Talk:Spare ribs

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[edit] "Spare ribs", One word or Two

It seems to me that "spareribs" one word, refers to a cooked pork dish, usually cooked or served with sauce, and that "spare ribs" refers to having extra ribs. "Spare" means excess, extra, more than is needed, desired, or required. The single word term "spareribs" derives from Low German 'ribbesper', and the two word terminology derives from the two separate words "spare", meaning extra, and "ribs". "Spare ribs" would be what a paleontologist has left over after putting together a dinosaur skeleton, and "spareribs" would be what he eats. In any case, both versions have been used in both this article, and less clearly in the Pork Ribs article. I'd like to see "Spare Ribs" get redirected to the Spareribs article, rather than the other way around, like it is now. Mcraigw 19:09, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

What do the various English dictionaries have to say about this? Badagnani 19:12, 23 August 2007 (UTC)
In the Merriam-Webster Online dictionary, they have an entry for spareribs (one word), but do not have an entry for "spare ribs" (two words). They do, have both spare and ribs. We should probably check some other dictionaries as well. Mcraigw 17:42, 24 August 2007 (UTC)
As far as I am aware, the word "spareribs" is used very rarely here in the United Kingdom. "Spare ribs" is used almost exclusively. I have not once seen the term "spareribs" in this country outside of the internet, though on my numerous trips to the United States (East coast mostly), I have seen both "spareribs" and "spare ribs", with the former possibly being more common. As Wikipedia is an English-language encyclopedia, and as "spare ribs" seems to be the most common (according to Google hits, that is) English-language term, and as the difference in usage between the two appears to differ between UK and US (without checking Canada, Australia, e.t.c.), and as this article is currently (and has always been) at Spare ribs, WP:ENGVAR suggests that, at least for now, the article should remain at Spare ribs. --Dreaded Walrus t c 02:30, 20 September 2007 (UTC)