Wikipedia talk:WikiProject China/Archive 26

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A question on romanization

Hi all, can someone help me figure out what Che-a-tow Bay (apparently on the east coast of the Shandong Peninsula) is in Pinyin (and whether we have an article on the area)? Thanks. Parsecboy (talk) 13:57, 11 December 2014 (UTC)

Further to Parsecboy's post above, there is mention of the bay on page 230 of this book here [[1]]--Ykraps (talk) 08:37, 12 December 2014 (UTC)

I expect this is Jiaozhou Bay. Pe-tche-lee (mentioned in Ykraps' link) is the Bohai Sea. —Kusma (t·c) 10:41, 12 December 2014 (UTC)

Yeah, I wasn't sure if it was Jiaozhou or not - I'd only ever seen it romanized as Kiaotschou (and variants thereof) - we did get the Bohai Sea though. Thanks. Parsecboy (talk) 13:13, 12 December 2014 (UTC)

Just checked the coordinates given in the book Ykraps linked above - they're right at Jiaozhou Bay. Parsecboy (talk) 13:19, 12 December 2014 (UTC)

Proposal for flags

As we know official flags weren't really big until the Qing dynasty's dragon flag was adopted. However, it is known that dynasty flags were usually carried around with certain characters on them. I was wondering if it would be beneficial to recreate these flags? Eric - Contact me please. I prefer conversations started on my talk page if the subject is changed 01:45, 15 December 2014 (UTC)

We need to be careful, many 19th century French and German books used to invent fictional flags and coat of arms to represent China and other Asian countries, which in earlier times, didn't use emblems and flags in the same manner that western countries did. For an example, see File:Arms of the Qing Dynasty (fictitious).svg and File:Brockhaus and Efron Encyclopedic Dictionary b15 462-3.jpg. If we are to recreate Chinese "flags" as depicted in old sources, we need to be certain that they were realistically used first. --benlisquare_T•C•E 03:19, 15 December 2014 (UTC)

I mean as if we were to put the popular used ones? Like the blue Mongol Yuan flag with the white design that is used throughout today's popular culture? And if we note that it is a proposed flag/popular representation directly below it? Eric - Contact me please. I prefer conversations started on my talk page if the subject is changed

I second benlisquare's caution -- there is no point in anachronistic flags, ones which the people at the time would not have recognized. It would be like putting a modern Italian flag for the Roman Empire! ch (talk) 00:12, 16 December 2014 (UTC)

I don't see your point. The Italian flag is not recognized as associated with the Roman Empire. As long as its a widely used flag used as representation of a possible flag I see no problem in it. Eric - Contact me please. I prefer conversations started on my talk page if the subject is changed

Sorry, I should not have brought up a distracting point. I agree with you that having a flag would be neat, but I'm afraid that saying "as long as it's a widely used flag" opens the door to sources which are not WP:Reliable Sources. "Widely used" where? And "possible flag" is different from "historically attested" flag. Or, to go back to the original question, it would not be "beneficial to recreate these flags" because this would be clear Original Research.ch (talk) 03:18, 17 December 2014 (UTC)

Talk:Joshua Wong (activist)

There is an ongoing move discussion; join in to improve consensus. --George Ho (talk) 08:39, 20 December 2014 (UTC)

The discussion is now closed.  Philg88 ^♦talk 09:13, 20 December 2014 (UTC)

Move discussions on Hong Kong people

I invite you to ongoing discussions at Talk:Gary Fan Kwok-wai, Talk:Lau Kong-wah, Talk:Christopher Chung, Talk:Connie Mak Kit-man, Talk:Jasper Tsang Yok-sing, and Talk:Wong Sing-chi. --George Ho (talk) 23:21, 22 December 2014 (UTC)

These are irrelevant to WPCHINA. 58.153.97.184 (talk) 16:32, 23 December 2014 (UTC)

No, you've been mistaken about the scope of WPCHINA already. These are in scope, as Hong Kong is part of PRC and China, but they are less relevant than other discussions, as they pertain to peculiarities of Hong Kong English, and WPHK existing. However Chinese Language Entertainment is a workgroup directly under WPCHINA, so is directly related to the entertainers. -- 67.70.35.44 (talk) 21:57, 23 December 2014 (UTC)

That entertainment one should be (and should have been) a standalone WikiProject, or place jointly under the WPs of Taiwan, HK, S'pore and M'sia. 58.153.97.184 (talk) 02:33, 24 December 2014 (UTC)

It was, but became closed due to inactivity, and became a WPCHINA taskforce instead. --benlisquare_T•C•E 03:45, 24 December 2014 (UTC)

Meanwhile Gary Fan, Jasper Tsang, Lau Kong Wah, etc., aren't entertainers. They're politicians. 58.153.97.184 (talk) 02:33, 24 December 2014 (UTC)

Taiwan, Hong Kong, Malaysia, Singapore articles

Please stop applying the {{WPCHINA}} tag to articles that are related to Taiwan, HK, M'sia, S'pore, unless such articles are also immediately relevant to China. Modify the auto-bots. 58.153.97.184 (talk) 04:07, 20 December 2014 (UTC)

You are mistaken. WPCHINA applies to the Chinese diaspora, so if the Singapore article is about ethnic Chinese, then WPCHINA also applies. Further, Hong Kong and Macau are part of China, de jure, legally, under international agreement, etc. So, while not necessary to add a WPCHINA, there's also no bar preventing it from applying to WPHK or WPMACAU articles. And WPCHINA covers the Chinese civilization, not just the People's Republic, so Taiwan is covered. One China is something that the Taiwanese government subscribes to. And the government in Taipei dejure claims dominion over all of mainland China. -- 67.70.35.44 (talk) 05:44, 20 December 2014 (UTC)

You're right in some aspects, though not entirely. But the point was that we don't need to double tag so many articles with {{WPCHINA}} and another tag, say, the one for HK or Taiwan. I've come across many talk pages that are double-tagged, unnecessarily (or even tagged only with {{WPCHINA}}). In most of these cases only the HK or Taiwan tag alone is enough. 58.153.97.184 (talk) 04:40, 22 December 2014 (UTC)

PRC task force

This brings up an issue, I think that WPCHINA should add a PRC task force switch to the project banner, to indicate when a topic is a PRC topic, and leave it off when it isn't one, to indicate to people that WPCHINA covers more than just the PRC. -- 67.70.35.44 (talk) 05:44, 20 December 2014 (UTC)

Simply spin it off. 58.153.97.184 (talk) 04:40, 22 December 2014 (UTC)

We'd need to find more supporters than an pair of IP editors to create a new PRC task force -- 67.70.35.44 (talk) 21:59, 23 December 2014 (UTC)

As a matter of fact China = PRC proper. 58.153.97.184 (talk) 02:35, 24 December 2014 (UTC)

That statement is wrong is so many ways. PRC < China, and has always been so. I even showed you why already with One China. China prior to the rise of the PRC is not PRC, etc. since it is prior to PRC. We even have a taskforce for Chinese History to address some of that. -- 67.70.35.44 (talk) 05:43, 24 December 2014 (UTC)

Should Chinese Canadians in Greater Vancouver be split from Chinese Canadians in British Columbia?

Should there be a Vancouver-centric split of Chinese Canadians in British Columbia?

See Talk:Chinese_Canadians_in_British_Columbia#Enough_sources_to_prove_standalone_notability_of_Vancouver_Chinese_and_do_an_article_split.3F WhisperToMe (talk) 05:22, 25 December 2014 (UTC)

Shanghai New Year's stampede

Our article on the 2014 Shanghai stampede is ready to be added to In The News as soon as it's expanded. I don't have time at the moment to do it myself, but there are lots of references in English, and I'm sure in Chinese as well, along with the Chinese Wikipedia article.

Thanks in advance for any help! Λυδαcιτγ 09:41, 2 January 2015 (UTC)

@Audacity: I've slightly expanded the article to include some details on the rescue efforts and response. Zhaofeng Li [talk... contribs...] 14:41, 2 January 2015 (UTC)

@Zhaofeng Li: Thanks for your help. It's on the front page now, and I'm glad that viewers from the rest of the world will be able to learn about this important, though tragic, event. Λυδαcιτγ 03:34, 4 January 2015 (UTC)

Looking for Chinese language sources

I am wondering any editor able to search for and read Chinese language news sources can comment, on either side of the issue, at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/2010 Hebei tractor rampage. Thank you. Cullen³²⁸ Let's discuss it 01:42, 29 December 2014 (UTC)

 Done by multiple editors.  Philg88 ^♦talk 04:30, 4 January 2015 (UTC)

Szechwuan cuisine move to Sichuan cuisine

There is a proposal to move the article Szechwan cuisine to "Sichuan cuisine" on the grounds that pinyin is the standard for article titles. Moves to "Sichuan cuisine" have been defeated several times in the past.

You may wish to join the discussion at the Szechwan cuisine Talk Page ch (talk) 22:16, 4 January 2015 (UTC)

Gongchen Tower

We really need some content there. Please, please, give a look and see what you can add. Many thanks. :) Anna Frodesiak (talk) 08:57, 9 January 2015 (UTC)

Wikipedia talk:Articles for creation/Tang Performance Arts in Dunhuang

Hello China experts. This old AfC draft will shortly be deleted as too essay-like. It contains some interesting information, though; could it to be made into a shorter article with just facts about the performance art and none of the explanations and speculation? —Anne Delong (talk) 14:01, 13 January 2015 (UTC)

WikiProject X is live!

Hello everyone!

You may have received a message from me earlier asking you to comment on my WikiProject X proposal. The good news is that WikiProject X is now live! In our first phase, we are focusing on research. At this time, we are looking for people to share their experiences with WikiProjects: good, bad, or neutral. We are also looking for WikiProjects that may be interested in trying out new tools and layouts that will make participating easier and projects easier to maintain. If you or your WikiProject are interested, check us out! Note that this is an opt-in program; no WikiProject will be required to change anything against its wishes. Please let me know if you have any questions. Thank you!

Note: To receive additional notifications about WikiProject X on this talk page, please add this page to Wikipedia:WikiProject X/Newsletter. Otherwise, this will be the last notification sent about WikiProject X.

Harej (talk) 16:57, 14 January 2015 (UTC)

Draft:China Development Brief

Dear China experts: This old AfC submission will soon be deleted as a stale draft. Is this a notable topic that's worth keeping and improving? —Anne Delong (talk) 02:10, 18 January 2015 (UTC)

Selected Stories of Lu Hsun

The article suffers from two major issues: the summaries and short interpretations, while generally a nice idea, seem pretty whimsical. And it is not really convincing that this particular translated edition of Lu Xun's work (as opposed to the collections that he edited himself) should deserve its own wp entry.

Would be great if someone with better access to secondary sources about Lu Xun and his work could have a closer look at the article.

Regards,

Yaan (talk) 22:46, 24 December 2014 (UTC)

It seems superfluous to me, but I am not sure if the article violates any specific WP guidelines.Ferox Seneca (talk) 12:59, 19 January 2015 (UTC)

What are the Chinese characters in these names?

As part of my expansion campaign of Chinese Canadians in British Columbia I am adding information about Chinese organizations mentioned in this paper by W. E. Willmott. No Chinese characters are printed, but Willmott shows the Mandarin and Cantonese. Pinyin is used for Mandarin. On p. 31 Willmott explained that the Cantonese romanization used is that of The student's Cantonese-English dictionary (1947) by Meyer and Wempe, 3rd edition, published by Field Afar Press.

Here are the terms:

• Rising China Holding Company (Hua-xing Shi-ye Gong-si, Wa-Hing Shat-ip Kung-Sz) -- Could this be 華興實業公司/华兴实业公司?? (mentioned on p. 33 of Willmott)
• Zhi-de Tang (Chi Tak T'ong) - A clan association (mentioned on p. 31 of Willmott)
• Yu-shan Hui-guan (Ue-Shaan Ooi-koon) -- An association of Chinese from Guangzhou (mentioned on p. 31 of Willmott)
• Jie-fang (kaai-fong) -- ad hoc Chinese associations (mentioned on p. 34 of Willmott)

Thanks! WhisperToMe (talk) 05:35, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

• • The third one might be 禺山會館. Yushan 禺山 being the hill that forms part of Guangzhou's ancient name Panyu 番禺.
  • The last one is kaifong 街坊. _dk (talk) 05:58, 28 January 2015 (UTC)
    • Thank you! WhisperToMe (talk) 06:22, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

Should Pinyin format names be excluded from overseas Chinese articles about people of Cantonese origin?

In Talk:Jenny Kwan I noticed a local decision to exclude Pinyin on the basis that it's not reflecting her actual Cantonese background. I believe that all ethnic Chinese biographical articles are supposed to have Pinyin regardless of where the origins are (even if they are Hong Kong). Am I correct on this? @Darryl Kerrigan: WhisperToMe (talk) 02:57, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

As mentioned in the discussion I'm perfectly fine with using the Chinese template to hold the information on the Traditional, Simplified, Pinyin, and Jyutping parameters. WhisperToMe (talk) 16:49, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

Wenchang, Hainan

So, it is said that there are 4 counties in Hainan. Wenchang used to be one, but is now a city. I don't understand. How can a county become a city? Please help.

• Wenchang City
• Wenchang County (just created by me)

Anna Frodesiak (talk) 02:17, 18 January 2015 (UTC)

Hi, you might want to be careful. In China, a "city" could mean a "city proper", i.e., a concentrated built up urban area. But in administrative terms, it means a broader administrative region. Perhaps administrative divisions of China would clear this up for you. In the case of Wenchang, it was a county for some 2,000 years before the Chinese government decided that it has sufficiently urbanized to convert its administrative status to a 'city'. The new 'city' and the former county are one in the same. Other cities that were 'converted' from county to city include Kunshan, Jiangyin, and Qidong, Jiangsu, though there are really hundreds of examples. It is therefore probably not necessary to have two separate articles. Also, I just wanted to make sure that you are not conflating Wenchang County with Tunchang County. Colipon+(Talk) 04:29, 18 January 2015 (UTC)

Wenchang city

Wow. Just so I'm clear, Wenchang is an article about a place. This place has a city in it and many other towns. The lead says "...is a county-level city ..." This Wenchang article refers to an area that is 50 km long and 40 km wide. Is this right? Anna Frodesiak (talk) 04:49, 18 January 2015 (UTC)

Legally speaking, Wenchang City = Wenchang County, which covers 2,400 km2 and governs many towns. And the urban center of Wenchang, which a casual visitor may regard as the city itself, is officially Wencheng Town (文城镇) (the second syllable, while only slightly different in spelling, is a different character). This edit of yours is incorrect. In China, counties never govern cities, only the other way around. Your new article Wenchang County should really be merged into Wenchang, as the county was upgraded to a city in 1995. And if you want to start an article about the urban center of Wenchang, it should be called Wencheng, Hainan (Wencheng by itself if a dab page). -Zanhe (talk) 07:01, 18 January 2015 (UTC)

Colipon and Zanhe pretty much nailed it above. Although there is a city at its heart, in Chinese administrative parlance Wenchang is a county—in the same way that Haikou is a provincial level city but nevertheless includes a fair bit of territory beyond the urban area and its suburbs. There is no separate "Wenchang County". FWIW, I think it would be confusing if we were to have a separate article for the urban centre.  Philg88 ^♦talk 18:52, 18 January 2015 (UTC)

Unfortunately, the extremely complex nature of Chinese administrative hierarchies forces Wikipedia into writing about the city proper and the city's broader administrative region in the same article. In cases where this is not so clear cut, it makes for very confusing article structures. For instance, Jinhua is a prefecture-level city in Zhejiang province with jurisdiction over Yiwu, but the latter is a much better known urban centre. So should the article for "Jinhua" write about Yiwu at all? Similarly, a number of changes to Inner Mongolian "leagues" to "prefecture level cities" have made things very confusing; Hulunbuir is a vast and sparsely populated region (bigger than Britain) with an administrative centre at Hailar, which is the city proper. Hailar used to be a county-level city but now it is a "district". The normal practice is to write about the urban city proper in the article about the prefecture, but in this case, the article about the city proper continues to reside at "Hailar District". I'm not sure what the solution to this might be as the administrative hierarchies do not always align nicely with reality. Colipon+(Talk) 19:01, 18 January 2015 (UTC)

Even more confusing is the recent "upgrading" of the Shigatse county-level city to a prefectural-level city. The old Shigatse prefecture all of a sudden becomes a "city", which covers 182,000 km2, and the old Shigatse county-level city is renamed Samzhubzê District, which covers 3,000 km2. The "real" city proper of Shigatse, however, is divided into the Chengbei and Chengnan subdistricts of Samzhubzê District.

Sorry for the long post:

First, my apologies to Zanhe for reverting him (a couple of times). I just couldn't understand how it could all be true. I'd like to plead temporary insanity. :) I'd also like to thank everyone here who has cleared this up. I've also read Administrative divisions of China#Ambiguity of the word "city" in China and get it.

Now, forward:

1. I will move the content from Wenchang County to Wenchang and all are free to do as they like with it.

2. I will do a bit of cleanup at other articles because I've changed a few links.

3. Commons could use a bit of arranging. I made a few cats that are probably okay. I guess all that needs to be done is changing the parent cat back to Wenchang from the present Wenchang County and speedy tag the latter. It that right?

4. The Wenchang article, in my view, really, really needs some clarification in the lead. The link to County-level city just won't catch the eye of enough visitors. Throwing in Administrative divisions of China#Ambiguity of the word "city" in China somewhere also doesn't seem right. I live here, and it confused the heck out of me. Imagine someone unfamiliar with China? The lead ought to have content that immediately makes clear what Wenchang is. Chunks of what you've written above works. Stating the geographical size in the lead works. Stating the fact that it encompasses lots of towns and forests works.

5. The pushpin map makes visitors think Wenchang is a city. That should be addressed. Maybe a caption that says "city proper" and shove that image down to a City proper section. The green and red map at in this thread could help clear things up and be used as the lead image. A big, fat caption would help.

6. Wenchang should really have sections on the "city proper", towns, geography, etc., right? That would help visitors.

7. County-level cities for Hainan are Wenchang, Qionghai, Wanning, Wuzhishan City, Danzhou, and Dongfang, Hainan and all need similar treatment, I think.

8. Shouldn't Wuzhishan City be moved to Wuzhishan, Hainan (now a redirect)?

@Anna Frodesiak:  Done per WP:NC-ZH.  Philg88 ^♦talk 07:20, 19 January 2015 (UTC)

9. Visitors at Hulunbuir will think it's a city because that's what the lead says. You say there are hundreds like this? Well, I think they all need at least a phrase in the lead that says something like "...actually comprises X large cities, X towns, X sq. km of land...".

Just because admin divisions are absurdly complicated, it doesn't mean articles should be. Our job is to make things clear for visitors.

Feedback? Anna Frodesiak (talk) 01:04, 19 January 2015 (UTC)

No need to apologize, Anna, I know your edits were made in good faith. Your suggestions are good, but the problem is manpower. There are about 2,000 county-level divisions in China, and most articles are one-liners that basically say the place exists. Unfortunately not many people seem to be interested in writing content about them. I would like to, but my current focus is on history, which is even more poorly represented than administrative divisions, IMO. As for Wuzhishan City, I think the current name is fine. Wuzhishan, Hainan is ambiguous, as it may refer to the Wuzhi Mountain, which is also in Hainan. -Zanhe (talk) 06:18, 19 January 2015 (UTC)

Thanks, Zanhe, for your understanding and patience with me. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 11:26, 19 January 2015 (UTC)

Update

I've done a bit to help make things clear at Wenchang. Please help copy edit it. I will wait a while, and then try to use the latest version of the lead to add to the other county-turned-city articles in Hainan.

As for the zillions of other articles in this situation, well, we can at least assess and fix some of the big articles by adding in a clarifying lead sentence or two.

There are more of these green and red maps here if anyone wants to work on the other 5 Hainan articles.

Oh yes, should the Wenchang article's city proper section get a mini-infobox with pushpin map image or cityscape image inside? Anna Frodesiak (talk) 11:26, 19 January 2015 (UTC)

One more thing. Should the commons category get a child cat called Wenchang City or some other name? Anna Frodesiak (talk) 13:50, 19 January 2015 (UTC)

I'm just going to go ahead and do a bunch of these things....boldly. :) Anna Frodesiak (talk) 23:31, 19 January 2015 (UTC)

• Commons  Done
• All 6 Hainan "city" articles lead clarification and main image replacement  Done.
• "City proper" section in all 6 articles  Not done (Wenchang only done.)

Anna Frodesiak (talk) 00:35, 20 January 2015 (UTC)

Anna, I think the child cat should be called Wencheng Town or Wencheng, Hainan, which is the official name of the urban center of Wenchang (note the slight difference in spelling). In all official documents and many other contexts, Wenchang = Wenchang City, and creating a subcategory called Wenchang City would be confusing. -Zanhe (talk) 01:13, 20 January 2015 (UTC)

I do prefer "Wencheng Town". If the Wikipedia article ever breaks away to be a city article, then the confusion will be back. Now I know why students here hate geography and why govt officials are always mired in ambiguity and confusion. So, one day we may have article Wenchang about the geo area, but identified as a city yet not a city, and another article Wenchang, Hainan, about a city, but not the geo area. Insane. And all of this seemingly because of the thoughtless translation of "shi". Anna Frodesiak (talk) 01:21, 20 January 2015 (UTC)

Now Town. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 01:26, 20 January 2015 (UTC)

I appreciate the work everyone is doing, but I still find the following description a bit problematic:

"Dānzhōu (Chinese: 儋州) is a city in the northwest of the Chinese island province of Hainan. It is a county-level city administered directly by the province. Although called a "city", Danzhou refers to a large land area in Hainan - an area which was once a county. Within this area is the main city, Danzhou City."

The problem is, when people refer to "Danzhou", they still most likely mean the city proper. Therefore, going by WP:COMMONNAME, the subject of the article should be mostly dealing with the city proper of Danzhou. That said, it can include information about the administrative regions under its jurisdiction. For example, the article at Suzhou will have only passing mention of Kunshan, Jiangyin, etc, which are technically cities under its jurisdiction but are not normally associated as such; the article is, therefore, by and large, still focused on the Suzhou City proper. Perhaps a better way to phrase this is, "Danzhou is a city in the northwest of the island Chinese province of Hainan. The county-level city has jurisdiction over the large land area that was formerly known as Danzhou County. Its urban centre is located at XYZ town." Colipon+(Talk) 02:54, 20 January 2015 (UTC)

That's pretty good. So, are you saying that instead of an article about the area with a section called "Danzhou Town", it could be an article about Danzhou, the town, with section called "surrounding area" or something? Anna Frodesiak (talk) 03:31, 20 January 2015 (UTC)

One benefit is that if the "town" content gets big, we don't have the naming problem when splitting it off to a standalone. It will always remain the main article.

One concern is that what if the "town" content never grows, but the surrounding area content does. Then it gets top-heavy with content that isn't really about the subject. What then? Anna Frodesiak (talk) 03:36, 20 January 2015 (UTC)

• I disagree that we should apply WP:COMMONNAME here. When the Chinese government or media mention X shi (city), they most often refer to the entire area, not just the city proper. The city proper would be called X shiqu. And if someone says he or she is from X city, they could be from any place within its jurisdiction, not necessarily the city center. The case of Danzhou is even more complicated. Its urban center is the inland, wonderfully named Nada Town 那大镇, but was formerly at the coastal Xinzhou Town. But neither town is the most famous place in Danzhou, which would be the Yangpu Economic Development Zone, which is geographically inside Danzhou but administered directly by Hainan province. I think the safest solution is to stick with government definitions, while mentioning the common usage (although it might be difficult to find sources to support non-official usages). -Zanhe (talk) 04:06, 20 January 2015 (UTC)

That's pretty good too. Even better, I think. The article is about the area. We are forced to say "city", but clarify in the lead. A nice infobox image to show visitors the subject is an area. The body contains sections of the built-up areas and their significance. So, how do we name built up area articles if they break away? Anna Frodesiak (talk) 04:30, 20 January 2015 (UTC)

Ideally, the main article should be about the city/county as an organic whole, with summary info about its individual components, and each town/township/subdistrict having its own, more detailed article. It would be analogous to the situation with New York City and its five boroughs, Wencheng Town being the equivalent of Manhattan, which in the mind of many visitors is the NYC. -Zanhe (talk) 05:14, 20 January 2015 (UTC)

Fair enough. So, what would Wenchang Town article be called? Wenchang Town? What if it gets city-sized? Anna Frodesiak (talk) 05:42, 20 January 2015 (UTC)

The town is actually called Wencheng 文城, not Wenchang 文昌, with a different second character. The article should be Wencheng, Hainan per WP:NC-ZH. -Zanhe (talk) 05:56, 20 January 2015 (UTC)

Fantastique! So, if others would show their approval, we could cite this to help other articles find their way. Many thanks. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 06:13, 20 January 2015 (UTC)

Oh, and I don't think it's a problem with a town getting "city-sized". A town in China is an official sub-county division, determined by the national government. Some towns are actually city sized (I was amazed at the size of Dipu when I visited the "town"), but are still officially a town under the jurisdiction of a county. -Zanhe (talk) 06:25, 20 January 2015 (UTC)

Yes, Zanhe is right. The cases are not so clear-cut with Hainan cities, so perhaps Danzhou is a poor example. I don't know if I agree that Chinese people, when describing where they're from, will necessarily use the 'prefecture-level city' in which they were born. More likely they will resort to this if their own birthplace is not well known. Like the example I used, Yiwu is a county-level city under the jurisdiction of Jinhua, but no one I know from Yiwu will ever say that they are "from Jinhua". This is not to mention 'cities' which were previously mostly rural prefectures, such as Jinzhong, whose urban centre is at Yuci District. People from this area, when asked where they are from, are much more likely to use their home county rather than their prefecture-level city. All of this being said, the vast majority of prefecture-level cities have an indisputable urban centre for which they are named, and at the moment most Wikipedia articles, apart from the "administrative divisions" section, focus solely on the urban centre of the city. See for example Hangzhou, Ningbo, Hefei, Changsha, and so on. Apart from a mention in the administrative regions table, the areas under its jurisdiction which are not also part of the urban centre are usually not written about at all. Therefore I don't think the best approach is to treat all sub-divisions the same way the New York City article might treat its boroughs; the fact is that often the county-level cities under the jurisdiction of a prefecture level city is not associated in common usage at all with the sole exception of its administrative status. The point is if a user is looking for Hangzhou, it will find the Wikipedia article on "Hangzhou", but if they are looking at a neighbouring county-level city like Jiande will not be visiting the "Hangzhou" article to look for information on the urban area of Jiande.
Another distinction worth mentioning is the separation between a "city" and a "municipality", the latter being used more commonly to describe all the areas under the city's administrative jurisdiction but the former used to describe the chengqu. Colipon+(Talk) 14:30, 20 January 2015 (UTC)

I'm getting slightly confused. Aren't you in agreement but just explaining things different ways? Regardless of what the article title is, the content explains things.

Can we get consensus on a few things?

• 1. We should avoid calling articles XXXXX City if that article subject refers to an area containing one or more built-up areas.
• 2. It is acceptable to add an explanatory sentence to the lead.
• 3. It is acceptable to add a map as a lead image to help visitors understand that the subject is an area and not just a built up area.

Anna Frodesiak (talk) 00:40, 22 January 2015 (UTC)

I agree about these principles broadly, sorry if I was unclear. I was simply suggesting that the situation is nuanced depending on which city you are talking about. Some prefecture level cities are entirely built up and consist only of an urban area (Wuhai for exmaple), while others encompass large swathes of rural land (Jinzhong). Colipon+(Talk) 19:38, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

Fair enough, Colipon. Many thanks. :) Anna Frodesiak (talk) 00:25, 1 February 2015 (UTC)

Requested move of Min Nan, etc

I've proposed a move to Southern Min, etc for discussion at Talk:Min Nan#Requested move 4 February 2015. Kanguole 18:52, 4 February 2015 (UTC)

Category:Lhasa Prefecture

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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I don't agree with the decision to rename, and one support vote isn't a fair consensus! Lhasa is the city, but the wider prefecture contains hundreds of villages and thousands of square kilometres. It would be like merging Category:New York state into New York City, well almost.. This makes it very awkward now when it comes to creating articles on the wider prefecture, some of which may be 150 km from Lhasa city but will have to be categorized with the city category. I understand Lhasa is a "prefecture-level city" but really from a development point of view it makes absolutely no sense. I'm sure John Hill would agree. ♦ Dr. Blofeld 22:36, 27 January 2015 (UTC)

I understand Nlu's reasoning based on lhasa and a few others being prefecture-level cities, but as I say, the wider area really functions similar to a state or county of a western country. We definitely need something to distinguish between the city itself and the wider area which covers hundreds of square miles. Shigatse for instance is only a large town really, yet the old prefecture covers 182,000 km2. With just Category:Shigatse some village 200km from the actual town will have to be categorized in the same one as perhaps a market or monastery in the town itself. You see what I mean? Even if technically it's correct to only have it as a prefecture level city it presents a major developmental problem. ♦ Dr. Blofeld 22:39, 27 January 2015 (UTC)

Aymatth2, opinion needed.♦ Dr. Blofeld 22:48, 27 January 2015 (UTC)

The only solution I can think of if Prefecture on the end is no longer correct is to have Category:Lhasa as the one for the wider area and Category:Lhasa (city) as a sub category containing the articles on the actual city itself. Same applies to Shigatse and Chamdo.♦ Dr. Blofeld 22:50, 27 January 2015 (UTC)

• @Nlu: This is a puzzling move. The Lhasa region or prefecture is 29,274 km2, while the city proper is 53 km2, like New York State and New York City. The Lhasa article structure is also odd. A hatnote claims it is about the prefecture-level city but the text almost entirely discusses the city proper. Most readers would think of Lhasa as the small city, not the huge and largely unpopulated mountainous area around it. I do not understand the CfD rationale. Am I missing something? Aymatth2 (talk) 00:51, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

The way I see it, we need to have consistency - that's why the rationale here for arguing for a deviation needs to be convincing. In general, there is a consensus that "prefectural-level cities" need to be named based on their prefectural-level city official names. (See WP:NC-ZH, as well as WP:NC-TIBET.) One can easily make an argument that "Shanghai" may be interpreted by some to only refer to the "city proper" (the eight inner districts), for example - and in fact, the Shanghai article addresses it. But to not create a naming/disambiguation nightmare, "Shanghai" should refer to the special municipality, and Lhasa should refer to the prefectural-city. There is also a strong preference for using official names here (regardless of one's view about the PRC government - which I despise, to be honest) because otherwise we end up with a nightmarish patchwork of unworkable exceptions that editors would have to carefully navigate to not refer to the wrong thing. If the dissatisfaction is with the content of the "Lhasa" article as far as its lack of coverage for areas outside the old city of Lhasa (now Chengguan District, Lhasa), then the solution is to expand/revise the article, not by reintroducing ambiguity. The entire PRC territory's prefectural divisions uses this naming scheme for the articles and the prefectural divisions. Making an exception for Lhasa - even though not one with no merit - begs the question of what other exceptions one should make. Certainly "Chongqing" is not traditionally regarded as covering the entire area that it does not, but I don't think we have a choice but to make that article Chongqing cover the municipality. For good and for bad, the old city of Lhasa is now Chengguan District; it can be properly covered under that article. The policy of consistency does not mean political approval. (New York City is not a good counterexample; "New York City" is actually one of the official titles of the city, and the use of the disambiguator of "City" is also necessary to distinguish it from the state; the only similar situation in China is Jilin and Jilin City, which actually creates some awkward prose at times but unavoidably so.) --Nlu (talk) 07:16, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

Nlu, yes I can see why you did it as technically Lhasa, Chamdo and Shigatse are now Prefecture-level cities rather than prefectures, but it still makes no sense so blur the city itself with 29,274 square kilometres of area. We definitely need a system to separate articles on the city itself from the wider region. As Aymatth2 says the information about counties really has no place in the article on the city. We should find a way to cover the wider region in a different article and keep the categories separate. I am aware of the system that the PRC insists, but in practice it is like merging New York state and city into one, although on a smaller scale of course. I strongly suggest consistency for Chinese prefecture level cities too. But so many of them are really large areas to be categorized as just cities. What we need are like Category:Lhasa etc qith hat notes at the top explaining that the category is to hold articles on the wider prefecture and then have a Category:Lhasa (city) for articles within the city itseld. Personally I'd rather call the prefecture level cities xxx Prefecture and reserve Category:Lhasa etc for those about the city itself and I think this would be less confusing for our readers and more reader friendly in the long term, but if it's not technically correct that is a problem, but not as big a problem as this now presents. I think we should have Category:Lhasa (prefecture-level city) for the region if that is now technically correct rather than Lhasa Prefecture, and make that consistent with Chongqing etc all across China, and then reserve the pure Category:Lhasa and Category:Chongqing etc about the cities themselves. I think it's possible to make this consistent and clear to our readers with hatnotes at the top of all of the categories. I also believe that Category:Populated places in Lhasa etc is confusing now to our readers and inconsistent with the others categories in Category:Populated places in Tibet, it makes it seems like they're in the city not the wider region, should at least be changed to Category:Populated places in Lhasa (prefecture-level city) if we're going to insist on formal naming but I still don't like mentioning city in wider regions but we can at least compromise. I still think we're best calling them Category:Lhasa Prefecture etc and placing hatnotes at the top explaining it is a prefecture-level city but they're named like that for consistency and to distinguish between region and city for encyclopedic purposes.♦ Dr. Blofeld 10:08, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

• The principle in Wikipedia is that we go with common usage, regardless of whether it is "right" or "consistent". If several articles compete for a name, we give it to the dominant meaning and qualify the other article names in parentheses, or just qualify all the article names if none is dominant. E.g. Winston Churchill, Winston Churchill (1620–1688), Winston Churchill (novelist), but John Smith. In this case, almost all readers would take "Lhasa" to refer to the city, so the article on the city should have that name – as it does. Lhasa (prefecture) should have a separate article. There should be categories to match. Has this been discussed elsewhere? Aymatth2 (talk) 13:28, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

I don't think so. The Lhasa Prefecture article I believe it was once an article and redirected, but I think that was back in 2007 or something. I see it's since been deleted and redirected in 2012. But there really ought to be a separate article and that county content moved to it. We need some consensus on what to do with the categories though so they're consistent all across China.♦ Dr. Blofeld 15:48, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

Then I suggest that the appropriate discussion to make is to see if there is consensus to alter WP:NC-ZH and WP:NC-TIBET consensuses reached long ago. "Common usage" still to be workable and not otherwise against other policies (including NPOV, for one). If there is a consensus to make an exception for Lhasa, then there is a consensus to make an exception for Lhasa. But the delicate - and I think well-reached - consensus previously reached at WP:NC-ZH serves many Wikipedia policies and has done so for many years, and should not be disturbed without very good reasons, particularly when it is fairly well-explained in the article itself that the old city is now Chengguan District. (Again, analogous to how the Shanghai and Chongqing articles explained how the municipalities cover far more territory than the traditionally-regarded city boundaries.) (Yet another example would be Xiangyang; the traditional city of Xiangyang would be just what is now Xiangzhou District, Xiangyang – but again, the articles do explain that, I think, perhaps not as adequately in this case as with Shanghai, but adequately – and if we start having that district be "Xiangyang (district)" or "Xiangyang (old city), we are going to create a lot more confusion than solved. Same thing with Lhasa (admittedly, not quite as problematic to make an exception, but still problematic).) --Nlu (talk) 16:04, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

I think I also should add that "common usage" cannot be one that is frozen in time. Boundaries (political and otherwise) change. Shimizu, Shizuoka, for example, was formerly a city in itself before being merged with Shizuoka, Shizuoka. (The second "Shizuoka" in the article title refers to the prefecture.) At the time of the merger, if one talked of just "Shizuoka" (as a city) one would not think of Shimizu as part of it - rather, it would just be the two wards Aoi and Suruga - but times passed, Shimizu is part of Shizuoka. Lhasa is a bit of a special case because of its long history and because it is effectively "frozen in time" in many ways due to political and cultural reasons. But the temptation to perpetuate the freeze in time creates more problems than it solves, I think. There are 283 prefectural-level cities in the PRC and four special municipalities. Are we ready to make a patchwork of 287 naming schemes as to what are "cities proper"? It would make it very difficult for editors to properly edit the articles and confuse the readers tremendously. Again, if there is a consensus to make an exception for Lhasa, then there is one, but not only do I not see a compelling reason to, I see compelling reasons not to do so despite some good reasons to do so. --Nlu (talk) 16:40, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

• Wikipedia:Article titles is the relevant policy. Key points (to me) are "The title is one that readers are likely to look or search for and that editors would naturally use to link to the article from other articles" and "The choice of article titles should put the interests of readers before those of editors, and those of a general audience before those of specialists." The WP:NC-ZH or WP:NC-TIBET guidelines may clarify how articles should be named, but should not violate the policy. I see nothing in these guidelines that says the articles on a city and a Prefecture-level city surrounding it must be combined. Two articles would appear to be sensible in most cases, and certainly in this one. I suggest the titles Lhasa for the city and Lhasa prefecture-level city for the article on the larger area. Aymatth2 (talk) 17:54, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

I don't disagree that there should be two article, but there are already two articles - Lhasa and Chengguan District, Lhasa, and the Lhasa article more than adequately explains that the old city is Chengguan District — just as, in the example I gave above, the Shizuoka, Shizuoka article explains that the older Shizuoka city is now Aoi and Suruga. Again, guidelines can be broken, but they shouldn't be broken without a very good reason. In this case, making an exception for Lhasa solves a nonexistent problem and creates bigger ones. There is no good reason for a "special Lhasa exception" that has been brought forth, as far as I can see - particularly given, with all due respect to you, Aymatth2, I am seeing no acknowledgment from you about how Lhasa is not unique in this aspect and no proposal as to what to do to prevent the factorization that would result when the same logic is applied. I think the readers are more than capable of telling, upon arrival at the Lhasa article, that if they want to look for specific old-city information that they should go to the Chengguan District article. In any case, I don't think we can simply talk this out here among the few of us. If you want to have the articles moved, I'd suggest making a move request and see if there are broader voices. --Nlu (talk) 18:20, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

And don't forget this part of the naming policy (rather than just convention):

Ambiguous or inaccurate names for the article subject, as determined in reliable sources, are often avoided even though they may be more frequently used by reliable sources. Neutrality is also considered; our policy on neutral titles, and what neutrality in titles is, follows in the next section. Article titles should be neither vulgar (unless unavoidable) nor pedantic. When there are multiple names for a subject, all of them fairly common, and the most common has problems, it is perfectly reasonable to choose one of the others.

In this case, the most common name has substantial problems, and should be avoided. But again, perhaps at this point the best thing to do is to create a move request and see if we can get other people to chime in. --Nlu (talk) 18:33, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

• Closer's comment: the CFD discussion had been open for three weeks, and had been listed at this Project's Alerts page throughout that time, so it seemed reasonable to close and implement it per the nomination. I have no axe to grind on the merits of the case. – Fayenatic London 20:59, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

Break1

• @Nlu: Almost all readers will think the article titled Lhasa should describe the city. A separate article can cover the 29,274 km2 Lhasa prefecture. There are many examples where a city and region have the same name, e.g. Kano and Kano State, São Paulo and São Paulo (state), Hanover and Hanover Region. I cannot see a proposal to move all city-specific information from the Lhasa article to the Chengguan District article being accepted. Few English-speaking readers would identify Chengguan with Lhasa. Starting an article on Lhasa prefecture-level city to describe the surrounding region is consistent with common practice and could be easily done since only a small amount of content would have to be moved. Aymatth2 (talk) 01:59, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

But again, that begs the question: what's "the city"? Right now, "the city" is the prefectural-level city. The old city can be dealt with properly without breaking conventions. And as I've pointed out several times, Lhasa is not unique in this respect; virtually every single Chinese prefectural-level city is bigger than the "traditional" boundaries of the city. States (first-level divisions) are not in the same situation - that's why, again, we have Jilin (province, first-order) and Jilin City (prefectural-city, second-division) as unavoidable, but otherwise, there is no good reason. Again, I am suggesting that this be submitted to a WP:RM, because it seems like we're going around in circles. And with all due respect, I'd suggest reading some other prefectural-level cities' articles (Xiangyang being one that I referenced above, but I'd suggest a couple more - Yangzhou and Luoyang for two examples), and it will be clear that Lhasa's situation is not only not unique, but (other than the language and cultural issue) quite common. (And while I've referred to WP:NC-ZH, this situation is also not unique to China or the Chinese-speaking world.) Breaking convention in Lhasa's case simply calls for a complete breakdown of the system without a good reason. --Nlu (talk) 04:47, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

It's bleeding obvious when you look at a satellite map what Lhasa city is and what Lhasa prefecture is. Easily distinguishable, Lhasa is the main urban centre of a region and should be treated as such in building an encyclopedia.♦ Dr. Blofeld 14:37, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

Except we cannot write articles based on satellite maps. We need reliable sources to back up any definition we use. -Zanhe (talk) 04:49, 30 January 2015 (UTC)

• I do not propose to move the article on Lhasa, the city, but to start a new article on Lhasa prefecture-level city to contain information on the surrounding region. That can be discussed here to gain consensus from other editors. Perhaps this is a language issue. A "prefecture-level city" is not a city in the usual sense of the word, but a far larger administrative area. It is normal to have separate articles for a 53 km² city and a 29,274 km² region surrounding the city, as in the Kano, São Paulo and Hanover examples. Aymatth2 (talk) 11:43, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

I would fully support that and urge you to do so. Common sense applies here Nlu, and you seem to be largely devoid of it. Category:Populated places in Lhasa, Category:Populated places in Shigatse and Category:Populated places in Chamdo should be moved asap to (prefecture-level city) to avoid confusing the wider prefecture with the cities. At present it makes them look like neighbourhoods or suburbs and that mostly isn't true as some of the villages are 200km from the actual city!♦ Dr. Blofeld 14:36, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

I don't think this makes sense at all, and I believe that this is an uncalled for use of language. I've been trying to be civil in this discussion despite my disagreement, as I see the point but disagree with them, but this is improper. "Lhasa prefecture-city" would break all convention as to PRC cities and be completely unprecedented. As such, I believe a broader discussion and consensus-making is necessary. If created without consensus, I would immediately make an AfD for it as a WP:POINT-making gesture and WP:FORKing without consensus. There is not a single explanation expounded here as to why Lhasa is exceptional in this situation. The current article structure for Chinese prefectural-level cities is well-thought out - not perfect, but a good solution to the otherwise would-be confusing structure of Chinese administrative divisions. As it stands, breaking up this structure - for one single city - is not called for without a good reason. I will abide by consensus if the consensus is otherwise, but there isn't a consensus at this point without broader discussion.

Why I think a WP:RM is the proper mechanism at this moment is because, effectively, even though both of you are calling it a "new article," it effectively would be move of Lhasa to Lhasa prefecture city while moving Chengguan District, Lhasa to Lhasa, and then content transfer from the new Lhasa prefecture city article to the new Lhasa article. Effectively, it is two article moves rather than true new articles. But I am open to other means of discussion so as long as it is a properly brought discussion request with broad consensus-making rather than threatened-unilateral actions that breaks convention without consensus that the breaking-of-convention (which can be done - conventions are meant to be broken, but only with very good reasons) is necessary and does not create more problems than it solves. I am still seeing absolutely no acknowledgement that Lhasa is not unique in this aspect and any proposals to prevent the problems that will arise. Don't be unilateral, and don't be tunnel-visioned in your thinking. --Nlu (talk) 15:44, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

• This is as good a place for the discussion as any. The rationale is simple: most English-speaking readers who search for "Lhasa" will expect an article on the city. There should be a separate article for the much larger prefecture-level city, normal practice for situations like this in all other countries. Perhaps the official name for the city is Chengguan District, but very few English-speaking readers will know that. It would truly create a fork to move all the information about the city – history, architecture, economy etc. – to Chengguan District. Reader convenience is far more important than consistency. Aymatth2 (talk) 16:02, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

Arguably, this is a good place for the discussion, I'll acknowledge. But I am guessing (based on the lack of anybody else jumping into the discussion on either side) that it is not being noticed by anybody else. An WP:RM should bring more notice to the discussion. As would some other centralized discussion, as I think this issue deserves. But "reader convenience is far more important than consistency" (an argument that I don't completely disagree with but I think you overstated) begs the question of, "Is reader convenience truly served when naming conventions breakdown into patchwork fracturing?" As it stands, the naming that you propose, I think, risks creating more reader confusion than it solves as it causes Lhasa to be in its own naming scheme that is inconsistent with all other PRC prefectural-level cities; therefore, it would in fact create other forms of confusion than the confusion that you are trying to solve. Again, this is not unique: Chongqing includes far more territory than the historic city, such that the counties that it absorbed when the municipality was created still has the popular perception of "not truly part of Chongqing." That is pretty much the same for any sizable prefectural level city of PRC - and, for that matter, any sizable city that underwent an absorption process in its history. In Taipei, for example, the "Taipei District Court" has jurisdiction over only the southern parts of the city that were parts of the city when it was a provincially-controlled city; the northern parts of the city fall under the jurisdiction of the "Shilin District Court." Breaking convention should afford more consensus-building than just a discussion between three individuals, particularly it is a convention that involves 287 entities. The problems that you are identifying - real ones - can largely be solved by beefing up the contents of both Lhasa and Chengguan District, Lhasa. (As was the case with Shanghai.) --Nlu (talk) 16:12, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

• Readers are very unlikely to notice or care about inconsistent naming conventions. The proposed structure may be useful for other articles about cities at the heart of prefectures. It is normal to have different articles for a city and for the surrounding region. Jamming them into one article for the sake of following a naming convention is daft - if the naming convention does indeed say that should be done. Let's give other editors a chance to express their opinion. Aymatth2 (talk) 16:29, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

We were talking about categories primarily Nlu. What justification is there from an encyclopedia developmental point of view to have only one category for both city and region in one? What exactly does a village to the north of Damxung for instance actually have to do with the old city of Lhasa? It would be different it some of these "prefecture-level cities" were only 50 square km, but we're talking tens of thousands of square kilometres, they're the size of some states and counties in the western world. It's absurd to treat villages over 200 km from the actual city as if they're in it. Category:Populated places in Lhasa is just wrong and confusing. ♦ Dr. Blofeld 17:25, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

That's a separate issue that does not have direct bearing on the naming of the articles. (They are related, of course, because the general policy is to have the category names match article names, but it can be solved in other ways.) (And above, your statement that you will support a "Lhasa prefectural city" article name belies your assertion that this is primarily about category names.) Besides, "Category:Populated places in Lhasa Prefecture" is more problematic because Lhasa Prefecture doesn't exist any more. Rather than throwing invectives at me, if you have alternative category name proposals, WP:CFD is the proper place to take them, not trying to sneak it by by trying to create mini-not-really-consensus-consensuses.

But on the merits, again, how is this different than Chongqing? (Particularly, see the treatment at Chongqing#Administrative divisions - and there is already an analogous treatment here in the Lhasa article itself.) Political and other boundaries change. What is "Lhasa" should not be deemed to be frozen in time. Popular perception of what "Beijing" is changed in time. Again, I do think you make a valid point but other points trump them. But it shouldn't be just what you or I say. Follow proper procedure if you want changes. As I've said, I will abide by consensus.

But as a side point: I do not oppose subcategorizing Category:Populated places in Lhasa (or any other Lhasa-related categories) so as long as it doesn't break convention. (I will oppose the ones that break convention but when I say "oppose," I mean, "argue against," not "will defy consensus.") A "Category:Lhasa (historic city)" or "Category:Lhasa (pre-PRC)" (and a subcategory branch from there), for example, is not something I will oppose (even though I think it is more properly handled through a "Category:Chengguan District, Lhasa" tree. --Nlu (talk) 17:39, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

I didn't think of it in any other way. I'd also like to keep things consistent. If we can agree that all prefecture level cities are called :Category:xxx prefecture-level city and where there is a city and a particularly large prefecture-level area to try to distinguish between the two with hat notes at the top of the categories explaining what they're to hold then we should get somewhere. Each prefecture level should have the main cat Category:Lhasa prefecture-level city, a Category:Populated places in Lhasa (prefecture-level city) and Category:Lhasa reserved for article only about the actual city itself rather than on settlements and places in the wider area. Yes, CFD will be the place to propose it, but I was hoping for some general discussion and agreement from the China project before we proceed to avoid a conflict at CFD.♦ Dr. Blofeld 18:01, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

That's still basically "let's tear up the entire naming convention because of Lhasa." The current naming convention has served well for a number of years and shouldn't be torn up because of perceived problems when doing so will create more problems. --Nlu (talk) 19:48, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

Dr. Blofeld, who is to decide which part of the prefecture-level city is the "actual" city and which part is not? Your approach will inevitably lead to WP:OR and endless argument among people with different ideas about where the "real" city boundaries should be. And it will be impossible to keep up with the reality on the ground, at a time when all Chinese cities are expanding at a rapid speed. Adhering to the official boundary is the only practical option we have. -Zanhe (talk) 23:34, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

How is it OR to simply rename the categories with (prefecture-level city) on the end to avoid confusion with the actual towns? ♦ Dr. Blofeld 09:01, 30 January 2015 (UTC)

• I agree with Nlu. We should not take a travel guide's approach to political geography, but should adhere to official political boundaries for the simple reasons of precision and consistency. The only well defined boundary for a city is the government one. Most people only have a vague idea of what constitutes the "real" city, and everyone's definition will be different, causing endless potential for disagreement. And the government definition is likely no less common than the common perception, especially in reliable sources. Governments of all levels publish copious volumes of sources, including essential statistics such as census results, geographical surveys, economic activities, etc. If we stray from that, we won't be able to write anything with precision.

In general, Wikipedia does follow the government definition, so we have a Las Vegas article that's not about the Las Vegas Strip, New York City is not just Manhattan, and City of London is about the smallest city in England, not the largest. In cases where someone has created a fork for a different definition of the city, such as Tokyo and Tokyo Metropolis, the alternative title is devoid of attention from editors and will likely be merged back to the main article. In the meantime, while the main article is ostensibly about the "real" city of Tokyo, it includes the Ogasawara Islands, more than 1,000 km distant from the city center.

The solution is to treat the entire city as an organic whole while maintaining a heavy focus on the city center, with summary information on the peripheral counties, each with its own article with more detailed information. And categories should be the same. There should be only one category for Lhasa, which contains articles about the "real" city, with subcategories for the distant counties under its jurisdiction. -Zanhe (talk) 20:10, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

Zanhe, you're missing why I objected to the deletion of the categories though. Category:Populated places in Lhasa is confusing to most readers who will think of Lhasa as the small city with the Potala, not a big region of 30,000 km2. What I'm getting at is that the categories should avoid implying that these places are inside the city and simply rename Category:Populated places in Lhasa (prefecture-level city) to try to avoid that and make it clear that it's in the prefecture rather than city itself.♦ Dr. Blofeld 21:50, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

I think the best way to minimize confusion is to replace Category:Populated places in Lhasa, with a structure similar to Category:County-level divisions of Lijiang City‎, which in turn would contain a subcategory for each county or district, and put place names inside those subcats. This would hopefully help readers realize that the city of Lhasa has jurisdiction over these counties which in turn contain many smaller places, but the counties are not inside the "real" city. -Zanhe (talk) 04:41, 30 January 2015 (UTC)

I created Category:Township-level divisions of Tibet to cover the townships within it, but by prefecture Category:Populated places in Tibet with the villages. All I want to see is to avoid calling a village 150km from a city as if it's actually within the city, just a slight rename with (prefecture-level city) on the end should suffice. And the same for any in China in which you're covering large rural areas of an urban based prefecture. I do think it's possible to be consistent and clear, without breaking any "PRC rules" in doing so. I think it's time the Tibetan villages were all sorted out. I created a lot of stubs in my early days on here and in all honesty think most of them should be deleted until we can create a half decent article on them, ideally the townships first.♦ Dr. Blofeld 08:41, 30 January 2015 (UTC)

• If we have an article for each county, the one on Chengguan District, Lhasa will describe the "real" city. That information should not be replicated in the article on the prefecture-level city, which would now provide an overview followed by a summary section for each county pointing to the main article for each county. Aymatth2 (talk) 20:49, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

• While Chengguan District is probably closer to most outsiders' concept of what the "real" Lhasa should be, we cannot say it is the real Lhasa unless most reliable sources say so. If you take a look on Google maps, you'll see Chengguan includes large areas of mountainous terrain that's decidedly non-urban, but parts of the contiguous urban core of Lhasa lie in neighbouring counties, including the county seat of Doilungdêqên County. And the Lhasa Airport, which most visitors would probably consider part of the "real" Lhasa, is not in Chengguan, or even the Lhasa prefecture-level city, but in Lhoka (Shannan) Prefecture. -Zanhe (talk) 23:52, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

Break2

• We seem to have agreement that there should be two articles with two matching categories, one for the 53 km² city and one for the 29,274 km² region. This is analogous to Kano and Kano State, São Paulo and São Paulo (state), Hanover and Hanover Region. City articles tend to be different in nature from region articles. The article about the city is likely to be the larger, judging from the contents of the Lhasa article now, but they will both be sizable, with little overlap. We have two proposed ways to name them:

	ALT1	ALT2
53 km2 city	Lhasa	Chengguan District, Lhasa
29,274 km2 region	Lhasa prefecture-level city	Lhasa

The argument for ALT1 is that almost all English-speaking readers who search for "Lhasa" are likely to be looking for the city article. The argument for ALT2 is that these are the official names.

• If ALT1 is accepted, a new article should be started for Lhasa prefecture-level city, and content that describes the region should be moved from Lhasa to the new article. Chengguan District, Lhasa should be turned into a redirect to Lhasa. The lead of Lhasa should explain that it is officially called Chengguan District, and lies in the Lhasa prefecture-level city.
• If ALT2 is accepted, all content that describes the city – history, economy, architecture, culture etc, – should be moved from Lhasa to Chengguan District, Lhasa, replaced by a 1-paragraph summary section in the Lhasa article with a {{main|Chengguan District, Lhasa}} pointer to that article.

Does that accurately describe the alternatives? Aymatth2 (talk) 20:34, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

• I think the status quo is the best, i.e., with Lhasa describing the prefecture-level city but with a heavy focus on the city center, similar to Tokyo, New York City, Chongqing, and numerous other city articles. Have you considered what happens if Chengguan District grows and is split into two or more separate districts (which happens a lot in China), are we going to a third article with combined information of all the urban districts of Lhasa? -Zanhe (talk) 20:53, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

• With the status quo in naming (ALT2) Chengguan District, Lhasa should logically pick up much of the content about the urban area – and yes, a district split would be tricky to handle. ALT1 would avoid the issue. By using the "unofficial" but widely-used name for the city, it can handle changes to district boundaries with little change. Tokyo and New York City are poor analogies. Both are considerably smaller and much more densely populated. Lhasa prefecture-level city is almost entirely wild, unpopulated mountain country, a city only in name. Aymatth2 (talk) 21:38, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

• I'm afraid that the ALT1 approach to the "unofficial" definition of the city will inevitably lead to WP:OR. The government definition of the city is far from perfect, but it's consistent, well defined, widely used, and official. And I think that's the only real option we have, because the alternative is simply chaos. Imagine repeating the current discussion for all 290 or so prefecture-level cities in China, and coming up with an unofficial definition of the "real" city for each one of them. And there are even more county-level cities, which face a similar problem, on a smaller scale (see the Wenchang discussion above). -Zanhe (talk) 23:25, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

How is it OR? The PRC government I believe calls urban Lhasa 53 km2 vs 29,274 km2 for the wider prefecture area so clearly it also considers Lhasa the main urban area and the rest rural with an official boundary. And it's pretty obvious on a google map that the city of Lhasa can be roughly seen and that it has little to do with some village up near Nam Co.♦ Dr. Blofeld 09:30, 30 January 2015 (UTC)

• Wikipedia is not a directory that changes with each bureaucratic reorganization. Readers who search for "Lhasa" are looking for an article about the city in Tibet. The article about Lhasa should describe the city, not the vast administrative area created in 1960, although that deserves an article too. Readers will have little interest in today's official names or official delimitation of the city boundary. They want to read about the city of Lhasa. If this discussion has helped identify problems that need to be solved with other articles, that is good. The problems should be solved, not brushed under the carpet. Aymatth2 (talk) 01:12, 30 January 2015 (UTC)

• Like it or not, Wikipedia almost always follows the government definition of administrative divisions, because when such matters are concerned, the government is the ultimate authority. The fundamental problem here is the discrepancy between the government definition and the common outsider perception, which is not going to be solved by any amount of discussion on Wikipedia. And I disagree that readers should not learn about the places' official delimitations. When I saw that Las Vegas was not about the Las Vegas Strip and the Strip is actually not in Las Vegas, I was surprised but also glad to have learned something about the idiosyncrasy of American political divisions, from editors with more local knowledge than I do. -Zanhe (talk) 04:30, 30 January 2015 (UTC)

• Of course we should give readers information on the official divisions. In this case, there is a large prefecture-level city and a much smaller chengguan district. Two administrative divisions, two articles. The user searching for "Lhasa" is almost certainly looking for the city proper, so the article "Lhasa" should have a scope something like:

"Lhasa (officially Chengguan District, Lhasa) is an urban agglomeration within the larger Lhasa prefecture-level city. ..."

The reader is given a focused article on the city, gets the offical names, and can click to the article on the surrounding region. Lumping together the prefecture-level city and the chengguan district in one article is incorrect and confusing. We get statements like "Lhasa sits in a flat river valley in the Himalaya Mountains". True of the city proper, not of the prefecture-level city. We get a confused mess. Aymatth2 (talk) 15:03, 30 January 2015 (UTC)

• I think the second alternative should be "status quo as to naming, with content to be decided later." Some of the current culture/history content should remain in prefecture-level city article (whether called Lhasa or Lhasa prefecture-level city or Lhasa (prefecture-level city) or some other alternative), and some of it should go to the district-level (whatever it is named) - not all of it should. But that's a content-based decision that can and should be decided later (and not necessarily requiring a centralized discussion - that's more editorial than policy). The naming issue should be decided first. --Nlu (talk) 21:08, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

• We cannot say "We have decided what to call them, later we will decide what they are about." We have an article titled Lhasa, we have an article titled Chengguan District, Lhasa, and I just created an article titled Lhasa prefecture-level city. The question now is what each should contain. Aymatth2 (talk) 01:12, 30 January 2015 (UTC)

Yes - and in fact we must, because whatever "we" (and it shouldn't be just "us" - we need more voices) decides here cannot bind the future editors as to content; that defeats the point of Wikipedia, and our policies precisely prohibits this kind of "dead-hand control." (See WP:OWN.) But in any case, the creation of "Lhasa prefecture-level city" is against policy. As such, with all due respect, I'm going to nominate it for deletion as a creation of a redirect against consensus (as reflected in the naming convention). Please don't repeat it until further, proper direction. --Nlu (talk) 02:23, 30 January 2015 (UTC)

• Proper direction? From which authority? Aymatth2 (talk) 02:27, 30 January 2015 (UTC)

As I mentioned before, this really needs a consensus to deviate from the current naming convention. You know that there is no consensus (at least not yet), and you created it anyway. That's improper. If RfD results do not agree with me, obviously, the community would have spoken. --Nlu (talk) 02:31, 30 January 2015 (UTC)

I will also deem this a sufficient notification; no {{RFDNote}} will therefore be further posted. --Nlu (talk) 02:32, 30 January 2015 (UTC)

Nlu, I don't see how Aymatth2's creation of the redirect causes any harm. It's actually quite accurate, as the current Lhasa article is about the prefecture-level city. I think the RfD should be withdrawn before more editor time is wasted discussing the merits of such a minor edit. -Zanhe (talk) 03:14, 30 January 2015 (UTC)

With all due respect, with all the discussion that is going on here, I think creating it is bad faith - again, not terrible faith, but bad faith in the sense of making a WP:POINT. No one is going to be searching for the phrase "Lhasa prefecture-level city." (They might search for those terms separately, but not together as a phrase.) Further, Aymatth2 has made arguments - some I will acknowledge are valid points - that suggests that this creation is disingenuous. But in any case, the discussion can potentially get some other editors involved and chime in, which would be a good thing regardless. --Nlu (talk) 04:36, 30 January 2015 (UTC)

Not happy with the category naming convention but I've added hatnotes to them to make it clear that they're about settlements situated outside the main urban area. And that's not OR as the PRC registers the size of the main urban areas like 53km2 for Lhasa etc. I'm content with that now, but I still think there's a case for covering the prefecture-level city in different articles than the main city.♦ Dr. Blofeld 09:36, 30 January 2015 (UTC)

Recap

The above discussion has been very useful in bringing out aspects of this complex subject:

• Confusingly, the former Lhasa Prefecture has been renamed Lhasa City. The former prefecture is a huge (29,274 km²) and sparsely populated area with population about 500,000 that contains the small city of Lhasa (population about 250,000) and many villages.
• No administrative division exactly corresponds to the small city. The Chengguan District, Lhasa (Chengguanqu means "inner city area"[2]) is closest, but contains large rural areas, and the urban area spills into neighboring counties
• The project naming conventions say "In general, when deciding to disambiguate a place name, those settlements ranked higher administratively (i.e. higher up the following table) are primary topic over those ranked lower, unless sourcing exists to establish significant notability of a lower-ranked division."

At risk of misrepresenting other editors' views, I would say that

• Dr. Blofeld (talk · contribs) and Aymatth2 (talk · contribs) consider that the present combo Lhasa article is confusing. Most readers will expect Lhasa to describe the small city alone. The Lhasa article should be more clearly focused on the urban area, and text describing the former prefecture moved out into a new article with a name like "Lhasa (prefecture-level city)".
• Zanhe (talk · contribs) considers that since there is no official definition of the small city and its boundaries, Wikipedia editors should not try to invent one. It is better to retain the status quo, with a combo article covering both meanings. Chengguan District, Lhasa is not the same as the small city, and anyway may be split some time in the future. Text about the small city should not be moved to Chengguan District, Lhasa.
• Nlu (talk · contribs) does not disgree that there should be two articles, but considers that using the title "Lhasa" for an article about the small city would violate the naming convention and cause chaos with all the other articles on Chinese cities. With the status quo, Lhasa describes the former prefecture and Chengguan District, Lhasa describes the old city. We may decide to move some, but not all, of the content describing the small city to Chengguan District, Lhasa at some time in the future

I find it impossible to accept that Wikipedia cannot have an article about the small city of Lhasa because there is no administrative division that precisely corresponds to the city. It is common for cities to spill over their official boundaries, and common for official boundaries to include rural areas surrounding a city. As long as the article follows reliable sources, there should be no difficulty describing the small city. I do not accept that the text describing the small city should be moved to Chengguan District, Lhasa, leaving behind a summary in Lhasa. Editors would not expect the small city to be described under Chengguan District, so forking would be inevitable. There would be no violation of the naming convention in having Lhasa describe the small city, since sourcing exists to establish significant notability of the small city. Most references to "Lhasa" are to the city rather than the former prefecture.

Assuming no other views or information are presented over the next few days, I expect to submit a formal proposal to spin off the text on the former prefecture from Lhasa into a new article, and try to gain consensus from a wider group of editors. Any suggestions on the best place/format for a proposal? Nlu (talk · contribs) has suggested a WP:Requested Move. Maybe, but that does not seem to exactly fit this proposal. Aymatth2 (talk) 14:43, 31 January 2015 (UTC)

Yes, exactly as I see it. And should you research the prefecture level city area properly, you'll increasingly realise that rural economy info on farming in Lhunzub County etc which cna be gleaned from the Chinese encyclopedias has no place in an entry on Lhasa the city itself.♦ Dr. Blofeld 14:48, 31 January 2015 (UTC)

I would say that Aymatth2's summary is a good one. I would also say that I believe Dr. Blofeld's observation is an apt one, but not particularly relevant to article naming or scope. That's true for pretty much all Chinese (or, for that matter, many cities elsewhere). In the part of California where I live, for example, Alviso, San Jose, California is largely (unfortunately) basically irrelevant to the identity and economy of San Jose, California as a city. (That was despite Alviso residents' hopes at that time that merging into San Jose in 1968, more than four decades ago, that doing so would incorporate it into the city's economy, would bring better services, and would otherwise improve the conditions of the residents.) That doesn't mean that there should be a hypothetical "San Jose (common perception)" or "San Jose (minus Alviso)" article, or, more saliently to this discussion, that the "San Jose, California" article should exclude Alviso in its contents. Contrary to this particular situation, I do think there may be some value to having an article to discuss Lhasa's urban area specifically, but the "Lhasa" article should not be eviscerated; there can be a split of content, but not a limitation on content, nor should the split be done in such a way as to compromise the integrity of the naming convention, because doing so will bring greater confusion. In particular, while I think that the current hat notes are perfectly adequate in explaining to any readers that the prefecture-level city is not the same as the urban area (although I fail to see how a reader who can distinguish the such in Guangzhou would be unable to do so for Lhasa), a potentially better solution would be to have an "Urban area" section added to Lhasa. Then, optionally, should Dr. Blofeld (or anyone else) want to write an "Urban area of Lhasa" or "Downtown Lhasa" article (which would be analogous to, for example, Downtown Los Angeles - a case in which, I might add, "Los Angeles" may not, in the common mind of those unfamiliar with the city, cause people to think of, among other areas, San Pedro, San Fernando Valley (largely part of Los Angeles but not completely so, concededly), or South Central Los Angeles, the Los Angeles article does not exclude them, and explains in the article the city's expansiveness in light of history, which, I submit, is not completely incomparable to Lhasa) article, the new, narrower-scope article can be properly linked from Lhasa via {{main}} or {{see also}}. It should also be noted that the history of the city is explained in the Los Angeles article even though a substantial part of that history has nothing to do with San Pedro or San Fernando Valley. The fact that a major part of Lhasa's history may have nothing to do with Qüxü County does not mean that we exclude Qüxü from the Lhasa article. (And it probably had a lot more to do than we realize; certainly, back in the prime period of the Tibetan state's existence, a lot more than what we think of Lhasa currently - indeed, beyond the borders of the current prefecture-level city - would be affected by what happened in the city itself - and yes, that included economy and culture.) And I would also add that Zanhe made many good points I did not think of. Limiting the "Lhasa" article's scope based on what we think what readers might think of Lhasa is effectively original research (perhaps well-reasoned, but still original research - remember "original research" is not the same as "junk" but rather, original research is original research) and what, in court, we might call "opinion without foundation." (Again, "opinion without foundation" is not the same as "wrong opinion" or "false opinion," but without foundation.) (A hypothetical "Urban area of Lhasa" or "Downtown Lhasa" may also run into such risk, but would limit the the scope of such risk, and this is why I said I would not oppose it; some others might.) It should also be remembered that we don't have any real idea what Dr. Blofeld thinks of as "Lhasa" (based on the recent history) is sufficiently coterminal with "Lhasa" historically. Going back to Tang Dynasty times the city was called "Lhasa" - but we do not know whether the city back then coincides with what is now conceived of as the urban area, or Chengguan District, or the prefecture-level city. For all we know, back in Tang times the city could have been a lot larger or a lot smaller. We still need to have a workable definition that doesn't lead the way to 287 naming schemes (and, more importantly, 287 needs to define what what the "real city" is). What my feeling is at this point is this: if there is to be a "spinoff," it should not be "spin off the former prefecture into a separate article." It should be "spin off the urban area into a separate article, while leaving a substantial part of the history/culture aspects in the current article." But yet another option, not explored here, is to spin off the proper sections into articles (linked by {{main}}) - "History of Lhasa" for example. (Analogous to History of Los Angeles.) That may address some of the concerns here without creating more problems, in terms of confusion, OR, or POV. --Nlu (talk) 16:34, 31 January 2015 (UTC)

• @Nlu: The problem of articles about nested geographical units can be managed. The city of São Paulo sprawls out into Greater São Paulo which in turn is part of the Expanded Metropolitan Complex of São Paulo, a region in São Paulo (state). Obviously it is a challenge to avoid forking, but it can and should be done to meet the needs of our readers. I have found that careful choice of the main headers, and fairly tight summation in sections with a {{main}} hatnote sets a style that almost all subsequent editors observe, and that minimizes the problem. I can assure you that narrowing the scope of the "Lhasa" title to the small city, and moving the former prefecture content to "Lhasa (prefecture-level city)", is completely consistent with the project naming conventions. They allow for the situation where a lower-ranked settlement is more notable than the larger unit with the same name, to the extent that it is the dominant meaning of the name, as they must to be compatible with the general naming policy in Wikipedia. Aymatth2 (talk) 02:23, 1 February 2015 (UTC)

Official boundary of the city of Los Angeles shown in red

I think Aymatth2 summarizes the issue well, although I disagree with his proposed remedy. Administrative boundaries are fraught with all kinds of idiosyncrasies, because of history and politics, and often disagree with outsider perceptions. This is a worldwide phenomenon, not just Lhasa. We have administrative boundaries that are too big (Lhasa, Chongqing, and most Chinese cities), too small (Las Vegas, Boston, and many North American cities), or simply weird (see accompanied map of Los Angeles). No matter how unreasonable they seem, that's the reality on the ground, which determines how the local people are governed, who they pay taxes to, etc. It's arrogant for outsiders, who mainly see faraway places from a tourist's point of view, to demand that the reality be changed to fit their own vague idea of what a city "should" be. If we were to redefine Lhasa as just Chengguan District, as proposed by Aymatth2, there would be no reason to stop here. Are we ready to redefine Los Angeles as Downtown Los Angeles (or Los Angeles County, if you're an inclusionist), New York City as Manhattan, Las Vegas as Las Vegas Strip? -Zanhe (talk) 00:40, 1 February 2015 (UTC)

• @Zanhe: This is absolutely not a proposal to equate the small city of Lhasa with Lhasa Chengguan District. I would be against adding much more to the Lhasa Chengguan District article, which I see as a definition of an official administrative division, subject to periodic bureaucratic adjustment. The proposal is to narrow the scope of the Lhasa article to the small city of Lhasa as described by reliable sources, and to start a new article to cover the former prefecture, with an appropriate summary of the article on the small city. Los Angeles is a good example, with other articles covering Downtown Los Angeles, Los Angeles County, Los Angeles metropolitan area and Greater Los Angeles Area. Some of these are formal and some informal divisions. Compared to the difficulty of avoiding forking with these overlapping divisions, managing the articles on the small city and the huge former prefecture will be easy. Aymatth2 (talk) 02:23, 1 February 2015 (UTC)

• • If "managing the articles on the small city and the huge former prefecture will be easy," then it seems to me that it's a call to solve a nonexistent (OK, maybe that's too strong of a word - not-particularly-serious) problem and replacing it with a bigger (perhaps also not-particularly-serious, but bigger) problem of making an exception out of a consistent naming scheme (and, potentially, lead to the need for 287 naming conventions instead of one). But again, I do believe you've outline the views well, and I am perfectly willing to accept that reasonable minds can differ on this. The content issue of "what is Lhasa?" can and should be hashed out later if the consensus is to break up the content. (But again, my view is still that Lhasa should remain as an article on the prefecture-level city; that view may or may not be agreed by other editors, of course.) --Nlu (talk) 02:52, 1 February 2015 (UTC)

• • • I do not understand the concern about naming conventions. Using Lhasa for the small city conforms with the project naming conventions and Wikipedia policy, and is not an exception. "Lhasa" usually refers to the small city. "Sourcing exists to establish significant notability of the lower-ranked division." It is the primary topic. I have sampled articles that link to Lhasa to confirm that most refer to the small city as opposed to the prefecture, or prefecture-level city. I will check a sample of Google Books to confirm that the small city is the primary topic before submitting the formal proposal. The policies and guidelines have been carefully formulated to cover situations like this. Aymatth2 (talk) 14:06, 1 February 2015 (UTC)

• • • • It doesn't comply with WP:NC-ZH. Please see the table on geographic divisions, particularly of prefecture-level cities - something that currently followed on all other prefecture-level cities (with the one exception of "Jilin City" due to the need to disambiguate from the province that it is in). That table cannot be any clearer than it currently is, so I am not sure where the confusion is.
      • I'm sure that Google Books results will use "Lhasa" to refer to the historical city a lot more than it would the prefecture-level city. That's because they are going to be "frozen in time" given Lhasa/Tibet's political situation. You are going to get books that never acknowledge the status quo. You are going to get books that have outdated information due to the difficulty in accessing Tibet. You are going to get books that discuss only the history. All of which will use "Lhasa" in an outdated sense. Which is fine as far as those books are concerned - but do not reflect reality. It would be like (although not as severe) how books on North Korea are necessarily going to have limited amount of information on the North Korean provinces given the lack of current information. For all we know, what was considered the prime resources for particular North Korean provinces could be completely wrong at this point. For Lhasa/Tibet, that won't be as much, but books in this case aren't going to be particularly useful. --Nlu (talk) 16:46, 1 February 2015 (UTC)

These are the relevant part of the table and the notes:

Type	char.	Normal	Disambiguate
			by location	by type
Municipality / City (plc / clc / pc / ccc) 直辖、地级、县级市 直轄、省轄、縣轄市	1	no example yet	no example yet	Mang City 芒市
			no example yet	Mang
	>1	Beijing 北京市 Nanjing 南京市 Yiwu 义乌市 ROC: Taipei 台北市 ROC: Keelung 基隆市 ROC: Pingtung 屏東市	Yichun, Heilongjiang 伊春市	Jilin City 吉林市
			Yichun, Jiangxi 宜春市	Jilin 吉林省

Towns, townships and villages of the PRC are to be disambiguated according to the following procedure:

1. By province-level division. Places in the districts of the following automatically go to 2A): All sub-provincial cities (except Jinan), Jilin City, Wuxi, Suzhou, Wenzhou, Fuzhou (福州), Kunming, Lanzhou, and Lhasa
2. If the name is not unique within the province, disambiguate: A) By the prefecture-level city if the parent division is a district. B) By the county-level city, county, or banner otherwise; autonomous counties should omit the ethnic groups and the word "Autonomous" (e.g. Huanren Manchu Autonomous County → Huanren County) as long as no ambiguity is created by the short form.
3. If the name of the parent county-level city or county is ambiguous, revert to 2A). If the prefecture-level city is not primary topic within the PRC, revert to 2B).
4. If the English name is not unique even within the county-level division, use pinyin tone marks.

The proposed "Lhasa" does not comply with this because the "small city" is not a county-level city (which only exists in the PRC) or county-controlled city (which only exists in Taiwan), and, in any case, when a county-level division has the same name as the prefecture-level city, it is supposed to be further disambiguated. It is also further poorly defined - certainly, there is a good argument (although, again, I think overcome by other concerns) that one may commonly think of "Lhasa" as a smaller area than the prefecture-level city - but you are not going to get consensus on the contours of what "Lhasa" is. ROC-Tibet era sources are unlikely to be of help because it was even then poorly defined. The virtually-independent-but-not-quite Tibetan government back then did not also appear to define its administrative divisions well, and its sources are likely to be 1) lost and/or 2) kept in PRC archives that the PRC government will not let anyone access. Effectively, trying to define a smaller "Lhasa" creates the OR/POV problem of, "What is that (smaller) Lhasa?" Using Chengguan District to define that smaller Lhasa avoid these problems but appears to be disfavored by everyone else in this discussion. The only way to avoid that problem is to leave "Lhasa" alone, as far as I am concerned, so that it doesn't create more problems than it solves.

Again, naming conventions are to be broken when there is a good reason to (again, see Jilin City, which is an exception, although in this case a specifically enumerated exception due to its peculiar naming), but saying that it doesn't break naming convention is not true. It is clearly, clearly not true. It would be like having "Shanghai" redefined to the eight inner districts and having a "Shanghai (municipality)" that covers the special municipality. There may be good arguments for doing so, but saying that it doesn't break convention flies in the face of clear wording of the convention. --Nlu (talk) 16:57, 1 February 2015 (UTC)

• @Nlu: You are ignoring the introduction to this section, which says (my highlighting): "In general, when deciding to disambiguate a place name, those settlements ranked higher administratively (i.e. higher up the following table) are primary topic over those ranked lower, unless sourcing exists to establish significant notability of a lower-ranked division". This is consistent with the Policy on article titles, as it should be. Wikipedia:Disambiguation#Is there a primary topic? explains the concept. As a cross-check on whether the small city is the primary topic, we can also take a sample of Google News results. Aymatth2 (talk) 17:12, 1 February 2015 (UTC)
  • "Lhasa" (smaller city) is not an administrative division at all and therefore is not a "lower-ranked division." That's the difference. This is not, again, unlike "Shanghai" - the eight inner districts are traditionally considered Shanghai, and if you say that you are going to "Shanghai" but to a different part than the eight inner districts, you probably have to qualify the statement depending on where you are. Also not so dissimilar is that in some contexts, "Taipei" still refers to what would be the area that was enclosed by the Qing-era city walls. (See, e.g., Taipei Station.) That doesn't mean that the Taipei article should be eviscerated with its history to become a purely administrative one. --Nlu (talk) 17:16, 1 February 2015 (UTC)
  • And let me ask you: do you have a precise definition of the contours of what you propose to be "Lhasa"? Or is it, "Well, it's not the prefecture-level city - but I don't really know what it is"? If it's the latter, I think you need to rethink whether your proposal is workable in practice even if it is workable in theory. --Nlu (talk)

Lhasa from the Pabonka Monastery. The Potala Palace rises above the old city.

Lhasa is the small city nestled in the Himalayas that is shown in the photograph to the left, and shown in most of the photographs in the article on Lhasa. Many books and scholarly articles describe the city, and there are often news items about events in the city. Lhasa continues to grow steadily, but a satellite view shows it is still very compact compared to most cities. Partly, I think, this is because of topographical constraints. It is the main settlement in the former Lhasa Prefecture, which is now rather confusingly called Lhasa City. It is reasonable to have an article that describes this small city and a separate article that describes the huge former prefecture that surrounds it. I am struggling to understand the true reason for resistance to this proposal. Anywhere else a small city and a very large surrounding region would have separate articles. Aymatth2 (talk) 17:46, 1 February 2015 (UTC)

And I'm struggling to understand why you think this is a workable definition. What other article defines a city by what is shown in a photograph? For that matter, what other article defines a city (at least a currently existing one, as oppose to a historic one) in such ambiguous and inherently POV terms? And what other article creates an exception that effectively, if applied to logical extreme, would lead to 287 naming schemes in a country? I think that it's a matter of your not understanding that Lhasa is not unique in this aspect in China (or, for that matter, elsewhere in the world).

But as I indicated, I don't oppose an article dealing with a smaller area (I am still concerned about OR/POV issues with such an article, but when it's limited in scope, the issues would be less). What I am opposing is breaking up well-working naming convention for the sake of it. Call it something else. Don't call it "Lhasa." Just as if someone wanted to build an article about the "real" Taipei, I'd suggest something like "Taipei (Qing boundaries)" and not the idea of calling it "Taipei" and making the current Taipei into "Taipei (municipality)" (and proposing to strip the municipality article of massive amounts of content). (Indeed, the Chinese Wikipedia does have such an article (zh:臺北城) - roughly translatable as "the walled city of Taipei.") --Nlu (talk) 17:55, 1 February 2015 (UTC)

(And, granted, it's five photographs, but you really think we should define San Jose, California by using these photographs?)

• Lhasa is the obvious name for the article because most sources that use the word describe the small city, and most readers using the word are looking for information on the small city. Perhaps they are wrong, but that is irrelevant. Wikipedia goes with common usage in reliable sources.

Q: What is Lhasa?

A: A small city in Tibet.

Aymatth2 (talk) 21:03, 1 February 2015 (UTC)

How big is that small city? What areas does it contain? I don't think you can come up with a definition that there will be a consensus on, even among sources that you will cite. Ergo, there will be no NPOV way to properly define it. "Whatever is in the photograph" is not a proper definition. --Nlu (talk) 21:19, 1 February 2015 (UTC)

Not very big. The Potala Palace is in the middle of it now, to the west of the old city. @Nlu: What is the reason for these frantic attempts to stop having the article called Lhasa focus on describing the place commonly known as Lhasa? If I were paranoid, I would see a political motive, but I cannot see anything political about having different articles for the city and the former prefecture. Xinhua calls the place Lhasa, and so does People's Daily. I am mystified. Aymatth2 (talk) 21:53, 1 February 2015 (UTC)

No political motive at all. If anything, if I saw a reasonable argument, I'd like to see an argument that undermines the PRC authorities. But in this case, I don't see a reasonable argument. I don't like having a well-working naming scheme broken up to solve non-existent problems. In this case, the problem is close to non-existent, and the solution creates more substantial problems. Otherwise, we're just cutting open a hole on clothes to use the fabric to patch a smaller spot.

And I am still waiting for a workable definition. "A small city" is not one. "Not very big" is certainly not one. "What's shown in the photograph" is not one. "The area surrounding the Potala Palace" may be a better one, but is still too vague. "The area that is coterminal with Chengguan District" may be workable but apparently disliked by all parties. Give us a workable definition and I may reconsider. But we've been arguing this for days and all I see from you is vagueness as to definition. Granted, this is not a courtroom, but in a courtroom such vagueness will never fly.

Perhaps I am too much of a stickler for non-vague, definitive definitions, but in this case, particularly with geographical features, we need concrete definitions, or otherwise the article will fall into utter confusion. That's my motivation - non-vague, non-POV, workable definitions, not generalized statements that creates confusion. --Nlu (talk) 21:57, 1 February 2015 (UTC)

Put in another way, with an example that has nothing to do with the PRC - at least I consider it to have nothing to do with the PRC (some PRC-favoring editors may disagree) - traditionally, Xindian and Ankeng (see zh:安坑地區) are considered separate communities, although, when the administrative boundaries became more definitive during the Japanese rule, they were put into the same township (later county-controlled city and then district of New Taipei during ROC rule). Today Ankeng is still, in the popular consciousness, considered not really part of what one talks about when one talks about Xindian. But that doesn't mean that, assuming that an article is to be created to talk of the area of "Xindian District minus Ankeng" that it should then supplant the Xindian District article and cause it to become "Xindian (district)." Further, assuming an article is to be created for Ankeng (and as noted here, one exists on Chinese Wikipedia), a proper, definitive definition should be given for Ankeng so that we are not left with vagaries where everyone writing the article has a different idea of what "Ankeng" is. The Chinese Wikipedia article for Ankeng precisely defines it as west of Xindian Creek and north of the ridge line of Tutan Mountain (zh:塗潭山) up to the northwestern boundary of Xindian District. That is a sufficiently precise, workable definition. None of the definitions that you have suggested for the smaller city of Lhasa is workable and NPOV.

Similarly, had you been suggesting an article of "Palo Alto" that includes Stanford University (commonly thought of as part of Palo Alto, although actually never been as a matter of law) and changing the Palo Alto, California article into "Palo Alto, California (city)," I would also be objecting to it as strongly as inaccurate (although not necessarily vague - although it may then be potentially be vague as to whether it includes the SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, part of the university but partially within the boundaries of the city of Menlo Park, California). And that is less vague than what you are suggesting. Come up with a workable definition, and perhaps we can talk. Otherwise, it comes down to, "I don't like this definition of 'Lhasa' but I don't really have a workable definition." When a proposal creates just as much, if not more, problems than it solves (and I do acknowledge that it solves some problems) and, in the process, breaks naming conventions that have served us well, then as far as I am concerned it's a proposal that doesn't make sense. Particularly when it fails to acknowledge that the problems it purports to solve exists throughout China - throughout the world, for that matter - and that naming conventions needed to allow some problems to be unsolved to avoid creating bigger problems. --Nlu (talk) 22:35, 1 February 2015 (UTC)

Yet another example that's close to me (geographically) that has nothing to do with the PRC: on the westside of Cupertino, California (where I live) are a patchwork of residential areas, some of which are within the City of Cupertino and some of which are not. (Basically, it comes down to that whenever a new development of one or more houses are to be built, the county requires that the owner applies to have it annexed to the city of Cupertino, but otherwise, older properties are allowed to stay outside the city of Cupertino.) In the popular perception, these unannexed-areas are part of Cupertino - they carry Cupertino addresses and are part of the same school district. Yet the Cupertino article should not include them, because they are not part of Cupertino as a matter of law. I would object hard if you wanted to create a "Cupertino (postal area)" article as unnecessary, but even if arguendo "unnecessary" isn't a proper objection, the Cupertino article certainly shouldn't be renamed and certainly statistically should not include these unannexed areas. And even then, there has to be a non-vague definition of what this extra article would be: it would probably have to be an article that contains a definition that coincides with the 95014 ZIP code, rather than a vague statement about what is popularly perceived as "Cupertino" - because there will be differences in perception as to what is "Cupertino." (The west side of San Jose, near De Anza Boulevard, is commonly (mistakenly) thought to be part of Cupertino, for example, but is part of San Jose.) --Nlu (talk) 23:28, 1 February 2015 (UTC)

Regardless, we're going around in circles. It seems like nobody's convincing anybody here. (I would suggest that perhaps I am as guilty as anyone on this, but I think a major problem is a failure to acknowledge weaknesses in one's positions when arguing the strengths in one's position; if one fails to acknowledge weakness, then arguments will be ultimately unconvincing.) I think you should go ahead and put together a proposal and see if the rest of the community will chime in when responding to the proposal. I still do think that WP:RM is the right mechanism, but there certainly can be other mechanisms. --Nlu (talk) 21:54, 1 February 2015 (UTC)

• For some reason the small city of Lhasa fascinates people, which is one of the reasons why it deserves a focused article. The problem is to select only the most relevant information from the mass of sources. Where there are different definitions the obvious approach is to give them all, citing the sources: "The old city of Lhasa, as of 1670, was... By 1893 it had grown to... The Chengguan District covers... According to Xinhua..." It is unlikely that editors will fight over which view is definitive. If they do, we can sort it out. Aymatth2 (talk) 03:07, 2 February 2015 (UTC)

Perhaps a bit of a gruesome example, but hot off the press on the TransAsia crash: [3] Note that it was described to be "near the capital of Taipei" even though the crash site is well within the boundaries of the city (in fact, close to geographic center). Still not a good reason to exclude anything but the area within the old Qing city (roughly modern day Zhongzheng District) from the Taipei article. --Nlu (talk) 05:48, 4 February 2015 (UTC)

Moving forward

I confess to being stuck over the next step. With respect to everyone who has worked on the article, the decision to combine the former prefecture and the urban district in one article has created a very confusing result. We are told that Lhasa is a prefecture-level city that consists of one district and seven counties, it covers almost 30,000 km² (12,000 sq mi), and the valley location protects it from intense cold or heat. That is a massive valley. There is very little of the information one would expect of an article about a large area like this: extent, geology, topography, hydrology, flora and fauna, archaeology, history (of the region), demography, economy and so on. What little there is often gives no sources. Almost all the text is about the small city. The term "Lhasa" is almost always used for the small city, and almost all the pictures are of the small city. But the article is meant to be about the prefecture-level city. It would surely be cleaner to separate the region and the city into different articles and then expand the one on the region to provide the missing information. Aymatth2 (talk) 16:17, 4 February 2015 (UTC)

I do not like the idea of using the Requested Move (RM) approach, because that gives the impression that the proposal is to move Lhasa to a different title, when in fact it is just to move a few paragraphs into a new article on the region in preparation for expanding that article. The best title for the new article is also debatable. I lean towards "Lhasa (prefecture-level city)", with or without parentheses. I suppose "Lhasa City" is technically more correct, and that could be handled with a hatnote. I could see an RM discussion getting as confused as the article, and going nowhere. A waste of everyone's time. I thought briefly of asking here if anyone would object to my creating an article on the prefecture-level city, covering all the geology, geography etc., followed immediately by a Requested Merge into Lhasa. This way editors could see the difference in scope and character of the two subjects. Then I thought a better way would be to add the missing information to the front of this article, effectively making it a two-part article, one all about the region, followed by one all about the city. With that as a starting point, perhaps the RM would work. Aymatth2 (talk) 16:17, 4 February 2015 (UTC)

Long story. Anyway, I checked for sources on the extent, geology, geography, demography and so on of the region. I discovered that the Lhasa terrane came from Australia and some other odd facts. I also discovered that it is very hard indeed to find anything meaningful about the region in online sources, including Google Books and Jstor. There are masses of sources about Lhasa, the small city, and hardly any about Lhasa, the former prefecture. That confirms in spades that the small city is the primary topic, almost certainly what a reader is looking for. It also means that making a decent article about the administrative area could be a tough slog, unless some hidden trove of information shows up. Not sure what the next step should be. Aymatth2 (talk) 16:17, 4 February 2015 (UTC)

I am now actually more convinced than I was at the start of this discussion that the better approach is to beef up the contents Lhasa article to make it clear that the prefecture-level city and the ancient city have connections but are not coterminal. The problem with having a separate "small city" article is that there is no good way to define the boundaries of the "small city." Conceptually, I don't disagree with it, but in practice it is problematic, the more that I think in comparison with cities in the United States and elsewhere. And, again, similarly, editors through the years have had to make the same approach with, for example, Chongqing and Beijing and, again, in non-PRC situations, Los Angeles and Tokyo. If there is a easily definable way for the boundaries of the "small city," I wouldn't be having as much problems with it. In light of the fact that no one reading Tokyo properly should be confused to think that the the ancient city of Edo is coterminal with the current city of Tokyo, or, for that matter, Tokyo at the time that it was renamed Tokyo is coterminal as the Tokyo of today, I find it (for the lack of a better way to put it) disrespectful of readers' intelligence that they would think that the prefecture-level city was what the city was back in ancient times. The Rome article is not just the seven hills (although it was what Rome was at one point).

Another major reason (and I still haven't seen any convincing argument otherwise) is that the WP:NC-ZH naming scheme has worked extremely well. It has led the editors to productively improve the PRC city articles throughout the years, without getting into unnecessary disputes, including potentially politically-charged ones, about how large the city areas should be deemed. In cases where the cities' administrative boundaries don't fit popular conception of the cities, the city articles have generally explained that fact well. It is not perfect - and perhaps the Lhasa situation points out its limitations. But the limitations can be dealt by content improvement without tearing up the naming convention. Sure, naming conventions can be broken, but shouldn't be broken without considering the consequences, which I am not convinced have been thought through. Is there a problem with having Lhasa refer to the prefecture-level city? Yes, as I have acknowledged. But the alternatives - including the main one proposed by Aymatth2 - all appear more problematic to me. It is not that I am (at least I think) as inflexible as the Song emperors who effectively got bound by the rule of, "The ancestors' rules should never be changed." But the naming convention drafters appear to have created a consistent scheme that works well. Breaking it up for relatively minor reasons appears to me to be asking for major trouble where none, or little, currently exists. I have seen little acknowledgement, let alone solution, of the issues that moving away from it would create, and it is the lack of a solution that convinces me that moving away from it is unwise.

As far as what Aymatth2 said about "it is very hard indeed to find anything meaningful about the region in online sources, including Google Books and Jstor. There are masses of sources about Lhasa, the small city, and hardly any about Lhasa, the former prefecture," I would beg to differ. In fact, all the objectively available data that we have is pretty much about the prefecture-level city and its political subdivisions (including that of Chengguan District), not about the "small city." The population. The surface area. The demographics. That is because these objective data are given in PRC sources - which, I realize, is kind of a chicken-or-the-egg problem. But it is precisely we have that problem that I believe we have an additional problem in moving away from using administrative boundaries - we have no idea what the "small city"'s population is, its surface area is, or its demographics. When, for example, the Tibet exile government headed by the Dalai Lama asserted that Lhasa (the small city) now has a majority-Han population due to Han immigration, it becomes an unverifiable claim because we do not know what the definition of the small city is based on the Tibetan exile government's assertion - and therefore can't cross-check it against the demographics of Chengguan District or "Chengguan District+." The PRC-provided information, obviously, is itself politically tinted. But it has at least some definitive definitions (if, again, tinted), whereas "the small city" has none of those, unless we tighten the definition of the "small city" into an objectively definable area, and it appears to me that everyone else objects to defining the small city as Chengguan District. But without such a definition, the "small city" article is going to fall into a subjective mess.

In any case, if, as Aymatth2 suggests, there is to be a "Lhasa (small city)" and "Lhasa (prefecture-level city)" split (whatever those articles are to be called in actuality), then it seems to me that the request should be to move Lhasa to the new proposed name of the prefecture-level city article, and then, if passed, content migration starts. I still find the entire idea unwise the more I think about it and the more I think of the analogies that this has with the examples raised in this thread. Lhasa is more similar to those cases than it is different, and the fact that we don't have similar breaks in convention in those cases and yet are still able to convey the proper information in those articles convinces me that creating a "Lhasa (small city)" (again, whatever it is called) article without an objectively defined boundary is simply asking for trouble. --Nlu (talk) 03:05, 5 February 2015 (UTC)

• There are not many sources on Lhasa Municipality itself, but plenty on its components. I may start an overview-style article in user space, then request a move to mainspace. That way editors will be able to see what they are being asked to comment on. "Municipality" seems the best qualifier. Aymatth2 (talk) 01:59, 22 February 2015 (UTC)

• Calling Lhasa a municipality is incorrect. Strictly speaking, only the four provincial-level cities in China are officially called municipalities, and Lhasa is not one of them. See Municipality of China and China Today. -Zanhe (talk) 04:52, 22 February 2015 (UTC)

• The article Prefecture-level city gives prefectural level municipality as an alternate title. Direct-controlled municipalities of China#Position in hierarchy says, "Some cities of lower levels may also refer to themselves as municipalities in the English language." Lhasa is one of them. It is common to find news reports that refer to "Lhasa Municipal Government" or "Lhasa Municipal CPPCC" and so on. This book is one of many that attempts a definition: "Lhasa Municipality, a prefecture-level city covering almost thirty thousand square kilometers." A useful discussion is given in Deciphering Lhasa’s Urbanization. Still, I am open to suggestions for alternative titles. Aymatth2 (talk) 12:48, 22 February 2015 (UTC)
• I have not yet started the user space article on the administrative region formerly known as Lhasa Prefecture, but am digging around and starting or expanding sub-articles and should make a start on the main article in a week or two, inshallah. I worry that when I propose a move to mainspace it will be rejected because of disagreement over what the article should be titled. I do not care if it is "Lhasa Municipality", "Lhasa municipality", "Lhasa (municipality)", "Lhasa (prefecture-level city)", "Lhasa (prefectoral-level city)", whatever. But I do not want "we can't agree what to call it" being taken as "it should not exist".

@Zanhe:, @Dr. Blofeld:, @Nlu: How can we separate quibbles over the target name from a serious discussion about having two articles rather than one? How can we focus the discussion on the proposed move of the yet-to-be-written article to the existential question? Aymatth2 (talk) 03:54, 24 February 2015 (UTC)

I am not sure what the question is. My own gathered thoughts (at least I think they are gathered) is that if there is to be a "Lhasa (small city)" article, it should be focused on the historical city and make it clear that it is not coterminal with the prefectural city but also without an assertion that it is the "real" Lhasa (because we don't really know where the "real" Lhasa ends, as an objective matter), and at the same time not break the current naming convention. (Again, that's because, in my view, no convincing argument has been made for breaking the naming convention.) One possibility, I think, is History of Lhasa. --Nlu (talk) 07:46, 24 February 2015 (UTC)

• @Nlu: I am assuming that the article on "Lhasa" should refer to the small city, talking about its history, economy, architecture, culture and so on, since that is overwhelmingly what readers will expect it to be about. Google news and books searches make it clear that is the primary topic. Another article should cover the former prefecture. If you reject the idea of two articles, and think one article should cover both the former prefecture and the small city, vote "merge" on the move request. If you accept the idea of two articles, how do we avoid the move request getting bogged down on the question of the name for the article on the former prefecture? Aymatth2 (talk) 12:17, 24 February 2015 (UTC)

  It sounds to me that you are asking, "How should we proceed with an ill-advised move that is not going to be ill-advised?" I don't have an answer to that. And I disagree that "that is overwhelmingly what the readers will expect it to be about." In a way, that statement is true, but in another major sense, it is not. Readers come to Luoyang because it is a historical city, I'm sure, and the boundaries of historical Luoyang are very different than the boundaries of the modern (prefecture-level) city of Luoyang. But the Luoyang article, for good reasons, cover the prefecture-level city. Remember that both cities are millennia-old cities. People wanting to find out about the ancient city of Luoyang and the modern city of Luoyang will start with the Luoyang article, as is appropriate, and then they can be directed to articles about the historical significance of Luoyang as an ancient city. Same thing can and should be done with Lhasa.

  I understand the rationale for having a separate "small city" article. But that article should not entrench what your mindset is (to be very frank about it) but should be open-minded. You are stuck in the "but the prefecture-level city is not Lhasa!" mindset. That may very well be one good way to look at it, but on the other hand it creates vast dangers of original research and unverifiable content. Further (as we seem to be going around and around on this with no acknowledgment of any kind from you) this situation is not unique to Lhasa, but applies to every single Chinese (or, for that matter, world) city with a lengthy history. (Or, for that matter, not-terribly-lengthy-history or not-terribly-large, as I thought my example with Cupertino and Palo Alto demonstrated. Such demonstrative examples, however, seem to be met with silence and non-response from you.) Breaking up the naming convention for one city is ill-advised. There are better ways of addressing the concerns that you raise by beefing up the contents of Lhasa and the name-to-be-determined article. Again, having taken some time off from the issue to think about it further, I am now of the belief that a separate History of Lhasa article more appropriately addresses the topic. An article that deals with the "present small city of Lhasa" with ill-defined boundaries simply invites original research.

  I will also say: the characterization of this as "a petty squabble" is demeaning to others. It suggests that arguments that others make with evidence backing them up are things not worth your time to address. I would say: not so. Again, I understand the point of wanting to have a separate "small city" article. But that kind of an article, while having its value, should have proper historical and definable constraints. So far, again, I feel that you are coming up with vagaries. "The area in the valley" is about as definitive as you ever got in the discussion. That's still not definitive enough. Moreover, there is no present verifiable data for the demographics or the economy of the "area in the valley." There are such data for the prefecture-level city. There are such data for Chengguan District (and other subdivisions of the prefecture-level city). But not for the area in the valley (or alternative suggestions). That's why I am saying that if we are to avoid original research, a separate article that focuses on historical aspects may be the best thing to do.

  But at the risk of undermining my own point - but I think I should - it appears that there may be sources that do define what the city of Lhasa's boundaries were before the PRC takeover. The PRC Lhasa City governmental Web site suggests that there were, in fact, defined boundaries that were gradually enlarged, both before and after the PRC takeover. (See here.) However, that governmental Web site article is (deliberately? politically?) vague about what those boundaries were, but they suggest that there may be more proper ways to define the city than what we have available right now. If you are willing to contact the Tibetan government in exile to see whether they actually can point us to definable boundaries with verifiable sources, that will remove a large part of my objection. But I still believe that there is no reason to break up the naming convention for one city; the small city article can be named something else. I've suggested "History of Lhasa," but I would be just as satisfied with "Lhasa (urban area)" or "Lhasa (historical city)" or "Lhasa (city proper)" or something of that nature. But breaking up a naming convention when this situation is not only not unique but prevalent throughout China (and fairly common elsewhere in the world) is unwise. And there is no way for me to suggest a wise way to carry out an unwise course of action. You simply can't ignore the problems that breaking up this naming convention will create and effectively say, "OK, my head is in the sand. Now what should we do next?"

  As a final lament: it pains me to be effectively arguing for what might seem as an affirmation of the status-quo-imposed-by-guns-of-the-PRC. But when there are no real verifiable, non-original research definition of what a smaller city is, and when the current naming convention works well, I do feel that it is unwise to do anything but follow that convention. For decades, the maps in Taiwan, where I was born and spent the first cycle of my life, ignored the PRC political reality and continued to use provincial/municipal boundaries that were official to the ROC. The maps eventually became effectively useless because of the lack of acknowledgment of reality. The sources that we may see and people may cite that resulted in the Google search results are effectively frozen reality from the time of the PRC invasion, because Tibet is so closed off (much more so than other parts of China, even). It is not the political, demographic, or economic reality that Lhasa currently is in. It's wrong. It's imposed by blood (Chinese and Tibetan alike). It's still reality. And the only verifiable reality, regrettably. (And as an aside on the out-of-date Taiwanese maps of China issue - but which I think is actually demonstrative of the problems that we have here with unverifiable boundaries - those Taiwanese maps did not have county/city boundaries for the mainland Chinese provinces (only mapping the county seats, as well as prominent towns that were not county seats, as dots), basically because I think they, with wisdom (as limited by the political situation) realized that they did not have usable verifiable boundaries for the counties because they couldn't use the old boundaries (due to lack of data) or the new boundaries (because they did not want to acknowledge PRC boundaries), so they left the boundaries off the map. Whether we wish to acknowledge the boundaries imposed by the PRC or not, they are also, by this point, the only verifiable boundaries that we have absent some definitive sources about what the pre-PRC Lhasa's boundaries were.) (As I've written above, it's possible that they exist somewhere in a verifiable source.) --Nlu (talk) 16:34, 24 February 2015 (UTC)

• @Nlu:. I have no idea where "petty squabble" came from. Perhaps some other discussion. I take it that when I request a move into mainspace of the draft article on the prefecture-level region you will either vote to merge it into Lhasa, or after seeing what it looks like you will support the move. It would, I think, be incorrect for you to object to the move on the basis that you dislike the proposed title when you have refused to suggest an alternative. Aymatth2 (talk) 17:49, 24 February 2015 (UTC)

  I have suggested an alternative: "Lhasa." With the "small city" article being named one of the various alternatives that I've suggested above. I am noting that you are still not responding to my substantive points on why doing otherwise is unwise. You may disagree, but a lack of response is disconcerting. The fact that you don't like my suggestion is not the same as I haven't suggested anything. The "small city" article should be named something else with a definable scope. --Nlu (talk) 17:56, 24 February 2015 (UTC)

  And this is what you wrote: "How can we separate quibbles over the target name from a serious discussion[?]" I find this attitude dismissive and unproductive particularly when you hadn't (as I've had to say for the nth time) addressed any of the problems that would be presented with deviating from the naming convention. And your response suggests to me that you haven't seriously read anything that I wrote above, let alone address them. Whether you agree with them or not, I've written my objections in good faith, and it does upset me that as far as you are concerned, you seem to be hearing none of it. --Nlu (talk) 17:58, 24 February 2015 (UTC)

  And, despite your claims of not wanting to POV-fork an article, it seems to me that that is exactly what's going on. If you have positive contributions to make to a prefecture-city level article (which I'm sure you do), you can add those things to the present Lhasa article and then we can worry about whether the consensus is to move it. By creating a separate article (even in your own name space) it seems to me that you want to then create it as a fait accompli eventually and go, "Well, it's too valuable to waste." That, I would submit, is the classic POV-forking. I would suggest you put the contents in the Lhasa article now (suggestion only - I can't force you to do it, and we're all volunteers, not having obligations to do anything, I realize) and then consider the movement later. --Nlu (talk) 18:04, 24 February 2015 (UTC)

Quoting from WP:POV fork:

In contrast, POV forks generally arise when contributors disagree about the content of an article or other page. Instead of resolving that disagreement by consensus, another version of the article (or another article on the same subject) is created to be developed according to a particular point of view. This second article is known as a "POV fork" of the first, and is inconsistent with Wikipedia policies. The generally accepted policy is that all facts and major points of view on a certain subject should be treated in one article. As Wikipedia does not view article forking as an acceptable solution to disagreements between contributors, such forks may be merged, or nominated for deletion.

Since what qualifies as a "POV fork" can itself be based on a POV judgement, it may be best not to refer to the fork as "POV" except for in extreme cases of persistent disruptive editing. Instead, apply Wikipedia's policy that requires a neutral point of view: regardless of the reasons for making the fork, it still must be titled and written in a neutral point of view. It could be that the fork was a good idea, but was approached without balance, or that its creators mistakenly claimed ownership over it.

The most blatant POV forks are those which insert consensus-dodging content under a title that should clearly be made a redirect to an existing article; in some cases, editors have even converted existing redirects into content forks. However, a new article can be a POV fork even if its title is not a synonym of an existing article's title. If one has tried to include one's personal theory that heavier-than-air flight is impossible in an existing article about aviation, but the consensus of editors has rejected it as patent nonsense, that does not justify creating an article named "Unanswered questions about heavier-than-air flight" to expound the rejected personal theory.

The creator of the new article may be sincerely convinced that there is so much information about a certain aspect of a subject that it justifies a separate article. Any daughter article that deals with opinions about the subject of parent article must include suitably-weighted positive and negative opinions, and/or rebuttals, if available, and the original article should contain a neutral summary of the split article. There is currently no consensus whether a "Criticism of..." article is always a POV fork, but many criticism articles nevertheless suffer from POV problems. If possible, refrain from using "criticism" and instead use neutral terms such as "perception" or "reception"; if the word "criticism" must be used, make sure that such criticism considers both the merits and faults, and is not entirely negative (consider what would happen if a "Praise of..." article was created instead).

Please read these criteria and see that you are quite fitting these criteria even if arguably not completely so. Read each paragraph. Examine whether what you are doing is exactly this. --Nlu (talk) 18:07, 24 February 2015 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.