Talk:Eastern Province, Saudi Arabia

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Contents 1 Article title 1.1 Where we are 2 Persian/Arab Gulf 3 Naming conflict 4 Moving proposal 5 Requested move 5.1 Survey 5.2 Discussion 6 List of governorates

[edit] Article title

Ash Sharqiyah literally means "eastern", thus the name of this page should either be Al Mantaqa Ash Sharqiyah, which literally means "Eastern Province", or, a better way, the formal English name, Eastern Province. Naming this article Ash Sharqiyah or Ash Sharqiyah Province is like naming the Saudi Arabia article "Al Mamlakah Al Arabiyah Al Saudiyah", which is not clear at all. -- Eagle^amn 16:02, Jun 1, 2005 (UTC)

What are your proposals for the other Ash Sharqiyah ? Tobias Conradi (Talk) 04:29, 3 Jun 2005 (UTC)

My belief is that it should be Ash Sharqiyah, Saudi Arabia and that all of the other provinces should go by that scheme... there is a certain amount that notabilitiy has to do with Saudi Arabia being named that... important places have been anglacized.... but, we wouldn't call Tokyo (東京) "Eastern City" or Afghanistan "Country of the Afghans" now would we? Province is an english word that helps to tell readers what it is... Eastern is less so... we often do that Miso soup is a mix... and so are countless other articles... gren 05:31, 3 Jun 2005 (UTC)

1. syntax
   1. for subnational entities I allways used the following:
      1. X in general
      2. X Province if there are different things called X
      3. X Province, Country if there are two provinces called X
   2. This avoids the impression Ash Sharqiyah, Saudi Arabia could be a city.
2. translation
   1. Of the governorates of Egypt none are translated, of the states of Sudan a lot are.

Tobias Conradi (Talk) 05:51, 3 Jun 2005 (UTC)

• I agree, no one would call Tokyo the Eastern City. Nevertheless, the "Eastern Province" is the name commonly used in English, both by the Saudi government (e.g. school textbooks) and others. For example, in google, there are 2,460,000 hits for (Eastern+Province+Saudi+Arabia), and only 9,410 hits for (Ash+Sharqiyah+Saudi+Arabia). Searching only .gov domains (the most credible) yields only 36 hits for (Ash+Sharqiyah+Saudi+Arabia), and 10,200 hits for (Eastern+Province+Saudi+Arabia). BTW, if using the name Ash Sharqiyah is unavoidable, the Riyadh article should be renamed to Ar Riyadh and so should other places, just for the sake of consistency. Check the search links to see that whenever Ash Sharqiyah is used, some awkward names/spellings are also used for other places in Saudi Arabia itself, some of which you might consider undisputable.

"Of the governorates of Egypt none are translated, of the states of Sudan a lot are.": Well, Riyadh, Mecca, and even Saudi Arabia are translated (Arabic names in latin alphabet: Ar Riyadh, Makkah, and As Saudiyah respectively, along with Ash Sharqiyah). -- Eagle^amn 20:49, Jun 3, 2005 (UTC)

What are your proposals for the other Ash Sharqiyah ? Tobias Conradi (Talk) 04:29, 3 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Tobias Conradi (Talk) 23:10, 3 Jun 2005 (UTC)

• I'm not sure what they are called by their own inhabitants (in English)/governments and other governments. As far as I'm concerned, Ash Sharqiyah is rarely used in English to refer to the Eastern Province in Saudi Arabia (read my previous comment), therefore I wanted to perfect the consistency of the Saudi province names (like Category:Cities in Saudi Arabia, the names are now consistent).

This is my last comment regarding this, as I believe I made my point crystal clear. -- Eagle^amn 10:57, Jun 4, 2005 (UTC)

You made your point crystal clear, nobody had doubts about this. But you do not address naming of arab subdivisions in general. I am not generally against translations but for now I oppose to the move. Tobias Conradi (Talk) 15:15, 4 Jun 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Where we are

Wikitravel gives an alternate name for this province only. It's not clear to me why this might be.

The article names (proposed... they're all red links as I write) in Wikitravel are all of the form Ash Sharqiyah Province. In Wikipedia, on the other hand, articles or stubs exist on each province, but there is no systematic naming convention that I can see. I think we need to have one. Until we do, this proposed move would just complicate things.

At present there seems to me to be no consensus supporting this move, and there are also some unexplored issues.

See also Category:Provinces of Saudi Arabia. Andrewa 19:32, 24 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Persian/Arab Gulf

Arabian Gulf is ambiguous and only(?) used by arab countries. Tobias Conradi (Talk) 00:38, 14 October 2005 (UTC)

Eagle, why do you always revert disambiguation by others? Tobias Conradi (Talk) 11:23, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Naming conflict

According to Wikipedia Naming Conflict policy, this table should be used:

Criterion	Option 1	Option 2
1. Most commonly used name in English	?	?
2. Current undisputed official name of entity	?	?
3. Current self-identifying name of entity	?	?
1 point = yes, 0 points = no. Add totals to get final scores.

I filled it out:

Criterion	Eastern Province	Ash Sharqiyah Province
1. Most commonly used name in English	1 (by far, see above)	0
2. Current undisputed official name of entity	0	1 (supposedly)
3. Current self-identifying name of entity	1**	0

what is self-identifying name?

Well, I added the scores, and according to the official policy, it should be renamed. -- Eagle^amn 23:03, 20 November 2005 (UTC)

According to the official policy, policies are guidelines. Tobias Conradi (Talk) 10:26, 21 November 2005 (UTC)

• Support - Use English names in English Wikipedia (followed quickly by the official or native form and a transliteration if necessary). LuiKhuntek 07:56, 1 December 2005 (UTC)
• oppose - all the others are in arab. also in other countries subdivisionss listings/articles Ash Sharqiyah is used. Tobias Conradi (Talk) 11:24, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

"Ash Sharqiyah" is used in other articles because of disambiguation. Most of the original article writers used "Eastern Province." And about which one is the "self-identifying", it's just like "Saudi Arabia", which is only used in English as opposed to "Al Saudiyah" only used in Arabic. The same thing applies to this article. I mean, if this were to stay as it is, I think - for the sake of consistency - the Saudi Arabia article should be renamed to "Al Mamlakah Al Arabiyah Al Saudiyah"! -- Eagle^amn 15:34, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

Shouldn't it be "Al Saudiyah"? if this is the arab equiv you mention two sentences ago? Tobias Conradi (Talk) 16:11, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

Well, or this one could be "Al mantaqah Al sharqiyah" -- Eagle^amn 17:59, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

but words like Provinz, mintaqah, departamento, changwat, wilaya, Bezirk etc. are usually translated in WP into english, whereas the rest of the name is not. Tobias Conradi (Talk) 17:30, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

OK, how about "Kingdom of Al Arabiyah Al Saudiyah"? -- Eagle^amn 18:28, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

• Support. all the others are in arab. -- this is because their are toponyms and not directional names. See States of Sudan or Governorates of Egypt for similar situations. 129.252.70.25 22:32, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

  like the Ash Sharqiyah Governorate in Egypt? Is it Eastern Governorate? Do we translate Nanjing as Southern capital? Tobias Conradi (Talk) 23:41, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

We translate if it's the most commonly used and self-identifying name in English. (See the Google numbers I listed above) -- Eagle^amn 00:27, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

BTW: Sudan in WP would support your view. Tobias Conradi (Talk) 02:08, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

The Nanjing comparison doesn't work. Nanjing is a stylized derivation of "southern capital" (literally, South+Capital) but it is not a descriptive phrase. "Southern capital" in Mandarin would be something like "nanbu de shoudu." It is similar to English names like "Jamestown" -- it's not conceptualized as James' Town to an English speaker; it's just a toponym. (And it wouldn't normally be "translated" as "Jacquesville" in French or "Jakobsdorf" in German. Likewise, names Copenhagen or Rijeka aren't literally called "Merchant's Harbor" or "River" in English.) However, true descriptive toponyms, especially those based on cardinal directions are often translated. (E.g., North Sea, Ivory Coast, South America, North Korea, Red Sea). Many or most of the federal districts of Russia, the regions of the Czech Republic, the provinces of Cameroon, the districts of Israel, and the governorates of Lebanon among others use translations of cardinal point references. Since the Saudi Arabian province is usually referred to in English by its translated name (see above), the entry should carry that as its title. LuiKhuntek 21:55, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

• Ash Sharqiyah Governorate -> Eastern Governorate
• Ash Sharqiyah Region -> Eastern Region? Tobias Conradi (Talk) 22:24, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

"Often." And since the Saudi Arabian province is usually referred to in English by its translated name, the entry should carry that as its title. LuiKhuntek 18:17, 12 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Moving proposal

Hi there...It seems that there is no definitive consensus to move the article yet, as such I'm going to remove the move request that is currently pending. Please add the move request again if consensus to move has occurred. Thanks! --HappyCamper 20:48, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

Actually, there is a slight ambiguity in the definition of "consensus" on the move page. It states about 60% is consensus. At the top, we have 2 votes to 1, or about 66% consensus. If everyone is comfortable with the move, please leave me a message to expedite the move fix. --HappyCamper 20:56, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

I would prefer not to move. It seems this is a larger issue. Somewhere I saw the question whether Rio Negro, Weisse Elster, should be translatd to Black River, White Elster. I prefer: no move until there is a policy. Tobias Conradi (Talk) 03:43, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

There is a proposed guideline under discussion (in which you have already been involved) at Wikipedia:Request for comment/Naming conventions (subnational entities) and other places linked to from the RfC. I agree that this move should not take place while the guideline is at this stage of discussion. Andrewa 15:05, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

See also Wikipedia:Naming conventions (subnational entities). Andrewa 01:58, 31 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] List of governorates

I have added a list of governorates in Eastern Province as officially stated . Brokenlove 22:39, 3 November 2006 (UTC)