Talk:British Isles/Archive 4

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Contents

Wading in

Well, I suppose since I went to the trouble of reading through this morass, I should comment.

A few points. For me, the most important issue is that we need an article about the island group that includes "Great Britain, Ireland, and nearby islands". It seems to me that there is no doubt that the only name in common usage for this assemblage is the "British Isles." Various other names have been suggested, but none has really caught on.

Now, in terms of the issue of controversy, it seems to me there are two questions, which have sometimes been conflated:

  1. Is the use of "British Isles" controversial?
  2. Does the term "British Isles" necessarily include Ireland?

The answer to the first question would appear to be "yes." It would appear that the term tends to be avoided in Ireland, and that at least a fair number of people in Ireland object to the usage of "British Isles" as implying British political supremacy over the Republic.

The answer to the second question seems to me to also be "yes." Certainly there are many people who don't use the term (although I think the degree of controversy has been exaggerated here), but when the term is used, it is almost always used to include Ireland. Exceptions may be found, I'm sure, but I think it's much more fair to say that "a lot of Irish people don't use the term 'British Isles' because they find it politically objectionable," than to say "a lot of [Irish] people use the term 'British Isles' as excluding Ireland, because they find Ireland's inclusion to be politically objectionable."

The use of "British Isles" in a way which excludes Ireland is also, so far as I can tell, incoherent. Can anyone point to a geographical reference that uses the term "British Isles," but excludes Ireland?

Taking this idea to its logical conclusion, it would apparently mean that part of the United Kingdom (Northern Ireland) is not part of the British Isles. Or are we to assume that Northern Ireland is part of the British Isles, but the Republic of Ireland is not? If Ireland is excluded, what about the Isle of Man, also not part of the UK? If someone can point to a coherent definition of "British Isles" in a way which excludes Ireland, so much the better, but so far the best that has been provided is a quote from a politician in a letter not primarily concerned with geography, and a whole lot of assertion.

The basic fact is that nearly everybody who doesn't like the term "British Isles" as a term inclusive of Ireland simply doesn't use the term. Most everyone who uses the term "British Isles" uses it to include Ireland.

So, hopefully having dealt with the "the term British Isles may not include Ireland" complaint [okay, I'm sure I haven't successfully dealt with it, but moving on...], there arises the question of how to deal with the fact that the term is controversial. It seems to me that this needs to be discussed on this page, and that there needs to be some discussion of the history of the term (such as it is). But it still seems to me that the article should be mostly about geography, because while the term obviously has other connotations, the reason to have an encyclopedia article called British Isles is to have a term to use to describe the geographical area (which is essentially United Kingdom+Republic of Ireland+Isle of Man, as far as I can tell) which is normally referred to as the "British Isles." But I feel like I'm losing the thread, so I'll end there. john k 23:58, 6 July 2006 (UTC)

Nice wading. The take-home message of your post seems to be that there are two possibilities: 1) Majority view: The British Isles are a geographical term for Ireland, Great Britain, Isle of Man, etc, but the term may be politically controversial. 2) Significant minority view: The British Isles were once a geographical term for Ireland, Great Britain, Isle of Man, etc, but this term is no longer (or should no longer) be used. The current article is factually wrong by stating that the inclusion of Ireland is controversial. The inclusion of Ireland isn't controversial. The term itself is controversial, and the point of dispute is whether the land masses should be called "Ireland, Great Britain, and Isle of Man" or "the British Isles." Flying Jazz 01:27, 7 July 2006 (UTC)
Or the "Anglo-Celtic Isles" or whatever other neologisms have come along. (And I think the article has to stay at British Isles, because there's simply no other name in truly common use.) john k 02:02, 7 July 2006 (UTC)
I accept that most of the world uses the term "British Isles" to describe the group of islands in question. I've lived in a number of countries and can testify that there are people who use the term, believing that if reflects a political reality, i.e. that all of Ireland remains under British rule.
By maintaining in the article that the term "British Isles" is used/or has a geographical or other validity, we are simply perpetuating this ignorance.
I've lived in Germany for years and am currently living in Greece. In both these countries, the terms Scotland and Wales are practically unknown, and the majority view (even among educated types) is that England is coterminous with Britain, and even the United Kingdom.
It is interesting that the Wikipedia article on England acknowledges this confusion, and I think the wording could (and should) be adopted here.
"England" is sometimes used incorrectly as a synonym for Great Britain or the United Kingdom, usually arising from innocent confusion over local geopolitical terminology.
If Wikipedia is all about reflecting usage and taking into account how terms are understood by people around the world rather than how they are defined, and if British Isles remains as Feline1, TharkunColl, Dave souza & co would have it, then the article on England will have to be similarly altered to reflect the worldwide view that England is coterminous with Britain. --Damac 07:29, 7 July 2006 (UTC)
I thought that the British Isles (terminology) was there for just that purpose and, if needed, any article needing to clarify what'what can refer to it. --Bazza 08:30, 7 July 2006 (UTC)
Sigh. "British Isles" is a term which properly refers to Great Britain, Ireland, and neighboring islands. This is what it was originally defined to mean, and what it still generally means. That a lot of people are ignorant is completely immaterial. There's a difference between a misconception and a term which can promote misconception. There are all kinds of names which can promote or suggest misconceptions. We shouldn't avoid them because of this, we merely have to be careful to explain it, and, as Bazza suggests, British Isles (terminology) does just this. This article also explains the issue. Nobody reading the article would come away confused about the political realities. I would add that the "England" issue is a bit misleading. I'm sure there are people who have misconceptions based on it. But if you look at the history of usage, "England" was used as a synonym for "UK" pretty consistently in the 19th century, including by British people. Such people were not actually saying that "England" and the UK were coterminous, they were just using synecdoche - England is the main part of the UK. Similarly, people often called the Kingdom of Sardinia "Piedmont," even though Piedmont was only one part of it, and was not in the official name. People called the King of the Two Sicilies "the king of Naples", even though half of his kingdom was the island of Sicily, and not properly called that (and, indeed, "King of Naples" was never an official title, just an informal one, except perhaps under the Bonapartist kings). That this synecdoche promoted misconceptions is almost certainly true, and that it was based on an anglocentric view of Britain and the British Isles is also true. But it is ridiculous to pretend that anyone who uses "England" to refer to the UK is doing so because they don't know that Scotland and Wales are not technically part of England. john k 09:21, 7 July 2006 (UTC)
Are you sure about that last part John? After all, Northern Ireland is part of the UK, and you didn't include it with Scotland and Wales. Perhaps you didn't know. --Mal 09:05, 24 July 2006 (UTC)
Baisically agree with the above. It would be original research to move this page to a title other than British Isles, and it goes to pains to describe the situation. John k's sumamry baisically sates my position. --Robdurbar 09:24, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

Awkward

By the way, what's with "for the group of islands, or islands, or an archipelago," - all these terms mean the same thing, why on earth do we need to include the same information three times? This is incredibly awkward. john k 00:00, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

Official Documents Never Use The Term

I'm afraid I have to take issue with this. Official RoI government documents and minutes do use the term.

All these are official reports and minutes from both the Dáil and the Seanad. Ben W Bell talk 18:22, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

Some needed refs

Jtdirl, would you please provide some refs and explanations for your recent RV and additions, namely:

  • "...largely coterminus with the former..." do you intend coterminous as in the regions had the same boundaries, or coterminous as in the terms were synonymous?
  • "...part or all of Ireland" how can an archipelago contain part of an island?
  • A number of editors have raised issues with the Lloyd George footnote, would you please address those concerns?
  • could you provide a ref for "...widely disputed in Ireland and elsewhere"?
  • could you provide a ref for the claim that British Islands was intended to replace British Isles when refering to the archipelago?

Thanks, EricR 00:37, 8 July 2006 (UTC)

Two viewpoints

Martin, in a nutshell there are two viewpoints. One, expressed strongly by Jtdirl/FearÉIREANN, is that, increasingly, everyone tries to avoid using the term, and that almost every sentence in the intro should deprecate the term or emphasise that it offends millions of people. The other, which is my view, is that such controversy clearly exists in the Republic of Ireland and possibly to a lesser extent elsewhere, that as JFE says it has become "politically incorrect" in some diplomatic and academic circles, but that the term is still much more widely used with no intent to "oppress" anyone and the introduction should start with a one sentence paragraph giving this common definition without caveat before going on to describe the controversy. Both are agreed that the term has no synonym in widespread use. No doubt others hold variations on these themes.

JFE has given an interesting account of proper professional sourcing. I was intrigued by the statement that "The BBC and the Guardian both ask that "British Isles" not be used, or in the latter case, that "British Isles and Ireland" be used if at all possible", since this went against the Guardian article from 2001 cited previously. It states that when "the Guardian style guide has no entry, which is the case here" they turn to a definition in Collins dictionary: "A group of islands in W Europe [in Europe, please note, not quite near to Europe], consisting of Great Britain, Ireland, the Isle of Man, Orkney, the Shetland Islands, the Channel Islands belonging to Great Britain, and the islands adjacent to these." I wondered if the style guide might now have an entry, but that seems not to be the case. Indeed, several [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] more recent examples using the term quite freely turned up in a quick search. Perhaps JFE was going on hearsay, but seems to be in error here. The BBC News style guide which is available as a pdf makes the interesting statement that "The British Isles is not a political entity. It is a geographical unit, the archipelago off the west coast of continental Europe covering Scotland, Wales, England, Northern Ireland, the Republic of Ireland, the Isle of Man and the Channel Islands." The recent TV series by Alan Titchmarsh: British Isles: A Natural History, is currently widely available in book form under the same title. Which just goes to show the importance of reliable sources and not the fascinating anecdotes which I am sure JFE has come across as being entirely convincing in his usual company.

By the way, MelForbes, sorry to hear of your detestation of the term "British", shame that you won't enjoy the tales of Para Handy, "Chust wan of Brutain's hardy sons". ...dave souza, talk 07:00, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

dave souza, please don't misquote me, please read again. I said the words "British Isles", not Britannica or Britain. It shouldn't be classed as one as there are 3 nations on it namely, Wales, Scotland and England, and it's quite a large island too, it's more a land mass than an island. When you start misquoting me over over my very clear and simple input, then I really do wonder about your other edits! And BTW, if the Channel Islands are part of the British Isles as you state, then it is quite clear that the term "British Isles" is a political term. Get your atlas and have a look! MelForbes 10:23, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
Clarification, you detested the British Isles, then went on about things British. Fair enough. Note that it's not me stating that the Channel Islands are part of the group, but the Guardian and BBC definitions that others had already misrepresented (unless there's a secret policy I've not found). Trust you'll restrict your viewing to commercial channels to avoid upset. ..dave souza, talk 10:56, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

Dave, you are misquoting me again! I said I detested the name "British Isles" and not Britain or the name Britain. Looking back on my edit, maybe "detest" was too strong a word to use, and ill-judged, but it's done. Really I don't want to labour this, it is a political label amd the centre of Britain is London, not Scotland, not Wales, but London! If you are comfortable with this, that's fine by me, everyone to their own views! MelForbes 11:28, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

Isn't the centre of Britain more likely to be Cumbria or thereabouts? London seems a bit far south to me. That being the case, I have no problem in terms of comfort level, with Cumbria being the centre of Britain - short of millions of megatons of explosive power, I think there's probably very little I could do about it if I were uncomfortable with it. --Mal 09:22, 24 July 2006 (UTC)
What do you mean by Britain? Be factually correct as you wish others to be — the island you refer to above (Scotland, England and Wales) is Great Britain, which is just one component of the British Isles. And what exactly is the difference between a land mass and an island? --Bazza 12:25, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
Technically America is an island for it is sorrounded by sea, but all those thousands of islands off the coast of Canada are not called the American Isles! MelForbes 13:34, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
Shows how easy it is to trip over these terms! MelForbes, I apologise for misunderstanding your post and am glad that you have no problems with the name Britain. All these labels are indeed political, and also to a greater or lesser extent geographical. Whether caveats in every sentence give undue weight to dispute about their suitability is the question in hand. ..dave souza, talk 12:33, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
I would recommend avoiding the term Britain on its own. British Isles (terminology) lists two meanings for it, which means it is ambiguous unless qualified each time it is used. --Bazza 12:36, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

Introduction

Why is the naming dispute given so much priority in the introduction — over half of it. One paragraph on that topic should be enough in the lead, the rest should be in the terminology section. --Bazza 12:34, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

And, again on the introduction, what is the logic behind the order in which the main islands are listed? Is it alphabetical, largest first, smallest first, or Irish first? I don't care what order is used as long as it is NPOV and has some validity. --Bazza 12:34, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

If one of the countries supposedly in the British Isles has a dispute with the terminology then that has to be explained at the beginning. If the peoples in Great Britain had a dispute over that or other terminology, they too would have a right and expectation to have the fact that there is a dispute stated up front. If you don't state it up front then you are conveying the impression that there isn't a dispute and that is POV. Similarly if either the Unionist or Nationalist community have a major dispute over terminology then it would be only right to make it clear at the start that a dispute exists. Hiding the fact that there is a dispute, and stating one side in the dispute's interpretation as facts, with a mention later on 'oh by the way, a large number of people disagree' is editorialising and POV and not an option. Rob's edits are balanced and neutral. FearÉIREANN\(caint) 13:33, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

If one of the countries supposedly in the British Isles has a dispute with the terminology then that has to be explained at the beginning. No country has any dispute over the term British Isles. --Mal 09:28, 24 July 2006 (UTC)
By my count, the introduction as now has eight sentences, five of which refer directly to the dispute, one refers to avoidance of the term and another states it is sometimes understood to be restricted to UK sovereignty. In addition the disambiguation line refers to contentious. Only the last sentence in the intro is free of such implications. I am glad to see that you are content with Rob's edits that he negotiated with you, but my concern remains that this formulation gives undue weight to a minority position and does not fairly state the normal usage. ..dave souza, talk 13:45, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
What you regard as "normal usage", but what millions of others regard as abnormal and POV usage. Vast numbers of people disagree with your interpretation. The article has to reflect the fact that you are not the only person whose views matter. Get over it. FearÉIREANN\(caint) 14:01, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
But the problem is millions upon millions more people in the English speaking world the world over use the term than the couple of million (potentially) that regard it as abnormal and POV usage. It is not only the considerations of those in the Republic of Ireland that matter, but those of the entire world. Yes I agree that the views of the population of the Republic should be mentioned however they are a minority and that should also be taken into consideration. Ben W Bell talk 14:11, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
You've conveniently ignored both my observations: that the introduction gives undue weight to the naming dispute, I say again One paragraph on that topic should be enough in the lead, the rest should be in the terminology section.. On the logic behind the list of entities in the British Isles, I repeat What is the logic behind the order in which the main islands are listed? Is it alphabetical, largest first, smallest first, or Irish first? I don't care what order is used as long as it is NPOV and has some validity..—The preceding unsigned comment was added by Bazza 7 (talk • contribs) 07:50, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

Is it proper to use the phrase "seceded in 1922" within the introduction? My understaning of the term "secession" would strongly imply the date should be 1919. Also the citation referring to 1920 in the Channel Islands section above (the authors seemingly interchanging "Southern Ireland" and "Irish Free State") is adding to my current confusion. EricR 15:35, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

The terminology article uses "became independent", the Irish Free State article uses "separated". Either would seem better than "seceded". ...dave souza, talk 16:26, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
I too would very strongly agree that the controversy surrounding the term is given way too much weight in the introduction. The present intro would be appropriate for an article solely discussing said controversy, but for a general article about the term (as it is understood by almost the entire English speaking world), it is too much. In my opinion, all that is needed in the introduction is to say: "The use of the term in considered controversial by some, especially those in the Republic of Ireland (see Terminology)". Martin 16:23, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

I would have thought that the standard we should be applying is that we should not attempt to represent the dispute as if a view held by a small minority deserved as much attention as a majority view, and accept that giving undue weight to a significant-minority view might be misleading as to the shape of the dispute. We should avoid nationalistic bias on either side, presenting each view fairly. There clearly and understandably is the view that using the word "British" has an unfair implication of sovereignty, but while this view might be endemic in the Republic of Ireland and in certain political parties elsewhere, it is clearly not the view of much of the world. That view is clearly expressed by the "Great Britain, Ireland, and adjacent smaller islands" definition given by the The American Heritage® Dictionary and WordNet ® 2.0, © 2003 Princeton University referenced by Dictionary.com, and reflected in the style guides of the Guardian and the BBC as shown in this talk page earlier. While the extreme sensitivity of the significant minority is much appreciated, the views of the majority should surely be respected to the extent of holding back the second mention of the dispute in the article by half a sentence, as I have proposed earlier. Vast numbers of people disagree with the interpretation of one rather vociferous individual who should accept not being the only person whose views matter, and get over it. Of course others will feel that I am conceding too much to that person's pov pushing, and their views should also be given proper consideration. If no respect can be given to what in global terms is the majority view, impartial outside comment might be the way forward. ...dave souza, talk 17:07, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

I think the introduction as it stands at the moment is about right (apart from the spelling of "archipelago") - it makes it clear that "British Isles" is the most commonly used term while also giving an explanation of why a significant minority dislike the term or disagree about which islands are included in it. It is pretty clear that there is "extreme sensitivity" and "pov pushing" on both sides of the argument, not just on one.Rhion 17:50, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
The order of islands is based upon the order in which they came into my head; and quite frankly, that's about as valid and neutral as many of the other justifications that have been put in for various arguments on this talk page ;) --Robdurbar 18:12, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
As for numbers of mentions; I agree it could be cut by a sentence or two, but the problem would be which two sentences? How about merging the 2nd and thrid pargaphs into:
'The use of 'British Isles' to describe the entire archipalego is disputed, particularly in the [[Republic of Irleand]', where official documents and the media tend to avoid this potenttialy offensive term. This is because the islands coincide almost exactly with the former United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, from which the Irish Free State (now the Republic of Ireland seceded in 1922. The word British can be seen as wrongly implying continued United Kingdom sovereignty over the entire archipelago, with British Isles interpreted to mean the islands that are owned/part of Britain.[1] Furthermore, British Isles is sometimes understood to refer only to those parts of the archipalego that are still under British sovereignty. --Robdurbar 18:18, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
Pretty close I think, if we're going to have this information in the introduction at all (which I'm unsure as to whether it should be or not). However if we're keeping it up there then this is close. I'd consider changing "Where official documents and the media tend to avoid this potentially offensive term" to use "often" instead of "tend to" as in our searches it seems to be minorly common but not as common as elsewhere. However I must say I'm still in two minds about this "disputed" as simple searches across sites such as the internal search in the Irish Times (www.ireland.com) shows they do use the term quite often. Ben W Bell talk 18:28, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
Firstly, I'd much prefer the word "controversial" to the word "disputed," as I think that this simply makes more sense. I'm not sure what it means to say a term is "disputed." To say it is controversial makes sense, and is clearly true. Second of all, it's just not true that "British Isles" is ever really used to refer only to those parts of the archipelago still under British sovereignty. The inclusion of the island of Ireland as one of the British Isles is so strong that the British government has made up a new term, British Islands, to refer only to those islands under British control. Nobody has yet provided any clear instance of "British Isles" defined to exclude either the Republic of Ireland or the island of Ireland. The reference to Gorbachev seems like an unnecessary detail. BTW, do we have any evidence that the Soviet foreign ministry actually said that "all of Ireland was ruled by the United Kingdom?" This seems like nonsense. The story as provided by JTD seems to show that Gorbachev thought that the Queen was Ireland's Head of State. That is not the same thing at all. Canada and Australia have the Queen as their head of state without being ruled by the UK. Presumably Gorbachev (who was, after all, meeting with the Taoiseach, and so forth) knew that Ireland was a sovereign state, but was simply unaware that it was a republic, thinking it was a commonwealth realm. john k 19:36, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
Considerations of undue weight should not get in the way of clarity in the lead section. It may be enough to simply note the controversy in the introduction, but the lead should attempt to resolve the ambiguity as much as pratical. There is cited alternate usage as a geopolitical term—but this was moved to the terminology section; and is really not fully explained. Previous versions implied a usage as an archipelago, but excluding Ireland. If this can be cited then it should be mentioned within the introduction. The intro should devote as much space as required to resolve the ambiguity, keeping in mind WP:LEAD. In my opionion doing so does not give undue weight to the controversy.EricR 18:30, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
What is ambiguous about defining the term as it is commonly understood, mentioning that some disagree with the definition or its application, and then providing a link to an appropriate place in the article where the issue is examined more in-depth? I think a separate controversy section might be a good idea; that would go a long way to ensuring the issue is addressed in as much detail as needed, and also that it does not pervade the rest of the article to such an extent that we give it undue weight. Martin 18:46, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
The lead section should stand on it's own as an overview and summary of conflicting usages. My thought is that the introduction should provide the geographically challenged with enough of an overview to recognize differing usage of "British Isles". Text that serves to explain usage should not be subject to "undue weight" arguments, while text which only promotes the controversy should.EricR 19:10, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
It's a good point that the extent of the dispute needs to be verified. Anyway, in my opinion it is essential that the caveat "(despite a terminology dispute)" be removed from the first sentence: it could be replaced with "in purely geographical and historical terms". Whether as a continuation of that paragraph or as the start of the second paragraph, the dispute could be better explained by the following:
In political terms the islands include two sovereign states, the Republic of Ireland and the United Kingdom, and use of the term 'British Isles' to describe the entire archipalego is strongly disputed in the Republic of Ireland and some other contexts as the word "British" is associated with the United Kingdom and the former United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland which included the whole archipelago before the Irish Free State (now the Republic of Ireland) separated in 1922.
The argument appears to me to be rather too developed for the introduction, and the footnote expanding one side of the dispute would be better in the Terminology section: if not, a balancing footnote supporting the other side will be appropriate. ..dave souza, talk 18:51, 10 July 2006 (UTC) modified 18:55, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

Hello, just catching up...business temporarily distracted me from important things like this (I'm not joking!!). Ok, I'm completely square with FearÉIREANN's comments at the top of this section...absolutely spot on! El Gringo, many thanks also for your comments. I'm also totally in agreement with those who have requested a balanced first paragraph...the serious problems with the term need to be highlighted clearly and appropriately, yet the 'Executive Summary' nature of a Wikipedia first paragraph should be preserved. The detailed/thorough explanation of the contentious implications of the term and its avoidance by many can go in a section below - but certainly NOT be hived off to any 'terminology' side article!! [Stupid remarks from some above do not deserve a response.]

To my reasonable English or British colleagues, you should understand exactly my motivation here... Firstly, I love my country dearly and our independence to govern our own future is enormously valued - as anything would be that was aspired to for so long and was bought so dearly. Secondly, due to the international nature of our business, my London-based organisation has 50+ nationalities. When I assumed my position, time after time I was asked if I was British 'because you're from the British Isles' - can you imagine how peeved I was!?! No offence to those of you who are British, but if you were repeatedly mistaken for anything else (particularly a former invader) you'd be rather unhappy also.

I'm going to have to reflect on what we have now and then give you my thoughts (here in discussion)...sure, we have all the time in the world don't we (praise be - something in my life that doesn't have a deadline!!). User:PConlon 22:25, 10 July 2006

Again of the above it is john k's contribution that seems to express the situation more eloquently than the others. Note I used the word 'understood to refer to only those parts that are still under British sovereignty' to indicate that this may not be the intended meaning in some of the given examples. Taking his and other comments into mind leaves with the 2nd and 3rd paragraphs merged into:
'The use of 'British Isles' to describe the entire archipalego is controversial, particularly in the [[Republic of Irleand]', where official documents and the media often avoid this potenttialy offensive term. This is because the islands coincide almost exactly with the former United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, from which the Irish Free State (now the Republic of Ireland seceded in 1922. The word British can be seen as wrongly implying continued United Kingdom sovereignty over the entire archipelago, with British Isles interpreted to mean the islands that are owned/part of Britain. Occaisionally, British Isles is understood to refer only to those parts of the archipalego that are still under British sovereignty. [2]
I think with this forming the second paragraph, and a terminology section straight after in the intro, I could agree with dave souza's comment that this is adequate representation of the debate in the intro (thus removing the caveat from the first paragraph). --Robdurbar 21:47, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

(the above edit conflicted with the 'fresh approach' bit, but I thought I'd leave it in anyway) --Robdurbar 21:47, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

At first reading the balance seems ok to me, and without the caveat in the first paragraph the problem is greatly reduced. My concern is more that we're telling the reader about a controversy involving two countries without first having said anything about the countries, which is why my recent suggestions name the sovereign states first. The question of the boundaries and the various state names seems a bit involved in detail for the intro: it would surely be preferable here to say here something setting out the principle that Ireland separated in 1922 and resents the implied ownership in the wording, going through the state names in the detailed section. The same goes for the footnote, though a balancing footnote at the "most commonly known as" sentence could give the BBC and US definitions. ..dave souza, talk 22:29, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

I think that if we must include the last sentence we should also link to the term British Islands, which is the official British government term for the same thing. But I also think that one academic conference is not sufficient for us to say that this is a genuine usage. I could provide thousands of instances where the term "England" is used to refer to the UK as a whole. In this case we have one instance of this usage. Why do we say this is a legitimate usage? Can we find any actual reference sources which state that a usage of British Isles=British Islands is acceptable? Any style guides of major organizations? Anything besides one academic confernece a month ago? john k 23:22, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

A fresh approach

Just to see if a better balance can be struck, I've tried incorporating the naming question at the outset in a less contentious manner. Here's a proposed first paragraph of the intro:

The large archipelago off the northwest coast of continental Europe most commonly known as the British Isles, and also termed the Islands of the North Atlantic (IONA) or the Anglo-Celtic Isles, includes the islands of Great Britain, Ireland and several thousand surrounding isles. In political terms the islands include two sovereign states, the Republic of Ireland and the United Kingdom, and the alternative names are used as the term 'British Isles' to describe the entire archipalego is controversial in the Republic of Ireland and some other contexts due to the word "British" often being used to imply belonging to the United Kingdom. The archipelago includes the British Crown dependency of the Isle of Man, is commonly defined to include the British Crown dependencies of the Channel Islands which lie close to the coast of France, and sometimes is held to include the Faroe Islands which are an an autonomous region of the Kingdom of Denmark.

This would then be followed by brief paragraphs outlining the content of the main sections, including the name controversy but not letting it get out of proportion. ..dave souza, talk 21:37, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

Hmm, I'm not sure whether the mention of the Faroes is worthwhile (it sounds - and I'm sure that not the intention - rahter expanionist), though it is interesting to include the alternative names in the intro (though on the other hand where does that stop? Also, are these names really that important to go in the intro?) I prefer my above version; but then, I would wouldn't I ;) --Robdurbar 21:50, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
The Faroes really just came up because I was looking in the main article for political status: no great need for them to be there, but on the other hand the only reason to include the Isle of Man is political as it looks from a glance at a map to be rather smaller than some of the Hebrides etc. The main idea was to establish the principle at the outset that alternative names are proposed, and why, without overwhelming the context of the article and focussing the lead on disputes and controversies. ..dave souza, talk 22:37, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
Do we have any sources that include the Faroes as part of the British Isles? If not, we shouldn't mention them. We should mention them if this is actually common usage. john k 23:22, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

As Gringo, PConlon and others have been repeated ad nausaum, re Dave's proposal, the answer is an unambiguous no. The claim that Ireland is covered by the term is widely disputed, not just in Ireland but internationally. (That is why the term is avoided internationally.) The dispute is not political, not is British Isles a geographic term. The dispute is far more complex and the fact that a fundamental dispute exists has to be stated explicitly in the opening. To mispresent the reason for the dispute, state as fact one interpretation and so by implication rubbish the other one, and then bury any detail until later on in the article, is a complete non-starter. You only have to look at the words of the British historian who wrote a book on the history of the archipelago, Norman Davies. He was blunt.

The Isles ceased to be British precisely fifty years ago [he was writing in 1999] when the Republic of Ireland left the Commonwealth, though few people in the British residue have yet cared to notice. (Norman Davies, The Isles Macmillan, 1999. p.xxii.)

The opening paragraph cannot state as fact something disputed internationally, just because British writers are blind to the dispute. Others internationally aren't. It may be inconvenient having to give a detailed explanation at the start, but it has to be there. The only other alternative is to have no definition of what the British Isles is in the opening paragraph. If there is a definition, it has to reflect the different viewpoints, not state one as implicit fact. FearÉIREANN\(caint) 22:20, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

I appreciate your enthusiasm for redefining the English language, though that seems to be what Wikipedia is not. Obviously this is a first draft, and given verifiable fact about the extent to which the term is controversial the wording can be modified in that light. ...dave souza, talk 22:41, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
Well the problem with that is that it gives the views of a small minority equal weight with those of the overwhelming majority (and that doesn't constitute an endorsement of either position). I mean to say, quote a lot of people in Ireland, Great Britain, and North America dispute Northern Ireland's status as part of the UK, but that doesn't mean that the NI article should say that Northern Ireland is "considered by some" to be in the UK. Conversely, it would be ridiculous not to mention the dispute at all and to fail to give it the depth of analysis it deserves. *If* the term is not defined in the introduction as including Ireland, then it cannot be used in that way in the rest of article, thus making this whole article a complete waste of time. And also, if we're going to mention that some consider it does not include Ireland, then we're going to have to stop saying that it's a term used to describe the archipelago; if it doesn't include Ireland, then it clearly is not a term used to describe the archipelago. Martin 23:03, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
A completely false and misleading claim. Firstly it is a demonstrable fact that Northern Ireland is part of the UK. Some people may not like the fact, others do. But fact it is. It is not a demonstrable fact that the name of the archipelago is British Isles. It is a matter of dispute, with states, millions of people, academics, writers and others all disagreeing. Your claim about a "small minority" is so ignorant of facts as to be laughable. "British Isles" is rarely used in Ireland, certainly in any way that implies that Ireland is in it. It is declining in use in Scotland. The EU avoids the term. The US avoids the term where possible. Maybe you regard the rights of English people as superior to everyone else, and their definition as gospel. If this was Englishopedia that might have some relevance, but as it isn't it doesn't. Just because one state has more citizens than another is more irrelevant on Wikipedia. If numbers decided things that way on Wikipedia, then as most Wikipedians are based in the US, Wikipedia would have to be written in American English, using American dates. The default page for the Times would be the New York Times. Queen Elizabeth would be described as Queen of England, American attempts to call the Prince of Wales Mr Charles Windsor would have had to be conceded and we would regard Saddam Hussein's surname as Hussein. None of those are true. If the article claims, as it claims, that there are two sovereign states on the British Isles, and one of those disputes its inclusion, then that is one out of two. It doesn't matter whether it has 1 million or one hundred million citizens. If one of the two sovereign states disputes their alleged position in a term's use, then that has to get major coverage. FearÉIREANN\(caint) 00:32, 11 July 2006 (UTC)
Once again, you are claiming that the meaning of the term is disputed, when the evidence so far provided only shows that the usage of the term is controversial. Davies, one would add, is a historian of Poland, and his history seems to be largely designed in order to make people think by using weird, unorthodox terminology and calling the plantagenet kings "Edouard II," and so forth. The book is essentially a long polemic against anglocentric ways of thinking about the history of the, er, British Isles. Even so, Davies is not saying that the meaning of "British Isles" is disputed. He is saying that there are no British Isles any more. I see nothing in Davies to suggest that he is saying that "British Isles" now means the same thing as the UK government term of art British Islands. He is just saying the term is now technically inaccurate, and shouldn't be used. Basically, it comes down to the fact that we ought to have an article on "the group of islands of which Great Britain and Ireland are the main components." They form a geographical and, I might add, a cultural unity. The only possible location for that article is British Isles. We should of course indicate that Irish people don't like this term, and that many of them avoid it, but the preferred Irish form, which seems to be "these Isles," is an impossible article title. And, still, you have provided virtually no evidence for any substantial alternate usage of "British Isles" to not mean "Great Britain, Ireland, et al" The term "British Isles" does mean "Great Britain, Ireland, et al," which is precisely why Irish people don't use it. There is absolutely no evidence that the meaning of the term is widely disputed. It seems to me that a brief reference to the term British Islands, and that very occasionally "British Isles" is used as synonymous with this government created term of art, should be sufficient. john k 23:22, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
How can the Davies quote above possibly be used as a reference. Neither a strictly literal reading nor recognizing the play on words can support the contention that "Some academics also dispute the use of the term." The quality of citations in this article is going from bad to worse, any old thing stuck between <ref> tags is not a proper supporting reference.EricR 00:10, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

Strange how, if the "British Isles" is only rejected by a "minority" of Irish people, as all our Irish experts from Britain tell us, that the Irish government and all nationalist parties to the Belfast Agreement refused to accept the term in that agreement in 1998. For the "common name for these islands" it is more than noteworthy that it does not exist in the international agreement between the Irish and British states. Could some of our "Ara aren't we all British after all" brigade explain why the term "British Isles" is deliberately ommited from the GFA? 193.1.172.163 00:15, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

He calls Edouard II that, and Henri II that, because that is what they called themselves at the time, as you well know, John. Edward II and Henry II were later anglicised names constructed to create the impression that they were English kings first and foremost, when in fact some of the early kings rarely set foot in England. I am surprised that you still keep mispresenting Irish viewpoints and claiming that it is only the usage that is disputed when Irish users have been repeating here over and over and over that it is the meaning that is disputed. How many Irish users have to say that before you actually hear what they are saying and stop thinking they are saying the exact opposite to what you claim? The dispute is over meaning. It always has been over meaning. It always will be over meaning. It is the meaning that suggests that the term means the entire archipelago. That has been disputed by every Irish government, by the opposition and by numerous others. They say that the British Isles does not cover Ireland, does not include Ireland, that Ireland is not in it. Davies makes that quite clear too. The British Isles no longer describes the archipelago, in his own words. There is no term to describe the archipelago. There has not been since the 1940s. (BTW the same time the Commonwealth also dropped its British tag.) Irish users could not have been more clear. I am puzzled as to how you still haven't got the message. 'FearÉIREANN\(caint) 00:32, 11 July 2006 (UTC)
Of course they didn't call themselves that. In writing, they were always named in Latin. Standardized English and French spellings both developed only considerably later. And I have never heard that the first language of "Edouard III" was anything other than English. In terms of Davies, again, he is not saying what you are saying he's saying. Yes, he's saying that the term "British Isles" is now incorrect because the Republic is no longer British. However, he is most certainly not saying that the term "British Isles" means something different from "UK+Republic+Man". And I know that you've been repeating that the meaning is disputed, but you've yet to provide any substantial evidence of this - you just keep repeating it, which is why we keep disagreeing. As to Irish users, several Irish users (Zoney, for instance) have been considerably more reasonable on the subject than you have, and you are, so far as I can tell, the only person who is actually suggesting that there is some other meaning for the term "British Isles" than the one used here. john k 10:43, 11 July 2006 (UTC)
The real Acid Test. If the Channel Islands were to politically join with France, then would they be any longer part of the so called "British Isles". Ireland politically broke away from Britain round about 1922, so it follows that Ireland is not part of the BI's. Look!, we don't need Einstein to sort this. MelForbes 01:54, 11 July 2006 (UTC)
Firstly, Ireland did not "break away from Britain" around 1922. In a way, the islands separated around the time of the retreat of the ice sheets at the end of the last ice age. Considering the term 'British Isles' was first introduced centuries ago to describe a collection of islands which included Ireland, it follows that Ireland is part of the British Isles. --Mal 09:42, 24 July 2006 (UTC)
Well, including the Channel Islands makes "British Isles" a cultural concept, rather than a purely geographic one. But they aren't universally included. john k 10:43, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

Jtdirl, of course it is not a demonstrable fact that the name of the archipelago is British Isles; as you well know, there is no official term. And remember, this is the English language Wikipedia, so with regards to English language terms, the views of the whole anglosphere count; I am only following Wikipedia guidelines when I say that the views of the minority do not carry as much weight as the majority. Are you actually telling me that you find my assertion that a minority of the English speaking world dispute the term "laughable"? So you're saying that the majority of the people who speak English on planet Earth do not use "British Isles" to include Ireland? And what's more you apparently base all of this on nothing more than your own opinions, given that you have not produced a scrap of evidence to support your theory that the entire world avoids using the term, in contrast to the many many references produced from government sources (Irish and others), the media (Irish and others), and commonly accepted reference dictionaries, which show widespread international usage.

And then, what's more, your argument does not even obey primary laws of logic. If the majority of Ireland, the EU, and the US "avoid using the term", then surely they do so because the term includes Ireland? If the term "British Isles" does not include Ireland, and therefore does not imply British sovereignty in Ireland, then there is nothing controversial about the term, and no one would need to avoid using it. Either:

(a) British Isles includes Ireland, in which case people find it offensive and avoid using it; or

(b) British Isles does not include Ireland, and so there is no controversy over using the term.

Which is it? Your insistence that the merest mention of the term is a huge faux pas, would seem to imply that you are arguing in favour of (a), yet you also seem to believe that (b) is also the case. No wonder your argument is so confused, given that it is not even internally consistent. But hey, maybe I'm just being picky. You know us "northerners do love wars", right?

193.1.172.163, if you're directing your reply at me, firstly, I do not regard myself as British (even though I come from the British Isles (sorry, couldn't resist it!)). As for why the term was omitted from the Belfast Agreement, I would imagine that it's because some people object to the use of the term. Has anyone on this page denied that this is the case? Martin 16:00, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

footnotes

Someone seems to have placed footnote references before full stops and commas. That is incorrect. Note citations are placed outside (i.e., after) a full stop and comma.

It is incorrect to write "this is a footnote[3].

The correct format is to write "this is a footnote.[4]

It may have been a genuine mistake by someone. Anyone who has written books or theses will be aware of it. Copywriters automatically ensure that all such notes are placed after the comma or fullstop. (One of the reasons they are done that way is because writers otherwise very often forget to add in full stops or commas having added in a large footnote. It may also have been linked to technical issues when people wrote using manual typewriters rather than PCs.) Some small number of US manuals prefer placing footnotes before full stops but in general that is seen as incorrect by most of the world's style guides. UK style guides in particular (and as a British topic this article is written in British English) regard doing that as fundamentally wrong. FearÉIREANN\(caint) 13:57, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

I think it's probably because the debate on this matter has got people who have never used footnotes before to start using them.Rhion 15:56, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
Yes, I had no idea how to put a footnote in Wikipedia until now. As for full stops, I just copied the style that was already there (and I can't remember what it was). TharkunColl 16:02, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
Might be my fault; I'm used to writing in the Harvard referencing system, which puts refs (tho not footnotes, which I very rarely use) before the full stop; it seems counter intuitive, to me, but that's the way it is. --Robdurbar 18:06, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
No problem, guys. It is an easy mistake to make. Over the years I must have written thousands of footnotes in academic work, and among the thousands of articles I have worked on here, so I used to the issue. If you see the problem cropping up in any other articles, correct it. Various referencing systems use different rules (Harvard's rule on referencing is the opposite of how many Europeans write references) but most if not all put footnotes outside full stops and commas. FearÉIREANN\(caint) 20:02, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
I was under the impression that the Harvard referencing was perfectly acceptable on Wikipedia? Martin 23:51, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
What is the preferred format for further citations of the same work? I was using title and page, but it seems you are using author, title, and page. Ibid. is dangerous unless you add a more complete citation in an html comment, just try searching the history for a deleted parent citation some time.EricR 00:32, 11 July 2006 (UTC)
Ibid and op.cit are standard citations used in hundreds of thousands of articles on Wikipedia, just as they are used in billions of books published worldwide. For those who may not know what they mean on WP, users usually link the first mention of each to the page explaining the term, then use the rest unlinked. That is standard notation, used here as elsewhere. It also enables younger readers through using the links to understand what footnotes in that standard form mean and how to read them. So it also adds to their education. Apparently some American users do not like using them on WP. However most Americans and just about all non-Americans have been using them for ages. I suppose to avoid deletion problems we could put the text in a hidden box, or use author also. FearÉIREANN\(caint) 01:20, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

The lead reconsidered

Considerate and inclusive guy that I am, it struck me that Robdurbar's approach could be developed into a way of setting out the controversy at the outset in a manner that met the requirements of WP:LEAD so that the reader should not be surprised: at present the lead is a mini-article about the dispute, and the readers are probably astonished to find sections about geography, geology etc. So here's a draft, not fully wikified, which I hope may prove more acceptable to both viewpoints.

For clarification of the various names and the naming controversy see British Isles (terminology).

The islands of Ireland, Great Britain, and several thousand surrounding isles together form the largest archipelago in Europe which is most commonly known as the British Isles, but this name has no official status and is considered unacceptable by a significant minority of the people of the islands.

The islands, situated off the northwest coast of the continent, include two sovereign states, the Republic of Ireland and the United Kingdom. From the 11th century the monarchs of the dominant country, England, also came to rule Ireland and Wales. Despite repeated disputes Scotland remained independent until in 1603 the whole archipelago came under the personal rule of the same monarch with the Union of the Crowns. After a turbulent century with a brief spell as a republic, the Acts of Union 1707 created the United Kingdom of Great Britain, and subsequently the Act of Union 1800 created the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. A long struggle by Irish nationalists culminated in a separation in 1922 which led to the independence of what became the Republic of Ireland from the United Kingdom which still includes Northern Ireland.

At the point of separation the term British Isles became anachronistic, but it had entered common usage as a geographical term and continues in widespread use although it is politically incorrect. People in the Republic of Ireland, whose official state name is Ireland, object strongly to the word British which can be seen as wrongly implying continued United Kingdom sovereignty over the entire archipelago. Thus in the Republic of Ireland the use of the term is seen as controversial and sometimes offensive. Official documents and the media rarely use the term. Some academics also dispute the use of the term, which is sometimes understood to refer only to those parts of the archipelago that are under British sovereignty. Despite this dispute, no alternative names for the isles as a whole have gained wide acceptance.

The archipelago encompasses an area south to north from Pednathise Head to Out Stack, Shetland in the United Kingdom, and west to east from the Tearaght Island in the Republic of Ireland to Lowestoft Ness in the United Kingdom, containing more than 6,000 islands and totalling 315,134 km² (121,674 sq. miles) of land.

In geographical terms, the islands are largely low lying and fertile, with more mountainous areas in Wales, Ireland, the North of England and Scotland. The geology is complex, formed by the drifting together of separate regions and shaped by glaciation.

I would hope that this approach is not too offensive to those strongly defending the majority usage, and that all will contribute to making this a better lead to the article. ...dave souza, talk 06:49, 11 July 2006 (UTC) attribution corrected 07:39, 11 July 2006 (UTC)
That seems well worded, if a bit over extenesive on history, but that's a minor issue. To my mind, we now have at least two versions of the intro that seem to balance the issue well. --Robdurbar 07:06, 11 July 2006 (UTC)
Apologies for mixing you up with Ben. The history is needed in outline, in my opinion, for those many readers who may still think that the whole place is called 'England! ..dave souza, talk 07:48, 11 July 2006 (UTC)
Basically fine with me, although I'd prefer that we not state straight out that "British Isles" is anachronistic. But then again, most of the proposed solutions have been fine with me. john k 10:52, 11 July 2006 (UTC)
One point - I think the phrase "politically incorrect" is best avoided. The one thing we haven't had here yet (much) is rants about "political correctness", and using the phrase would probably inspire some even if it is not meant in that way. Let's not go there. "No longer accurate as a political description" or something perhaps.Rhion 11:22, 11 July 2006 (UTC)
Both good points, picked up the latter when JFE told us that the BBC ask that it shouldn't be used. Probably better to trim the sentence to something like "At the point of separation the term British Isles became technically inaccurate, but it had entered common usage as a geographical term and continues in widespread use." ...dave souza, talk 11:58, 11 July 2006 (UTC)
Another idea: trim / clarify the 1922 bit to "A long struggle by Irish nationalists for independence culminated in a separation in 1922 leading to the creation of the Republic of Ireland and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland." ...dave souza, talk 12:09, 11 July 2006 (UTC) fmt modified15:17, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

Backup Unused Claims

Okay. JTDirl you keep on claiming that the term "British Isles" isn't used in the Republic of Ireland. It isn't used in the US, it isn't used in Europe. Any simple search on the net shows that this isn't the case. You continue to claim this, and I'm well open to being persuaded that this is the case, but as yet we have not seen any real evidence that this is in fact the case. We have seen plenty of evidence that the term "British Isles" is used in the RoI government, it is used by Irish newspapers, it is used in the Republic of Ireland. The Encyclopaedia Britannica, an American publication defines it as "group of islands off the northwestern coast of Europe. The group consists of two main islands, Great Britain and Ireland, and numerous smaller islands." We have seen US dictionary definitions supporting that it is used to include Ireland and numerous other pieces of evidence that the term is in fact used relatively widely in all these areas you proport it to not be used in. Now I realise you cannot easily use something as base as Google search hits to prove a negative but we need some kind of verifiablility to all these claims and as yet the only piece of "proof" is a single letter to an editor in an Irish newspaper. We need something more concrete to back up these claims, something verifiable. We can all use anecdotal evidence on this one, and infact I recently spoke with a friend in Dublin who says that he and no one he knows takes issue with the term as it's purely geographical, but this isn't evidence. Quick searchs through even the RTE sites show that they use the term (and I actually caught a newsreader using it on an RTE broadcast the other night) in both our described meanings (with and without Ireland). It does seem that the media and government in the Republic of Ireland is more than happy to use the term when they wish to make something seem part of something larger (such as most advanced pit facility in the British Isles, longest river or railway line etc) which seems to completely contradict your claims. The usage seems to be in both the cases of the media and the government usages that it is okay for geographical terminology but a definite no no for political uses, which one would expect to be the case for a geographical term. Ben W Bell talk 07:21, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

I contacted a couple of my Irish friends overnight on this issue. Apparently the vast majority of Irish people avoid using the term in question. Mainly it is seen as a political label going back to an era when England imposed an often bloody and imperial rule in the area. I do believe that it is noteworthy, that if the majority of the people of the second biggest island of the archipelago do not consider themselves part of this de facto political label, then by all means they are not. MelForbes 12:06, 11 July 2006 (UTC)
And these couple of friends have conducted surveys of the entire Irish population, and had them published in reputable sources? Good, because in that case your evidence is not a worthless anecdote. TharkunColl 16:09, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

Ah now, ah now. We'll have less of that, MelForbes. We really are delighted to be John Bull's other island which is why the political representatives of 80% of the island's population have names such as Her Majesty's Loyal Soldiers of Destiny and the Royal Tribe of British Milesians. Sure, you'd have to be deaf to not hear millions of Irish people thudding at the door of empire this morning screaming to be let in and stripped of this "Irish" nonsense. With such majority support for British rule over Ireland, who could deny that the term British Isles is just rejected by a tiny minority? We are dying, and have been dying for centuries, just to be part of the British world. Sure any eejit could tell you that. And lord knows there's a fair slew of the aforementioned here (not to put too fine a point on it). On behalf of all Irish people on earth I'd like to say four words: God Save the Queen. Now, where do I remove this cursed Irish from my passport and get a proper identity like, em, British? El Gringo 12:56, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

Well, you could always move to England, just like millions of your fellow countrymen and hey presto! Your sprogs will be English! Magic eh? TharkunColl 16:09, 11 July 2006 (UTC)
Hey TharkunColl, maybe you should personally muster a force and invade Ireland again, steal the land, expel all the Irish to Connaught, surely that should solve your dilemma. MelForbes 17:14, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

I have commented out the third paragraph of the intro because of the following concerns:

  • To what extent the term is controversial or offensive needs a cite.
  • Official and media use of the term needs a cite.
  • Some academics..., cite provided is innapropriate
  • No alternative names..., better to state the term which has gained some usage, IONA, which is verifiable and serves to illustrate that there is a dispute.

EricR 14:43, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

Thanks EricR - I was also going to tackle the second paragraph to shift emphasis and remove ambiguity ("Britain") but I thought I'd propose here first: Because it contains the word British, the term British Isles can be mistakenly interpreted to mean the islands that are part of the United Kingdom.[1] This is because the islands largely fall within the same boundaries as the former United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, from which the Irish Free State (now the Republic of Ireland) seceded in 1922.[2] --Bazza 14:57, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

I've also deleted some of the text which fails to meet WP:V. Specifically contentious might be the mention of Anglo-Celtic Isles. The provided reference was to a university course description which in fact used "Anglo-Celtic Islands" as a descriptive phrase and "British Isles" as a proper noun. "Anglo-Celtic" is often used as an ethnic description; "Anglo-Celtic Isles" as a proper noun naming the archipelago needs a proper citation. The only printed usage of the exact phase which i have been able to find used the confusing capitalization: "Anglo-Celtic isles". EricR 15:17, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

Also, to prove that "Anglo-Celtic Isles" is a geographical term, rather than, say, a term used to describe the islands in the early middle Ages (as I would suspect is the most common usage of said phrase), I'd think we should try to find references to this term that are not historical, and are, as you note, clearly a proper name rather than a description. john k 17:07, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

Just noticed something! Correct me if I'm wrong. Is user john k and user TharkunColl one and the same person. If so, it is against Wikipedia ethics to use 2 personalities on the same page. MelForbes 17:26, 11 July 2006 (UTC)
Um be very careful what you are accusing people of. john k is a long standing user with many many thousands of edits under his belt and is also an Administrator. Him and Tharkuncoll are not the same person. A simple check of their contributions and user pages should have told you that despite the fact that John K is the only person to have ever edited Tharkuncoll's user page.. People can have similar view and not be the same person. Ben W Bell talk 17:48, 11 July 2006 (UTC)
Noticed something?? What convinced you of this? If you'd actually read this page, you'll see that earlier I criticized Tharkun rather harshly for suggesting that Derry/Londonderry was a majority Protestant/Unionist city. I've also had other instances of disagreeing with him. As noted, I've been around for several years, while Tharkun, as far as I know, has only been here for a few months. He also seems to be British, while I am American. I am using my real name here. What gave you the impression we were the same person? john k 21:07, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

This sub-section has desceneded into a series of personal attacks, original research and off topic discussion (especially TharknuColl and MelForbes),. Please contribute helpfully. --Robdurbar 18:10, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

I just ran across a possibly useful reference while looking for a cite for the Nancy Reagan gaffe:

"A further and much more effective unionist tactic in countering the nationalist insistence on the territorial integrity of the island of Ireland was to change the geographical frame of reference to that of the whole archipelago of the British Isles."

"...nationalist opinion remains sensitive to the potential of the British Isles map image, and that is reflected in nationalist rejection of the very description 'British Isles'. Nationalists use the awkward and ambiguous description 'these islands' as an alternative. However, outside the British Isles, or these islands, if preferred, the term British Isles remains quite commonly used."

"...a satellite television station broadcasting to Ireland was prevailed on to drop the description British Isles from its weather forecasts."

Guelke, Adrian (2001). "Northern Ireland and Island Status", in John Mcgarry ed.: Northern Ireland and the Divided World: The Northern Ireland Conflict and the Good Friday Agreement in Comparative Perspective. Oxford: Oxford University Press, p. 231. 

The author is quite clear as to the term refering to an archipelago, and goes so far as to discuss secession and perceptions of legitimacy re: contiental, island and archipelago states. The reference identifies the controversy yet places the dispute between nationalists and unionists. As this is so far the only reference documenting the extent of the dispute, should this be reflected in the article text?EricR 19:21, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

As "verifiability, not truth" is the threshold for inclusion in Wikipedia, it should certainly warrant serious consideration. Martin 20:05, 11 July 2006 (UTC)
I claim no expertise whatever about Ireland, but since the title of the book states it is about NI, then it would be natural to place the dispute there between nationalists and unionists. The nationalists could be expected to express a heightened sense of the feeling in the Republic. and are there any Unionists in the RoI? Such extrapolation to the RoI could not be counted a reliable source, but the book does constitute good evidence of the viewpoint in NI. ...dave souza, talk 20:11, 11 July 2006 (UTC)
Indeed. This reference seems to strongly suggest what most of us have been saying: 1) those of Irish Nationalist bent tend to not like the term "British Isles," and b) this is because the term includes Ireland, and suggests that Ireland is part of the UK. As somebody noted somewhere on this page, JTD's argument seems kind of incoherent - on the one hand, the term "British Isles" is horrible and rejected by Irish people, but on the other hand the meaning of the term is uncertain. These don't really go together. john k 21:07, 11 July 2006 (UTC)
dave souza, point taken, also the chapter is very focused on the Good Friday Agreement and in that sense is somewhat dated isn't it? Still it's a pretty direct treatment of some of the contentious points in the article. A further quote: "The claim that the British Isles should constitute a single political entity by reason of its map image as a 'natural' unit...has not been very strongly articulated by any of the parties to the conflict. While use by unionists of the concept has grown, they remain divided on its exploitation..." Not evidence of disputed meaning, but controversial usage. EricR 00:31, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

To all the Irish Nationalists who are ruining this article

What is the problem with you people and the word "British"? Can you not understand that "British" is as ambiguous a term as "Irish"? All people in Ireland (North AND SOUTH) ARE British in the geographical context of coming from the British Isles. Similarly all people on the island of Ireland ARE Irish in a geographical context of coming from the island. If all people in Ireland (island of!) could accept the unquestionable fact that there is both a common British culture and identity unique to the entire British Isles, and a common Irish culture and identity unique to the island of Ireland then we might have a few less problems on the island.

I also see that a certain Irish admin (not hard to guess who) has been at his old tricks of ruining articles by inserting paragraphs upon paragraphs of PoV waffle, heavily exaggeraging controversy by over-stating minority viewpoints, and by using his WP privilidges to futher his own agenda. This article is becoming worse now than the Northern Ireland article, and that's saying something! Remove all this over-inflated controversy now and keep the simple facts! Jonto 20:49, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

Chill. The OED states that the term is geographical - for WP purposes that's acceptable. It doesn't mean that all people in Ireland can then be termed British. We all know the problem of those from the north of Ireland terming themselves British - that's their free choice, and nobody ought to deny it. But this is where the problem arises - the term is political through-and-through, with historical origins (1621 and all that). How does WP reconcile the OED statement (and others to the same effect, no doubt) with the political implications? I say, give the definition, briefly describe the controversy, then devote the rest of the article to a list of links to articles that cover the substance in better detail.--Shtove 21:09, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

I might have considered to decipher any logic in your argument, but then you instantly lost all credibility when you chose to say this:

"We all know the problem of those from the north of Ireland terming themselves British"

All people in Ireland (geographical context) CAN be termed British (geographical context) whether they like it or not. All people in Ireland (geographical context) CAN be termed Irish (geographical context) whether they like it or not. These are raw facts, and anyone who choses to argue with them obviously has an agenda to push. Enough said. Jonto 21:40, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

Oh Dear, this is getting political, or maybe it was political already. In fact the whole issue is political, it is not factual. MelForbes 21:51, 11 July 2006 (UTC)
Exactly - that's why you need to strip out most of the political "offensive" bollocks from an article about a term in GEOGRAPHY while no other realistic common name for the archipeligo is in existence.Jonto 22:04, 11 July 2006 (UTC)
 "while no other realistic common name for the archipelago is in existence"

The other realistic common name is e.g. In Britain and Ireland as opposed to the phrase In the British Isles. Yes Jonto, it's that simple. BTW your rude language does not impress me one little bit. MelForbes 22:21, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

Nice to see you don't know the differences between "Great Britain", "Britain", and "British". Apologies for the word "bollocks" (not that I'm worried about impressing you), but I had not visited wikipedia in quite some time and was quite disgusted to see the recent state of this article; despite the older edits clearly also over-emphasising any "offence", newer edits simply take the issue to a completely new ludicrous level.Jonto
Wouldn't that be In Great Britain and Ireland, and doesn't that leave out the Isle of Man, among others? - FrancisTyers · 23:24, 11 July 2006 (UTC)
I thought that the Isle of Man was British, Ireland is not. Your theory defeats it's own purpose. MelForbes 23:55, 11 July 2006 (UTC)
My theory? o___O What are you talking about, I don't have a theory. Can you really call the Isle of Man, Britain? - FrancisTyers · 00:17, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
I wrote British, not Britain. MelForbes 00:20, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
You said "In Britain and Ireland". - FrancisTyers · 00:26, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
Then, why should Ireland be called British when quite evidently it's not, apart from Northern Ireland. MelForbes 00:41, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
"British", as I have said is as ambiguous a term as "Irish". RoI is not British in the sense of being in the UK, but British in the sense of being in the British Isles.Jonto 01:26, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
(undented) The Isle of Man is not British. Britain is an ambiguous term: if referring to the big island in the British Isles, then call it Great Britain. If referring to the largest sovereign state in the British Isles, call it the United Kingdom. The name Ireland is similarly ambigous because it refers both to the second largest island in the British Isles, and to the second largest sovereign state; it should be used with care as well. The adjective British is also ambiguous: as well as pertaining to the aforementioned ambiguous Britain, it is also the adjective used to describe United Kingdom nationality, and should therefore only be used in isolation when no ambiguity can be ascribed. This is why there is an excellent British Isles (terminology) page. Stating that people from Ireland are British is ambiguous on two counts and should be avoided. --Bazza 09:10, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

Why not use the new and improved "Anglo-Celtic Isles"? New and improved I say...

Probably because "Anglo-Celtic" isn't particularly inclusive. There are other cultural or ethnic groups with origins in the British Isles, besides Celts and Angles. --Mal 10:07, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

Very common English mistake

I'm just staggered Jonto...no offence (as your original remarks were written in a well meant way), but you are way, way out there. Your statement regarding 'the unquestionable fact that there is both a common British culture and identity unique to the entire British Isles' is quite, quite wrong!!! The majority population of Britain (i.e. most English people, who are by far the largest population group on the island) are of Anglo-Saxon/Norman rather than Celtic origin...very different cultural groups. This majority population in Britain did unquestionably dominate the island group is every sense for centuries, during which time they (naturally I suppose) started using the English term 'British Isles' to describe the whole area they dominated - IT IS A PRIMARILY POLITICAL TERM. To use this term to infer that we Irish are 'British' is, well, very inaccurate, to say the least. The following analogy is not meant to be smart-arsed or impolite - taking an apple and naming it an orange will never make the apple an orange! The problems existing in our island's north eastern corner ('Northern Ireland') is due to the forced mixing of these two very distinct cultures, in a way that each saw the other as a threat...sparking hundreds of years of almost continual conflict. What we are (hopefully) moving towards is a future in which each culture (or tradition if you will) respects the other and is able to live peacefully side by side. To repeat an important point (made far, far above), the term 'Irish Nationalists' is used to describe the section of the community in Northern Ireland who aspire for their lands to become part of the Irish Republic. I and most of my fellow Irish contributors are citizens of the Irish Republic and are in reality no more British than the Danes. Thank you for your genuine attempt to offer a solution, but you have only served to show that many, many English people, while not intentionally showing any hostility towards us Irish, totally misunderstand where we've come from, what we are and what we aspire to in the future.

To my Irish colleagues specifically...we all have been doing and continue to do a tremendous job fighting to have our identity clearly and properly presented here. What we do here needs to be fair and appropriate - so that it will be respected and will endure. We are getting close to an acceptable solution, but we aren't quite there yet. We can present the majority Irish view (very negative toward the term as it is!) without needing to be overly wordy and without rubbing the faces of our (mostly well intentioned) British colleagues in it. Oh, incidentally, The Irish Times may be writing an article about this soon.

To my British colleagues, who accept that the term argued over here is rather more than a simple geographic one and simply want a very commonly used term to be described without excessive political verbage...please be patient a little longer, we're getting there! User:PConlon 23:14, 11 July 2006

Please do not make ignorant assumptions about my background and knowledge of the political situation in Ireland. I am not English - I am from NORTHERN IRELAND. I am Northern Irish, I am an Ulsterman, I am British and I am Irish. I have heard enough about the NI situation to know how pointless, inward looking, and primeval the whole problem in NI is. I have also travelled and worked extensively throughout the world and have met people from the British Isles in almost every corner of the globe.
You also need to bring yourself into the 21st century - all your arguments about "culture" relate to events happening hundreds, if not thousands of years ago. Please look at the British Isles as they are TODAY in 2006. You will find that people within the British Isles have in more cases than not, more in common with each other than with any other region in Europe (any region outside Europe that we would have as much in common with would most likely have been a former British colony at some stage or another). We are the only major region in Europe where English is our first language for a start. We all have a reputation of drinking a lot! We have a similar sense of humour and music (Have artists like U2 and the Corrs not also accepted "Brit" awards?). Go to almost any "English" or "Irish" pub throughout the world and you will not find purely "English" or "Irish", but most often a large mix of people from across the British Isles.
In regards to NI in you are quite wrong - people in Northern Ireland in 2006 have more in common with each other than anything else. Also, one thing that annoys me about many southern Irish nationalists is that they seem to think that the problems in "the North" are nothing to do with them, despite the fact that the problems are an extension of an island-wide civil war in which the southerners decided to eventually leave us northeners, and forget that they are still part of the problem today. They call their state "Ireland", which IMO is quite arrogant. Many forget that the south was part of the United Kingdom for longer than it has been independent. Southern Irish nationalists often selectively seem to forget that many of the things they take for granted every day are thanks to the fact that they were formerly in the UK. If many in the south could see the reality that they have alot more in common with the rest of the British Isles than not, then perhaps it would go a long way to helping things in "the North", and relationships throughout the whole British Isles in general.
Your definition of "Irish nationalist" is also very narrow in scope and is not that definition to which I was referring - I was not solely referring to the NI variety, but to anyone across the island, especially including patriotic southerners. A lot of nationalist Irish also seem to define there "Irishness" as simply "not British" (whatever that means), despite the fact they (despite your best attempts to deny it) have more in common with the people in the UK than anywhere else. You seem to simplify culture in the British Isles into being defined by being either "Celtic" or "Anglo-Saxon", despite completely forgetting that the UK and British Isles in general has a large and diverse mix of genetics from many "tribes" other than the 2 mentioned (And didn't we mainly originaly all originate from central Europe anyway?) and that there are probably far more "Celts" in the UK than in the RoI. As the old saying also often goes, "The Irish are more English than the English themselves".
A widely accepted geographical term only becomes political when certain people choose to make it so. I urge editors not to succumb to this nonsensical attempt to convert a standard 2006 geographical term to a political one due to overly zealous nationalistic political viewpoints.
Jonto 23:54, 11 July 2006 (UTC))
You are simply incorrect. The term British Isles is derived from Classical examples in Latin and Greek. Until the Stuart period the word "British" referred to the Celtic inhabitants of the isles, and the English establishment resisted the term "British" for a hundred years or so. TharkunColl 23:13, 11 July 2006 (UTC)
I find your essentializing of Irish, English and British cultures highly offensive. Please refrain from such monologues and concentrate on the article. --Robdurbar 22:22, 11 July 2006 (UTC)
Chill again! The pro-inclusion of Ireland side has been the most offensive to date with sprogs, bollix and maybe a possible sock. It behoves none of us to get too precious! MelForbes 22:50, 11 July 2006 (UTC)
The word is spelt "bollocks". TharkunColl 23:13, 11 July 2006 (UTC)
TharkunColl, thanks for informing me, it's plain to see that I don't know much about the word. MelForbes 00:17, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
Actually it can be spelt Bollox, bollix, or bollocks. FearÉIREANN\(caint) 23:17, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

Re the claim that that Thar and JohnK are the same: that is not true. I have known and respected John for years, even through we disagree on some things (and agree on a lot more). Jonto, BTW, is a notorious POV pusher who in the past has been blocked for what was widely deemed as vandalism of articles by doctoring neutral articles to push a Unionist and frequently bitter anti-Irish agenda. His reappearance here is to be expected. Rob has made determined efforts to work to achieve balance here. Unfortunately some editors, specifically Dave, Thar and to a lesser extent Martin and Eric seem so blinded by their own conviction that they know the truth that they dismiss obvious evidence and twist meanings of Wikipedia policies to ridiculous lengths to try to justify an untenable position here. All they achieve is edit wars. Every time they delete factual information to push their agendas, Irish users like Gringo, Damac, DJ, PConlon, myself and others will simply reinsert the facts. If that has to be done a thousand times it will be done. While Irish contributors have added in wordings that covered and allowed for various meanings (such as stating that the term was variously interpreted by different people as including the full archipelago or the full archipelago minus Ireland — an accurate representation of reality. Some people hold one view, others the other) they blank out one widely held viewpoint and insist that their country's one is the only one. Irish users have never tried to suggest that there isn't an interpretation of British Isles that includes Ireland. They have openly said that there is, merely pointed out that others hold a different interpretation. It has been a handful of British contributors who have consistently sought to remove any semblance of balance and turn the article into a British statement of British views, with those British views stated to be facts. That is extreme POV-pushing.

The extent of the twisting of the Wikipedia policies was seen in the farcical removal of a reference that academics don't all agree even when a footnote proved the point. Apparently that academic isn't qualified in their eyes to be referred to as an academic, even though he is an internationally renowned academic who wrote a history of the frigging isles, because he didn't write the viewpoint they wanted to hear. They deleted a paragraph that was ludicrously described as original research even though all it did was summarise what it is stated in other Wikipedia articles and elsewhere in thousands of books — that the word British has been dropped from international organisations from the British Commonwealth to British crown and replaced with more neutral terminology, because British was seen as carrying baggage. Successive Canadian, Australian and governments have said that. It has been written for years. It is written in Wikipedia articles. But yet again the British POV-pushers think that because it does not suit their agenda they can dishonestly label it as something that it isn't and then delete it. That, unfortunately, has been their approach all the way through this. All they do by such bloodyminded arrogance is make creating a consensus more difficult. Because while Irish editors have worked with the likes of Rob to try to agree on things, and have inserts wordings that never denied the British viewpoint, the likes of Thar et al think that they can just run roughshod over everyone and delete every non-British viewpoint, take things out of context, mispresent what is said, and falsely label things. As I have said, Irish users will not be letting this issue drop. If they have to fight til Christmas or beyond to ensure this article does not become a British propaganda piece they will do so. FearÉIREANN\(caint) 23:17, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

BTW Mel, I'm curious as to who the supposed sock is? All the editors I have seen on the pro-inclusion of Ireland side bar PConlon are people I have dealt with before and none are socks. I don't think PConlon is either. FearÉIREANN\(caint) 23:19, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

Almost all of the Irish govt. references to the British Isles have been removed. Why? TharkunColl 23:25, 11 July 2006 (UTC)
FearÉIREANN, I don't mean your side, it's the other, apologies for my grammer and spelling. See an earlier edit of mine [8] MelForbes 23:28, 11 July 2006 (UTC)
Quote from jtdirl: "Jonto, BTW, is a notorious POV pusher who in the past has been blocked for what was widely deemed as vandalism of articles by doctoring neutral articles to push a Unionist and frequently bitter anti-Irish agenda. His reappearance here is to be expected."
[removed personal attacks. - FrancisTyers · 00:25, 12 July 2006 (UTC)]
- I have never been blocked from Wikipedia
- "Doctoring neutral articles" - hmmm jtdirl - what contributions have you been making to this article recently?
- If you do recall my only real previous editing was to attempt to NPOV all the Sinn Fein propaganda that was propagated by the notorious "Lapsed Pacifist". Please check the histories.
- If I'm so "bitterly anti-Irish", why do I often describe myself as "Irish"? Why have I spent considerable months of my life in Dublin and have many friends from the Republic? I'm not "bitterly anti-Irish" - I'm "bitterly anti violence", "bitterly anti corruption to law and order in NI", "bitterly fed up with pointless wrangling in NI", and "bitterly against zealous nationalism (of any kind)".
Jonto 00:21, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
And how about Ultra Loyalism? MelForbes 00:25, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
Did you actually ever care to read anything I had ever written? If you did then you would realise that I was against "ultra-" anything Jonto 01:22, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
Can I also add that "Ultra Loyalism" as you put it is a form of nationalism.Jonto 12:12, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
Your edits weren't as neutral as you believed and did trigger off edit wars. (Though I did agree with your stopping of users removing the ark survey stuff from the Northern Ireland article. But then I wrote the stuff that mentioned that surveys show that support for Irish unity actually stands in the early 20s, not high 40s in Northern Ireland, as republican myth claims.) But I suppose some of your clashes were thanks to the extreme POV-pushing of the thankfully gone Lapsed Pacifist (amazing how he did a runner just after I had reported him to the arbcom) pushing extreme republican POVs all over the place and doctoring names just to offend Unionists reading WP. (His antics even got him into the Irish newspapers, where he was held up as an example of a pain-in-the-butt republican. We all suspected that he was a plant from a political party. The fact that he did a runner as soon as people began checking his edits and where he was editing from, confirmed everyone's suspicions.) I was of course wrong to say that you were blocked. I was trying (stupidly) to do two things at once and wrote here what I meant to write about someone else somewhere else. So apologies. Mea culpa. Mea maxima culpa. Or in Irish: Tá bron orm. FearÉIREANN\(caint) 02:09, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
Thanks for the apology JT. Happy 12th ! :D Jonto 12:07, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

If a 'sock' is a fake account made by one person pretending to be someone else, then I can assure you I'm not a sock. My surname is Conlon and I'm from Dublin. Jonto, sorry to mistake your origin (hope you're enjoying the holiday today then!) - I'm so used to English people saying things along the lines of your point of view. I've heard your view and you mine; I guess that we have to agree to disagree on some points. Still, we should all be able to find some mutually acceptable middle-ground regarding the article wording. On the classical geographers point, I believe that they simply made a mistake in naming all inhabitants of these isles Prettani (as you might do if you have never been to the place and lived in Roman times!) and the mistake was carried forward. Btw, I'm obviously a new contributor to Wikipedia and don't know how to set up a user page - if someone could explain how to on my discussion page, I'd appreciate it. User: PConlon 16:32 modified, 12 July 2006

Racism

User:PConlon said:

"The majority population of Britain (i.e. most English people, who are by far the largest population group on the island) are of Anglo-Saxon/Norman rather than Celtic origin...very different cultural groups."

The term "Celtic" is linguistic - just like, for example, "Germanic", "Slavic", or "Romance". There is no Celtic "race". And since the term is linguistic, it follows that only a tiny proportion of the inhabitants of Scotland, Ireland, or Wales are "Celtic". The rest speak English and are therefore "Germanic". TharkunColl 00:02, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

Eureka TharkunColl, let's call'em the Germanic Isles. Second thoughts, bad idea, you might be highly offended. MelForbes 02:39, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
This might be quibbled with, though, due to the fact that the fairly recent ancestors of many to most present day English-speakers in Ireland, the Scottish highlands, and Wales spoke Celtic languages, and often today maintain a Celtic identity, even if they no longer speak Celtic languages as their first language (or at all). (This whole post, where I appear to disagree with my sock puppet Tharkun, is obviously simply a lame attempt to distract attention from the fact that we are the same person). john k 00:48, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
Apologies john k, it does look unusual to edit another user's page with a redirect, and I did say possible. Sprogs use by TharkunColl I thought most offensive. MelForbes 00:57, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
What's wrong with sprogs? I could just as easily have said kids or children. TharkunColl 07:45, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
Evidence of peoples divided by a common language! What in the Saff is commonplace slang evidently has distasteful connotations for MelForbes. Perhaps if you'd said bairns or weans it would have been taken more lightly. ...dave souza, talk 08:01, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
What's wrong with "sprogs"? Well it is the language of the gutter. It has no place in enlightened argument! Also, it's use and support is telling. MelForbes 11:12, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
It is a perfectly good word, and your comments reveal a rather distasteful snobbery I'm afraid. However, your suggestion that I should force all the Irish into Connaught is not only offensive but also ridiculous. I mean, I know it's a big hotel and all, but come on! Then again, perhaps you meant Connacht, the Irish province. And as for your comment "it's use and support is telling", I have no idea what you're going on about. TharkunColl 11:31, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
There, you are off again. I guessed that you wouldn't have an idea. BTW, thanks for correcting my spelling. Is that Irish spelling or the British spelling? MelForbes 11:49, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
Thar does like to be offensive, as his tone and content of his stuff above shows. But as I mentioned before, John is a unambiguously a trustworthy wikipedian and most definitely not someone who uses sockpuppets, much less ones he then fights with and whose views he (and many others) regularly find at best annoying on occasion, on other occasions deeply offensive. I can vouch for John's intergrity. FearÉIREANN\(caint) 02:14, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
I can verify that in this part of the British Isles, "sprogs" is not considered offensive or insulting at all. --Bazza 09:02, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
Actually it is erroneous to claim that "The majority population of Britain (i.e. most English people, who are by far the largest population group on the island) are of Anglo-Saxon/Norman rather than Celtic origin." All people from Great Britain are descended from the original inhabitants of the Island from the paleolithic. There is certainly some Teutonic genetic influence in England and Scotland, this is most pronounced in York (about 60% Germanic to 40% indigenous in the male line of descent, so still a substantial indigenous contribution) and Norfolk and along the east coast of England, interestingly the areas are those which are known to have been part of the Danelaw rather than those supposed to have been settled by Anglo-Saxons.[9] The claim of very different cultural groups is interesting, maybe this can be claimed of the situation a thousand years ago, but I see no real evidence of any great difference between the cultures of the different nations of Great Britain in the present time, especialy with regard to popular culture. Alun 09:14, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
Tosh. All people from Great Britain are not descended from the original inhabitants. My friend sitting next to me now is a Sikh of Ugandan Asian descent. This discussion is getting way off topic and is liable to start insulting a lot more people than a minority of contributors have managed to do so far. --Bazza 09:24, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
Ah well, poor use of words, my appologies to your friend and all other people to whom I may have caused offence. It's not off topic to claim that something in the article is incorrect though. Those of us who do have ancestors that lived in Great Britain in antiquity are certainly not exclusively descended form Celts or Anglo-Saxons, as if there was some sort of ancient ethnic cleansing and subsequent apartheid. This is just a modern political fabrication. The thing that scares me is that it is so similar to the repugnant contentions of racial purity that have so blighted Europe over the last century or so. Alun 09:37, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

Minor edits

I presume this is an innocent mistake (I believe some editors, paritcularlry vandal fighters, have to turn minor edits off or all are marked thus?) but I note that Jtdril completed about 10 edits, leading to the following diff [10], marking all of them as minor and with no edit summaries. Please be more careful in future; even if each edit was minor, the effect of doing lots of minor ones in a short time is quite major; and edit summaries would be helpful. --Robdurbar 09:56, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

Sources/Examples

As TharknuColl has noted before, I have removed a number of sources/examples from the article. This is where points appear to be referenced by half a dozen citations/examples. As I have stated previously, this:

  • Unecessairily increases page length
  • Is not required. If a user were to question a point further, extra sources can be shown on the talk page to the enquirer
  • Is close to being a violation of WP:POINT

--Robdurbar 10:07, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

Disruptive behaviour

It is noticeable that JTD / FE has once again failed to respond to requests for reliable sources for his assertions, but instead has flung wild accusations around on this talk page. This comment reads like a description of JTD's own doings and misstates other people's positions while showing a clear failure to assume good faith. It claims that others "dismiss obvious evidence and twist meanings of Wikipedia policies to ridiculous lengths to try to justify an untenable position here" despite having failed to answer civil questions about the policies or to point out here his evidently different interpretation. JTD goes on to say "All they achieve is edit wars. Every time they delete factual information to push their agendas, Irish users like Gringo, Damac, DJ, PConlon, myself and others will simply reinsert the facts. If that has to be done a thousand times it will be done.", once again threatening to edit war. Interestingly it claims that "They deleted a paragraph that was ludicrously described as original research even though all it did was summarise what it is stated in other Wikipedia articles and elsewhere in thousands of books", indicating that JTD has a very different interpretation of WP:NOR from the understanding that Slimvirgin pointed out to me while discussing another article. The threat to "fight til Christmas or beyond to ensure this article does not become a British propaganda piece" makes it effectively impossible for anyone who will not accept it being distorted to support an Irish nationalist viewpoint to constructively contribute to the article. Having written this, JTD then spends what in my time zone are the wee sma' hours changing the article from the version last edited by Robdurbar and overriding the consensus which had been reached on this talk page without any contribution to the discussion from JTD. I see no point in trying to undo JTD's changes myself, but leave it to more experienced editors to review the edits and to find a way of allowing normal editing of this article in accordance with WP:NPOV to proceed. ...dave souza, talk 10:09, 12 July 2006 (UTC) slight clarification 10:15, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

Hmm, I'd like to point out that Jtdril's changes were not VERY wholesale, and I understand the wish to avoid this talk page, which often becomes a slanging match between certain users. However, I do share some of dave's above concerns.
More importantly, I wonder what people think of the current page, to see how we can proceed? I'm not really sure where we're at so I propose a bit of a straw poll --Robdurbar 12:59, 12 July 2006 (UTC):
Your diplomacy in a very difficult situation is very much appreciated, Rob. The consensus I had in mind came in the #Introduction discussion above, where by 21:47, 10 July 2006 we seemed to have agreement that the caveat could be removed from the first paragraph. JTD made no comment on that section, though he did make a remark on my alternative proposal #A fresh approach. Although wishing to avoid the talk page is understandable, JTD managed to make a further seven full contributions to the talk before you implemented removal of the caveat, at which point JTD promptly added a slightly reworded caveat as a minor edit with no comment on the edit or on the talk page. At around the same time JTD removed the commenting out from part of the lead being questioned on the talk page and added a modified version: the need for full discussion is still evident. This only seems to confirm an intransigent and uncooperative attitude, which I hope will now improve. ..dave souza, talk 18:30, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

Straw Poll

Explanation

Taking the version by MPF 11:31 UTC July 12 2006 as a standard version of the page, what do users think of the current situation of the page? Please try to list yourself into one of the approximate following categories, and maybe give a bit of description as to where you think the page ought to go.

I propose we allow this little poll to run for 60 hours from now i.e. till 01:00 UTC on July 15th. It's purpose is not to give an indication of consensus, just for people to clarify where they think the article is and where it needs to go. I fear that the current discussion is a bit confused and often goes off topic; hopefully, this poll can clarify it.

Wikipedia is NOT a democracy and votes are evil; so this is definately not binding, but more a place for us to broadly 'show our hand' and say what we think of the current situation. --Robdurbar 12:59, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

Categories

The article is about right

Users in this category feel that only minor changes (e.g. change in format or grammar) need to be made to the contentious sections of the intro and terminology. They feel that the given entry represents a neutral and verified view of the situation

  1. I could see an argument for removing a little of the terminology debate from the intro, but generally feel that we've reached what should be an acceptable version of the article. --Robdurbar 12:59, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
  2. I think it is about right as it stands. Rhion 16:50, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

The article is slanted to the 'Irish' point of view

Users in this category feel that the page gives too much prominance to the 'Irish view' that the British Isles is an offensive term that may not always include the Republic of Ireland

  1. The lead is overwhelmingly slanted to emphasise the importance of the controversy. Of eleven sentences, only two fail to mention it, and this preoccupation excludes topics that the article was originally about. The controversy is mentioned in the disambiguation line at the top referring to the terminology article for detail, which I favour, but this is superfluous if, as some demand, the controversy is fully explored in detail in this article. The layout of sections has been altered to bring the controversy to the top, for no other reason than to emphasise it, in a terminology section which sets out a one sided case. ...dave souza, talk 16:51, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
  2. It does spend an excessive amount of time talking about a minority who find the term offensive when the rest of the English speaking world (including many UK dictionarys and encyclopaedias) has been proven to use the term as a geographical term. It is a geographical term, not a political one and is used as such by the majority of the English speaking world other than a minority that "choose" to take offense and claim it as a political label. Ben W Bell talk 17:29, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
  3. I have some concerns about neutrality here. If we state that the term can be mistakenly interpreted to mean the islands that are part of the United Kingdom then I think we need to make it clear that people who knowingly use the word are in no way implying this. In fact the article should state that the term is exclusively geographical before we mention that it is sometimes misunderstood. I also think we need to explicitly say that the UK state makes no territorial claims over any part of the Republic of Ireland, as the article is phrased in such a way as to imply that use of the term infers this. If we are going to include the Irish governments attitude ( British Isles is now not an officially recognised term, and no branch of the Irish government, including the Department of Foreign Affairs and the Irish Embassy in London, uses the term), then we need to say the same about the UK, after all I would not expect there to be any official recognition of the term, it is a geographical term and has no official or legal status anywhere. If we include reference to the fact that certain (usually commercial) websites seem to misunderstand the term and apply it only to the UK or even only to Great Britain, then we should show evidence that certain Irish websites also use the term British Isles, and use it to include all of the Islands in the archipellago. I think that neutrality is important and think that at the moment the article makes no attempt to give any alternative POVs. It seems to me that we are lacking balance here. Alun 20:10, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

The article is slanted towards the 'British' point of view

Users in this category feel that the term 'British Isles' is given too much legitimacy in the article. In paritcular, they may think that other terms are being deliberatly ignored, or that the article states too definately that RoI is part of the British Isles

The article gives too much prominance to the terminology debate

Users in this category feel that the terminology debate is given too much prominance in the article. They should express how they feel the problem could be tackled differently, and how neutrality could be maintained or introduced by reducing the info on the debate

  1. I think that there is far too much attention paid to the British Isles controversy. State what the controversy is certainly, state that it is not used in Ireland, fine. It can be done in one or two sentences, it only needs to be mentioned once in the introduction for anyone to get the point. Put the rest of the info in the terminology article. Otherwise ditch the terminology article and have everything here. I can't help but feel that the point is laboured somewhat, with several things being repeated. Alun 14:14, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
  2. Agreed in principle. Halve the terminology explanation in the introduction, give a synopsis in this article and an expanded explanation in British Isles (terminology) or, if too long for there, British Isles (naming dispute) or similar. --Bazza 15:29, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
  3. Somewhat. It's not too bad, but the discussion does seem excessive to me. john k 15:31, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
  4. I believe this. I also believe the introduction has become unwieldly and if we are keeping the info in the intro about the dispute it should be moved below the contents, into the terminology section or even a new section. It is enough to mention that some people take offense over the use of the term in the intro without going into details on it (just five words is enough), it is after all just an introduction. Ben W Bell talk 16:37, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
  5. The extent of coverage of this minority issue both in the lead and in the terminology section unbalances the article, and detail should be in the terminology article or a new naming controversy article. ...dave souza, talk 16:54, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
  6. Agreed, too much of the page is taken up with the terminology dispute, in particular too much taken up with citing individual politicians' and (even more so) journalists' gaffes. Gorbachov's is perhaps notable, as he ought to have known better - but Reagan?!? Wow! What a surprise!! Is there anything he didn't make a gaffe about? And that "Utah British Isles Association", so what!? - the less said of that sort of extraneous body, the better. - MPF 22:42, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
  7. The positioning of the Terminology section also suggests that it is the most important thing about the British Isles. The lack of any survey on the matter or any large coverage suggests otherwise. The article should be primarily about the geography and history of the islands (a subject treated by entire books and articles). josh (talk) 00:36, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

Other viewpoints

Users in this category feel that none of the other headings (broadly) cover their POV. They should give an explantion of what they think is wrong/right with the article and how it needs to progress

  1. Different headings of British Isles which may help.
  • 1. Political; Includes Britain, Isle of Man, Channel Islands and hundreds of smaller islands.
The official term used in this context is British Islands. Most style guides, etc., that we have seen say that "British Isles" should not be used in a political sense. john k 15:24, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
Politically, the British Isles are divided into RoI, UK, IoM. (signed afterwards) --Bazza 18:00, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
  • 2. Political Historical from 1800-1927; Included Britain, Ireland, Isle of Man, Channel Islands and hundreds of smaller islands.
1949, when Ireland became a Republic and left the Commonwealth, would seem a better date for the end. And the opening date would clearly be 1603, when all parts of the islands came under a single ruler
  • 3. Geographical; Disputed, as Ireland was never part of Britain.
Nobody has yet presented any evidence that the geographical meaning is actually disputed. There is an archipelago. The most commonly used name for it is "British Isles." There are some who think this name is inappropriate, because, as you say, Ireland is not British. As to Ireland "was never part of Britain," that is not true. Britain is considered an acceptable short form of "United Kingdom," and before 1922 it was the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. john k 15:24, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
Don't use "Britain" — it's imprecise. I maintain, though, that Ireland is, for the purposes of this article's geographical descriptions, part of the British Isles. (signed afterwards) --Bazza 18:00, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
  • 4. Cultural: Non-runner as Britain was P-Celtic and Ireland was Q-Celtic. MelForbes 14:23, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
Are you serious? Firstly, what you are referring to is linguistic, not cultural. even in this linguistic sense, the Celtic languages are related, and since the early centuries of the common era they have only been spoken in the British Isles and Brittany (whose P-Celtic speakers came originally from Britain). At any rate, when people talk about the British Isles as a cultural unity, it is surely at least as much the unity provided by the English language, and the common culture and history of these areas from the 17th to 20th (and, in terms of culture, if not politics, into the 21st) centuries that provides the cultural meaning of the term, not anything about P-Celtic and Q-Celtic. john k 15:24, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
What's this P and Q stuff got to do with culture? --Bazza 15:39, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
  • 5. More.
I have been wanting to add Geology and Geography in this article but the edit wars around Ireland has prevented me. There are aspects which can be covered (such as inter-island distances, transport, communications) which are not appropriate for the individual islands' articles. --Bazza 15:39, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

Note john k and Bazza, I was only trying to be helpful! Liked the way you rubbished my imput. A chicken and egg situation, yet again. Once Ireland was part of a broader European continental shelf, and not part of Britain, and Britain was part of that shelf too. Surely linguistics do separate peoples into different cultures, e.g., French, German, Italian, dare I say it, British and finally Irish to name but a few. That is not my doing, that is how scholars describe the different cultures. P-Celtic and Q-Celtic are 2 distinct languages, not closely related as you claim, try communication between the two. Then you are talking about the last 300 years of common language, well it is more like 150 years or so. MelForbes 16:05, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

I didn't rubbish your input. If you use technical terms like in a general discussion you shouldn't be surprised if they're questioned. I'm not a linguist. --Bazza 18:00, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
  • 6. Biogeography, ecology, etc. I consider more should be included about the British Isles in their most widely used context, as a region sharing many common features of geology, flora and fauna, etc. Better reference should also be made to international organisations covering the region like the Botanical Society of the British Isles. - MPF 22:42, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
  • 7. Linkboxes and categories. Rather than the current Regions of the World infobox at the bottom of the page, there should be a European Regions linkbox, including Balkans, British Isles, Iberian Peninsula, Scandinavia, etc. - this would perhaps help others realise the non-political, trans-national nature of what is being described on the page. Similarly maybe there should be a Category:Regions of Europe. - MPF 22:42, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

The article is unclear, and fails the reader

1. The natural subject matter of the article is an archipelago, the most common name of which is "British Isles". However, there a few points which should be made as clear as possible to the reader—i believe policy and precedent in other naming disputes supports a clear and concise overview of these points in the article lead:

  • There are other names proposed/in usage for the geographical entity. "Islands of the North Atlantic" is ceartainly verifiable, was its usage deemed so minor that it does not warrant inclusion in the intro? And what of the descriptive phrases "the isles"/"these isles". We have a reference stating "these isles" is used (though not as a proper name) to replace "British Isles" when refering to the archipelago. I seem to recall the phrase once once explained in the terminology article, but has since been removed.
  • The name chosen for the article has other definition/usage/connotations. At one point the Burk cite was used to clearly support alternate usage. The text preceding the footnote has changed to such an extent that i'm now unsure of the intention of this reference. Regardless, we should be able to find a reliable source for alternate usage, and there is much evidence of connotations and confusion.
  • The name is controversial/offensive. Hopefully a reliable source can be found which documents the extent and basis of the controversy.

In my opinion these points need to be concisely presented in the article lead, and expanded on within the body if necessary. Doing so does not lend undue weight to a particular POV, but falls within the requirement that we provide a clear overview of the subject matter and article scope.

We should be careful not to mix and match the above points. Evidence of conflicing and confusing usage is not evidence one of the islands has somehow moved from the archipelago. A body of text follows the introduction and clarification of terminology, text which some readers may find more useful than the discussion of the disputes. Editors should take care not to imply that, when such things as geology and climate are discussed as in similar wiki articles, the text is referring to anything but the archipelago and unambiguosly includes Ireland. EricR 17:02, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

2. As a result of the emphasis on the terminology dispute the article now has four sections going over the history: it would be much clearer for the reader as well as being more concise to combine the Origin of the term with the history and political history. This should be brief and be focussed on the archipelago wide matters, referring only to main island or national histories rather than providing an extended list of links as the present history section. Having set the context the terminology section would not have to repeat points, and should give a short, clear and balanced explanation rather than going into detail to try to justify the nationalist perspective: such detail to be in a linked article. ...dave souza, talk 17:08, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

I like the outline of history links, and was considering adding more, but if it is the way of building a more logical page layout then by all means delete it.EricR 20:17, 13 July 2006 (UTC)
Thanks, the work is appreciated. In a way most of the section is sub-pages of History of Britain and History of Ireland, each of which has an infobox providing these sub-links in a very concise way: I'd suggest that these infoboxes feature here, and in addition links to History of the Isle of Man, History of the Orkney Islands, Shetland Islands and the Channel Islands: think thats it? What I'd suggest is these infoboxes as well as links, say, to prehistoric Ireland and Roman Britain etc in a section noting the origins of the term Pretani, and so on. A brief run through the history with each section headed by points about development of the name and its implications could then be followed by the terminology section: this leaves a question if there's a need for more space for archipelago wide prehistory and history, and whether a better alternative might be to combine the brief history of the name (Origin of the term British Isles plus main points in unions / independence of nations) under the terminology heading (or Name heading?) as a precursor to that section. It would be worth discussing these possibilities before launching into a reorganisation. ..dave souza, talk 21:35, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

Comment/Poll Discussion

[removed inflammatory post. - dave souza, talk 17:43, 12 July 2006 (UTC)]

Really the post should not have been removed, for to remove it indulges in selected censorship, and where did we come across that before. That being said, can anyone tell when the term "British Isles" ceased to be a political statement. If anyone has the answer to that question, then it would go a long way to resolve the wording at issue. MelForbes 18:04, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
Agreed. As a compromise, I'm gonna retrieve it and add it to archive 3. --Robdurbar 20:28, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

Footnotes 4, 5, and 6

Looking at the intro in the version linked above by Robdurbar, I see the following footnotes:

4. For example a tourist site called Isles.com excludes any mention of Ireland, focusing on the three nations of England, Scotland and Wales exclusively, with Ireland not mentioned.
 5. Other British Isles websites similarly exclude Ireland from their definition of the term. For example this site focuses exclusively on the Britishness of the British Isles, and leaves out mention of Ireland.
 6. TIME magazine is a classic example. When quoting the cost of advertising in the magazine, it only quotes pounds sterling, the currency of the United Kingdom, and excludes the euro, the currency of the Republic of Ireland. When discussing circulation it defines it as the circulation of the "British Isles (inc[luding] Ireland)". Yet the circulation on the advertising cost page and on the circulation page are different. Similarly it uses as a representative issue of its magazine one showing a picture of Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom, who possesses no relationship with the Republic, while on its home page showing a picture of the Thames in London. No images of Ireland are used, and only one mention is made at all. (It further adds to the confusion by using American English spellings rather than either British English or Hiberno-English, an action not likely to endeer itself to those covered by either definition of membership of the British Isles).

The first two footnotes apply to small, unofficial websites of no significance whatsoever. The last footnote simply doesn't make any sense to me. The issue of the cost of advertising not including costs in Euros is utterly irrelevant to how Time defines "British Isles." And why does the fact that images on it mostly have to do with England or the UK? Most of the people in the British Isles live in England. This is like if one said that the term "North American," which is a geographical adjective created specifically to mean "Americans and Canadians" does not include Canadians because all of the pictures on a web page about "North America" are of things in the US. It just doesn't follow. And the point about British English seems completely irrelevant to me - what does it have to do with anything? john k 15:38, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

Footnote 6. Advertisers in the UK are most likely to sell their products in the UK and therefore want UK circulation. The fact that there is RoI circulation is just a bonus but not something that is a massive factor in the choosing of the advertising. People wanting to buy advertsing want to know how the circulation and the breakdown makes their decisions easier. The RoI one is included as Time magazine doesn't have an RoI specific issue and it is just lumbered with the UK one but most advertisers will only be interested in the UK circulation (which has to be listed for advertisers in UK magazines by law). As for it being American English this is because Time Magazine is a US magazine, that just happens to have regional versions. By and large its articles are almost all written in the US and used in every version with the odd editorial in the regional variations and of course different advertising. If it was all the same advertising they'd be missing out a fortune on revenues as most US companies wouldn't want to advertise elsewhere and regional based advertising for various versions makes more money. They have to print it abroad anyway so you may as well slot in different adverts. Ben W Bell talk 16:46, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
Okay, well I understand now, but I don't understand how any of this is relevant to what "British Isles" means. john k 17:35, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
Lol, well I think this is more about the footnotes used. To be honest, it was pure laziness on my part, I didn't check through the footnotes that had been used, for which I apologise. 'TheBritishIslesShow' website casued by Internet explorer to crash when I tried to load it, so that can go; I've replaced the others with examples from 'lons clubs international' and Oxford University, which the article had also previously used.
As for the Time link, it is poorly written; I barely undersrtand the point. If you understand it, Ben W Bell, then maybe try and re-write it? --Robdurbar 17:45, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
I understand what the footnote is trying to say, and in all fairness I believe the author of the footnote has actualy misconstrued what he/she was trying to write and that the note is actually irrelevant, or at the very least a poor example. As I've stated above there are very good reasons for what Time does in their magazine (advantages of working in a magazine and events company). Ben W Bell talk 20:06, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

The footnote is directly relevant and accurate.

The magazine claims that it is a British Isles edition, yet in reality only focuses on Britain, undermining the claim that the term is some sort of neutral geographical term and not only that is British-orientated. Would a magazine aimed at the what it called the American continent only refer to the United States currency, United States topics, use United States images, etc. If it did there would be an outcry from all the other countries on the Americas, who would accuse it, rightly, of meaning the United States and being dishonest in its use of terminology. Canada and all the other states on the Americas would go ballistic at such an approach, as would the people of Scotland if Time purported to publish a claimed United Kingdom edition that focused exclusively on England and ignored Scotland and the rest of the UK. If you purport to be a British Isles edition, and the British Isles means, the British users here claim, a set of islands including Britain and Ireland, to leave out one of the world's biggest currencies, one used by one of the biggest islands supposedly in the British Isles, and only quote UK's currency, is a massive PR faux pas. If you claim to be a British Isles edition including Ireland, it is absolutely crazy to use as a sample cover an ancient edition that is exclusively of interest to one part of the islands. To have entirely UK contents to the webpage (bar one single mention of outside the UK) and then call it a British Isles edition sums up exactly the perspective of Ireland on the "British Isles": that it means, and is generally understood to mean, the isles that are part of or belonging to Britain, and that non-British topics don't feature in the definition. TIME's stuff embodies exactly how the British Isles is seen by many worldwide — as the United Kingdom by another name. Which is why Ireland has insisted for decades that it does not belong to the British Isles and that to suggest it does is disrespectful at best to Irish independence. TIME's stuff unambiguously thinks 'British Isles = United Kingdom'. As Ireland has experienced worldwide, that is the general attitude, which is why Ireland does not accept any claim that it is part of the British Isles, and won't accept it.

BTW as someone who works in the media, it is a golden rule in promotion in other cultures that one never ever ever ever uses the promoter's language and always the language of the culture one wants to promote in. To use American English in an advert aimed clearly at the United Kingdom is about a big a faux pas as one can commit. American magazines no more use AE for UK promotion than UK magazines use British English for promotion in the US. As Wikipedia experience shows only too well, locals in both places take high offence at the other side's English being targeted at them. Americans think BE old fashioned, long-winded and ridiculous. British people see AE as evidence that Americans cannot spell and are only semi-literate. Advertisers will tell you one only ever uses one's own form of English in the other's jurisdiction if you are using it to stress your identity. You never ever ever use it casually in a document sent to advertisers because some of those advertisers will be very nationalistic about their own language and will react to receiving bumpf written in the other version with the words 'fuck you. I'm not advertising in a magazine that can't be bothered to use proper English in its promotional material.

The claim that the other websites are of no consequence is crap. They show clearly that the claim that everyone bar a few Nationalist paddies define the BI as UK, Ireland and some islands as clear bullshit. They show as not even every British source accepts the supposed definition. Regrettably, as Irish users have commented on here and elsewhere, British users here seem so wedded to their insistence that they are right that they cannot cope with mention of the fact that there is widespread opposition to their viewpoint in many walks of life, in Britain as well as in Ireland. They are so blinded by their POV-pushing that if the Queen was quoted they'd turn around and say "she is only a figure-head. Her words carry no weight" while if Blair was quoted they'd say "but is is only an unpopular prime minister." They are so in denial that they are blind to the clear evidence that their viewpoint is not the only one. FearÉIREANN\(caint) 21:17, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

Hear hear FearÉIREANN, hear hear! MelForbes 22:53, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
I would think that the proper issue with whether Time is a true British Isles addition is whether it is sold on newstands in the Republic, and not whether it actually deals with issues about the Republic. Most American magazines are, in fact, sold in both the US and Canada (and have prices listed in both US and Canadian dollars), and are thus de facto North American editions, even though they don't talk about Canada very much. I wouldn't even be surprised if they only list ad prices in US dollars elsewhere in the magazine. If TIME is indeed sold in Ireland, then it is a British Isles edition, whether or not it has any interest in actual Irish issues. And the fact that Time uses American English, as much of a faux pas as it may or may not be, is completely unrelated to the issue of what "British Isles" means. As to the website, I thought we were supposed to take our understanding of usage from reliable sources. A couple of websites are not a reliable source. I'm sure I could find a million websites that call Elizabeth II "Queen of England," and I'm sure you would be the first to quite rightly say that this does not allow me to say that it is disputed whether or not "Queen of England" is an appropriate way to describe her. You have dismissed fairly clear examples of usage of "British Isles" to include Ireland by Dail members and Irish ministers on various grounds, and yet you somehow think that a couple of random websites (one of which does not even work) are relevant examples of usage? Beyond that, you're really moving into the area of failing to assume good faith. Perhaps if you try to think for a minute about why people might have good faith reasons for not agreeing with you, this thing might not be so heated. john k 22:47, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
john k, you wrote about the "common culture and history of these areas from the 17th to 20th", between Britain and Ireland. Well it would have made me wriggle with laughter if it weren't for the true facts of that era. Did you study the history of British common culture in Ireland. The "culture" (British rule) was so cruel and horrific that it set Edmund Burke to described it as "a truly barbarous system; where all the parts are an outrage on the laws of humanity and the laws of nature; it is a system of elaborate contrivance, as well fitted for the oppression, imprisonment and degradation of a people, and the debasement of human nature itself, as ever proceeded from the perverted ingenuity of man". Don't lecture me about culture please. MelForbes 00:21, 13 July 2006 (UTC)
I am not trying to minimize the awfulness of British rule in Ireland. But, er, the existence of a common culture is rather difficult to deny. Burke himself, a major political figure and philosopher in England, was born in Ireland. So was Britain's greatest military leader of the 19th century, and several major British writers. Beyond that, there is generally a common literary, etc, culture between the two places. Your own biases have completely blinded you to unsigned byjohn k
You are the first person I have ever heard accusing Edmund Burke of being blind, for he wrote those words, not I. Okay, now on that basis let us make Australia, New Zealand and the Falkland Islands members of the British Isles too. MelForbes 14:52, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

Actually John, you completely miss the point. British contributors here have ad nausaum insisted that there is no dispute about the term British Isles, even when there patently is. They have insisted that only the Irish have problems, yet problems show up all over the place. They insist that everyone else but the Irish agree on the terminology and definition f British Isles. Yet a thirty second search threw up British website after British website after British website that completely contradicted what Thar, and Souza and others have been insisting endlessly on the page, about the uniformity of British opinion on the topic. British users dispute the Irish belief that internationally the term British Isles is equated with United Kingdom and as a result causes deep offence in Ireland. When highly moderate Irish users pointed out the nature of the offence, they were accused of pushing extreme nationalist POVs, and subject by continuous rascist attacks. Yet a simple glance at an international magazine like TIME proves the Irish point: a supposedly reputable magazine, though available in Ireland, able to take advertising from Ireland and priced in Ireland in euros, thinks the term British Isles so anglocentric that though the document is supposedly targeted at Irish advertisers too they cannot be bothered using Irish currency, and just use British currency. Though supposedly targeted at both Britain and Ireland as supposed equal members of the British Isles, the magazine uses 100% British images, 100% British cultural references, shows front covers 100% devoted to British topics, and in all the paperwork mentions the word 'Ireland' only once, and this is documentation that they supply to potential Irish advertisers. And then they wonder why Irish advertisers boycott the thing, and why so few people actually read it.

Every reliable source on word meaning and usage that has so far been presented agrees that "British Isles" includes Ireland. Surely for determining what a word means, dictionaries, style guides, and the like are our proper sources, not random websites? As to TIME, see Ben Bell below. The US and Canada comparison is a propos. john k 10:00, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

Your nonsense (and yes it is nonsense) about the Queen, etc, misses the point completely. (And you know very well that I was the one who stopped the Queen of England crap on Wikipedia, and insisted on proper accuracy in titles). If Irish users had said that no-one ever uses "British Isles" in Ireland then the references produced in rebuttal would have some value. But that is not what was said. What they said was "most people don't . . . the vast majority of people don't." Anyone with even a passing acquaintence with Ireland would know how true that is. The fact that the British users here reacted with such shock and disbelief, and practically accused those saying that of being Brit-hating IRA supporters - that was the tone of some of the attacks - shows just how limited their knowledge of Ireland is. Irish people qualified what they said, just as they qualified what they wrote to cover British sensibilities (They didn't say in the article Ireland wasn't in the BI, just that the question was a matter of dispute. Merely pointing out a self-evident fact drove some British editors here into a rage.) With one or two exceptions (Alun and Rob come to mind) the British contributors in contrast have not qualified what they have said, but stated unambiguously that everyone on the planet except a few Brit-hating paddies agreed that Ireland was in the British Isles. The links on the page are there for context. They show that, contrary to the claims some British users continually inserted, even in Britain there is no agreement on whether the term British Isles covers Ireland. The BBC sometimes uses the term as a geographic one. Other times, specificially on news programmes, it tells its staff not to use it. On other occasions, it says "British Isles and Ireland".

Every reliable source on the planet agrees that "British Isles" covers Ireland. It would appear that sometimes people say "the British Isles and Ireland" to avoid offense of Irish people at being included in the British Isles, but this is basically redundant. There may be a fair number of people who use the term incorrectly, but that does not mean that a term is "disputed." Otherwise one could just as well say that it is "disputed" as to whether or not "England" means "United Kingdom," because one can certainly find a lot of examples of that (which was my point about that). People being wrong is not the same thing as a meaning being under dispute. john k 10:00, 13 July 2006 (UTC)
I agree, people being wrong is also not the same as people being confused. Alun 10:03, 13 July 2006 (UTC) Actually I don't agree, most reliable sources, or a majority may agree, but not every one. Alun 14:36, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

As to the not showing good faith, it is hard to justify doing that after rascist attacks, after blanket statement of untruths, after insistence despite all the evidence that the term British Isles was purely geographic, with language in the article continually doctored to suggest that. Only today another paragraph was doctored to suggest the complete opposite of what it said prior to the doctoring. The trouble was the paragraph demonstrated with detailed sourcing that the claims made of universal British agreement on the meaning of British Isles was bunkum. So, as usual with this article the paragraph was doctored to say something else, entirely without evidence to justify the claim. No matter how many times the simple elementary demonstrable fact that the BI term is controversial and disputed is shown, certain users insist on demanding that the opening paragraph state unambiguously that there is no dispute and no controversy. Instead they expect it to be OK to bung of mention of the fact that a few Micks have a problem with the title to somewhere in the article (even that wasn't originally tolerated in the article until Irish users got fed up seeing the anglocentric biased editing going on and intervened. I personally don't have a problem with people claiming Ireland is in the British Isles (even though I would never say that myself) but the antics of various British users on this page, their tone and attitude, offended me, a moderate.

Irish users have regularly proposed compromises, and wordings to incorporate British and Irish sensibilities. With a few notable exceptions, the response of British users has to demand that British statements be stated in the opening paragraph as fact, with Irish qualifications relegated to ambiguous paragraphs later on, once the reader has been told the British view as the "fact". And you wonder why Irish (and non-Irish) users alike are so fed up with the attitude they face here. That is why Irish users are not going to allow the issue to drop. If they have to, they will fight attempts to add in a British bias to this article until Christmas, this time next year, or as long as it takes. FearÉIREANN\(caint) 01:11, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

Back the the issue on Time magazine. If it is sold in the Republic of Ireland and the UK then it is a British Isles edition under the definition. Whether or not the magazine contains RoI content or not is really irrelevant, if it is distributed in the RoI (and the different sets of circulation figures show it is) then it is a British Isles edition. As for the currencies their offices are based in the UK and therefore they use the pound. It is not a great conspiracy to put down the population of the Republic of Ireland, just a commercial working reality. And as for it not containing items on Ireland, well Time Magazine contains articles on the world over not just the British Isles, and even when it does do the UK is it really unreasonable for it to focus on the goings on of the majority of the population and what they'd be interested in? Remember the population of the Republic of Ireland only makes up approximately 5.5% of the total population of the British Isles, so getting the odd mention in a predominately UK based magazine that is also distributed in the RoI isn't unreasonable. Anyway if it is being sold in the RoI then many of the population there is buying it and obviously doesn't have a problem with that particular issue. It is the same with all cross border circulated magazines and items.
The US/Canada ones listed before are a good example. Many US magazines are circulated in Canada but contain no Canadian content. Why? Because Canada constitutes only about 11% of the potential readership and you need to cater for the majority of your coverage, not the minority. Similarly going back to British Isles magazines there are hundreds of magazines produced in the UK, that are UK centric and cover only UK topics that are circulated in the Republic of Ireland and hence circulated in the British Isles. Why? Because the economy of the RoI isn't sufficient and the readership not great enough to justify the costs of producing specific issues of these niche magazines for solely that market, it's not a deliberate attempt to put the nation down it is simply a matter of economics. Ben W Bell talk 07:24, 13 July 2006 (UTC)
'Anyone with even a passing acquaintence with Ireland would know how true that is' - I'm afraid that this is original research, true or not. I think that a problem is that there is no way to prove the minority/majority view in either the UK or Ireland; we can only ever say 'some' until we have figures, for both cases.
I think the Time example - as Jtdirl I think suggests - should be used to show the confusion over the term, rather than justify either sort of use. Btw, I'd remove the bit about American English from the footnote, it just adds confusion.

--Robdurbar 09:33, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

I would like you to clarify just how the Time example can be used to show the confusion over the term. It seems clear to me that the publishers of Time refer to this edition as a British Isles edition because that is where it is circulated. No confusion there. If you can show that this edition is not circulated in the RoI then you would be correct. It seems to me to be an example of a source that does not actually support the contention in the article. Alun 09:43, 13 July 2006 (UTC)
Well is that not the point? Have we verified that this copy is circulated in Ireland? If one of our Irish contributors could just pop down to the nearest newsagents....? --Robdurbar 10:04, 13 July 2006 (UTC)
It may very well be. In that regard it is not a WP:RS if we do not even know if it is circulated in the RoI or not. Alun 10:09, 13 July 2006 (UTC)
Alun. You miss the point. The point is that they describe it as British Isles advertisers documentation yet when it comes to designing something described as being for the "British Isles" they focus exclusively on the UK. If they had produced advertising bumpf for the "British Isles" that exclusively focused on Ireland, showed TIME editions with Irish images on the front cover, photographs of Irish locations and only quoted euros (or puint before the new currency came in) there would be an outcry among British Nationalists; the midmarket tabloids would go ballistic complaining about a "slur" on Britain, about a bias towards Ireland. (And they would have every right to. It would be insulting to ignore Britain in a document purporting to be for the British Isles.) If they produced advertisers's documents for "North America" and focused exclusively on the US and US dollars, and ignored Canada, Canadians would take high offence, as would the US if documents marked "North America" focused exclusively on Canada and left out the US. Or if documents marked "for Iberia" completely forgot about Portugal focused entirely on Spain, etc. The point is clear: as Irish people find out worldwide, howevermuch in theory people may claim that "British Isles" does not mean the UK and its islands, in practice "British Isles" is taken to mean in reality the UK. That is exactly what the TIME documents do here. Claim to be not just British but also Irish (and distribute the editions on both islands), but when producing advertising bumpf the documents presume "British Isles = Britain".
The argument that British advertisers are worth more than Irish ones due to numbers, or that it would get more readers in Britain, is hogwash. One of the biggest chains of local newspapers in Britain is owned by an Irish media organisation. One of Britain's most prominent national daily newspapers is run by an Irish company with an Irish boss. Britain's biggest airline is Irish. Two of its most highly paid broadcasters are Irish. The heads of a number of book publishers are Irish. The Irish form one of the largest ethnic group in the UK and international studies show that the Irish economy is the fastest growing in Europe, the Irish have the one of the highest literacy rates in the world, and Irish people have a disproportionally high tendency to read international magazines and have an awareness of world issues. From an advertiser's perspective, Celtic Tiger Ireland is a dream market, and the Irish in Britain are a financial goldmine (only last week it was revealed that Ireland has the highest concentration of millionaires in the world) all of which makes the equation of 'British Isles' purely with the 'UK' both financially foolish, yet very revealing. It matches what Irish people find all around the world: that people at best think that British Isles means Britain, at worst, that if Ireland is in the British Isles then Ireland is part of Britain. Irish people spent so much time having to correct people about that, which is why Ireland has for many years stressed at home and abroad that it is not part of the British Isles and has not been for decades. TIME's faux pas in equating regarding Ireland as part of the British Isles for distribution purposes, but forgetting about it for advertising purposes, and thinking British Isles = United Kingdom is just one example of a worldwide attitude.
I know some users are genuinely trying to understand what the problem Ireland is with the claim that it is part of the UK. Imagine for a moment if things were in exactly in reverse. If the islands were called the Irish Isles. And it was insisted the England, Scotland and Wales was part of it (even though people in the UK kept saying 'no we are not'. And everywhere you went worldwide you met the statement 'so you are English. That's part of the Irish Isles. So do you like having President McAleese as your head of state?'. 'If you are English, that means you are Irish. So you use the euro then?' 'You are Irish. So did you vote for Bertie Ahern to be your prime minister?' 'Do the Irish let you English people have a parliament, or do you send your MPs to Dublin?' etc. We face that all the time. People think "British Isles = British", meaning "Irish = British". So I had someone come up to me and offer me sympathy on the death of "your lovely Lady Diana". Or tell me how I must be "so proud to have a great lady like the Queen Mum". Or have someone in the Middle East go into a rant about how he hated my Imperialistic prime minister. "Bertie Ahern?" I asked. "No, your prime minister Blair." "No. No. No. He is the British prime minister." I replied. "And you Irish in British Isles so you British" he snapped back. Personally I have no problem with the royals — I've met the Prince of Wales and Duke of York and liked them. I just get fed up telling them that they are someone else's royalty, not mine. And I get fed up telling people not to blame the Irish for British policy in Iraq, or the lies over Saddam, or Bush's relationship with Blair, etc. The TIME magazine stuff is just more of the same pain-in-the-butt stuff we Irish are fed up to the teeth with. The person who did the document was so ignorant that they thought "sure everyone in the British Isles loves the Queen. Lets put the front cover we had of her in the leaflet. And everyone in the British Isles uses the pound, don't they, so lets use it. And everyone in the British Isles will identify with pictures of London", etc etc etc. And Irish people, as they are used it, would look at that bumpf and sigh — "for fuck sake. The Queen is nothing to do with us [nice lady, but has no more to do with us than Hillary Clinton or Mrs Putin]. Nor is London anything to do with us. And we haven't used sterling for nearly 30 years. But these ejjits in TIME don't get that." FearÉIREANN\(caint) 22:44, 13 July 2006 (UTC)
I can see your point, if it's sold in Ireland and the UK then one would expect the cover price to be in both euros and pounds. I do admit that it is sometimes not so obvious to British people to see the nature of the problem, and you are quite right if the situation were reversed then there would be an almighty stink in the media. I have been generally keeping out of this discussion as I can see both points of view, but don't really understand why there is so much passion involved. As I said before I am unconcerned with the nomenclature used. I had not even considered that there was any problem with the term British Isles untill this discussion took off. I have started to pipe links like this [[British Isles|British and Irish Isles]] in my recent editing, so as not to cause offence, though it seems whatever one does someone will get offended. I had a look at the Geographical Sociey of Ireland website to see if there were any pointers as to how to refer to the archipellago, but all I found was a reference to Ireland and the U.K. for subscriptions for their publication.[11] By the way imagine how us Welsh feel about the so called Prince of Wales. Alun 13:03, 15 July 2006 (UTC)
Well, that they give a circulation figure which notes "Including Ireland" suggests that it is circulated there, doesn't it? john k 10:08, 13 July 2006 (UTC)
Forget about TIME, the same edition is circulated in various European cities. Take Mercedes as the new bench-mark instead. They make a right hand drive version, they never make a BI version. Maybe better not rely on commercial enterprises to establish the facts, as almost anything can be proved or disproved by using such criteria MelForbes 14:29, 13 July 2006 (UTC)
Maybe they sell it in Japan. Or South Africa. Or Australia. Or New Zealand. Or India. Or Mozambique. Or... Don't complain if a bad example has led to total confusion. --Bazza 15:03, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

I and and zillions of other people believe that Ireland is not part of the British Isles or the British Islands. Then, why does the article insist on including the whole island of Ireland in that term. Surely this must be the model case of POV on Wikipedia. Surely it is up to the people of Ireland if they want to call themselves British, surely it is not in the gift of the British editors, as Wikipedia is an open source encyclopedia and is under obligation to its terms of reference to remove itself from all POV. We have some facts established, but not with certainity, that Britain, Man, Dogs, Skye, Wight etc are part of the British Isles or British Islands, but then again many Scottish people, especially, will quickly grumble about such claims. Ireland should be removed from the first sentance of the article, because this claim is devoid of certainty. One solution is to contact other Irish editors only, classed between Ireland and Northern Ireland , and have them vote for inclusion or exclusion, as British ruled Northern Ireland may be divided on this issue. MelForbes 14:54, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

So just how many is a zillion? Also how can you have part of an island be in the British Isles? Surely either the entire island is or it isn't. Also we are not in a place to make up definitions for terms wether or not Irish Wikipedians, British Wikipedians or Congoan Wikipedians wish to, ours is the place only to report verifiable facts. As it stands there is a massive overwhelming evidence that the term British Isles includes Ireland in its usages, and the term is used as such in the Republic of Ireland. Surely your insisting it isn't in the face of such evidence is POV pushing. Ben W Bell talk 17:00, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

Comment: This article is about the British Isles, of which Ireland is most assuredly part. It is not about Great Britain or the United Kingdom, in which case I could see the point. This is a geographical area; make a brief mention of the countries included in the article, not in the intro, and let it go. There is nothing in the North America article about Canada not being part of the United States of America. This is making an issue of a non-issue. One puppy's opinion. KillerChihuahua?!? 17:24, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

No, the heart of the problem is this, to many people the term British Isles does not include Ireland and to other other folks it does. That's where the certainty lies, in those 2 different points of view. The problem for Wikipedia is this, which point of view does it choose to represent, and because of the uncertainty, can it choose? Wikipedia cannot include an uncertainty as a certainty, therefore Wikipedia cannot choose. The island of Ireland must be omitted from the list of countries in the BI, and any case for inclusion or exclusion discussed in a later sentences or paragraph. BTW as an anecdote, I spent some years in Wales and my experience there was that many Welsh people avoid word British wherever possible, so it's not Ireland alone. MelForbes 18:05, 14 July 2006 (UTC)
Are there any cites for this? KillerChihuahua?!? 18:15, 14 July 2006 (UTC)
Not at all. First, which are you taking exception to — British Isles or British Islands? Secondly, this article bends over backwards to say that (a) it is about the major group of islands off the northwest of Europe and (b) the name given to that group in this article is open to dispute, said name having been chosen because it is in common use (rather than zillions of people using it). If you care to follow the recent discussions you will find that people have been constructively attempting to come to a concensus to allow the article to expand; you will also notice that there are no offerings for an alternative commonly recognised term to describe the set of islands. Come up with such an alternative and you will contribute substantially to this article, rather than offering only negative criticisms. --Bazza 18:20, 14 July 2006 (UTC)
The British Isles and Ireland would be the most universally acceptable name for the group of islands. The following quote yet again explodes the myth of this "certainty".
Quote from English Law, The Interpretation Act 1978, Schedule 1 distinctively identifies the following: "British Islands", "England", and "United Kingdom". The use of the term "British Isles" is virtually obsolete in statutes and, when it does appear, it is taken to be synonymous with "British Islands".
So, British Islands = British Isles QED -MelForbes 19:07, 14 July 2006 (UTC)
The Interpretations Act also states that land includes "Land covered by water" and a person could be a "body of persons". It's purely used to define language for use in Acts of parliment, which don't generally require to refer to the Republic of Ireland. It does not define the English language. josh (talk) 19:23, 14 July 2006 (UTC)
You miss my point, I was not quoting The Interpretation Act 1978. That was just part of the broader quote. The relevant part was bolded. The point was this; when it suits British Law, both British Isles and British Islands are interchangeable and mutually inclusive. Okay, now get rid of the wool. Quote; "British Isles".........when it does appear, it is taken to be synonymous with "British Islands" -MelForbes 20:19, 14 July 2006 (UTC)
The Act appears to give guidance on how to interpret wording on statutes rendered obsolete by the separation of the RoI. The date long predates modern definitions, showing its usage has not entered the language in terms of dictionaries and style guides. Anyone got a link to a RoI dictionary? ...dave souza, talk 20:41, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

The remarkably ingenious and convoluted argument built on the failure of Time magazine to price their rag in Euros is presented as supporting in some way the statement that "Some international publications send confused messages as to whether they include or exclude Ireland in their definition of the British Isles." It seems a bit unnecessary, as we already have British Isles (terminology) dealing with the point that there is confusion about the various terms. However, the analysis or synthesis appears to be entirely the editor's. Please read Wikipedia:No original research#What is excluded? - "It introduces an analysis or synthesis of established facts, ideas, opinions, or arguments in a way that builds a particular case favored by the editor, without attributing that analysis or synthesis to a reputable source". A citation will be needed giving such attribution if this argument is to be included. ..dave souza, talk 17:29, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

Footnotes 4, 5, and 6 continued
Wikipedia lists British Islands as being a UK legal term. It includes the Channel Islands which are not part of the archipelago. So British Isles ≠ British Islands. You've decided that "British Isles and Ireland" are universally acceptable — on what grounds? Also, make up your mind if you're quoting British law or English law. And stop bolding your comments so much - it's too much like shouting in my face. --Bazza 21:09, 14 July 2006 (UTC)
Sorry for shouting in your face. Quote, "The Channel Islands are not part of the archipelago." When did that happen, like who is making the rules here, who is deciding who is in or out of the club. I can get loads of citations, going back years and years, stating that the Channel Islands are part of the British Isles. Also "Britain and Ireland" is very acceptable too, but really, the issue is not about Britain and Ireland, the issue is concerning the name "British Isles" MelForbes 22:49, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

The rules here are WP:CIVIL, WP:V, WP:NOR and WP:NPOV, to name some of the most relevant. Having had a look as some of the footnotes cited in support of this alleged controversy, it increasingly looks as though these rules are not being followed. ..dave souza, talk 08:40, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

Link 4 revisited

Link 4 as of now refers to The Welcome Trust, in the University of Oxford, equates the British Isles (its study is called People of the British Isles) with the United Kingdom and excludes the people of the Republic of Ireland. The page linked gives no such indication. Sub-pages such as Press and News refer to Oxford professors investigating how genetic structure varies geographically in the UK, an area which by either definition is in the British Isles. There appears to be no mention of the people of the RoI being excluded: the spin in the footnote thus seems to be a violation of WP:NOR. That this particular study area is in parts of the Isles which don't include the RoI is not proof that further studies might not include that area, or that there was any intention to equate the BI with the UK. ...dave souza, talk 20:41, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

Might this be a more generally acceptable Introduction?

I think that the first paragraph could be changed to be more agreeable to regular users of the term 'British Isles'. My offered suggestion is as follows (detailed listing of changes and explanations below):

Great Britain, Ireland, the Isle of Man and several thousand surrounding isles form an archipelago off the northwest coast of continental Europe, most commonly known, albeit controversially, as the 'British Isles'.

The islands include two sovereign states, the Republic of Ireland and the United Kingdom of Great Britain & Northern Ireland, and numerous British crown dependencies. Because it contains the word 'British', the term 'British Isles' can be mistakenly interpreted to mean that the islands that are all part of the present United Kingdom. The Irish Republic (then the Irish Free State) became independent in 1922. The Irish Republic left the Commonwealth of Nations (then the 'British Commonwealth') completely on 1 April 1949.

In the Republic of Ireland the use of the term is seen as controversial and sometimes offensive. Official government documents and the media there rarely use the term. Despite this dispute, no single alternative name for the isles as a whole has gained wide acceptance, although the term ‘Anglo-Celtic Isles’ is in some use.

These islands encompass an area south to north from Pednathise Head to Out Stack, Shetland in the United Kingdom, and west to east from Tearaght Island in the Republic of Ireland to Lowestoft Ness in the United Kingdom, containing more than 6,000 islands, amounting to a total land area of 315,134 km² (121,674 sq. miles).

Changes made:

Paragraph 1

Alphabetical order is acceptably neutral and so I’ve put ‘Great Britain’, ‘Ireland’ and the ‘Isle of Man’ in that order.

Paragraph 2

I removed ‘situated off the northwest coast of the continent’, as it was a repetition from above.

I inserted ‘of Great Britain & Northern Ireland’ after United Kingdom, as it gives the state’s full & proper name.

I inserted ‘British’ before ‘crown dependencies’, as it makes things clearer.

I inserted a ‘that’ after ‘interpreted to mean’.

I inserted ‘present’ in front of ‘United Kingdom’, again to make things clearer.

I removed ‘This is because the islands largely fall within the same boundaries as the former United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, from which…’ as I think it was unnecessarily wordy.

I changed ‘The Irish Free State (now the Republic of Ireland) seceded in the 1920s. The Republic left the Commonwealth of Nations (then known as the British Commonwealth) completely on 1 April 1949’ to ‘The Irish Republic (then the Irish Free State) became independent in 1922. The Irish Republic left the Commonwealth of Nations (then the 'British Commonwealth') completely on 1 April 1949’.

Paragraph 3

I inserted ‘government’ between ‘Official’ and ‘documents’.

I inserted ‘there’ between ‘the media’ and ‘rarely’.

I removed: ‘Some academics also dispute the use of the term’, as it does not seem to be necessary.

I changed ‘no alternative names…have’ to ‘no single alternative name…has’.

After ‘Despite this dispute, no single alternative name for the isles as a whole has gained wide acceptance’ I have inserted ‘, although the term ‘Anglo-Celtic Isles’ is in some use.’

I removed ‘Some other British sources also either do not include the island of Ireland at all, or else just include Northern Ireland, in the definition. Some international publications send confused messages as to whether they include or exclude Ireland in their definition of the British Isles’, as I do not think it is necessary in the introduction (should be included in the ‘Terminology’ section below).

Paragraph 4

I removed ‘the’ from in front of ‘Tearaght Island’.

I changed ‘and totalling...of land’ to ‘, amounting to a total land area of...’ to make it read better.

Unless there is strong objection from my Irish colleagues, I intend to make these changes tomorrow evening. Kind regards, User: PConlon 21:29, 12 July 2006

I don't see the need to include any of the extra terms in the intro, as none have any particular validity over the others (if anything, IONA has been used more than A-C isles). As discussed earlier, the 'albeit controversialy' should probably go from the 1st sentence.
Even then, I don't think that its particularly worded better than the current intro (tho the current version is mainly mine, so I obviosuly think its worded fairly well!). If any changes were to be made, I think it would be to the current paragraph 3 - maybe even to the extent that it is removed overall - but I'd rather see the straw poll run its course first. --Robdurbar 20:58, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
Thoguh obviously I wouldn't stand in the way of the above intro if others preferred it. --Robdurbar 20:59, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
Thanks for making a constructive effort to find a way forward. As I've pointed out a few times, vague caveats about the name only serve to denigrate it in a one-sided way; "albeit controversially" is unacceptable, but the sentence could end with a colon then "alternative less widespread names include the Islands of the North Atlantic (IONA) or the Anglo-Celtic Isles, or sometimes the archipelago is described as Britain and Ireland or the British Isles and Ireland." A more concise alternative would be to end it with "other names are in less widespread use." The "Despite this dispute" sentence would then be unnecessary. The Isle of Man is not geographically more significant than the Hebrides, the Orkney Islands and the Shetland Islands, and is not included in the style guides and dictionary definitions. The successive Irish names and dates are excessive detail for the intro, and I'd suggest ending the paragraph with "all part of the present United Kingdom, which has been incorrect since the independence of what became the Republic of Ireland." If the paragraph can be more concise, good. The intro should also mention the other main sections of the article, and I suggested a paragraph on geography and geology above. ..dave souza, talk 21:23, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

Some proposals are good. Some unacceptable. albeit controversially is a must. It is a matter of controversy. (This page alone shows that.) It has then to be stated in the opening. Leaving it out implies there is a consensus on the definition, which clearly there is not.

The re-ordering of the islands in alphabetically makes sense.

The statement about the former United Kingdom is vital because that is the crux of the problem. The British Isles as internationally understood for well over 100 years was largely similar, though not identical, with that entity. That entity's borders continued to be a source of controversy right throughout the twentieth century (i.e., the partition of Ireland, Scotland's role in the UK, home rule, el al). Most, though not all, UK people (as shown here) don't see how later developments could have impacted on the definition of the BI. Most, though not all, Irish people don't understand how later developments following the scrapping of the old UK could not but have an impact on the definition of the BI. So the position and definition of the former United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland is crucial and has to be be stated up front. Without it the context for the controversy would not be clear.

Your proposal for The Irish Free State (now the Republic of Ireland) seceded in the 1920s. The Republic left the Commonwealth of Nations (then known as the British Commonwealth) completely on 1 April 1949’ to ‘The Irish Republic (then the Irish Free State) became independent in 1922. The Irish Republic left the Commonwealth of Nations (then the 'British Commonwealth') completely on 1 April 1949 is completely wrong. The Irish Republic was the name of an Irish state from 1919 to 1922. The description of the modern Irish state is the Republic of Ireland, not Irish Republic, though the latter, wrongly, is often used (usually by the British — for some reason they couldn't use it in 1919-1922 but now use it for a state with a different legal description. Calling the RoI the IR is a bit like calling the United Kingdom the Kingdom of Great Britain. It is an old name no longer used. We in an encyclopaedia cannot make such an elementary mistake. It is also standard in history writing to use the relevant original name and then what it changed to in brackets, not the other way around. We don't write about "Tony Blair's predecessor (Winston Churchill) led Britain during the Second World War" We write "Winston Churchill (a precedessor of Tony Blair) led Britain during the Second World War." The same rules apply to states. It was something called the Irish Free State that left the UK, not the Republic of Ireland. Apart from anything else, The Irish Republic (then the Irish Free State) became independent in 1922 is open to wide misinterpretation. It could be understood to mean The Irish Republic ([which] then [became] the Irish Free State) became independent in 1922. That is why the original name is used, with the later adaption in brackets.

Re Some other British sources also either do not include the island of Ireland at all, or else just include Northern Ireland, in the definition. Some international publications send confused messages as to whether they include or exclude Ireland in their definition of the British Isles. Given that British users here wish to state the dubious claim that Ireland unambiguously is in the BI as fact (something that is not on) it is vital to state upfront that the there is not absolute unanimity in both the UK and Irl as to whether Ireland is in or out. Most in the UK believe it is in. Others don't share that assumption, as do international sources. Similarly in Ireland while a large majority believe that Ireland is not part of the BI, a minority believes that it is. We can only leave that out of the start by leaving out any statement as to whether Ireland is in or out. If, as a lot of users here do, we have to make the claim that it is in, we cannot avoid including the necessary qualifiers as to who believes this and who doesn't up front. Stating something as supposed fact at the start, and burying qualifiers into the text is POV. It gives a misleading impression to those many people who only skim the first paragraph of an article and don't go further.

Dave's claim about putting in a paragraph about geology and geography is a non-starter. The statement that the BI is only a geology and geography term is patent nonsense. If there are paragraphs about those in the opening, then there must be a paragraph about each of the other meanings: culture, politics, history, geopolitics, heritage, publishing, archaeology, etc. We cannot possibly fit all of those into the opening. So then we can't do geology and geography, just two of a long list. FearÉIREANN\(caint) 22:40, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

The purpose of an introduction is to give a taster of what's to come. From the MoS: The lead section should contain up to four paragraphs, depending on the length of the article, and should provide an overview, or executive summary, of the main points the article will make, summarizing the primary reasons the subject matter is interesting or notable, and including a mention of its notable controversies, if there are any. This article is not about the naming controversy, as you might expect from the undue weight given in the introduction: there is other information as well which deserves to be in the introduction. (I can't find the reference to this only being a geo article.) --Bazza 08:43, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

Revised proposal

The recommendation that names be in alphabetical order is accepted. The need to avoid any implication that there is consensus in the definition could be met by showing the dispute in the first sentence. It should be stated that "British" is deemed controversial by a significant minority, with expansion of the historical reasons for this going in the relevant section. I accept the point that history should be mentioned as it is the subject of section(s) of the article. However omitting any mention of the sections on geography and geology appears to go directly against WP:LEAD. I for one do not consider BI to be only a geology and geography term though it is widely used for these purposes on the clear understanding that it not a political entity, but the concept being pushed that it is only a controversy is patent nonsense. Pulling this together, we then have an intro on the following lines:

The islands of Great Britain, Ireland and several thousand surrounding isles together form the largest archipelago in Europe which is most commonly known as the British Isles, but this name has no official status and is considered unacceptable by a significant minority of the people of the islands.
The islands include two sovereign states, the Republic of Ireland and the United Kingdom of Great Britain & Northern Ireland, and a number of British crown dependencies. Because it contains the word 'British', the term British Isles can be mistakenly interpreted to mean that the islands are all part of the present United Kingdom. In the Republic of Ireland the use of the term is seen as controversial and sometimes offensive. Official government documents and the media there rarely use the term. Despite this dispute, no single alternative name for the isles as a whole has gained wide acceptance.
These islands encompass an area south to north from Pednathise Head to Out Stack, Shetland in the United Kingdom, and west to east from Tearaght Island in the Republic of Ireland to Lowestoft Ness in the United Kingdom, containing more than 6,000 islands, amounting to a total land area of 315,134 km² (121,674 sq. miles).
In geographical terms, the islands are largely low lying and fertile, with more mountainous areas in Wales, Ireland, the North of England and Scotland. The geology is complex, formed by the drifting together of separate regions and shaped by glaciation. The history of the isles is one of emergence of nations, and tends to be considered on a national basis.

This approach, it is hoped, will meet all concerns. ..dave souza, talk 08:11, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

The alphabetical order has the happy virtue that it is also the order of size, which is what I would have argued for had the two not been coincident. TharkunColl 08:45, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

I suggest the following minor alterations to the above:

  • para 1. "but" becomes "although": ...known as the British Isles, although this name...
  • para 3. Two islands don't make sense as written. I suggest: The archipelago encompasses an area...
  • para 4. ambiguous wording and capitalised compass point: ...Scotland and the north of England.

--Bazza 08:53, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

Also, history suggests that at some point a reference requirement will be demanded for "significant minority". --Bazza 08:54, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

Seems reasonable to me; though I would quite like some sort of mention of the fact that part of the controversy is that the whole British Isles were once one country (-IoM and the Channel Islands, of course).
Or, just how about replacing the second half of the second paragraph with: 'The state that is now the Republic of Ireland left the United Kingdom shortly after World War One. Thus the term's use is seen as controversial and possibly offensive in the Republic of Ireland, and both government and media rarely use it. However, no single alternative name for the isles as a whole has gained wide acceptance.' --Robdurbar 09:22, 13 July 2006 (UTC)
The British Isles (minus the Isle of Man etc.) only formed "one country" (if "country" is actually the correct word for the union) for little more than a century. Prior to that there were many different polities on the islands, in increasing number the further back one goes. The 19th century period of union, from a historical perspective, is actually quite anomolous, and we appear to be gradually returning to the more usual state of affairs. So why, in other words, do some editors want to single out the period 1801-1922 as somehow more significant than any other in terms of influence on nomenclature? The term British Isles existed long before this, by nearly two millennia. TharkunColl 09:57, 13 July 2006 (UTC)
Leave the expansion to the article, not the introduction. There is plenty of room there (or, if necessary, in a separate article) to discuss the historical evolution of the controversy. If the introduction says there is a dispute and explains what the dispute is, then that should suffice. Otherwise, it's in danger of becoming bloated again. --Bazza 11:11, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

I'm glad that the suggestion offered is at least appreciated for its attempt to be generally acceptable...I really am trying to be fair here. Thank you for all your points and corrections so far. I'll go through them with a fine toothcomb this evening and at least make the changes that there aren't standing objections to. I'll try to offer a way forward on debated points also. Best regards, PConlon 12:51, 13 July 2006

Britannia was the part of the island that the Romans conquered. Whilst Caledonia (now Scotland) wasn't. Therefore Britain = England + Wales i.e. Britannia? Great Britain (i.e. Greater Britain) was formed in 1707 when the Scottish abolished their own parliament and joined in a Union with England. Therefore, islands off Scotland = Scottish Isles. See here British Isles. See here British Islands. Can any one tell the difference between an isle and an island? , well Wikipedia can't. MelForbes 21:01, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

You are confusing the normal English words isle and island with proper nouns that may contain them. TharkunColl 21:30, 13 July 2006 (UTC)
It's not just Irish objections, have a look here too Anglo-Celtic Isles,,,MelForbes 22:17, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

Revised proposal (cont.)

Good evening (good morning actually!) all from User:PConlon, I hope some positive progress is the result of the last few hours... I’ve made the suggested changes that were unopposed in the discussion above. I'm well aware of the great need to keep the introduction concise. While, some changes are minor grammatical ones which don’t need to be listed (e.g. insertions of ‘that’s and ‘there’s), those of any significance are listed below…

Accepted changes made:

Paragraph 1

Listing of ‘Great Britain’, ‘Ireland’ and the ‘Isle of Man’ in alphabetical order. [For this it’s just as well that those of us who wanted our country renamed ‘Brilliant Ireland’ didn’t get our way!!;0)]

Change of ‘isles’ to ‘islands’.

Paragraph 2

[See below]

Paragraph 3

Insertion of ‘government’ between ‘Official’ and ‘documents’.

Insertion of ‘there’ between ‘the media’ and ‘rarely’.

Removal of ‘Some academics also dispute the use of the term’.

Paragraph 4

Change of ‘and totalling…of land’ to ‘amounting to a total land area of…’.


Continuing discussion points:

Paragraph 1

Given Dave's point that ‘the Isle of Man is not geographically more significant than the Hebrides, the Orkney Islands and the Shetland Islands’, should we list them all or should we remove the Isle of Man? I’m personally torn between being inclusive and being as concise as possible…opinions?

On 'albeit controversialy', I am certainly right with FearEIREANN on the crucial importance of its inclusion – it is necessary to clearly highlight the lack of consensus on the definition. This is a fact recognised by all here and I don’t believe that the wording used is too aggressive or denigrates the term unnecessarily.

Paragraph 2

I see that this has already been modified - I assume (and hope!) by the original author. It is shorter now, which is better. The point made about the proper order in which to present names is well taken. I see a couple of tweaks that I’m hoing the author wouldn’t mind being made – the message is unchanged (do say if I’ve changed anything vital). I have inserted ‘all’ before ‘the islands that are part…’. I have inserted ‘present’ in front of ‘United Kingdom’. I have removed ‘largely’ from before ‘fall within’. I have replaced ‘in the 1920s’ with the shorter and more precise ‘in 1922’ – I (naturally!) think that this date of independence is very important. Finally, I think that the only thing that really needs to be put in italics is ‘mistakenly’, as this is where I believe the emphasis should lie. Having 'British' in italics might make it sound a little like a dirty word! I respect TharkunColl’s point questioning the singling out the period 1801-1922, but I think it’s use is meant in an explanatory before-and-after context (i.e. before and after the island group separated into two separate, sovereign states). I liked some elements of Robdurbar’s suggestion on this too I might add.

Paragraph 3

I can’t with clear conscience argue against those who contend that the third paragraph is currently too long overall. I think it is too. I definitely think however that the first two sentences are really, crucially important.

Regarding the alternative terms sentence, I think their (brief) specification in the introduction is important and appropriate. ‘Britain and Ireland’ should be in there I think due to widespread usage (especially given the fame of the ‘British and Irish Lions’ rugby squad). ‘Islands of the North Atlantic’ (IONA) is a bit of a dead end I think – it was thoughtfully suggested during the peace process negotiations, but the obvious implication it has for including Iceland (the first North Atlantic island I think of!), coupled with the lack of its use anywhere else (to my knowledge – please correct me if I’m wrong), makes me believe that it doesn’t qualify as an ‘alternative term in use’. ‘Anglo-Celtic Isles’ is in some use (I personally can vouch for this!) and should I believe also be specified. Detailed background/explanation of all alternative terms should of course be left to the appropriate dedicated section further down the article.

Regarding: ‘Some other British sources also either do not include the island of Ireland at all, or else just include Northern Ireland, in the definition. Some international publications send confused messages as to whether they include or exclude Ireland in their definition of the British Isles’, I understand the author’s argument for including it. I definitely think it is unnecessarily long however. Might the author accept the following?: ‘Some British and international sources also either do not include the island of Ireland at all in the definition, or else just include Northern Ireland’.

Paragraph 4

I gratefully don’t think that anyone is now arguing that 'British Isles' is just an innocent geology/geography term, totally unconnected with contentious political implications. I strongly argee with Bazza - can it be possible?!!;OP - and Dave here that, as the article isn’t solely political, geological/geographic descriptions should be included in it – and hence be mentioned in the overview-providing introduction, in accordance with Wikipedia practice. I therefore suggest completeing the paragraph with the following (a further minor tweak, after Bazza’s, of Dave’s helpful input):

‘’The islands are largely low lying and fertile, though with significant mountainous areas in Ireland, Scotland, Wales and the north of England. The regional geology is complex, formed by the drifting together of separate regions and shaped by glaciation. The history of the islands is one of emergence of nations, and tends to be considered on a national basis.’’


Ok…please give your comments (it would be helpful to all if they were categorised under headings ‘Paragraph 1’, ‘Paragraph 2’, etc...). Best regards, User:PConlon 01:39, 14 July 2006

Paragraph 2
Your hope is misplaced, i edited that paragraph. Are we on a discuss–then–edit schedule? If so then i have no excuse but ignorance.EricR 06:08, 14 July 2006 (UTC)


My thoughts. The content of the paragraphs seems reasonable to me (though I am now having trouble figuring out just what the decided on current layouts actually are). One thing, it's minor but it really bugs me. The intro starts talking about the geographical makeup of the area, drops into political and nonemclature discussion then goes back to geography. Not to belittle the issue of the disputes over the name but I feel that paragraph 4 should be moved to paragraph 2 and then the other two moved down while changing nothing. I wouldn't change the wording. It just seems very jarring to me in a read through that it jumps about topics then comes back to the one mentioned in the first line. Ben W Bell talk 07:05, 14 July 2006 (UTC)
On the issue of the IoM; its not geographically more significant but it IS politically. Eric R's edits to paragrsaph 2, have, I think, been beneficial too. If you want to do an edit that good, no need to necessairily discuss first! --Robdurbar 08:07, 14 July 2006 (UTC)
It would be nice to have a list of the three or four largest-by-area islands rather than restrict it to just the two big ones - List of the British Isles by area suggests Great Britain, Ireland, Lewis, Skye and several thousand... (curiously still in alphabetic order: spooky). --Bazza 12:09, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

Paragraph 1 My concern remains that "albeit controversially" gives undue weight to an issue that has only been shown to be a minority concern. If absolutely necessary, I would go along with changing the sentence to end with "is most commonly known as the British Isles, but this name has no official status and is considered controversial by a significant minority of the people of the islands.". ..dave souza, talk 08:42, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

I think the two words should be left - they economically state that the term is used but that some people have a problem with that usage. From what I have read in previous "discussions" the controversy is not limited to the islands' inhabitants. I say again that these elaborations do not belong in the introduction but in the detailed sections which follow. --Bazza 12:09, 14 July 2006 (UTC)
The problem is that the term is often used without any controversy, as evidenced by the definitions and style guides, but in diplomatic circles and in some academic circles it's avoided. For balance we need to correctly say that there are sensitivities about the term without creating an inaccurate impression of a world wide furore. ...dave souza, talk 14:24, 14 July 2006 (UTC)
"albeit sometimes controversially"? --Bazza 09:15, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

Paragraphs 2 - 4 Robdurbar has a good point: having mentioned the controversy and the two sovereign states in the first paragraph, the area covered and geography paragraphs could then be followed by the naming discussion.

The naming discussion itself has excessive detail that belongs in the section itself, and by extending to two paragraphs with considerable footnoting gives undue weight to the point. Rather than getting bogged down in showing both viewpoints and footnoting each, I'd suggest keeping it short and putting the detail in the section. ...dave souza, talk 08:42, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

I still do not understand why the usage controversy requires two paragraphs in the introduction. I would hope that more summary information on other topics can be placed there once the article is expanded more on some fronts (e.g. climate, inter-island transport, etc.), so requiring the current information to be brief. There should not be footnote references - the information in the introduction should be expanded on in the main article, which is the place for references; placing them in the introduction guides readers past the detailed stuff rather than to it. --Bazza 12:09, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

Paragraph 2 A minor point regarding JPC's comment that "Finally, I think that the only thing that really needs to be put in italics is ‘mistakenly’, as this is where I believe the emphasis should lie. Having 'British' in italics might make it sound a little like a dirty word!" is perhaps contrary to the manual of style, where italics are used for proper nouns, for example book titles. Italicising "mistakenly" perhaps carries a hint that it is being questioned whether it's really a mistake, or part of a plot to oppress the Irish. Using 'single apostrophes' as quotes is standard in certain contexts, but I seem to remember somewhere that it can stop searches from operating properly, and "double inverted commas" are preferred. ..dave souza, talk 10:05, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

I believe I was the one who put British in italics - it was to emphasise (showing my HTML origins!) that it was the actual word British on its own which is being talked about. If convention says double-quotes, then that's what should be used. --Bazza 12:09, 14 July 2006 (UTC)
I should have read the manual before commenting! Wikipedia:Manual of Style says "Italics are mainly used to emphasize certain words. Italics for emphasis should be used sparingly.", then goes on to say "Use italics when writing about words as words". Thus italicising British since we're discussing the word is correct, emphasising mistakenly could be permissible but risks confusion that we're discussing it as a word rather than saying that it's a mistake. Best to read the MoS and see if you agree with my interpretation. The point about "double" being preferred over 'single' quotes (unless for nested quotations) is covered in the Quotation marks section. ..dave souza, talk 14:10, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

Apologies but just got time at the moment to skim read what's been discussed in the last day or so (am in stunning Switzerland this weekend)... We haven't of course agreed any discuss-then-edit schedule, but I believe it's best to take small, sure steps and, before making changes, try to give everyone who is following this closely a reasonable chance to give their views - it's so hard to follow what's going on otherwise! If permitted, I'll give my properly considered point of view on Monday - I've certainly picked up the points made about introduction topic order and the appropriate use of italics. User: PConlon 12:15, 15 July 2006

Footnotes

Footnote 10

To support the argument that the use of this term is controversial and sometimes offensive in Ireland, footnote 10 states As evidenced by the complaints received by the readers' editor of a major British newspaper: Ian Mayes, "Where are we?"." The Guardian is misrepresented: the article is essentially about confusion about the various terms, and does not refer to any complaint received about the term British Isles. It reports letters by unnamed writers, one suggesting that the phrase should be consigned to history and replaced by Britain and Ireland for general purposes, UK and RoI for political purposes. One reader points to the origin of the term including the Irish more than later immigrants, and suggests that if this were widely known there would be less resentment: sadly, hopelessly optimistic judging by this page. One reader reports that "My Irish friends regard [it] as grossly offensive. My response to this is 'There are several hundred islands off the north-west coast of mainland Europe of which the second largest is Ireland. What do you call them?' Of course, there is no answer to this." Sounds familiar. So we have one alternative suggestion, one report of hearsay about someone's friends. This does not appear to be a reliable source, and the analysis that "complaints" evidence the argument violates Wikipedia:No original research. ..dave souza, talk 21:43, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

Footnote 11

"As a result of the inaccurate presumption of continued United Kingdom sovereignty over the entire archipelago" - pretty important point this, referenced by footnote 11: Indicative of the confusion was the blurb written for Wildlife of Coastal Waters: British Isles, a 2002 book, which referred to "Britain's coastal waters . . ." (ISBN 1841620580). Shock horror! A publisher writes an inaccurate blurb for an amateur handbook on spotting birds, whales, fishes etc. by Tony Soper! Unfortunately we're not given the blurb to consider: could it be "Britain's coastal waters are one of the richest wildlife habitats in the world." ? Whoever wrote that has problems with English as well as with Geography. Or perhaps "Synopsis: A full-color, finely illustrated guidebook to the wildlife surrounding the British Isles for seafarers and visitors of the English coastline. Synopsis: Exploring the inshore wildlife of Britain's coast, stretching from as far south as Brittany to the North Cape,". So now we have England claiming sovereignty over Brittany! Perhaps these publishers thought that England and Britain were in the British Isles, rather than claiming sovereignty over them? Or perhaps they failed to read Author's Note, by Tony Soper, "Coasting the inshore waters of these islands.... As for seabirds, the coast and islands of Britain and Ireland host a significant part of the world’s populations," Well, that's perhaps evidence for two of the alternative formulations, used in the blurb for a book with the British Isles in its title. This looks like a classic case of Wikipedia:No original research#What is excluded? - "It introduces an analysis or synthesis of established facts, ideas, opinions, or arguments in a way that builds a particular case favored by the editor, without attributing that analysis or synthesis to a reputable source" ....dave souza, talk 15:26, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

Comment on both

My response would be to remove them, then, and either find a new source or palce a [citation needed] note to challenge people to do so. --Robdurbar 17:37, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

Remove both until an acceptable cite is located which meets WP:V and WP:RS. KillerChihuahua?!? 18:50, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

Not very helpful

I have just logged in and what do I see. KillerChihuahua not very helpful, this is certainly not your finest hour. MelForbes 19:10, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

Please be more precise. You seem to be engaging in a vague ad hom against me, with no specifics as to how you may or may not disagree with my actions, which include removing content not sourced per WP:V. KillerChihuahua?!? 19:18, 15 July 2006 (UTC)
There is a group of editors here trying to sort out certain issues, which I an not going to restate for you, that I am sure you are aware of. Consensus will not be reached by a unilateralist approach. All editors are endeavoring to be strictly direct with each others views on the matters in question. You have given little to this talk page, and I believe you should not have butchered the article to suit your own personal ideas. MelForbes 19:30, 15 July 2006 (UTC)
Consensus takes a back seat to WP:V, WP:NOR. I plan to "butcher" much more unless some decent sources are found. I have no "personal" ideas about this subject whatsoever, and as you have now made 3 uncivil remarks about me personally, I will make of this an official notice about violating the no personal attacks policy. Assume good faith and cease disparaging my presumed motives, about which you can not possibly have any concept whatsoever, unless you are a mind reader, which I most sincerely doubt. KillerChihuahua?!? 19:41, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

I previously would have agreed with the approach of adding a cite tag, but my imperfect understanding of policy has been refreshed a bit in the course of these discussions, and I had forgotten about WP:V#Burden of evidence. It is evidently necessary to remove the unsourced assertions until the long standing request for reliable evidence is properly answered. There was a reference earlier in these discussions to what seemed a good source for "controversy" in northern Ireland, and I am inclined to stretch the point and add that in, However, that leaves us with a situation where the controversy is only reliably known of in NI, and the whole presentation of this issue needs to be reconsidered. ...dave souza, talk 19:44, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

You are quite correct, dave. The burden, as I have mentioned, lies with those who want the information included. KillerChihuahua?!? 19:46, 15 July 2006 (UTC)
Yes, I've hidden the relevant assertions for the time being. Frankly, I'd been assuming good faith and had accepted that there was some substance to this controversy, but this creative use of sources means that the whole section, and the introduction, will have to be carefully reexamined. It also needs some effort to present fairly the view that the term is used geographically without malice. ..dave souza, talk 19:58, 15 July 2006 (UTC)
Fine, what citation do we use for the first paragraph? MelForbes 20:11, 15 July 2006 (UTC)
The intro is a summary of the content and does not necessarily require seperate footnotes. The information is referenced in several footnotes, http://www.know-britain.com gives the simple term. Was there something else you felt was unsourced in the intro? If so, we need to check the references given in the appropriate section of the article proper and ensure everything is correctly cited. KillerChihuahua?!? 20:37, 15 July 2006 (UTC)
Well, I was hoping to get back to St. Cuthbert's Co-operative Society and how Sean Connery worked as an artist's model for life classes at the Art College, but will try to find it: so much chatter here, it may have been archived. ..dave souza, talk 20:24, 15 July 2006 (UTC)
This is so called editing is really shitty and not very impressive regarding good faith! Why wasn't the citation needed tabs put into the articles by KillerChihuahua in the first instance. Anyone claiming good faith now, has a hill to climb, I am really very suprised. MelForbes 20:52, 15 July 2006 (UTC)
Read WP:V...dave souza, talk 20:59, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

Policies reminder

Perhaps some of you do not recall your welcome message; perhaps some of you never received one. I would like to remind everyone editing this article that the three pillars of Wikipedia policy are WP:NPOV, WP:V, and WP:NOR. This article contains much that is not verified and may well consist of original research. This must change, people. Find sources which meet WP:RS or the content must be removed. Any NPOV issues must be worked out here on the talk page. On the same subject, I remind all of WP:CIVIL, WP:NPA, and WP:AGF all of which are being routinely ignored on this talk page.

All Wikipedia policies can be accessed via WP:RULES. KillerChihuahua?!? 19:33, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

Keep digging! MelForbes 19:38, 15 July 2006 (UTC)
I have no intention of digging. I am here to enforce policy. It is up to those who wish that information included to "dig" for acceptable sources. KillerChihuahua?!? 19:44, 15 July 2006 (UTC)
Wikipedia does not have enforcers. It has admins who administer, and developers who develop things. If you want to become an enforcer, join the police or propose that such a role be created on Wikipedia. It does not exist right now. FearÉIREANN\(caint) 20:49, 15 July 2006 (UTC)
Jtdir / FearÉIREANN, you have been reverting fully discussed changes to a state which violates policy. I can only regard this as blatant vandalism. ..dave souza, talk 20:57, 15 July 2006 (UTC)
Oh, by the way, on Wikipedia everyone enforces policy. I thought you'd have known that. ..dave souza, talk 21:10, 15 July 2006 (UTC)
Yet more far fetched nonsense. What you mean is that a handful of British users "decide" something that hey presto, that is policy and Irish users better shut up. That will not be happening. The article is littered with claims that you and some British users make, without citations, merely the statement that it is facts. Maybe it is time all those unsourced claims were deleted too. Or have disputed and dubious tags put on them. Irish users have regularly come up with wordings to accomodate the differing British and Irish perspectives on the issue. Some British users instead insist that the British view is "fact" and everyone else's view a "minority". You can claim that as many times as you wish. It still is wrong. You could try working with users sometime, not bulldozing your viewpoint through and trying to add in weasel words and questionable edits that carry the tone "of course we all know this is wrong, but the Micks believe it." FearÉIREANN\(caint) 21:33, 15 July 2006 (UTC)
I don't even know where to start with that - as an experienced editor and Administrator, you surely do not have to be reminded of the policies, yet rather than mentioning parts of the article you find are incompletely or un- sourced, or providing sources, you are making a blanket accusation (of whom? "handful of British users" is 1) not enlightening and 2) irrelevant.) Perhaps a nice cup of tea would help? KillerChihuahua?!? 15:10, 16 July 2006 (UTC)
Thanks for adding sources which you feel support the assertion of controversy: I;ve moved these to the section as discussed above. Unfortunately your attitude does not appear to have improved, and these sources will have to be carefully examined. ...dave souza, talk 21:56, 15 July 2006 (UTC) corrected 22:02, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

Interesting behaviour. Even though there is clear agreement on this page that there is a controversy (just disagreement as to its degree and how that is communicated) you delete the qualifier insisting there is no evidence, so creating the impression to readers that there is no controversy. Evidence is provided, so you delete the qualifier and the evidence. Users have in the past been blocked for such behaviour, which is at this stage blatent vandalism. All that sort of behaviour achieves is to prolong an edit war indefinitely. FearÉIREANN\(caint) 22:55, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

Patience, please. ...dave souza, talk 23:03, 15 July 2006 (UTC)
Right, sorry about the delay: as a full time carer, I had to give my wife some attention. As you perhaps recall, when commenting out the disclaimer earlier I pointed out that there's a disclaimer in italics immediately above that paragraph. We've already discussed our concerns: hopefully we can find a form of words on this talk page that makes it clear that there's a problem without implying that one view or the other is invalid. You've cited book titles: it would be really helpful if you could post here the text that confirms the offence taken at the term, and how widely such offence is taken. That's all I can think of just now, time for bed. ...dave souza, talk 23:59, 15 July 2006 (UTC)
There is clear evidence on this page that there is controversy, yes. There is still no sourcing for putting that in the article. Wikipedia is about verifiablility, not truth. KillerChihuahua?!? 11:33, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Murderous British

Why would Irish people want to be classed as members of the British Isles, that's the 64,000 dollar question. For the British came and murdered, raped, stole the land, imposed their satanic penal laws. The history of the British in Ireland is nothing other than a shameful episode. Edmund Burke again, quote, "a truly barbarous system; where all the parts are an outrage on the laws of humanity and the laws of nature; it is a system of elaborate contrivance, as well fitted for the oppression, imprisonment and degradation of a people, and the debasement of human nature itself, as ever proceeded from the perverted ingenuity of man".unquote. Even though Irish people have forgiven, it's thanks, but no thanks! MelForbes 23:30, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

This section should be dealt with in the same way as the prior "English Isles" section.EricR 23:37, 15 July 2006 (UTC)
I am only stating the fact that people in Ireland do not want to be associated with the term British, and that is a fact. This is true history, holocaust denial is a criminal offence in some countries. MelForbes 23:41, 15 July 2006 (UTC)
It's appreciated that you may have learned all your life cruel England's to blame, but Wikipedia's policy of neutral point of view requires stating both viewpoints backed up by verifiable facts. This is an issue where different nations have perceptions shaped by very different media coverage of the issues, and if you want other people to sympathise with your viewpoint, a shillelagh is not a good way of communicating. ...dave souza, talk 06:02, 16 July 2006 (UTC)
It may surprise you dave souza, I am Scottish born, but don't live there now. I have worked in various countries including Wales, Ireland and the United States. But in all my travels, it was we Scots who bitched most about about the dreaded English (British) , the Welsh did it to a much lesser extent, but much more of a rarity in Ireland. I knew that my edit would provoke a hostile response, so nothing surprises me, but on reflection, maybe it did illicit some shock and awe amongst some. Truth can irritate, but also it must be remembered that truth avoidance will only prolong this so called discussion. A paragraph should be added to the article explaining why the term might be objectionable to some. I think that would be an excellent proposal. MelForbes 11:17, 16 July 2006 (UTC)
  • Editors take heed, objectionable would be a far far more appropriate word than offensive. MelForbes 13:01, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

"Take heed"? Sheesh. I concur on the terminology change and have made it in the article. KillerChihuahua?!? 13:12, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Once again, the quote from Burke, whose own background is a perfect example of the interconnections between Britain and Ireland that make the term "British Isles" a useful one. Nobody here is trying to condone English atrocities in Ireland in the 17th-20th centuries. john k 15:13, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Burke, he good: spent his political capital in a futile attempt to rein in the abuses of empire and preserve us from ideology. Given the end of empire, the term British Isles only makes sense in a geographical context (including Faroe Islands?). Why not just give it up and go to a list of links? And let the Scots grow up to take an independent place in the EU.--Shtove 21:21, 16 July 2006 (UTC)
Hear hear, and long live Alex Salmond! MelForbes 21:57, 16 July 2006 (UTC)
I always get pissed off by the the British did such and such in (include favourite historical atrocity) so every man jack of them today are all still personally responsibe bollocks. What a given state does at a given time in not the personal responsibility of every single member of the population of that state, and is certainly not the responsibility of those born centuries or decades after the given event. The UK has done, and continues to do repugnant things, as a British person I am not responsible for these things, just as all Irish people are not all responsible for the atrocities commited by certain repubican/nationalist organisations in the past. No one side is lilly white in Ireland, the UK state and various governments do bear the overwhealming majority of the blame for past murderous behaviour to be sure, but let's not descend into blaming the British population. Alun 05:32, 17 July 2006 (UTC)
Alun I wholeheartedly agree with everything you are saying. All of the footsoldiers and command represented each of the 4 nations without doubt, so we are all in this sad shit together. One of the questions is, can a nation turn it's back on this shit and leave if firmly in the past. Enough said without labouring the point, thanks. MelForbes 10:46, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

'Once again, the quote from Burke, whose own background is a perfect example of the interconnections between Britain and Ireland that make the term "British Isles" a useful one.'- what complete and utter bollocks, John K. And you, I must admit, are prone to intelligent contributions. So, because we have "interconnections" our Irish identity should be subsumed into a British context of "British Isles". What specious, sophistic intellectually weak logic on your part. Nonsense worthy of the Steven Ellis types of this world, a sort who wish to replace the myths of Irish nationalism with the myths of British imperialism and then attempt to tell us they are merely writing about "interconnections" which, as such, need to be wraped up in- surprise, surprise- British cloaks. Oh yes, where have we Irish heard this before? The sense of communal history that surpasses British occupation here is far too acute to ever accept the myths of British nationalism as our own. You, alas, have evidently embraced the terminological inventions of their imperialist tradition and put them on Irish society as being ours. One word: No. 193.1.172.163 23:24, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

This discussion is getting media coverage

Hey guys, I've just noticed. Hugh Linehan's Connect column in The Irish Times 15 July 2006 is about our little spat here. The Irish Times site is pay-for-view so I can't link the page. It is on page 2, left hand column of the Weekend section, for those users with copies of the Times lying around. FearÉIREANN\(caint) 01:02, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Just a LITTLE SPAT! For God's sake, national pride is at stake. Jtdirl deserves a Zed-but in the sternum.--Shtove 20:22, 16 July 2006 (UTC)
Why not list on WP:PRESS?EricR 01:46, 16 July 2006 (UTC)
Concur, and paste whatever seems to be the most concise bit which outlines the article's opinion. KillerChihuahua?!? 11:37, 16 July 2006 (UTC)
Ah now, there's interesting, we can get a citation that the term is disputed in the RoI from a media column inspired from a Wiki discussion page about attitudes to the dispute in the RoI. So we are inspiring people to produce material that we can then use as a reference. Nice.... Alun 11:41, 16 July 2006 (UTC)
Unfortunately, that is incorrect. This only sources that there is a dispute on this talk page, and is useless for using as a source for a dispute outside this talk page. KillerChihuahua?!? 11:54, 16 July 2006 (UTC)
Well I wasn't being entirely serious!!Alun 12:13, 16 July 2006 (UTC)
Apologies - on this page, you never know. KillerChihuahua?!? 12:14, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

There shouldn't be a big problem with linking the Irish Times when a cite is needed, as their login page offers 24hrs for 2€ and I'm sure enough editors would be willing to pay that to verify cites: a lot cheaper than the Lancet or Nature. ..dave souza, talk 17:26, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Point of information: reading WP:PRESS, don't forget that the argument includes editors who are Irish AND British, and (touch wood) recent rather than current edit war? ..dave souza, talk 17:34, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

A fresh start

We've had an outside viewpoint and a pretty drastic clearing of the ground which at the least points out some areas where solid verification and balanced writing is needed. Jtdirl / FearÉIREANN has contacted me on my talk page, and certainly there's a case to be made for making the terminology issue the first section. It's perhaps an unusual case in that there's a naming dispute that is vital to a good many people, but in other countries hardly anyone has heard of the controversy. To my mind this should be a possibility worth discussing.

We also now have further references for the controversy, but unfortunately it's in the form of book titles and I don't have these books to hand. Hopefully it will be possible to get :relevant quotes from the books on here for general information, and with any luck a reliable web page will be found giving good evidence about the nature and extent of the controversy. ...dave souza, talk 05:48, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

That seems to offer a bit more hope for the article. A reasonable compromise would be to keep the lead as it is at present but to put the discussion on terminology as the first section. However the italicized bit:
The term 'British Isles' can be confusing and depending on usage can cause offense to some people. For a full description of correct usage, see British Isles (terminology).
is not accurate as a statement of the dispute since it implies that no offence would be given if the term was used "correctly". As I understand it the term can give offence regardless of whether or not the usage is "correct". How about:
The term 'British Isles' can be confusing and can cause offense to some people. See the Terminology section below for details of the controversy.
I don't think the lede needs citations as long as everything in it is supported by citations in the main body of the article. In the main article I think we need to have every statement supported by a citation. At the moment some of the statements on the "Irish" side have citations which don't fully support the statements made, while many of the statements on the "British" side do not have any citations at all. (I write as a Welshman who has never considered himself to be "British" by the way, though I'm not sure if that counts as neutral.) Rhion 07:10, 16 July 2006 (UTC)
That seems a good proposal to me, and as an interim measure I've changed the italicised bit as suggested as well as adding a brief description of the "British" issue to the lead. Please take that as a basis for discussion rather than a definitive statement. For what it's worth I've always been rather fond of the "Brutain's hardy sons" idea and, like many Scots, like having both a British and a Scottish identity. This caused slight difficulties when i moved to near London for a while, and decided to call myself British, but as soon as I spoke to someone they'd say "Yewre Scotch, awent yew?" So I had to just accept being Scottish and live with it. Not really a problem. ..dave souza, talk 09:05, 16 July 2006 (UTC)
And regarding cites, a few "British Isles" references have been mentioned in talk, but either haven't been added or haven't survived. That's part of the sorting out that's needed ..dave souza, talk 09:21, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Here is what I found:

  • Great Britain; British Isles; Ireland: The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition. 2001-05. British Isles has links to Great Britain and Ireland; both the GB and Ireland articles state they are located in the British Isles. No further information, really.
  • The United Kingdom and Ireland "The UK and Ireland are regarded, for the purposes of this Genealogical Information Service, as being made up of England, Ireland (i.e. Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland), Wales, and Scotland, together with the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man. Together, these constitute the British Isles - which is a geographical term for a group of islands lying off the north-west coast of mainland Europe."
  • British Isles: "The British Isles comprise an archipelago located in northwestern Europe. There are two large islands, Britain and Ireland, and a large host of small ones; these include the Shetland, Orkney, and Hebrides groups, as well as numerous others."

Colliers apparently has a British Isles article, it is used as a source on the terminology article. KillerChihuahua?!? 12:18, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

As a bit of a rough hack, I've put a version of the terminology section at the top incorporating the sort of info that seems appropriate to me, and have included untouched the second and third subsections which still need work. At the same time I've commented out the original, so it's still there. Treat this as a draft for discussion / amendments. Enjoy! ..dave souza, talk 14:49, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

I've commented out two sentences which seem unencyclopedic, unsuitable for the intro, and which aren't sourced: "Unfortunately, associations of British with the UK make the term unsuitable as a legal or political description, and its use can cause offence to many Irish people and sympathisers. It can also cause confusion as some take it to mean the islands minus the Republic of Ireland: see British Isles (terminology)." Could we have reliable sources for these two sentences, please, and (assuming sources can be found) consider moving them out of the intro? SlimVirgin (talk) 16:01, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Whould it be useful to create a separate references subpage? There has been some discussion of such pages in the main namespace. I was thinking more along the lines of a talk subpage, a place to collect and organize some of references i've run across which may be useful, but haven't added to the article. EricR 16:18, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Well I'm glad that this article has seen some progress on it. As for sourcing the intro comments; as has been discussed previosuly, we had been operating on the idea that statements in the intro do not need to be seperatly cited, if done so in the main body of the text.

I think the dispute must be mentioned in the intro; even if it was over-done before, neither should we remove it all together. I would rewrite the removed sentences to describe the situation and hopefully remove the original research-style prose that they had been written in. Hopefully, then, they will contain just 'common knowledge' info and sourced material.

Btw, just as an interesting aside, I noticed the following comment on the talk page of a featured article: 'I would have thought that it is commonly held that the PM is the PM of Great Britain, not the UK. I've always thought that the UK includes Ireland and they have thier own PM'. It is this sort of opinion that means we need to emphasise the 'confusion' and 'debate' over the term. --Robdurbar 16:41, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Also, dave, I have reverted your edit of 14:44 July 16th because it appears to have messed up the aestehtics of the page. Its not a disagreement with what you did, but because it left the page looking messy and I wasn't entirely sure what you were trying to do from your edit summary and comments above. --Robdurbar 16:47, 16 July 2006 (UTC)
Ok, no problem: thanks for letting me know. I didn't really have time for it today, but the aim is to rethink the terminology section to start by briefly showing the history behind the Irish / British tension - it didn't start in 1801! - then show both the worldwide usage (with cites), make the point that it's not a political description, but this is often misunderstood, and put the Irish government and "nationalist" public view in all of the island (as against the "unionist" view). A subpage with this first draft is here Talk:British Isles/terminology draft. Ah, that seems to work: hadn't done that before. Point of information: it seems that JTD has been suffering both from illness and a reluctance to cite the Irish Times, which would be a source of references, as it requires paid subscription. As of now they seem to have a new 2 Euro for 24 hours sub,, and I'm sure that enough of us would be glad to pay that to verify any articles cited. ... dave souza, talk 17:20, 16 July 2006 (UTC)
I have subscriptions to various newspapers on the net, those ones I don't read in hard copy. As I buy the Irish Times every day I don't have a subscription to the net version. I only discovered Hugh's article at midnight last night when I went downstairs to have a cup of tea and while there read a section of the paper I hadn't read earlier. It is worth mentioning, BTW, that in 1996 a fierce row broke out in the Irish Times on the very issue of whether the British Isles includes Ireland, or whether using it to include Ireland was offensive. AFAIK the net archives of the Irish Times don't go back that far, so I don't know if we can read it here. I do remember it was pretty heated. The issue has also featured in one newspapers at various times. Unfortunately I didn't record the details at the time — I didn't expect the issue to rise here. Actually Wikipedia didn't exist at the time! It is a regular life issue. I have a suspicion that someone like John Waters in the Irish Times may possibly pick up on the issue for his column. It is the sort of thing he loves to focus on. (He also loves having bitter rows with fellow columnists, so the fact that Hugh raised it would suit his modus operandi; he could have a go at Hugh and raise a touchy topic with him in one go.) But that is just a hunch. Maybe like me he writes his newspaper column well in advance.
For users who might not be aware of the sensitivity in Ireland to terminology, they might want to look at Northern Ireland, which explains the Nationalist and Unionist sensitivity to terms. In Northern Ireland, British Isles is a pet term used by Unionists while a term detested by Republicans and many Nationalists. (Unionist and Nationalist editors regularly edit Irish articles in ways deliberately to offend and provoke each other. Extreme Nationalists call Northern Ireland the Six Counties or the Occupied Six Counties, implying they are a false creation or a quasi-apartheid state. Unionists use Ulster to pretend that Northern Ireland wasn't created in 1920 but dates back into the midsts of time, being the same as the ancient Irish province of that name. I once had to block six users in twenty minutes who were going on a vandalism spree changing Northern Ireland -> Six Counties -> Ulster -> Six Counties -> Ulster -> Occupied Six Counties. They'd then sneak into other articles to add in edits to provoke the others (call Northern Ireland "Ulster" in the Sinn Féin article; call it "Six Counties" in the Ulster Unionist Party article, etc.) The point is that what seems like only a term with no problems to some people outside Ireland can in Ireland be seen as provocative or agenda-driven. As I mentioned before, one thing that drives Irish people up the wall with anger internationally is when they go somewhere and they are called "British". When they insist they are not, they are told "but you are part of the British Isles. So you have to be British". Or where, as happened recently, a major international publication called Bono, Bob Geldof and Mary Robinson all British, and when challenged said "but they are from the British Isles. If you are from the British Isles, then you must be British. What else could it possibly mean?" So at this stage any suggestion that Ireland is covered by the term "British Isles" sees many Irish people go ballistic. (Scottish people, I suppose, may face the same thing with some people presuming they are English. Or Canadians have people presume that because they are from North America, therefore they are Americans, which "must mean" from the United States. Terminology that to English people in particular may seem neutral doesn't to those who end up at the receiving end of annoying and wrong presumptions when it is used. FearÉIREANN\(caint) 17:59, 16 July 2006 (UTC)
Regarding the terminology section, the reason I moved it down list is because it is a meta subject. In the heated debate thats gone on in this page people have seemed to forgotten that the article is about the group of islands usually called the British Isles not the term itself. Someone reading the article is going to be far more intrested in the half a billion years of natural history and not some petty 80 year old dispute. If need be we could give other names equal billing just to reduce the size of the Terminology and Origin of the term sections that currently take up nearly half the article. josh (talk) 18:46, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Irish Times Articles

I just got one of those Irish Times 24h subscriptions, so if you need anything checking this evening... --Robdurbar 18:11, 16 July 2006 (UTC)
What is badly needed is a source which meets RS which clearly states something about the connotations the term has for the Irish as outlined by Jtdirl, above. I have found nothing. If the Irish Times has an article on that, could you copy the entire article to your computer? That way there would be more than 24 hours to determine what can and cannot be stated in the article here using that as a source - there may be phrasing and copyediting which might need checking against the IT article. I hope this made sense, if not I will attempt to clarify. KillerChihuahua?!? 18:34, 16 July 2006 (UTC)
I think so. Bare in mind though I can't copy the articles onto a talk page or subpage, even if I save them on my computer; that would infringe copyright (leading us with the subscription problem; but we may have to grin and bear it I'm afraid).
The article prompted by this debate, by Hugh Linean, is generally sceptical about claims that Ireland is not in the British Isles 'Some have even argued that, with independence, Ireland withdrew from the British Isles and therefore should no longer be considered part of them. This surely is taking things a bit far. It's one thing for the wind to shake the barley, quite another for it to detach a substantial landmass from its moorings.' It also provides another source for some of the confusion comments in the article: 'As with Éire/Ireland, there is at the core of the argument a fundamental confusion between the geographical, the constitutional and the cultural.' It also states that 'These Islands' is the preferred term from politicians in Ireland; that could be worthy of inclusion. It notes that 'the Irish Times editorial stylebook is silent on this matter [use of 'British Isles']'
A letter from 1996 on the subject could be used as an example of offence. Written by 'Mark Fleming' it states: 'Sir, The term "British Isles" is not merely a geographic term. It is a geo political term, and one that I personally take offence to when used in relation to Ireland'. A second letter from the same year - this must be the debate that JTD remembers - is in a similar mood, and notes (interestingly) that the term should be avoided in lite of the BSE problems in the UK, for economic reasons! I would say that a number of other letters could be used to support the 'offence' claims in the article. These date mainly from that 1996 debate.
These 1996 letters generally rasie many the same points as we have here, and indicate that both sides of opinion are present in decent numbers in Ireland; it must be said, though, that the majority object to the term. Only one mentions the use of 'British Isles' in any alternative form (e.g. that it means just those islands that are British).
As for acutal use of the term itself; it pops up, used in its 'normal form', from time to time. I count maybe about 7 or 8 uses + numerous from quotes or organization names etc.; so to state that it is never used is wrong; on the other hand, less than 10 uses in a 10 year archive is not many.
To confuse things further, an article from April 05 about Sellafield states 'Mr Roche [Irish Environment Minister] said waste management was one of the most significant environmental challenges facing the Ireland and the British Isles.'; weather he used the phrase or the Irish Times used the phrase, it is a good and reliable example - more so than most of the current sources - of British Isels being used to mean the United Kingdom + Isle of Man.
In a 2000 article claiming that Ireland is over reliant on the UK in security matters, Kevin Myres notes that 'we' - that is Irish people - get angry when the islands are called the 'British Isles'
Interstingly, one article lays into the book by Norman Davies, that we have used as a source. Its by David Kennedy and points out many factualy inaccuracies in the book, particularly concerning the events and dates of Irish secession.

I hope all of those prove helpful! I've just spent an hour looking through and am now throughly bored; I have copies of the articles and can use them to help source points at some point soon. --Robdurbar 20:06, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

The book does have massive clangers — for example, it has Éamon de Valera winning the Irish civil war. Strange then that he ended it up in gaol and his supporters were told to ditch arms!!! I did give it a savage review myself. The errors however are all in terms of facts (who did what, where, etc). I couldn't find errors in the definitions of terminology. I get the impression that Norman bit off more than he could chew with the book. That by the end he hit a point where he was so fed up with the whole damn thing that he just slapped the final chapters together and didn't double check. Authors with big books hit that point. Churchill, oh so accurately, wrote of the three phases of writing a book. Loving writing it. Liking it but wishing it was finished. Detesting it, wishing you never had started it and wanting to fling it at your publisher saying 'take that f-ing thing away from me. I never want to see it every again.' I got the impression that Norman hit that last stage and didn't do the fact checking in the last third thoroughly enough. Re Roche's comment: I think British editors here aren't grasping the distinction between British Isles and Ireland (or Ireland and the British Isles) and British Isles. British Isles and Ireland implies that Ireland is not part of the British Isles, so you have to append it to include Ireland. Roche was not saying that Ireland was part of the British Isles. (Indeed he goes ballistic if it is ever suggested.) He was describing the archipelago using the names of the two identities he believes are on it: the British Isles and Ireland. It does not mean "British Isles, including Ireland". "British Isles and Ireland" would make no sense if one was to remove the term British Isles and name its component parts. If one takes Ireland to be part of Ireland, one would be writing "Great Britain, Ireland . . . and Ireland." That would be meaningless and garbled. "BI and IRL" is used as a way of implying that Ireland is separate from the British Isles, with its named inclusion necessary to discuss the entire archipelago. It is seen as a way to satisfy those on the archipelago who like using the term "British Isles" while not offending the Irish by implying that Ireland is already covered in the term. FearÉIREANN\(caint) 20:43, 16 July 2006 (UTC)
If you read more closely, that's exactly what my comments said - that its a good example of British Isles being used to mean the United Kingdom and Isle of Man i.e. not including RoI. --Robdurbar 21:16, 16 July 2006 (UTC)
If the "some academics dispute" text is readded to the article, i suggest using J.G.A. Pocock rather than Davies. Historians deciding to explain their [non-]usage of "British Isles" seem to often invoke this author. Also "dispute" may be too strong a statement, "find the term problematic" or something along those lines may be more appropriate.EricR 21:09, 16 July 2006 (UTC) Dispute or reject is probably correct for "some academics".EricR 19:36, 19 July 2006 (UTC)
Davies is a fairly well-respected historian of Poland, while Pocock is an eminent historian of British intellectual history (among other things). Pocock also has the advantage of not being from the area, which makes his objections more clearly academic rather than nationalistic. Thus, if Pocock does indeed discuss the issue, I think he's a better reference. john k 14:28, 17 July 2006 (UTC)
There's no real discussion of the term for the archipelago, the provided quote is pretty much it. But it's from a well known work and seems to be cited often.EricR 23:02, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

Fresh Start (cont)

Oh flip…things have been happening here! Ok, hum. I'm glad most of us are still looking for the best mutually agreeable solution. Regarding paragraph order, I argue strongly that the naming controversy be the first section of the main article (and thus should be the first paragraph), though this needs to tie into a wider debate (which I’ve avoided for the moment) about that separate ‘Terminology’ article. To debate one issue at a time, I am ordering the paragraphs to reflect the current order of the article – naming controversary below geography. We need to get the actual wording of the paragraphs right before anything else!

Right then, the ‘albeit controversially’ term was removed – words cannot describe how important its placement is in the first sentence is to us (non-British) Irish and others in Scotland & Wales! I appreciate that it is unlikely to be loved by some of you, but it really just has to go there. Ideally we’d like ‘controversially yet commonly’ put in, but stepping back from that the ‘albeit…’ is just about acceptable to us. Don’t forget that we have, with great restraint, left the image caption unchanged in deference to the title of the article! User MelForbes has reminded us all about the strength of feeling us Irish have on this in regards to relations between our two countries (not apportioning personal blame to people living today, of course).

I agree that footnotes should be placed in the main article – of which the introduction is an ‘executive summary’ of essential points. I also agree that there should be only one paragraph on the naming controversy, though the existance of controversy should be made clear in the first sentence (as discussed above). The following is not part of the naming controversary and needs to be in the first paragraph: ‘The Irish Free State (now the Republic of Ireland) became independent of the United Kingdom in 1922.’

As I have already noted above, a neutral geographical description should be part of the introduction, as the main article includes this. What we discussed before was good I believe – I particular admire the sensitive, even poetic, wording of the last sentence by Dave Souza: ‘The islands are largely low lying and fertile, though with significant mountainous areas in Ireland, Scotland, Wales and the north of England. The regional geology is complex, formed by the drifting together of separate regions and shaped by glaciation. The history of the islands is one of emergence of nations, and tends to be considered on a national basis.’ Given the prior discussion about whether to include ‘the Hebrides, the Orkney Islands and the Shetland Islands’ in the first sentence to join ‘the Isle of Man’, I’m of the opinion that we include all or none of these smaller islands. I do hear the views of Bazza and others preferring to include at least some of the smaller islands, but then I don’t think that we should choose which is mentioned and which is not. To keep things concise and easily readable, I suggest we simply put in: ‘Great Britain, Ireland and several thousand smaller surrounding islands’.

For the naming controversary paragraph, the following is essential content. I believe that the following is true, is worded as concisely as possible and needs to be included: ‘Some British and other international sources also either do not include the island of Ireland at all in the definition, or else just include Northern Ireland’. The following non-controvercial fact has to be included: All of the following is essential Introduct content (have with personal difficulty changed ‘offensive’ to the suggested ‘objectionable’ to be as accommodating as possible): ‘In the Republic of Ireland the use of the term is seen as controversial and objectionable. Official government documents and the media there rarely use the term. The archipelago is often simply described as ‘Britain and Ireland’, though the alternative collective term ‘Anglo-Celtic Isles’ is also in limited use.’

User: PConlon 17:47, 17 July 2006

Just thought to add the following into the first paragraph: 'Both states are members of the European Union'. This hopefully brings in a common, unifying bond that shouldn't be objectionable to anyone. User: PConlon 18:07, 17 July 2006

Well I agree with most of your changes, though I'm not keen on mentioning the alternative terms - their use (other than 'these islands') simply isn't widespread enough. I think we only have evidence for Ang-Celt being used at one or two academic conferences and IONA in the Belfast agreement. Based on the recent article from the Irish Times, which said that 'these islands' is the standard in RoI, I'll make the small edit of replacing that as the given alternative term. --Robdurbar 18:05, 17 July 2006 (UTC)
My favourite is British and Irish Isles, it's a logical extension of British Isles, and I like it because it doesn't refer exclusively to specific Islands (Great Britain and Ireland only refers to two of the six thousand or so Islands) and also it is not a political reference to any sovreign states. Ireland and the UK has the disadvantage that these are territorial terms rather than geographical ones. There are some cites as well.[12][13][14] Cheers, Alun 19:29, 17 July 2006 (UTC)
Ah, I see someone has suggested a merge with this article and British and Irish Isles. At the risk of being shouted at I might suggest renaming the whole article as British and Irish Isles and redirecting British Isles there.Alun 19:33, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

The "British and Irish Isles" sucks because it still uses the word "British" with its imperialist connotations. If "British Isles" is to be replaced, "British" should be removed entirely. Are there names for them in other languages that would be serviceable? - FrancisTyers · 19:39, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

British doesn't have imperialist anything, I identify as British and I'm about as anti-imperialist as as it is possible to get, for one thing I'm in favour of abolishing the monarchy and having a president for the UK (or UR as it would be known), and I'm also in favour of a federalist constitution for the UK, with substantial powers devolved to the federated regions. So I'm British, but I'm also Welsh (and there is no contradiction there), but I'm certainly not an imperialist. You are being offensive to many, many people, British simply means pertaining to the Island of Great Britain. If you want to remove any reference to British then you might as well remove any reference to Irish. Surely mention of the UK is more imperialist than mention of British? And anyway if we are going to censor any reference to British because there used to be a repugnant empire with that name, then what shall we call the capital of Italy? Alun 20:51, 17 July 2006 (UTC)
Thats absurd, I have two nationalities of these Islands, but I wouldn't dream of describing myself as "British" (one of thems English). The term has imperialist connotations. They didn't call it the English Empire. The "British Empire", the "British Army", the "British Crown". As far as I'm aware Ireland has never subjugated a substantial portion of the world. - FrancisTyers · 22:07, 17 July 2006 (UTC)
What's absurd? You are free to describe yourself how you like. You are not free to judge me for describing myself as British, I have two identities, one of these is British, the other is Welsh, if you don't like it then that is your problem not mine. The UK state may have appropriated the term British and applied it to their Empire, but it's still the state, ie the Kingdom that became an empire, and not the Island or it's people. Anyway your reasoning is like saying that the IRA and INLA use the word Irish, and they have murdered people, so we shouldn't use that word either. The French, Spanish and Portugese Empires were equally as murderous as the British Empire, as I'm sure the peoples of South America and North Africa can attest, should we stop using the words French or France? The British Empire ceased to exist over 20 years before I was born, when even my dad was still a schoolboy (and he's 71), I and most British people born over the last 59 years have no recollection of empire, and do not associate the term British with empire (or imperialism) in any way shape or form, and why should we? the empire was nothing to do with us. Given that there can be hardly any citizens of the RoI who actually even remember the time before Independence, and that the British Empire is a dim and distand memory, the last people who were members of which will soon be dead themselves, I think it's time you started living in the present rather than the distant past. Most people on the Island of Great Britain, when given the choice of identifying as English and British, Welsh and British, Scottish and British identify at least somewhat as British (English (83%), Scottish (69%), or Welsh (79%)). [15] Anyway the British Empire was a de facto English Empire, and the UK in many ways remains an English Empire, though a relatively benign one, here's a good example The correct and careful use of such terms as "United Kingdom" in any context other than the strictly legal is a recent development, dating from about the 1930s, when modern Scottish nationalism became a live political issue. Anything written before that date, even by historians, is likely to use "England". Disraeli famously signed the 1878 Treaty of Berlin as "Prime Minister of England", to the dismay of his Foreign Office advisers. And A.J.P. Taylor, in the preface to his volume of the "Oxford History of England", published in 1965, had to point out that "when the Oxford History was launched a generation ago 'England' was still an all-embracing word. It meant indiscriminately England and Wales, Great Britain, the United Kingdom, and even the British Empire." As a result of this, the usual term in most foreign languages has always been "England", and will probably continue to be so for some time yet. (Don Aitken) from here. I live in Finland and have first hand experience of this, I am not English, but the UK and Great Britain are routinely described as englanti here, I have only come accross one example of the correct yhdistynyt kuningaskunta (UK), on my residence permit, the British Isles are also refered to as Britteinsaaret (lit. British Isles). I have had to explain ad nauseum that Wales is not in England, people generally accept British, but Welsh usually gets a blank stare. It's OK if you are from Scotland, Ireland or England, these nations have a higher international recognition factor than Wales. But by your reasoning I would have to accept being called English rather than British, but to me English is more offensive than British because whereas I am British (because I was born on the Island of Great Britain and descended for generations (as far as I know) from other people also born on the same Island), I am certainly not English. Alun 10:14, 18 July 2006 (UTC)
I share your frustration of people equating "British" with "English", I had to explain where Wales was (and indeed who you could and couldn't call British), typically to Americans. Its unfortunate that you had the same experience. In the rest of Europe that I've been to they've had more of a clue (although I haven't been to Finland). By my reasoning you've have to accept being called "Welsh" instead of "British". Wales is bigger than Slovenia, and yet no-one would dream of calling the Slovenians "Yugoslavs" or "Slavs". Wales needs more presence on the international stage. - FrancisTyers · 11:55, 18 July 2006 (UTC)
Quite, I wouldn't have called myself British when I lived in the UK, but everyone there knows that Wales is not England. But I still disagree with your contention that British is an Imperialist word. I'll see your British Empire and British Army (though I know no one who ever uses these terms, they are simply The Empire and The Army to British people) and raise you British Telecom, British Steel, British Coal, British Leyland, British Academy, British Gas and British Broadcasting Corporation, I'm sure there are many more, are all these imperialist? Alun 16:10, 18 July 2006 (UTC)
I tend to find that when I define myself as British it's in a context where the other person would otherwise be defining me as "English" in the broad sense... it's a kind of pre-emptive thing. "I know exactly what you would mean to say by calling me English, so I'm going to use British, which means to me exactly what you intend". Ah, the subtleties of self-determination in the United Kingdom... an Englishman knows what I mean if I say "I'm not English, I'm Scottish", but to a foreigner that often parses as "I'm not British, I'm Scottish", which has a whole new set of implied meaning! Shimgray | talk | 16:18, 18 July 2006 (UTC)
Actually I quite like Anglo-Celtic Isles as well. Alun 05:51, 18 July 2006 (UTC)
Alun, that reference from Don Aitken is highly useful and clear, I think. Of course, a single authord has the luxury of not writing by committee, so it's unlikely that we'll get such a clear discussion. Also of interest is this article by John Davies on a similar subject. Here's his paragraph on the term "British Isles":
BRITISH ISLES. A geographical term referring to the islands off the north-west coast of continental Europe, including the islands of Great Britain, Ireland, groups such as the outer and inner Hebrides, Shetlands and Orkneys, and countless others. The southernmost islands are the Channel Islands (though these are not universally regarded as belonging to the group), and the northernmost the Shetlands. Geographically the Faeroes (which belong to Denmark) might be regarded as part of the archipelago, but from an English usage standpoint they are not generally included in the term. The use of "British" in this context does not indicate that all the islands now belong to Britain, any more than the phrase "Irish Sea" implies Irish sovereignty over that stretch of water. Many people in Ireland nevertheless dislike the phrase; unfortunately there is no alternative term likely to be widely understood.
I think this is a fair summary of the issue, and acknowledges Irish dislike of the phrase without making it the central focus. Something along these lines would, I think, be a good model for our intro. john k 11:01, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

The only viable alternative term presently in use that describes the islands in a collective sense is 'Anglo-Celtic Isles'; it has I understand only been offered as an alternative term relatively recently. I'm in absolute agreement about 'Islands of the North Atlantic' - I don't think it is used at all. 'These Islands' is of little use, well, outside these islands! Some people may not like 'Anglo-Celtic Isles' - in the same way as I and others really don't like the term 'British Isles' (in case anyone somehow missed it!) - but it is used...and in more than the 'one or two academic conferences'. If people don't want to use it, they don't have to - its existance though needs to be noted. If it were in wider use I would ask for it to be put in the openning sentence or paragraph, but accept the 'in limited use' qualification and placing as such. Robdurbar, I want to put it back in - happy to discuss further first though. I'll comment on 'British & Irish Isles' below. PConlon 22:29, 17 July 2006

I don't want to question its use or exlucde it from the article; just the intro. 'These isles' isn't a suggested alternative name, for the obvious reasons; but it is worth mentioning, I believe, as the most used term. As a (very rough) guide, a search for "british isles" in google.co.uk gives approx 15million results; "anglo-celtic isles" gives 75. On google.ie, the results are the same (As i did a 'search the web' search). OK, this is not scientific, but the figures hardly compare. --Robdurbar 21:51, 17 July 2006 (UTC)
Oh, and let's just remember - we're making good progress on the article here. This is not, however, a place for discussing whether we should rename the isels and the merits of the names; rather their importance and merits for inclusion in the article. --Robdurbar 21:53, 17 July 2006 (UTC)
And, whilst I'm accidently boosting my edit count; does the radio talk show below, which provided a rough 2:1 ratio of people disliking the term British Isles against those liking it a reliable source of public opinion in RoI that we could use? This is a genuine quesiton; I don't know the answer. --Robdurbar 21:59, 17 July 2006 (UTC)
It seems to me that it is not. It is, for one thing, basically anecdotal and approximate. Beyond this, the response from people who decide to actively respond to a story is not necessarily (or even probably) going to match to general public opinion on the story. The people most likely to respond are people who feel strongly about the issue, and I think it would be likely that people in Ireland who find "British Isles" unacceptable tend to feel more strongly about it than their compatriots who accept its use. Which is not to say that the former position is not more common than the latter, just that we don't really know. I would suspect that, of people in Ireland who really care about the issue, 2:1 is probably roughly accurate. But one would also suspect that most people don't really care. How does a hypothetical Irish person who tends not to use "British Isles" themselves, but does not particularly object when other people use the term fit in? If such people exist in large numbers in Ireland (as seems probable, given that I doubt that most people deeply care about geographical terminology), how are we to count them? It seems to me that there's probably no good way to gauge the exact nature of public opinion in Ireland, unless actual polls have been conducted on the subject. In the absence of this, I think it's fair to say that term is controversial in Ireland, but I don't see as we have any evidence for how controversial. If I had to guess, I'd say there's a substantial minority of nationalists who overtly dislike the term and talk about how much they dislike it, and so forth; another minority who uses the term (perhaps a smaller minority, but who knows?); and a plurality who doesn't particularly care. john k 22:28, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

Thanks Robdurbar, however the hyphen rather messes things up. Type it in without the hyphen (as I have done just now) and you'll get 660,000 mentions, rather than 14,300 with the hyphen. It is definitely appropriate for mention in the article, our only disagreement is whether it's appropriate for the introduction. I very much think it is. I would agree that it shouldn't be given inappropriate weight though...if you're worried that I'm hoping to emphasise it unfairly, you needn't. User: PConlon 23:13, 17 July 2006

I don't think the hyphen matters within a google search, i get the same 78 [16] if it is included or not. Based on my admittedly limited search for alternate usage, "Anglo-Celtic Isles" is the one that apprears least often. Even the name "British and Irish Isles"—which i had neglected to search for until now—yields two books and one journal article using it as a proper name.EricR 22:31, 17 July 2006 (UTC)
Actually Pconlon I don't think you're using Google correctly. Searching for Anglo-Celtic Isles will return all pages with the phrase Anglo-Celtic in it, and all entries with the word Isles in it, hence the high results. Similarly for Anglo Celtic Isles it searchs for everything with the word Anglo, everything with the word Celt and everything with the word Isles. This is not a valid count as it isn't searching specifically for that term. If you put the search term in quotes "Anglo-Celtic Isles" you get 75 results both with and without a hyphen, not a good result when looking for usage to back up the use of the term, only 75 web results in the world (on Google's lists). Ben W Bell talk 11:07, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

Have a look at this (it's quite entertaining too!)... http://media.wiley.com/product_data/excerpt/63/04713186/0471318663.pdf User: PConlon 23.29, 17 July 2006

Which uses "Anglo-Celtic isles" a descriptive phrase. Were you able to find their "seperate section for Celtic Ireland"?EricR 22:36, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

A link to any section within an article in its Introduction isn't standard Wikipedia practice (every user should know that the Introduction is an 'executive summary' of the main article). EricR, I'm afraid that you missed the point there - it's a collective term...not generally intended for breakdown into separate Anglo- OR Celtic- Ireland, Scotland, England, Wales or whatever. Ben W Bell, I think you're correct and I wasn't searching Google for the phrase as a whole. 78 identified links from your search is indeed modest. It still however qualifies (just!) as being 'in use', appropriately qualified with the word 'limited'. I believe that the Introduction needs to mention it, specifically. Are you worried that people might see it and adopt it in preference to the 'British isles' term you prefer?! It should be presented for information (key Introduction-worthy information) and people are free to adopt or ignore it as they see fit. User: PConlon 14:58 (modified), 18 July 2006

I jsut don't see why a very rarely used phrase should be included over, say, 'These Isles', which is the preffered term in the Republic of Ireland; though obviosuly not a full blown alternative. Britain and Ireland, again, is probably more common. The fact is that Anglo-Celtic Isles in the intro would be giving undue weight to the term. It is not worthy enough for the introduction (bear in mind, for example, that of those 75-80 pages, approximately 30 are Wikipedia or its mirrors (including this very page!). --Robdurbar 22:26, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

I see you remain far from convinced here Robdurbar! I appreciate your concern about 'undue weight' being given to it; that's why I'm not jumping up and down asking for it to be put in italics and/or bold text, or in the first sentence. The term is the only completely viable collective term, I personally use it and the existance of 50+ (non-Wikipedia) independent webpages using it despite its newness convinces me that it should be included in the introduction our encyclopedic article, with an appropraite 'limited use' qualification. Most of our other colleagues have already given its inclusion their approval. Please leave it be! Thanks. User: PConlon 17:25, 19 July 2006

Request to Merge: British and Irish Isles

User:Amalas has put an RTM on British and Irish Isles without creating a discussion topic here. And tagged a UK-geo-stub to it (which I have corrected). So I suspect that his/her intent is mischievous. Can the RTM tag simply be deleted? or does it have to be discussed since this is the nub of all the discussion above? (Personally, I think it is a very good alternative to this article [albeit that the title might be a problem :-) ]. I feel that this article is wildly over-long. Its purpose seems confused. If it is political history, then see History of the United Kingdom and History of the Republic of Ireland. If it is geography, then there are geographic articles on each of Great Britain and Ireland. If it is geology, then that would be valid — but the only paragraph on geology was deleted? So I ask again, what is this article trying to say, because it seems to me that British and Irish Isles says as much as we need to say without duplicating other articles. --Red King 19:39, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

Regarding the Request to Merge: Do you agree to merge British and Irish Isles into the British Isles

  • Disagree --Red King 19:39, 17 July 2006 (UTC)
  • Disagree --MelForbes 19:52, 17 July 2006 (UTC) Oh Dear, here we go again. The term is often used, then why stop it? What is the problem with the British editors. They accuse fellow editors of POV, use terms like absurd and baffled, and the page has even being called a joke by another british editor. WP:EQ? Clearly there is a problem here, why airbrush away these terms, they are quite frequently being used. MelForbes 02:32, 19 July 2006 (UTC)
  • Move unsigned comment by author to its own section to avoid confusion with comment by MelForbes, also it's a useful contribution. ..dave souza, talk 05:56, 18 July 2006 (UTC)
  • Support merge of British and Irish Isles into British Isles; the article needs a title and it needs to be at the most commen name. Having duplicate articles is against policy of course. Frankly, I'm baffeled as to why on earth it was created? Like the term or not, it needs to be at British Isles. --Robdurbar 21:38, 17 July 2006 (UTC)
Concur. Forking to another page, with that titled a neologism, isn't going to help the debate get anywhere; we're trying to decide how to deal with the term "British Isles" neutrally, not claim that the Isles are "most commonly known as the British and Irish Isles". Have it as a redirect here, by all accounts, discuss alternate names by all accounts, but we shouldn't rewrite the language to pretend the term isn't used. Shimgray | talk | 21:53, 17 July 2006 (UTC)
I'm not sure it's a neologism though, seems more like an Americanism to me, they seem to use the term British and Irish Isles a lot over there, but on the other hand maybe it is of quite recent invention, but it seems to occur a lot on American blogs, like this Those Islands off the North West Coast of France are now known as the British and Irish Isles (my emphasis).BBC America discussions Try a google and see. Alun 11:10, 18 July 2006 (UTC)
  • Disagree --User:PConlon 23:01, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

If this is a genuine attempt to offer a solution, I am grateful to User:Amalas for it. I do have to fall into the ‘disagree’ camp however, firstly because it isn't used at all as a term to my knowledge. It's just that too much of a mouthful to catch on - and would likely be abbreviated back to 'British Isles' in most instances anyway. People who object to 'British Isles' would object to that too. Robdurbar and Shimgray, are you both supporting as in 'agreeing' or supporting the disagreement of the person above?!! Incidentally, User:MelForbes does amusingly highlight the funny quandary that some English people get into when they try to get their head around 'the most northerly point is in the south' line!! I've so often had to correct the erroneous use of 'Southern Ireland' and remind these people of the wonderful word 'Republic'!

The south is the north and the north is the south. :) Or something like that... - FrancisTyers ·
Mel created the page at 18:50 UTC; Amalas was just stub-sorting and caught it (and then caught it for stub sorting...). I was concurring with Rob in saying that we ought to merge; forking is a bad idea, avoids addressing the problem, and just confuses people. Shimgray talk | 22:07, 17 July 2006 (UTC)
(edit conflicted!): to clarify here; Amalas was a stub-sorter who happened accross the BI and Ireland Isles page, created today (17th July) by User:MelForbes) and saw that it basicially covered the same ground as British Isles, a longer article, and so proposed the merge (see User talk:MelForbes). The long contribution from above is in fact from User:83.70.70.194, an anonymous contributor (though he has revealed himself to be the broadcaster Hugh Linnean). To 'diasgre' would mean that you disagree with the merge i.e. that British and Irish Isles should remain as a sepreate article; to 'support' would mean to want BI and Irish Isles to redirect to the Brtish Isles page --Robdurbar 22:10, 17 July 2006 (UTC)
  • Support; But really shouldn't this just go to AfD? The text is cut-and-paste from this article and merge would have no real effect here.EricR 22:42, 17 July 2006 (UTC)
The article is not cut and paste, and presently it is in the nascent stages. The episode of Amalas's edit has highlighted a major point of the discussion this last week. Amalas erroneously put {{UK-geo-stub}} into the article British and Irish Isles. Amalas thought that Ireland was in the UK. Supposedly because of the term British Isles! MelForbes 00:31, 18 July 2006 (UTC)
I'd imagine that the article was categorised as a UK Geo Stub more out of habit than anything else, I can't see there was malicious intent behind it or any other real motivation. Also looking through edits I can't believe Amalas actually thought Ireland was in the UK. Anyway as most of the British Isles is in the UK it is mostly right. :) Oh and I think we should merge. Ben W Bell talk 07:00, 18 July 2006 (UTC)
Oh incidentally concerning the article British and Irish Isles. Since User:MelForbes created and put in the information I find it amusing that he put the map on and then captioned it "location of the British Isles", which on that map includes Ireland, and left it there throughout his edits. Ben W Bell talk 07:02, 18 July 2006 (UTC)
Except that "British and Irish Isles" isn't a term in common usage (152 Google hits for both versions & and And), British Isles is in common use. Ben W Bell talk 14:54, 18 July 2006 (UTC)
Aren't you 193.1.172.163 actually agreeing to a merge, but of this article to British and Irish Isles? Alun 15:35, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

Yes, I am agreeing to a merge of this article to British and Irish Isles. 193.1.172.163 15:59, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

Yes me too, there is some confusion as to what we are agreeing/disagreeing. Not agreeing to this means that both articles remain. Alun 19:10, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

By the way, like the user above it is not clear which merge is being proposed. I'm just agreeing with MelForbes as he makes a lot of sense on this talk page. 193.1.172.163 14:22, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

  • Merge - There's no such thing as the British and Irish Isles. It seems as if someone has a fantasy that by changing the name of the archipelago to British and Irish Isles, on Wikipedia, that it will magically happen in real life, and be instantly recognised by the British and Irish governments and people, simply because Wikipedia says so. Oops, reality check. -- Jack Blueberry (t)⁄(c) •  18:28, 22 July 2006 (UTC)
  • Merge - Clear attempt at a POV fork. There should be one article covering the archipelago only. josh (talk) 19:11, 22 July 2006 (UTC)
  • 'Merge- Other pages seem to break a large number of Wiki policies and serve no purpose. Name of combined article should be British Isles as demonstrated by Dave Souza. MAG1 22:35, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

Author's comment

Sorry to butt in at a late stage, but as the author of the Irish Times article mentioned above, I wanted to make a couple of brief and (I hope) useful points. First, if anyone wishes I can make inquiries within the paper as to whether we have records of any debate about the terminology prior to 1996 (when the online archive starts). Second, as was correctly observed above, I don't personally have a huge difficulty with the phrase British Isles, but I suspect a majority of people in Ireland/Eire/Republic of Ireland (take your pick) do. For example, I mentioned this when presenting The Last Word programme on Today FM last week and the phone text opinions from listeners were approx 2/1 against. I know that's probably not worth much more than canvassing opinions in a pub (possibly less). But I think it also reflects the fact that opinion in nationalist Ireland is not as uniform as some contributors would have us believe. Third, the phrase British and Irish Isles is absurd. It's used by nobody and will be peculiar to Wikipedia. I do believe that there is a need for an overarching phrase to describe the archipelago as a geographical entity. I think there's also a strong argument that the same is needed to describe its shared cultural space. But, given the above, I don't see much chance of that. Finally, there were loads of other items I didn't have space to touch on in what was intended to be a relatively lighthearted article, but I offer this paragraph which I had to delete for space reasons:

'I live in a state called Ireland, which is located on an island called Ireland. But there are parts of Ireland which are not in Ireland. These parts are called Northern Ireland. However, the most northerly part of Ireland (the island) is not in Northern Ireland, but in Ireland (the state). Some of the residents of Northern Ireland refer to it as Ulster. But a substantial portion of Ulster is not in Northern Ireland, including the most northern part of Ireland (and Ulster). And the whole shebang, according to most geographers, forms part of the British Isles, which are only partly British, although there is a majority of British people in Northern Ireland (but not Ulster). Oh well... —Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.70.70.194 (talk • contribs) 20:25, 17 July 2006

Thanks for a really useful contribution, you are of course welcome to join in at any time and it's far from being too late. It's a good idea to log in and get a username, which is actually more anonymous than not signing it which means your name appears as your IP address. It's a great shame that paragraph isn't in your article, or we could have cited it! Note that it can be best to bring up things you've written yourself on the talk page and suggest that others might incorporate it, or follow the guidance at Wikipedia:No original research#Expert editors. This article has a lot of improvement still needed, and I'm glad to see it under way...dave souza, talk 06:06, 18 July 2006 (UTC) amended 06:17, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

Improvements

I'm glad to see the article improving, with more clarification of who does and doesn't think the term is controversial. In this light I've modified the "controversial" reference in the first sentence to make it clear that the sensitivity, though important, is not universal. The author's comments above help to confirm that, though as always published sources are needed. I've also added some clarifications to the Terminology section. However at the moment I think it goes into too much detail of various meanings and proving that there's confusion about the term: that would in my opinion be better in the British Isles (terminology) article. However before the link gets ditched, I'd urge everyone to read Chewin' the Fat: if nothing else it will probably show that sense of humour varies significantly across these islands. Will try to tackle the History section sometime...dave souza, talk 07:56, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

Why would you want to tackle the history section. What can you say that is not already in History of Britain or History of Ireland? --Red King 10:19, 18 July 2006 (UTC)
An overview including Orkney, Shetland, IoM, Channel Islands... wait and see, please. ..dave souza, talk 10:43, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

Ok Dave, I understand your 'not universal' point. I just find the 'in certain circles' wording jarring. How about 'by some inhabitants' or something like that? A 'Glossary of Associated Terms' within the main article drawing on the material in the existing separate 'British isles (Terminology)' article should be placed in the article (with the farse of a saparate page removed). I for one am looking forward to your revised History section...of which we need just one in the article! User: PConlon 15:17 modified, 18 July 2006.

Basically agree, a rewording would be welcome. However the point's been made that it's not just a proportion of the Irish, as well as unverified claims re. Scottish and Welsh nationalists there's the point about expats getting upset - again unverified but anecdotal evidence on this page makes it plausible. A tricky one. ..dave souza, talk 05:58, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

Delete this article?

May I offer a radical proposal that would solve the problem at a stroke. How completely deleting this article as it stands and redirecting it to British Isles (Terminology). There is no unique content here, it merely repeats what is in other articles, makes political speeches, or develops arcane arguments that would only be understood by people already familiar with the material. What the article should do is educate and inform, and the most important lesson that anyone new to the term (the arbitrary "man on the Osaka omnibus") needs to learn is that the title must not be taken at face value. --Red King 10:17, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

If this article is going to become a prolonged wrangling about the term without ever getting down to it, yeah, that's probably as good an idea as any. But I can't help but feel we've just created a grandiose disambiguation page... I have to reiterate, though, creating a POV fork at British and Irish Isles is a very very bad idea, and we really should avoid keeping both pages up. Shimgray | talk | 10:50, 18 July 2006 (UTC)
I'm not bothered about deleting this article one way or another, but I will point out that there are 25 articles on other language wikipedias that are also called British Isles, what should be done about them? Alun 10:56, 18 July 2006 (UTC)
Just what is the problem with British and Irish Isles as the name for these islands? Is it because it is respectful? Too accurate? Too realistic? Is it because it reflects resistance to the term British Isles in Ireland and as such is a reality too much for more rightwing British? Is it because it reflects the heartfelt reality of Irish people, even from players of English games like rugby who rejected the term so much that the British Lions became the British and Irish Lions? Is it because it reflects the Irish government's view when they rejected the term British Isles Council and insisted on the British-Irish Council in the GFA? 193.1.172.163 13:46, 18 July 2006 (UTC)
As for other language versions, they will soon follow when they realise that the term is not acceptable, just as they will not use it to an Irish person once he or she has explained the political and historical significance of the label. This issue is about respect, about the ability of British people to accept changed political realities and to, for once and for all, come to terms with the geographic limits of British nationalism. 193.1.172.163 13:46, 18 July 2006 (UTC)
The problem with British and Irish Isles is someone made it up. It's not a term in common use; it's a relatively obscure neologism. We're trying to write an article about the thing most people currently call the British Isles here, a process which is not best served by pretending the term "British Isles" doesn't exist or has been dropped from the language. It is not some right-wing anti-Irish conspiracy!
I mean, we could have an article on Major island group of North-West Europe, but that would be silly - nobody uses the term. British and Irish Isles has some traction, but very little; British Isles is unquestionably the most common term in English. Explain that it's contentious, sure, but we're not here to rewrite the language or cater to one particular political point of view (the one that says any use of "British Isles" is fundamentally unacceptable is, like it or not, a political point of view). Shimgray | talk | 14:33, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

Nah, you can't delete it - even though I'd personally like to - as it is term in common use and so unquestionably warrants an entry (I'm talking as an impartial Wikipedian there). Links to other relevant terms are of course appropriate. User: Conlon 15:04, 18 July 2006.

To clarify: what I had in mind was to delete the current content of this article and replace it with the content of British Isles (Terminology). --Red King 22:43, 18 July 2006 (UTC)
If you read British Isles terminology, you can see that much of it is about terminology within the British Isles and not necessaiirly about 'British Isles' itself e.g. the difference between 'England' and the 'United Kingdom'. This would be inappropriate at a 'British Isles' article. --Robdurbar 23:09, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

Red King, I'd be totally against your idea. Much (difficult) work has gone into giving the existing 'British isles' article a generally acceptable balance...I'm just amazed at the suggestion (though recognise the good intentions behind it). I just know what some of my more militant Irish colleagues would do with it...leading to another bitter editting war. Robdurbar, if the terms 'aren't necessarily about 'British Isles' itself', why does it have 'British Isles' in the title? A 'Glossary of Terms Used Within the British Isles' in the main article would actually be enormously helpful. User: PConlon 18:54, 19 July 2006

Adding foreign languages into debate

What about the fact that the group of islands is referred to in various other languages as the British Isles? Does that carry any weight?

  • Japanese - ブリテン諸島, which literally translates as "Britain chain of islands", but importantly excludes a の character which if written ブリテンの諸島 would indicate ownership of that chain of islands by Britain. It contains グレートブリテン島とアイルランド島, Great Britain island and Ireland island.
  • French - Îles britanniques, easy enough to translate to British Isles. Principally composed of la Grande-Bretagne et l’Irlande.
  • Chinese - 不列顛群島, consisting of 大不列顛島 Great Britain island and 愛爾蘭島 Ireland island.

So it's not just the English language which uses the term, it's commonplace in other languages. Ben W Bell talk 11:25, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

Restricting it solely to the ones I can parse (not speak, just get the framework of):
  • Catalan - "illes Britàniques", with a section discussing the term
  • Czech - "Britské ostrovy", 'ostrov' being island
  • German - "britischen Inseln", with a section discussing the term
  • Estonian - "Briti saared", 'saar' being island
  • Spanish - "Islas Británicas" is a "nombre tradicionalmente", with a section discussing the term
  • Esperanto - "Britaj Insuloj", with a section on alternate names
  • Hungarian - "Britanski otoci", 'otok' being island, with a section discussing the term
  • Icelandic - "Bretlandseyjar", 'eyja' being island
  • Italian (which I just fixed a broken image on!) - "Arcipelago britannico", and notes that "In tempi recenti il nome dell'arcipelago ha creato seri problemi a livello politico" - why is it stuff always sounds more elegant in Italian? - before going into alternate names
  • Dutch - "Britse Eilanden", with a note on the term
  • Norwegian (both) - "De(i) britiske øyene", with a note on the term
  • Polish - "Wyspy Brytyjskie", 'wyspa' being island
  • Portugese - "Ilhas Britânicas", with a section discussing the term
  • Romani - "Britanikane dvipa", but I'm completely confused as to what it says - it may actually be saying "The British Isles is a geographic thing including GB and Ireland and Man. The geographic group not (something) the UK or ROI or Man..." - which sort of makes sense, but the second part is a bit weird - not solely meaning, perhaps? I dunno.
  • Finnish - "Britteinsaaret", 'saari' being island, possibly a note on usage but I can't tell
  • Swedish - "Brittiska öarna" (where ö indicates island?), note on usage
  • Serbian - "Britanski otoci", 'otok' being island, with a section discussing the term

All use a vatriant of British Isles, though many also mention both English and Irish names (often giving the interesting impression that "Oileáin na Breataine" is the Irish for "British Isles"!). Discussion of the term seems to exist in most articles, but they're almost invariably just disambiguation pages between the different parts. Shimgray | talk | 11:50, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

If I can jump in here on top of MelForbes I'd just like to point out that in no way does "Oileáin na Breataine" mean British Isles in Irish. It means islands of Britain, which is an entirely different matter. It would be a surreal occasion to hear somebody on RnaG or TG4 talk about Ireland being an island of Britain. Moreover, for that matter I have never once heard the term used in any context and a quick Google of the term sees it used in the genitive case 'oileáin' meaning, for example, [17], (tuaisceart oileáin na Breataine atá Alba) 'Scotland is on the northern part of the island of Britain'. The nominative plural and genitive singular is the same spelling in Irish, oileáin. Oileán na Breataine is singular, island of Britain. 193.1.172.163 15:53, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

  • Yup! the British Isles does exist, no doubt about that. But what do they contain? --MelForbes 11:57, 18 July 2006 (UTC)
I'm baffled. All the above articles, as far as I recall, used the term to mean "(UK + RoI, GB + Ireland) + the extra bits". That doesn't seem to be in contention, does it? Shimgray | talk | 12:09, 18 July 2006 (UTC)
(proposal moved below)

This is silly, those are all simply foreign translations of the English!! Ever heard the expression about going around in circles until you disappear up your own 'rear-end'?! Well, this is what this discussion will do if we follow this line. The article needs to be sorted out in English (a common, native language of everyone involved in this dispute) and the foreign language articles should be a straight translation of the result. User: PConlon 15:09, 18 July 2006

Ah but it is relevant. They are not just all translations of the English, these other languages actually in many cases have specific constructions for the British Isles and that also includes Ireland. How other nations use the term in their language and its usages is everybit as important as the straightforward English usage. English isn't the only, or even the most spoken, language in the world. Ben W Bell talk 14:56, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

Sorry, just have to disagree...if other languages use a translation of 'British Isles' it is because the dominant inhabitants of the island group used it first in their own language. User: PConlon 17:11, 19 July 2006

Proposed minimalist solution

After poking through all those nice short foreign articles above, I feel we ought to consider making a very short article here, something along the lines of...
The British Isles is a commonly used term for a group of islands etc. [Map] Politically, it comprises two independent nations (UK, RoI) (plus the oddities).
Geograpically, it contains a number of islands: [list as many as seem appropriate]
The use of the term "British" is politically sensitive, as the adjective generally means 'of the United Kingdom', and term is often avoided because of unwelcome or misleading connotations; indeed, in Irish, the term generally used is Oileáin na Breataine ("Ireland and Britain"). A number of alternate names for the group have been proposed as a result. For a further discussion of (all this stuff), see British Isles (terminology)
(Perhaps a brief overview of the common history of the islands here? summary of common geographical features, whatnot. couple of paragraphs at most.)
(If there are any articles which deal with the Isles as a whole, but there probably aren't, list them as See Also here - is there a Geology of the British Isles?)
And then move all the lengthy debate into (terminology). You'd need to fix the wording, sure, but I honestly think this is a nice stable neutral solution.
It removes all the major points of contention as far as I can see - we don't say British Isles "is the name", we say "it's a commonly used term"; we cut it down simply to the basic disambiguation for the reader who wanders in here, and let them go to the terminology article, which can be a long and intricate footnoting frenzy, if they want that. Most of the benefits of the short article at British and Irish Isles, without giving the impression the term "British Isles" doesn't exist. Thoughts? Shimgray | talk | 15:24, 18 July 2006 (UTC)
Strongly support this well-thought out solution. KillerChihuahua?!? 15:29, 18 July 2006 (UTC)
Could you clarify you proposal a bit? There are a number of archipelago articles, most have some degree of detail concerning geography, history, geology, politics, etc. Would your minimalist approach keeps such detail out of this article? If so then why is this article a special case?
The topic of the article is a geographic entity, but by giving it a title some other issues need to be dealt with. There are alternate names in usage which are verifiable, we should notify the reader of these names. The title chosen for the article has verifiable alternate meanings and sometimes confusing usage. The reader should likewise be made aware of this.
We are having a tough time getting everyone to agree on an explanation of the terminology which meets the verifiability and neutral point of view requirements, but i don't think that calls for moving the matter to some other article. Precedent in other naming disputes is i think pretty clear—if there are other names in use state them, if the title of the article has another meaning let the reader know.
EricR 16:25, 18 July 2006 (UTC)
I've no problem with short sections summarising geography, history, etc - I just feel they should be kept to a very broad overview, kept short, and make good use of links out to, say, History of Ireland or Geology of Great Britain. As matters currently stand, the debate on terminology is a disproportionate amount of this article, and I feel that it could be best dealt with by a few lines here neutrally summarising it, and linking to a larger, much more detailed article on both the etymology and the current debate over the name. IMO, that serves the reader far better - it lets them cut to the chase, find what they want, and move on. Shimgray | talk | 16:46, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

Someone will come along at some point in the future and include all the geography/geology/ecology stuff and it will expand again. By the way what are you proposing to do with all the non-political stuff anyway? Alun 19:05, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

I'm sort of with this: what I'd envisage is short sections, each headed with a see main which might link to more than one article or, where appropriate, something concise like a template such as the history templates for Ireland and Britain. Each section should aim to be as concise as an introduction (if a longish one), giving a brief overview concentrated on inter-country issues: for example, the Wars of the Three Kingdoms would get a sentence or at most two describing their impact across the countries and mentioning the more usual English Civil War name. The aim would be for a reader to get a quick idea of the broad issues, but all the detail should be in linked articles. Good examples in principle, though the sections are too long, are the History of England and History of Ireland articles. A bad example is the History of Britain article which is no more than lists of links, giving the impression that all that's useful is the fragmented approach. ..dave souza, talk 19:32, 18 July 2006 (UTC)
I support this idea too, it is another way of skinning the cat to achieve the same end as my #Delete this article? above. --Red King 22:47, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

Revision

I have been bold, or perhaps foolhardy, and tried to sort out the article's arrangement. I have put in some sourced stuff, chucked out unsourced stuff and tangential information (bit of a judgement call there, sorry if I got it wrong), and tried to arrange it coherently. In particular I have put in the different definitions of British that have caused this controversy. Sorry if I have trodden on anyone's toes, but it would be really nice if you would accept good faith. I have tried to read the discussion, but it's pretty unreadable I am afraid.

It would be really good if we all thought about the reader rather than pushing our agendas. The reader coming to this page is probably looking for an introduction to this part of the world and pointers on to other articles. As far as I see it, the questions to be answered are as follows with my answers:

  • Should the page exist. Yes in my opinion. There are things that this group of islands share, and this should be included in the article. There are a number of articles that include British Isles in their title, but they are difficult to track down at the moment.
  • Should the article be called the British Isles. Again, yes in my opinion. As a collective noun for the archipelago, it is by far the most popular. It may be unpopular in Ireland (neutral statement), but it is not inherently offensive for a very large number of English speakers. Google searches generally muddy things in Wikipedia, but in this case a couple of minutes will show that British Isles is used innocently (i.e. geographically rather than politically) by a large number of organisations.
  • Should there be a substantial section on the name? Again yes IMHO as it is quite clearly a big thing in Ireland. However, as always it would be good if the section was kept on subject and contains verifiable facts rather then editoralising. Actually, again in my opinion, the section on Irish usage was pretty good.
  • What should the page be used for? IMO its best use would be for various types of natural history: the weather does not stop at the Irish sea or at any other line. The natural history of the islands is distinct from continental Europe and this would be a useful function for readers. I'm not so sure about a combined history. It would be a good thing to do, but probably impossible in Wikipedia as various brands of partisans try to ride their hobby-horses over it. It would definitely better to get non-controversial stuff done first.

Quite happy to admit blunders, but it would be good to keep to WP:EQ and WP:V. It would also be good if people were specific in their messages about what they want to happen to the articles. MAG1 20:31, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

Some of the edits are very good. I'm not sure about the Western European Isles paragraph (if you inserted that bit). Whilst I agree its worth mentioning, much of it seems editorialised - unintentionally, I think, inserting opinion over fact. Comments such as 'soure:any good atlas: and 'If the inhabitants of Iceland and the Faeroes consider 'these islands' to be western, it follows that they can have no objection to the term 'the West Europe Isles' are just very poor. If you didn't write it, I'm sorry, but I just looked at all the recent edits as one; if you did, its one poor paragraph in a strong rewrite! --Robdurbar 22:48, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the comments. Glad to say that my only contibution to the West Europe Isles paragraph was to convert some capitalised words. MAG1 23:20, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

My Tuppence as I'm leaving for a week

I'm afraid that the progress on this talk page has gone slightly downhill over the last 24 hours. To merge this page into British and Irish Isles would be absolutely ridiculous; there is no argument for it. To make this a redirect to the terminology is an understandable idea, but doesn't follow through: look at that page, it dosen't just discuss the terminology OF the British Isles, but the terminology WITHIN the British Isles. Something, I think most agree, is needed on the shared geology/biology and histories of teh British Isles.

As for the aritcle... it appears to be going round in circles. I don't think that the version of today is much different from that of, say, a week ago. We're just rehashing the same, fairly accurate stuff. It's not acutally a bad article and deals with the terminology, and the aspects of the isles, quite well. I'm intrigued by a couple of the above proposals; however I'm afraid that these really need to be realised and shown on subpages or test edits for us to know how they'll work.

I think for this article to progress now we need to accept that we all have slighlty different visions of the 'perfect' way to deal with the British Isles but that eventually we'll have to plump stick with one. Hopefully such progress will be made before I'm back next week! --Robdurbar 22:48, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

Have a great one, Rob. And thanks for all your help here. I think all sides in the debate appreciated it. FearÉIREANN\(caint) 16:33, 19 July 2006 (UTC)
Have a good holiday! At least the civility has improved and positive ideas for improvement are being put forward as well as some that show little understanding of policies and guidelines: hardly surprising given the attention that will have been drawn by the Irish Times article. It may be a slow process with setbacks, but there's hope for a better article emerging over time. ...dave souza, talk 05:12, 19 July 2006 (UTC)
I would broadly agree. It seems to be agreed that there needs to be a section on terminology; what we should try to agree is what other topics should be covered and in what depth. I notice that the "Geology" section directs to a main article called Geology of the British Isles but which actually deals almost entirely with the geology of the island of Great Britain, with no useful information about the geology of Ireland. Rhion 06:32, 19 July 2006 (UTC)
Rhion, thanks for noticing the "flaws" with the Geology of the British Isles article. This is typical and only one of the many and varying issues which JTDIRL and others have been alluding to. But it's not just a problem on Wikipedia, it's pandemic. MelForbes 11:30, 19 July 2006 (UTC)
My thanks too for alerting us to the deficiency. Anyone available to make a start on getting the geology of Ireland, the Channel Islands etc. properlycovered in that article? It gets off to a bad start with a copyright expired geological map of "Great Britain" which misses out Ireland, the Shetlands and the Channel Islands: could someone scan a better map, or failing that separate maps for the missing areas? We also need a Geology of Ireland article. ..dave souza, talk 13:39, 19 July 2006 (UTC)
To be fair, the article does mention the island of Ireland and some locations in the Republic, although I agree that it needs expanding substantially. --Bazza 14:05, 19 July 2006 (UTC)
"To be fair", unquote, had to grin! Just did a Google, the British Isles is a term that will become less and less and finally diminish as the years roll on. Just 3 minutes surfing revealed sites about the British Isles, who never seem to have heard about Ireland. It was like shooting fish in a barrel. Take a look here, [18], [19], [20], [21], [22], [23], [24], [25], [26].—Preceding unsigned comment added by MelForbes (talk • contribs) 14:14, 19 July 2006
So roll up your sleeves and add to that article! Just remember to follow Wikipedia policies, and stick to verifiable facts, not vague predictions. ..dave souza, talk 14:48, 19 July 2006 (UTC)
My comment was that the Geology of the British Isles article stood accused of not including Ireland, when it does. I don't see what that has to do with whether the term is correct, found on Google, never used or anything else. I would say, though, that the term will remain in use — even if misused by some — until a widely adopted alternative for referring to the archipelago as a whole is accepted into general use, not just by us who like to discuss its pros and cons. --Bazza 14:23, 19 July 2006 (UTC)
Just because people get it wrong doesn't mean we have to change it. Shall we rewrite the Sushi article because the majority of people think sushi actually means raw fish? No. Should we have the Seppuku article mention it's sometimes called hari-kari instead of hara-kiri because most people think it is? No. Should we change the article of Vietnam to say it is in South America because that's where the majority of Americans though it was during the 60s and 70s? No. If people are getting it wrong we should be educating them, not changing the meanings of things to suit. Ben W Bell talk 14:31, 19 July 2006 (UTC)
Agreed. --Bazza 14:40, 19 July 2006 (UTC)
Have a look here, Oisin and Ossian, 2 separate articles on Wikipedia, same subject, very interesting. A bit of Hiberno-Scoto cosy accommodation? --MelForbes 14:56, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

Ossian is about the cycle of poems by James Macpherson, Oisín is about the character. There's a dablink at the top of Ossian but not on Oisín. Both articles use the same images, and there is a little overlap, but they are different topics. KillerChihuahua?!? 15:03, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

Oh Boy!!! I just knew it, someone , somewhere would have an explanation, I must be a clairvoyant!! ;) -MelForbes 15:59, 19 July 2006 (UTC)
LOL - I wish I had as simple an answer to all the questions raised here! KillerChihuahua?!? 16:57, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

Alternative Terms

Okay. Under alternative terms we have the entry for Anglo-Celtic Isles. Now there is a line saying it even has its own website. www.anglo-celtic.org.uk. Whoever put this in, you do realise that this website for promotion of the term is actually only applying it to England, is about England and only England. It's not being used in relation to the British Isles. Ben W Bell talk 14:10, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

Just a quick note of a change: someone, not sure who, changed the image caption to 'Location of the archipelago often described as the British Isles'...knowing that 'often described' would be strongly objected to by British users, I replaced it with 'most commonly referred to'. Of the author of the original caption change I request that he/she accept the widespread use of the term - even though he/she and I both really don't like it! Let's not ask for more than we can fairly argue. I'm not sure of what the image captioning policy is; is it normally just the article title? User: PConlon 19:17 modified, 19 July 2006

Well, I changed that this time and then saw your comments. If you are going to argue that it is "most commonly called" I want to see every reference to "these islands" and then your evidence that it is the "most common" reference. And Google is not enough. For "most common" to stand, you'll need to do a mountain of research. 'Often', in contrast, is accurate and verifiable. And, with all due respect, I'd worry if the same people who are shoving a British imperialist title such as "British Isles" upon my country were not offended by my rejection of the triumph of their imperialist tradition as evidenced in the title "British Isles". Their national identity is not mine, and I refuse to accept that sort of irredentist raiméis in 2006. That fanatical ultra-arrogant tradition in British society has been trying to smother Irish identity for centuries, and the current shenanigans on this page is just part of the oldest hangover in world history. Let's be honest about it. It's over. Their empire is over. Despite all the Brits who are mad radicals full of spirit and fun, the section above cannot just live and let live. 193.1.172.163 20:14, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

Some time ago on this page Irish users were subject of a bitter racially-sounding attack. It bitterly enflamed relationships here for a time. Please do not now stand attacking British people in the same manner. PConlon's edit is correct (and he like I and others are Irish). British Isles is the most commonly used name. Many Irish people take offence. But just as British people cannot (as some on this page did) seek to deny the opinions and perspectives of Irish people, so Irish people cannot seek to deny the opinions and perspectives of British people. It is a fact that BI is used worldwide. People may differ on its meaning, very often depending on whether they were of British or Irish descent. But most people internationally mean the entire archipelago, often with no insult intended to Irish people, because they have no knowledge of how offended some Irish people are by that usage. Any search of any sourcebook shows that BI is the most common name for the archipelago. FearÉIREANN\(caint) 23:22, 19 July 2006 (UTC)
Probably some compromise will ensue, which will be challenged again in the not too distant future. That's why I believe it's particularly important not to shut down the other pages that refer to alternate descriptions. Or it'll go on and on and on. -MelForbes 21:40, 19 July 2006 (UTC)
The problem with alternate-name pages is that they're either redundant forks (ie, they broadly the same content under a different name) or they're just simple definitions - "X is another term for Y, which is where the article you're needing is". Unless there's significant differences in the content appropriate to the name (like the Ossian thing above, where one is folklore and one Macpherson-lore), having multiple pages (as opposed to the traditional forest of redirects) doesn't make much sense. I'm all for having entries about the names proposed as alternates, but scattering them all into seperate articles as opposed to condensing them together in one place just doesn't make practical sense, unless those articles have something significant to say about the term itself. Shimgray | talk | 23:08, 19 July 2006 (UTC)
There are several of these articles; in addition to Anglo-Celtic Isles, there's also Islands of the North Atlantic and Britain and Ireland. Again, I think that a British Isles naming dispute along the lines of Sea of Japan naming dispute would be an appropriate and helpful place to merge these.--Pharos 23:17, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

I think the compromise exists already: that the term is objectionable to some people is clearly flagged, and the reasons and nature of their objection fully discussed. In the mean time, the term "British Isles" is used extensively: examples of use can be seen at [27]. This is The Guardian remember (a left-leaning British newspaper not noted for its fanatical ultra-arrogance, for those not familiar with it). The term "British Isles" is used regularly, usually for geographical and natural history purposes. I tried some of the alternative terms, but they returned no hits.

Perhaps we should help the reader by providing some substantial content on this archipelago rather than a spectacularly unreadable and unhelpful discussion page. MAG1 23:20, 19 July 2006 (UTC)