of the name of another Belarusian author Janka Kupała. --Ssvb (talk) 09:47, 22 September 2024 (UTC)

The argument "it's disrespectful towards him to distort his name" is misleading and not based on the Wikipedia policies. Ymblanter (talk) 10:51, 22 September 2024 (UTC)

@Ymblanter: My understanding of the Wikipedia policy is that the "commonly accepted form" should be used before considering any other options. It doesn't look good when Wikipedians are inventing new spelling of their own to override it, based on their misinterpretation of the policy. --Ssvb (talk) 11:18, 22 September 2024 (UTC)

It should be commonly accepted form in English sources, not just in any sources which use Latn alphabeth. I can not imagine this conforms to WP:COMMONNAME, at best there is no English common name. Ymblanter (talk) 11:33, 22 September 2024 (UTC)

@Ymblanter: It's possible to restrict books.google.com to search it only in English books:

• "Vacłaŭ Łastoŭski" currently yields 92 results in all books and 72 results in English-only books.
• "Vatslaw Lastowski" yields 6 hits in all books and 5 hits in English-only books.

FWIW, many old Belarusian Łacinka books are even not indexed by Google Books at all and don't affect the results. I personally see Wikipedia's promotion of the "Vatslaw Lastowski" spelling variant as a form of violation of WP:NPOV.

I also see that @Spadar Sozhau attempted [2] to add references to some random publications from 1984, maybe as a way to show that the "Vacłaŭ Łastoŭski" spelling is attestable? --Ssvb (talk) 12:15, 22 September 2024 (UTC)

I actually looked at your edit now and had to revert it. The lede must use the same spelling as the title. If you disagree with the spelling you must open requested move. Ymblanter (talk) 12:20, 22 September 2024 (UTC)

@Ymblanter: The WP:RM policy says "If you have no reason to expect a dispute concerning a move, be bold and move the page". Just to be clear, do you intend to dispute the move? If yes, then you surely could have provided your arguments here before jumping the gun, rushing with your edit and accusing me of "clear disruption" in the comment of your edit. --Ssvb (talk) 12:42, 22 September 2024 (UTC)

I will just revert the move. The fact that we are having this discussion now shows such a move can not be uncontroversial. To be honest, I do not reasonably foresee a move from English alphabet to a non-English alphabet happening, but you can try of course. Ymblanter (talk) 13:17, 22 September 2024 (UTC)

@Ymblanter: The use of the "non-English alphabet" is permitted by the existing policy: Wikipedia:Naming_conventions_(Cyrillic)#Conventional names ("Diacritics may be used in the romanization of Cyrillic languages") --Ssvb (talk) 22:36, 22 September 2024 (UTC)

@Ssvb Łacinka a) has little visual concord with the standard romanizations of other East Slavic languages, b) is difficult for English speakers to understand at first glance, which is incidentally the opposite of what a good transliteration should be and c) was quite literally designed as part of a Polonization campaign against the Belarussian language. You can see this well in the screenshot where his name is spelled W. Łastoŭski.

Vatslaw Lastowski is such a minor figure I honestly doubt common-name applies in English for him. I have my quibbles with the BGN/PCGN system (mostly Г being romanized as H) but it's the best we have and it should be upheld. Kyoto Grand (talk) 18:23, 22 September 2024 (UTC)

@Kyoto Grand: a) is irrelevant b) isn't any different from Polish or Czech and c) is nonsense.

W and V is just the same letter in the Belarusian alphabet. Everyone switched to using V in late 1930s and onward. That's similar to how Long s had been replaced by round S in modern English. Take a look at another page scan from a different book, published in 1939. You can find "Vacłaŭ Łastoŭski" in the fourth line of the last paragraph.

As for the "minor figure" statement, Vacłaŭ Łastoŭski is notable enough to have a Wikipedia article. His name is recognized by those, who are interested in the Belarusian literature and "Vacłaŭ Łastoŭski" spelling is the most common in English publications as of today (based on the results of a books.google.com search). The choice of the name "Vacłaŭ Łastoŭski" agrees with WP:COMMONNAME and WP:UE. Or do you have a different criteria? --Ssvb (talk) 23:10, 22 September 2024 (UTC)

@Ssvb Many, many minor historical figures have Wikipedia articles. "Minor figure" doesn't mean "not notable." As for the relative commonality of the spelling, WP:COMMONNAME says, emphasis mine:

If there are too few reliable English-language sources to constitute an established usage, follow the conventions of the language appropriate...

The conventions of the Belarussian language are, of course, to use the Cyrillic alphabet universally. Per WP:UE, names must be romanized. And per a little thing called WP:BELARUSIANNAMES, Łacinka is "not to be used."

I see you're a mostly single topic editor with regards to Belarussian romanization - perhaps you could funnel your energy into something a little more productive, such as expanding our Belarussian Latin alphabet page with a translation from the much longer Tarashkyevitsa-standard Belarussian wiki page on the matter? Kyoto Grand (talk) 01:19, 23 September 2024 (UTC)

@Kyoto Grand: My question is: how few is too few? Are 72 hits on books.google.com too few when searching for English books? --Ssvb (talk) 01:43, 23 September 2024 (UTC)

@Ssvb Yes. All the "hits" are false positives, bibliography citations, or research papers/low circulation Slavistics texts (to the point of mostly having placeholder covers on Google Books) that use Łacinka for Belarussian names systematically (one, for example, is an encyclopedia that also systematically spells "Kharkov" as Khar'kov.

Besides, neither national transliteration nor Łacinka enjoy much currency at all within English language media written by native English speakers. Svyatlana Tsikhanowskaya is on this very site usually dubbed Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya - please note the use of ts and y, not c and j. This argument isn't productive. I bid you enjoy the rest of your day. Regards, Kyoto Grand (talk) 02:35, 23 September 2024 (UTC)

@Kyoto Grand: In what way are bibliography citations false positives? They mention the name of a person. And how can you be sure that there are no native English speakers among them? The English books and periodicals exist. And there are web pages, such as https://coseelis.wordpress.com/2023/10/31/vaclau-lastouski-conference-at-the-francis-skaryna-belarusian-library-in-london/ and the others. There's no need pretending that nobody has any idea how to spell Vacłaŭ Łastoŭski's name in English texts and Wikipedia shouldn't foster its own ad-hoc spelling to shove it down the others' throats. Just document what's already in use, based on what's more common today. If the most common spelling changes tomorrow, then rename the article tomorrow. It's as simple as that.

Also if you don't like the name of the Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya's article, then you can start or join a discussion there. Feel free to ping me if you are interested in my opinion. --Ssvb (talk) 03:16, 23 September 2024 (UTC)

@Ssvb I frankly don't really have an issue with that article title, thank you. It's how she spells her name when writing in English, apparently.

I didn't say bibliography citations were false positives. When a list says x, y, or z that means x or y or z. There are very few English search results for Lastowski with either spelling because the man is simply not discussed often at all in English speaking circles, but I'm seeing more hits for the standard transliteration. Here's an English article that namedrops him by what appears to be a Belarussian cultural institute in Lithuania. [3] Again, I think this is all really already addressed by established Wikipedia policy on the matter. If you don't like it, you're welcome to start a discussion on the matter over at the talk page for WP:BELARUSIANNAMES. Kyoto Grand (talk) 03:41, 23 September 2024 (UTC)

@Kyoto Grand: "I'm seeing more hits for the standard transliteration" - what can I do to verify this claim? --Ssvb (talk) 03:48, 23 September 2024 (UTC)