Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Countries

Category:Flag template shorthands has an RFC

Category:Flag template shorthands has an RFC for possible consensus. A discussion is taking place. If you would like to participate in the discussion, you are invited to add your comments on the discussion page. Thank you.

Member states of the Commonwealth of Nations

I have nominated Member states of the Commonwealth of Nations for featured list removal. Please join the discussion on whether this article meets the featured list criteria. Articles are typically reviewed for two weeks; editors may declare to "Keep" or "Delist" the article's featured status. The instructions for the review process are here. DrKay (talk) 06:48, 15 June 2023 (UTC)

Maps of Suriname

After corrections of mine were reverted whilst I was introducing maps of a border dispute of Suriname, I have started an RfC at Talk:Suriname#RfC: Should maps show border claims? I hope it will have a clear outcome, because the border dispute cannot be denied (there are enough reliable sources for that). I am generally contributing to the Dutch language Suriname Wikiproject and I do not have a lot of knowledge of regulations here on English Wikipedia. It is even my first RfC. So I would welcome a helping hand for a flexible and successful process. Ymnes (talk) 06:36, 1 July 2023 (UTC)

Culture by country categorisation

You're invited to participate at Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2023 August 21#Fooian culture to Culture of Fooland part 2. Cheers, Nederlandse Leeuw (talk) 22:40, 21 August 2023 (UTC)

Requested move 20 September 2023

• Armenian Soviet Socialist Republic → Soviet Armenia
• Azerbaijan Soviet Socialist Republic → Soviet Azerbaijan
• Byelorussian Soviet Socialist Republic → Soviet Belarus
• Estonian Soviet Socialist Republic → Soviet Estonia
• Georgian Soviet Socialist Republic → Soviet Georgia
• Kazakh Soviet Socialist Republic → Soviet Kazakhstan
• Kirghiz Soviet Socialist Republic → Soviet Kyrgyzstan
• Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic → Soviet Latvia
• Soviet Latvia → Soviet Latvia (disambiguation)
• Lithuanian Soviet Socialist Republic → Soviet Lithuania
• Moldavian Soviet Socialist Republic → Soviet Moldova
• Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic → Soviet Russia
• Tajik Soviet Socialist Republic → Soviet Tajikistan
• Turkmen Soviet Socialist Republic → Soviet Turkmenistan
• Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic → Soviet Ukraine
• Uzbek Soviet Socialist Republic → Soviet Uzbekistan

– For WP:COMMONNAME; the WP:CRITERIA of recognizability, naturalness, concision, and consistency (within the set, and with Soviet Union, which is not entitled Union of Soviet Socialist Republics); with WP:NAMECHANGES and WP:MODERNPLACENAME lending weight to reliable sources written post 1991 (every one of these is an existing country that renamed itself after becoming independent, not a newly created polity).

Frequency of use of various names in reliable sources can be gauged using Google Ngram (links below). In some cases where there were variations on the national name and all variations were too long for a single Ngram, I compared the most common of several sets. In some cases, a different name was most common by a small or moderate margin (i.e., Estonian SSR, Moldavian SSR, Tajik SSR, Turkmen SSR, and Uzbek SSR), but this proposal gives weight to consistency as outlined above, as well as consistency with the modern name in the case of Moldavia/Moldova.

Am SSR,[1] Az SSR,[2] By SSR,[3][4][5][6] Ee SSR,[7] Ge SSR,[8] Kz SSR,[9] Kg SSR,[10][11][12][13] Lv SSR,[14] Lt SSR,[15] Md SSR,[16][17][18] Ru SFSR,[19] Tj SSR,[20] Tm SSR,[21] Ua SSR,[22] Uz SSR,[23]

This move follows the failed RM at Talk:Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic#Requested move 30 March 2023, where the lack of consistency resulting from renaming only one of fifteen was a significant roadblock for consensus.  —Michael Z. 23:23, 20 September 2023 (UTC)

Oppose 20+ years long established titles - official names of the republics. Of course, people use storter name. Why don't we move United States → America then? I give one attempt to guess what is the content of the latter page ;-) - Altenmann >talk 05:06, 21 September 2023 (UTC)

United States is a short version of the official name United States of America. See WP:OFFICIALNAMES for a relevant explanation on the WP:TITLE policy.  —Michael Z. 05:43, 21 September 2023 (UTC)

• Is Moldova intended to use a different format? I noted in the Ukraine discussion that this is really a question of disambiguation for particular historical entities/particular time periods of continuous entities (all very potentially nebulous). en.wiki has a habit of using official names for such constitutional period articles (French Fourth Republic, Fourth Philippine Republic, Kingdom of Nepal, Kingdom of Iceland). This is certainly not a perfect way to go about things (at the very least it certainly imposes a particular historical framing on the articles and their content), but its widespread use likely reflects its understandability and convenience. I think readers will understand both potential titles (or all 3), so I don't have a strong view, just a note that at the moment for whatever cultural-linguistic reason, "Soviet Latvia" feels like an adjective-noun pair, rather than the single compound noun feeling that "Soviet Union" evokes. CMD (talk) 05:42, 21 September 2023 (UTC)

  I’ve updated Soviet Moldova for consistency. (I don’t know what I was thinking.)  —Michael Z. 12:25, 21 September 2023 (UTC)

• Oppose - I see Mzajac's point, but arguably "Uzbek SSR" (not giving abbreviation written out in full) is more common in English, and the "Soviet Foo-country" creates a number of ambiguities. 'Soviet Estonia' could refer to both 1918 Commune and 1940 SSR, Soviet Ukraine has similar issue. Kirghiz SSR indicates a republic where the Kirghiz were the titular nationality, whilst Kirghizstan indicates a specific country. 'Kirghizstan' was occassionally used during Soviet period but 'Soviet Kirghizia' was more common. Likewise we have the Belorussia/Belarus issue (a name shift that occured after end of BSSR). And so forth. --Soman (talk) 14:16, 21 September 2023 (UTC)

  We have disambiguation for the ambiguities (which we’re already using for several of these), but the WP:PRIMARY topic for each is very clear.

  The Commune of the Working People of Estonia, for example, was a Bolshevik puppet government under Russian occupation that lasted six months. I see no evidence that any sources call it Soviet Estonia. Please give evidence if you insist there is ambiguity.

  Soviet Kirghizia/Soviet Kirgizia was not more common.[24] And of course this is about what we use now per WP:NAMECHANGES and WP:MPN, and not to proliferate Cold War terminology that has become anachronistic (or the Soviet Union article would probably be titled Russia or Communist Russia). The Ngram charts clearly show a dramatic change in naming of every one of these in the 1990s, and that the current names contradict our guidelines. The name shift of Belarus did occur, as you say, its outcome is clear, and it is not an issue if we just follow the guideline.

  Would you be in favour if the proposal were modified? Consistency is low in the WP:CRITERIAORDER, and we have an opportunity to improve all of these article titles if we just try.  —Michael Z. 15:06, 21 September 2023 (UTC)

  Kirg(h)izia was more common. I did not know this. You have to set the date range to something like 1945–1992. Setting it to 1983–2019 will not answer the question. Srnec (talk) 20:16, 21 September 2023 (UTC)

  I’m not sure which question you mean.

  WP:MOS, note i, "recent", "current", "modern", and "contemporary" in reference to sources and usage should usually be interpreted as referring to reliable material published within the last forty years or so. In the consideration of name changes of persons and organizations, focus on sources from the last few years. For broader English-language usage matters, about forty years is typical.

  I’ve used 40 years for the Ngram charts. The charts show the transition started after the beginning of perestroika in 1985 and completed by 1995, so 30 years or less would be appropriate for names of most Soviet things. Renaming of the articles Kyiv in 2020, Donbas in 2021, and Odesa in 2022 shows there is also an extended post-colonial transition.

  The names we use for these places today are different than they were during the Cold War. We don’t write White Russia, Byelorussia, the Ukraine, Kiev, Kharkov, Lvov, to name some more obvious examples.  —Michael Z. 21:54, 21 September 2023 (UTC)

  Anyway, Kirg(h)iz SSR was most common then.[25] Soviet Kyrgyzstan and Kyrgyz SSR are most common now.[26]  —Michael Z. 21:58, 21 September 2023 (UTC)

• Oppose : I concur with the other opposition: long history of the current names, increased ambiguity. The current names were the official names of those political units at the time they were in place, so changing them would be, I think, counterproductive. But even if none of those arguments were the case, I don't see any advantage to the move. If the desire is to have soviet whatever, then the existing redirects should satisfy the goal. Radzy0 (talk) 23:34, 21 September 2023 (UTC)