Talk:Farid ad-Din Attar

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

The result of the proposal was move to Farid ad-Din Attar.

Note: Please don't come to my talk page disagreeing with this closure. The debate's been running for over a month, and needs to be closed. The lead of the article calls him "Farid ad-Din Attar", and nobody has actually opposed the move; the new title (from my limited understanding) would appear to be at least "more incorrect" or "less incorrect" than the status quo.

If indeed this move isn't considered acceptable, I recommend that you continue discussion on this talk page and find an acceptable name. You may then move the page yourselves if the software will allow it, or ask an administrator to do it for you. --kingboyk (talk) 13:47, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Requested move

Farid-al-Din Attar → Farid ad-Din Attar — See WP:MOS-AR for details. The current version is a completely wrong transliteration from Arabic. The hyphen between Farid and al should not be there. In addition, it's better to use the phonetic "moon letters" in the definite article, therefore I'm also requesting to change from /al/ to /ad/. —Cuñado ☼ - Talk 21:02, 1 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Survey

Feel free to state your position on the renaming proposal by beginning a new line in this section with *'''Support''' or *'''Oppose''', then sign your comment with ~~~~. Since polling is not a substitute for discussion, please explain your reasons, taking into account Wikipedia's naming conventions.

• Well, it's not completely wrong but support the move for both of the reasons given above. — AjaxSmack 05:13, 3 December 2007 (UTC)

• Support the move, but not the over-the-top criticism of the transliteration. Both the extra hyphen and the unassimilated consonant are standard in some circles, so it's an unusual rather than an incorrect transliteration. But agree it doesn't conform to the guideline that English Wikipedia has chosen, for good reasons, for our article names. Andrewa (talk) 09:46, 5 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Unsure (change of vote). The guideline is proving somewhat more controversial than I had hoped! Andrewa (talk) 09:07, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

• In fact Attar and people who lived and live at his hometown ant his nation called his name: Farid-od-Din like Kamal-ol-molk(This is how their name are pronounced in Persian language=Farsi). So both Farid-ad-Din and Farid-al-Din are incorrect but Farid-al-Din is more incorrect according to my Arabic knowlege. I support moving the article to Farid-od-din and making other ones redirect to current one. --Soroush83 (talk) 12:16, 5 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Discussion

Clearly this article was written from a source which does not indicate assimilated letters (possibly working through Farsi?) Consider Ikhvan al-Safa for Ikhwan as-Safa, below. This is not a crime. Please calm down. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 06:07, 5 December 2007 (UTC)

Interesting... and even more interesting, if I understand the suggestion above it's that this should be considered a Farsi name rather than an Arabic one, so Wikipedia:Manual of Style (Arabic) would not apply. No change of vote yet, but that could justify one.

We should also bear in mind that WP:MOS-AR is a proposed guideline rather than an official one, and that one of the sticking points is exactly the question of standard transliterations, see Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (Arabic)#standard transliterations vs. transcriptions/anglicizations, and specifically the question of purely Arabic versus Farsi-influenced ones, see Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (Arabic)#Persian again et al.

There's also a Wikipedia:Naming conventions (Persian) but it's not yet even to the Wikipedia proposals stage. Andrewa (talk) 16:59, 5 December 2007 (UTC)

At the risk of angering people, I must say that none of the comments so far seem well informed of Arabic transliteration. The Arabic MOS indicates that it applies to names using the Arabic script. There is another standard used by the Iranian government, but that mainly differs with how to transliterate short vowels, and true Farsi doesn't use the definite article /al-/. The hyphens in transliteration are only supposed to be used between the definite article, or specific grammatical terms, and the word associated with it. If you don't believe me, see this pdf comparing the 6 most commonly used systems.

For DIN: "Hyphen is used to separate grammatically differing elements within single units of Arabic script, notably the noun from the article and/or from the particles wa-, fa-, ta-, bi-, li-, ka-, la-, sa- and a-."

For ISO: "Hyphen is used in transliteration to separate grammatically differing elements, notably the noun from the article and/or from the particles wa-, fa-, ta-, bi-, li-, ka-, la-, sa- and a-."

For ALA-LC: "Hyphen is used to: connect the definite article al with the word to which it is attached; between an inseparable prefix and the following word; between bin and the following word inpersonal names when they are written in Arabic as a single word."

From EOI: "Always al- and ’l-" (the second referring to when words are run together, incorrectly mentioned above as Farid-od-din, it should be Faridu'd-Din or Farid al-Din according to EOI)

There isn't a standard that would run all the words together with hyphens. That is a common fallacy made by people who don't know any better. It shouldn't be propagated on Wikipedia. As to the assimilation of moon letters (al- or ad-), DIN, ISO, and UNGEGN all use assimilation, and ALA-LC and EOI do not use assimilation. The value in not using assimilation is simplicity; the writer doesn't need to understand which letters need assimilation. But whenever possible it's best to use moon letters, which reflect the actual pronunciation.

To conclude, using a hyphen between /Farid/ and /al-Din/ is wrong according to all the professional organizations around the world. Please support your statements with something other than "it's standard in some circles." Cuñado ☼ - Talk 05:40, 6 December 2007 (UTC)

I don't think Farid-od-din to be incorrect and I wonder how you tell Faridu'd-Din!!!. Me as a Persian speaker don't find any glotal in this name. but I say the nearer to native pronounciations is the most correct though I prefere Farid-od-din to all and Farid-ad-din to Farid-al-din. However the most common name for him in Persian is Attar or Attari Neyshaburi. And I don't insist on - and you may tell Farid od din is more correct but It seems "Faridu'd-din" is incorrect. I suggest IPA for his name too. --Soroush83 (talk) 15:22, 9 December 2007 (UTC)

I have already provided references for standards of transliteration, and you have presented your opinion. The letter /O/ is not used in any standard. Instead we use /ū/ with a long vowel, and /u/ for the short vowel. Besides that, your example uses the hyphen in the wrong place. The definite article /al-/ is made up of a hamza and a lam. The hamza uses the alif as a placeholder, and the hamza is not transliterated, except for the form that runs words together. So in your example we have the /d/ in Farid, followed by the short vowel /u/, followed by the hamza /'/, followed by the lam /l/ that gets converted because /d/ is a moon letter, followed by the hyphen /-/ representing the proper way to separate the definite article, followed by the /d/ of Din. So what do we get? Faridu'd-Din. I don't know what else to say, and I have a feeling you will respond with more of your personal opinions about how to do it. Your example is not supported by anything. Please just agree with Farid ad-Din so we can get on with our lives. Cuñado ☼ - Talk 04:56, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

You won't anger me, but I must disagree with parts of your approach here. Please respect that others may not hold your views, and support your own arguments with reference to Wikipedia policies and guidelines.

The core of your argument seems to be that the authority for deciding Wikipedia naming standards should be these authorities. I see this sort of argument with increasing regularity, and some evidence that Wikipedia's standards are changing in this direction, see User talk:Andrewa/systematic names. But as I understand it, so far our fundamental rule remains to prefer what English speakers use, rather than what any authority may want them to use. These authorities are relevant certainly, but that's because they may indicate what English speakers do use, rather than because they indicate what they should use.

So I'm sorry if you find my comments less than well informed, but I'd suggest you keep yours to the issues. Your point about authorities is well made, and does counter mine to some extent. But it doesn't invalidate mine, which is simply what I've seen people use. These people include literary greats like Carl Barks for example.

Your argument that the extra hyphen is a common fallacy made by people who don't know any better is the most interesting point you have made by far. If it's really all that common, then it's exactly what we should use here. To even call it a fallacy is to promote a prescriptive approach that Wikipedia, so far, generally rejects. Andrewa (talk) 00:48, 7 December 2007 (UTC)

I agree with you that certain words have been adopted into English, and the MOS accounts for that, and that is why we usually drop the marks representing the hamza and ayin symbols (al-Qaeda instead of al-Qa`idah). In modern cases, self identification of the individual is the obvious choice. However in other cases, without some kind of standard to follow, what exactly would you suggest using??? There are over 30 ways to spell certain names based on the variances in possible transliteration. There are people that for the last 200 years (I just made up that number) have developed and used standards, so that there is only one way to romanize a given Arabic word (using a given standard). Cuñado ☼ - Talk 07:16, 7 December 2007 (UTC)

It's more than certain words. These indicate a more general expectation as to how Arabic names are spelled in English.

As to the wider issue, the standard is WP:NC. But as a result we do spend a lot of time discussing, case by case, what the greatest number of English speakers would most easily recognize, and often generate some considerable heat in discussion.

And, in particular subject areas, groups of enthusiasts (sometimes organised in a WikiProject but often not) manage from time to time to enforce a standard that departs from WP:NC, and is more systematic and/or authoritative. Some of these are documented in Category:Wikipedia naming conventions (sixty-two pages at last count!) and most are not.

I think the tendency to appeal to authority rather than usage may be increasing as Wikipedia grows, and so I'm investigating this whole issue at User talk:Andrewa/systematic names, and you're of course welcome to contribute there. One of the latest contributions ended In short, good luck with this kettle of stinking fish; you'll need it. But we'll try... Andrewa (talk) 16:50, 7 December 2007 (UTC)

And please do consider the note to Seven Pillars of Wisdom in which Lawrence agrees that he has been wilfully inconsistent in the spelling of Arabic names, because they are (to an English ear, accustomed to the narrower range of English phonemes) all actually pronounced in several different ways. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 03:08, 7 December 2007 (UTC)

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