User:Andrewa/Optional diacritics

Macrons, accents and other diacritics are commonly optional in the spelling of English loanwords and in the spelling of proper nouns from other languages. Often, they are included in more formal sources, such as the academic press, and omitted in more popular sources, such as newspapers. Wikipedia regards all of these sources as reliable.

The purpose of Wikipedia is to provide accurate, verifiable information to readers. This information is primarily contained in articles. The purpose of an article title is help readers to find the article that contains the information they want.

The question of whether or not a diacritic should be included in a particular article title has, historically, generated a great deal of sometimes heated discussion. This guideline seeks to reduce both the time spent on such discussions and the heat generated by them.

This guideline deliberately does not cover every case. It covers two scenarios only:

1. Cases in which the inclusion of the diacritic(s) is harmless:
   • Poses no problems for those expecting the article name to use only the standard English alphabet.
   • Is attested by at least some reliable English language sources (it need not be common).
   • Results in an article title that is unique; That is, there are not several competing patterns of diacritics in different English sources.
   • Does not conflict with any clearly and consistently expressed wish of the article subject in the case of an article about a living person.
2. Cases in which the inclusion of the diacritic(s) represents a POV:
   • Several versions (with or without diacritics, or with different patterns of diacritics) appear in English sources.
   • There is no overwhelming preference for one over the other(s) in English sources.
   • The version without diacritics has at least some attestation in reliable English sources (it need not be common).

In the first case, editors are urged to include the diacritic(s) in the article title without making any further judgment as to whether or not they are correct.

In the second case, editors are urged to omit the diacritics.

These two scenarios cover the vast majority of controversial cases. Other cases are not affected by this guideline, and should be discussed with reference to other guidelines and policies.

Preferred spellings

Information as to any preferred or most common spelling in English should be provided in the article, particularly if the accented spelling of the article title differs from the most common spelling. Often, the most common spelling may be different in different contexts, for example the academic press may favour accents where newspapers do not, or the academic press may adopt different spellings in different subject areas.

Source languages

Use of accents in a source language does not automatically lead to their use in English. Also, it may not be obvious exactly which language or dialect is the source, potentially leading to conflicting accent patterns for the same English word.

Only English sources are relevant, except in the very special case that no English sources exist that use the term in question.

Where there is a conflict between source languages

If two source languages differ only in diacritics and there is no clear preference in English sources, the unaccented form should be used.

This is just a tie-breaker to avoid wasting editor and administrator time on what is not a big issue for readers. Redirects should of course exist in any case from all accented forms. In addition, these should generally all be listed in the article lead (unless there are very many and/or some are very obscure, and this rare scenario can normally be dealt with by commonsense, say by including some of them in a later section and perhaps pointing some or all of the relevant redirects to that section).