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Manual of style for Japan-related articles suggested alteration - lose the macrons on people's names

I'd like to suggest an alteration to the manual of style for Japan-related articles. My suggestion is that the manual of style be altered to say that the modern-day (post-Meiji) names of Japanese individuals should be written without macrons. I have NO IDEA where the idea of putting macrons on Japanese people's names has come from, but I am not aware of a single person who uses macrons on personal names in romanized form in Japan. I mean I do not think there is even a single human being who uses these things. It's not a debate or an issue so much as "Misplaced Pages versus everyone else". Can we please be a bit more realistic about the best way to write names, and lose the macrons, unless there is some evidence the person actually does use them? And if anyone here can find even one person who uses macrons, does anyone have a good recipe for cooking hats, because I'll be eating mine. JoshuSasori (talk) 05:09, 15 December 2012 (UTC)

Are you saying that what you want is for peoples' names that have within them: 〜おう〜／〜ほう〜／〜ろう〜／〜のう〜／〜しょう〜／…, for 5 examples in hiragana (for eg. 啓次郎　将積), to be written in romanized characters as: ...ou.../...hou.../...rou.../...nou.../...shou.../ etc., instead of written as: ...ō.../...hō.../...rō.../...nō.../...shō.../ etc.? Are you saying from personal knowledge of Japanese people with their own names, or what?

Please contextualise your complaint(?) French, German, Chinese and many many more languages can't be written in romanized characters without various accents, umlaughts, macrons and many more. The keyboard is very easy to use for these, correctly operated. Of course all the millions of people using computer keyboards everyday in these many languages are typing these 'special' characters on the keyboards everyday, as the basic sounds of each of the languages. —— --macropneuma 06:20, 15 December 2012 (UTC)

No. Regarding modern-day people's names only, the macron on the name should be removed completely, not replaced with a "u". Thus Yasujirō Ozu -> Yasujiro Ozu, and so on, and certainly not Yasujirou, as a default way of naming people. Regarding your second paragraph, you are wrong. Japanese keyboards don't contain any facility to type macrons, and the pre-Unicode common forms of computer-encoding for Japanese don't contain macroned letters. JoshuSasori (talk) 07:02, 15 December 2012 (UTC)

Japanese keyboards? Seems angry? ——--macropneuma 07:27, 15 December 2012 (UTC)

How are you writing macrons here? ——--macropneuma 07:58, 15 December 2012 (UTC)

Beneath your edit window you should be able to select from a variety of symbols not normally available on keyboards (including characters with diacritics). Others, like me, are set up with a compose key that allows you to combine two characters into one, so I type <COMPOSE>, "-", "o", and it outputs "ō".

I can confirm what Joshu says—macrons are rarely used by the Japanese. They're pretty much limited to foreign textbooks of Japanese. Dropping any indication of vowel length is something I find hard to stomach, but you'll find few supporters (unfortunately) of the "ou" style of transliteration outside of Japan. CüRlyTüRkey_Contribs 08:34, 15 December 2012 (UTC)

Either copy and paste or use the Misplaced Pages editing box thing labelled "Special characters". JoshuSasori (talk) 08:30, 15 December 2012 (UTC)

On the serious subject, it is a choice between ou and ō, because that destroys the language when the vowel length is obscured. Many Japanese friends have long vowel sounds in their names. These Japanese friends of mine write either with: macrons or ou style. Okay rarely, but not okay never. I already knew that rarity, of course. Who is silly enough to close off the options of anything just because it is rare rather than pop. On the other hand JoshuSasori has an point, exaggerated, about macron's wrong use in some titles here in WP. On the not serious subject of keyboards' writing of macrons, you're both doing the too hard way, which before i knew better i did too, and this seems the real frustration causing anger to show out: On Macs globally: Option-A then the vowel couldn't be easier, if you know how to operate your Mac computer and set it up, properly, for both Japanese language characters and for English (romanized characters) transliterations; that means finding an extended English keyboard setting, eg. US Extended. I suspect you're both on windows, so if i find the easier windows way, then i'll let you know together with a hat recipe. ——--macropneuma 08:49, 15 December 2012 (UTC)

Actually, I'm on Linux. If the macron is the only diacritic you're going to use, then your solution is fine. If you're going to use other diacritics, though (like if you're going to type French as well), then having a compose key gives you more options. The only place I personally use macrons is when editing Misplaced Pages (in real life I either use actual Japanese, or the "ou" style), so having to type one more key on rare occasions isn't a problem for me. CüRlyTüRkey_Contribs 09:02, 15 December 2012 (UTC)

Yes indeed! to many more options using the compose key, you have. Ahaaa! on Linux! Indeed macrons are more for published written form (more formal and proper), like this WP encyclopaedia is supposed to be. However my Japanese friends write their transliterated names with macrons in handwriting, and some write ou, but it is in fact easier, quicker, handwriting to just make the stroke above than another letter u. ——--macropneuma 09:08, 15 December 2012 (UTC)

(Personal attack removed) JoshuSasori (talk) 09:14, 15 December 2012 (UTC)

Many Japanese friends have long vowel sounds in their names. These Japanese friends of mine write either with: macrons or ou style. - hmm. JoshuSasori (talk) 09:12, 15 December 2012 (UTC)

Every Japanese I know either writes using the "ou" style or just plain "o" (barf). I honestly don't know a single one who uses a macron. This is within Japan. Abroad, it quite likely could be that they've gotten in the habit of using macrons for the benefit of foreigners who expect them. CüRlyTüRkey_Contribs 09:17, 15 December 2012 (UTC)

You're calling me a liar and writing direct hate speech at me now JoshuSasori. Don't be so silly. For one of several examples my friend writes: Keijirō (on his name card in front of me now). I already gave this as one kanji example, above. –And try walking in the shoes of the men who have the name 男坂さん (おさかさん, osaka san, Mr. Osaka), not, i suppose, the impossible: 大阪さん (おおさかさん, oosaka/ousaka/ōsaka san, Mr. Ōsaka) –i suppose impossible for a real name. Try walking in their shoes in business trips abroad and getting introduced all the time as Mr Osaka with the pronunciation of the city name, if pronounced correctly, as seems uncommon, by non–Japanese. ——--macropneuma 09:28, 15 December 2012 (UTC)

Indeed! Cūrly Tūrkēy <smile> (simultaneously serious and a humouring). ——--macropneuma 09:37, 15 December 2012 (UTC)

The better, compassionate, more factual and less conjectural, explanation, for the lack of 'em.

(Personal attack removed) JoshuSasori (talk) 10:46, 15 December 2012 (UTC)

I am an opponent of use of macron for the name generally accepted in English. However I prefer the name JoshūSasori rather than JoshuSasori. ―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 10:50, 15 December 2012 (UTC)

Trying to calm things down, let's try to clarify the issues. Basically, it is the conflict between being an accurate encyclopedia and honoring common usage. Both are part of the rules at Misplaced Pages and can conflict. I personally want to err on the side of the former, given that personal usage can often be based on ignorance or aberrant systems (so many people in Japan would render it Itoh, not Ito or Itō). Do we want an encyclopedia that honors every aberrant romanization if we find an example of it somewhere? I personally think that would be confusing and would make a manual of style meaningless. JoshuSasori's statement that Japanese rarely use macrons may be largely true for Japanese personal names, but not in the culture as a whole. Go to any train station and one can see place names written as a rule with macrons. Is JoshuSasori proposing not using macrons for personal names because it is common usage but using them for place names, where it is common usage? I just find the resulting confusion as undermining the consistency and quality of the encyclopedia. Let's just stick to romanization rules, with the occasional exception where the name is clearly well-known abroad without the macron. Michitaro (talk) 13:18, 15 December 2012 (UTC)

I don't think there is a conflict between being an accurate encyclopedia and writing all personal names without macrons. I think that would be the most accurate way to write names. Is JoshuSasori proposing not using macrons for personal names because it is common usage but using them for place names, where it is common usage? I just find the resulting confusion as undermining the consistency and quality of the encyclopedia. - yes, I'm proposing not using a macron on people's names unless there is evidence for it, because it's very clearly a minority (Personal attack removed) who do this. As it is every article ends up with macrons by default, which then have to be removed when, inevitably, it is discovered that the person in question doesn't use them. JoshuSasori (talk) 13:52, 15 December 2012 (UTC)

While I am generally opposed to using macrons in English language contexts, I personally don't think there is actually any need to reword the guidelines for how we render Japanese names. The guidelines, currently set out at WP:JATITLE, do already suggest that the form commonly used by the person in question or widely used in published English texts should take priority, and the macronned form should really only be used as a last resort. And in answer to the often-raised argument that writing Japanese names without the correct diacritics constitutes dumbing-down, all articles on Japanese-related subjects should also have the "technically correct" Hepburn Romanized form in the "Nihongo" template in the introductory line, as seen in articles such as Junichiro Koizumi and Shintaro Ishihara, so it is always possible to determine the correct Romanized form as well as the more commonly used form. --DAJF (talk) 15:22, 15 December 2012 (UTC)

• The title is supposed to be the common name of the subject. The most common form of a name will rarely if ever have a macron in it. The marconned vowels are not even Latin-1 characters, so they were a hassle to put in back in the days before Unicode, i.e. only a few years ago. Kauffner (talk) 17:09, 15 December 2012 (UTC)

By the way (from above) for the record of my friend Keijirō's example i used above:

He uses the ...ō (macron) on the name card he gave me and i just checked in facebook, he uses ...ou. So Curly Turkey when you say "...it quite likely could be that they've gotten in the habit of using macrons for the benefit of foreigners who expect them." i'm with you on that as a likely explanation. Is it a martyr's crown of thorns hat? This section was always a non-starter IMHO so i sought to clarify for everyone... . Done! ——--macropneuma 02:21, 16 December 2012 (UTC)

Why is this discussion taking place here instead of WT:MOS-JA? Anyway, it was decided that unless there is no known common form used by the subject of the article (that is how the subject or his/her representatives choose to parse the subject's name in roman letters), then we have to default to what shows up in reliable sources. If those don't exist, then we stick with the Hepburn romanization, including macrons. The easiest way to deal with this is to see if modern figures have a preferred way to write their names in English.—Ryulong (琉竜) 06:38, 16 December 2012 (UTC)

(ec) How can readers who don't understand ja know the difference between 大野 and 小野 without macron? See Ono. If editors think macrons are not needed on personal names, maybe we should adopt other romanization. Or should we just remove macrons from people's names? But that would create a difference between the family name 大野 and place names with 大野. Oda Mari (talk) 06:52, 16 December 2012 (UTC)

How can readers who don't understand ja know the difference between 大野 and 小野 without macron? - they can't. It gets worse: there are lots of examples of Japanese people with identical names even in kanji. Horror story: I used to know one man (a researcher in engineering) who shared an identical kanji name with two other people who did the same job, and he got mail addressed to him intended for them. He used to forward it to them but then worried that they would not forward mail for him back to him. So what? Misplaced Pages is not meant for solving every single problem of every person in the world. JoshuSasori (talk) 07:39, 16 December 2012 (UTC)

Wait—you can't see a difference between two names that are spelt the same and two names that are spelt and pronounced differently?

What's the policy on names that are spelt in multiple ways? Check out Natsume Souseki. That's an awful lot of reliable sources backing up that spelling of the name, including a source that shows a minor planet 4039 Souseki was named after him with that spelling. I'll betcha dollars to doughnuts you'll never get his article renamed. CüRlyTüRkey_Contribs 08:19, 16 December 2012 (UTC)

MOSJ already allows for different rules for articles on the people themselves and articles on things named after them -- see Osamu Dazai and Dazai Osamu Prize. It also just occurred to me -- JoshuSasori has not presented any evidence that most Japanese prefer not to use the macron, but it is perfectly clear that at least some do. This means that the proposed change to the MoS (never use macrons for modern Japanese people under any circumstances) would explicitly violate the wishes of living people. The current policy is just fine. elvenscout742 (talk) 06:04, 21 December 2012 (UTC)

A bit confusing, this is under what I said, but it's not responding to anything I've said, I don't think. These talk pages are not a great system for discussion, but maybe you could clarify who the above is written for. JoshuSasori (talk) 10:29, 16 December 2012 (UTC)

The first paragraph was addressed to JoshuSasori, the second was just rambling. CüRlyTüRkey_Contribs 10:41, 16 December 2012 (UTC)

The fact that there are so many aberrant romanizations out there, even for the same name, is one reason that I have not liked the policy about respecting common usage. In too many cases, it is just difficult to determine what is "common." So you count Google search results? Even if that doesn't include most paper sources? How do you know what the individual prefers, especially if they are dead or you can't contact them to confirm? Any self-respecting published encyclopedia just picks one romanization form and goes with it throughout the encyclopedia. If you make an exception, it should only be when there is overwhelming evidence. Michitaro (talk) 15:24, 16 December 2012 (UTC)

If they're dead then it's not up to us to figure out their personal preference. If they're alive, they're bound to have official websites. If they don't, then we have to stick with Misplaced Pages's internal policy. Them's the breaks.—Ryulong (琉竜) 17:51, 16 December 2012 (UTC)

"Official websites" aren't always reliable. The fact is that the overwhelming majority of Japanese don't personally care which way their name is romanized, and the English versions of official websites are usually produced by freelance translators who get paid the same whether they bother to insert the macron or not. Also, where do we draw the line? If we go by token inclusions of Engrish in what are essentially Japanese-language pages (e.g., "Ryo Kase's Official Facebook Page" or "Otsuchi Town Web Site"), then just about all Misplaced Pages pages on such topics (such as Ōtsuchi, Iwate) need to be moved. elvenscout742 (talk) 08:00, 21 December 2012 (UTC)

Also regarding the 大野/小野 issue, that's why we use {{nihongo}} to show that the former is Ōno and the latter is Ono (also I don't think I've ever seen the former written as "Ono" as they usually prefer to go with "Ohno").—Ryulong (琉竜) 17:54, 16 December 2012 (UTC)

• A modified version of Template:Google RS (modified by adding reliable English-language sources about Japan) may be useful for researching usage. How about coming up with a list of reliable English-language sources about Japan, then a modified version of the template that includes these sources can be created. LittleBen (talk) 01:01, 17 December 2012 (UTC)

How JoshuSasori thinks Japanese people spell their names is irrelevant. 99% of time Japanese people spell their names in kanji, hiragana or katakana. Of course we do not follow this convention on English Misplaced Pages. The MOS as it exists now is fine -- when a person prefers to spell their name without a macron, we spell it without a macron. Otherwise, we use the macron. elvenscout742 (talk) 03:52, 21 December 2012 (UTC)

The above discussion seems to focus a lot on whether is convenient for editors to type the macron. This is irrelevant, as Misplaced Pages discussion should be based around how to make the encyclopedia as good as possible for readers. JoshuSasori made one rather strange posting to a move discussion expressing his POV that Japanese people don't use the macron (no evidence presented) and that he "doubted" the person in question was an exception to this made-up rule. When I later posted my opposition to the move (on the ground that the logic of the arguments went against WP:JTITLE and WP:UE), JoshuSasori responded by inverting JTITLE, and then when I continued to question the logic of the move he posted a very odd misrepresentation of history (the person in question was born in Japan) and a personal attack about me trying to force my "opinion" on the article. It seems a lot more likely that JoshuSasori, who as far as I can see has yet to cite any sources, wants to force his opinion that Japanese people either do not or should not spell their names with a macron onto the MOS. The macron allows us to distinguish long vowels from short ones. It is standard in Hepburn romanization, and is only left out when technical limitations prevent it or when it is not required and it is more convenient to leave it out. This is why many English-language documents do not use it (I have produced some such documents in my job). However, Misplaced Pages has no such limitations, and must therefore continue to use it except in exceptional cases like "Tokyo" and "Junichiro Koizumi". elvenscout742 (talk) 04:15, 21 December 2012 (UTC)

We have this article, Mōri Gorō, a descendant of Mōri clan. Fortunately or unfortunately, we have no article for a grandson of Gorō's, Hideo Mōri. The article at ja:WP is this. ja:毛利秀雄. See this page. The top of the page says "Mohri, Hideo", but in the middle of the page, you can find "MORI, Hideo". "Mohri" is the majority, but it's not the Hepburn romanization. Do we use non-Hepburn "Mohri" or Hepburn, but wothout macron "Mori"? Anyway, if we create Hideo's article, we would have two different romanization for one family name. We have Ōkubo Toshimichi. One of his great grandson, Toshiteru is mentioned at Radiation Effects Research Foundation, we do not have his article though. Macron is not used on this page. But on this page, 大久保利晃 who works at the Radiation Effects Research Foundation is Ookubo Tosiaki. Which one should we use? There is Okubo Toshiteru too. It seems to me Ookubo and Okubo is the same person. See ja:大久保利通 and ja:大久保利晃. Consistency of family names would be lost by not using macron with modern figures. JoshuSasori, will you please stop requesting move article titles from titles with macron to without macrons? The macron matter has not yet settled. Oda Mari (talk) 08:28, 29 December 2012 (UTC)

Sometimes people in the same family spell their family names differently. For example, I'm currently working on Winsor McCay's article in my sandbox–his father was born Robert McKay. Earlier in the family history it was spelled Mackay. CüRlyTüRkey_Contribs 22:45, 29 December 2012 (UTC)

It's not "spelling", but "transcription". The Hepburn romanization is a system, not a language. The family name has been always 毛利 or 大久保. They didn't change kanji. Oda Mari (talk) 08:09, 30 December 2012 (UTC)

Exactly Oda Mari! and thanks, thanks for clarification. i play around with different versions of my Katakana name sometimes for amusement and keeping up practise, same same. There's one better Katakana version and it has the Katakana equivalent for the long vowel!: ー 《smile》 (Also, elsewhere i've been tired of uninitiated user–editors using romaji transliteration as if English spelling and English capitalisations—they have been too uninitiated to be told anything as they don't comprehend it—outside mono–lingual thinking.) ——--macropneuma 17:43, 30 December 2012 (UTC)

I have three comments/questions in response to the above:

1. "using romaji transliteration as if English spelling and English capitalisations..." As if what? Doesn't seem like you completed your thought.

2. I just recently told someone below that we don't bite the new guys here. So, don't bite the new guys around here. And don't be a lingua-snob.

3. Shouldn't these comments have been placed at the bottom of this section?

Boneyard90 (talk) 18:14, 30 December 2012 (UTC)

Whaaat? Completed thought. A misunderstanding. Wrong end of the stick? An attack? New guys here. i'm new here. Who else is? No one i've interacted with. I agreed with Oda Mari, from experiences elsewhere as related, hence these two reply post positions. If someone thinks i'm talking about them, then they're reading too much into my straight talking and very patient approach here. i expect to be taken as i give it at my word and assumed good faith of, as i have. Elsewhere i've had and a large group of people have had very big difficulties from someone who doesn't bear talking about any further than this and who is not here: who massively, over more than a year, pretends to understand Japanese more than they really do, and obviously does not understand much of Japanese, and attacked the large group, elsewhere, after first attacking me (and mass blanking in WP); my defending myself under sustained vicious personal attacks of my character and competence; then they'were lying about that, saying it wasn't attack, to get away with it; then my retreating to the big group elsewhere, there expressing my grief, disgust and experiences of them only to have them come attack the big group in superficially pretending defending themselves; big group has realised and banned them; all irrelevant except to say what i said above is serious and real, not to be mis-construed as snob. Biting new guys (diff) (diff) (diff) as i responsibly r.p.a.–ed, patiently replied & collapsed and moved on from. Something misleading gone on BTS? ——--macropneuma 22:47, 30 December 2012 (UTC) ——--macropneuma 23:03, 30 December 2012 (UTC) —— --macropneuma 23:20, 30 December 2012 (UTC) ——--macropneuma 23:30, 30 December 2012 (UTC) —— Please email me. ——--macropneuma 23:08, 30 December 2012 (UTC)

My original point in this discussion was to change the manual of style for Japan-related articles so that the macron would never be used on people's names unless they explicitly were choosing to use it. What I took from the above discussion was that my proposal was rejected, so I dropped the topic. Moving articles with macrons within the title is a completely different issue. The current manual of style, without alterations, allows moves to other names. So it's a different discussion. If you want to put macrons on Tokyo and Osaka and Kyoto, please start a new discussion on that. Also, I have been putting requested move away from macrons since I started wikipedia in February 2012: Toshiro Mifune, Kaneto Shindo, etc. I started announcing these moves here so that members can be aware of the discussion. It's not a new thing. JoshuSasori (talk) 08:41, 29 December 2012 (UTC)

Related questions

I've already raised a related point below and am grateful for the advice I received. I would like to point out that there are editors who are capable of writing solid articles on Japan-related subjects but who have very little knowledge of the language or writing system(s). As the English language/auto-translated sources I use don't use macrons I honestly don't have a much of a clue about whether or where they should be used. Is the list ] accurate? Is a more complete list available? Is there a similar one available for given names? Tigerboy1966  10:22, 29 December 2012 (UTC)

Yes, the list and associated spellings look accurate. For an idea of where & why macrons are used, go to the list on that same page and note #54 & #73. Look at the English spellings, and compare the kanji. Boneyard90 (talk) 10:31, 29 December 2012 (UTC)

OK. I'll do my best (have changed Ando=> Andō on the Daiwa Major article), but I will make mistakes and I hope you will be patient with my efforts. Tigerboy1966  13:42, 29 December 2012 (UTC)

Aw, shoot yeah, don't worry about it. We're all kinds of patient around here with new people. It's the old Japanophile veterans that want to kill each other. Boneyard90 (talk) 15:05, 29 December 2012 (UTC)

Well I'm used to dealing with people who add comments like "sea biskit was the best racehorse ever cos my dad said so and it said so in the film" to Horse Racing articles, so I am familiar the idea of being patient with new people.  Tigerboy1966  15:50, 29 December 2012 (UTC)

FA Nomination

I have nominated the article Lady Saigō for Featured Article status. Comments are welcomed at the FAC discussion page. Boneyard90 (talk) 13:51, 21 December 2012 (UTC)

Followup: this one is waiting for a third support. Opinions welcome. - Dank (push to talk) 03:49, 2 January 2013 (UTC)

Requested move notifications

There are two requested moves at Kindai Eiga Kyokai and Tadao Sato. JoshuSasori (talk) 07:56, 25 December 2012 (UTC)

One example of your other working up of this, over a long time of many months: (diff). To be crystal clear, this is regarding: 〜協会 (きょうかい, kyo u ka i / kyōkai, WWWJDIC translation: society; an association);

• "...To determine if the non-macronned form is in common usage in English-language reliable sources, a review should be done of all the related reliable sources used for the article (as well as any which may not have been specifically used, but can still be considered reliable per WP:RS)." –Misplaced Pages : Manual of Style : Japan-related articles – Determining common usage;
• "...too few reliable English-language sources to constitute an established usage..." –Misplaced Pages : Article titles – English-language titles – Foreign names and anglicization,
• "...For transliterations from kanji and kana, long o and u are written with macrons as ō and ū respectively. If you have difficulty typing these characters..." –Misplaced Pages : Manual of Style : Japan-related articles – General guidelines;

–policies, all read plainly without me doing interpretation / bias, and then directly quoted.

Misplaced Pages : Identifying Reliable Sources, in my plain reading without me doing interpretation / bias and then directly quoted below—without my having any 'mac attack'—is that WP articles about companies should have reliable sources, including for their article titles and including for the romanization of the names of Japanese film companies which are their article titles, of course; –as per reading holistically in conjunction with the Manual of Style : Japan-related articles:

• "Context matters" –Misplaced Pages : Identifying reliable sources (lead section)

"The reliability of a source depends on context. Each source must be carefully weighed to judge whether it is reliable for the statement being made and is the best such source for that context."

• "Articles should be based on reliable, third-party, published sources with a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy." –Misplaced Pages : Identifying Reliable Sources – Overview
• "Articles should rely on secondary sources whenever possible. ..." –Misplaced Pages : Identifying Reliable Sources – Some types of sources – Scholarship
• "Misplaced Pages articles should be based mainly on reliable secondary sources." –Misplaced Pages : Identifying Reliable Sources – Reliability in specific contexts – Primary, secondary, and tertiary sources

What are the reliable sources for: Kindai Eiga Kyōkai –this English Misplaced Pages Japanese company article? I have looked at the article. For the company name in a romanized WP article title, here are some of the reliable, third party, secondary, sources, according to WP sources policies: (and many more). WP isn't a video box in a video store in an English speaking country, –and it isn't the back of a corn flakes packet either! Therefore in terms of its standards of encyclopaedic information, it should not reflect the standards of information on those. In terms of its own standards of encyclopaedic information, I'm very much dissatisfied with WP's quality across most articles, with its amateurish info, and i want to see it improved, to scholarly encyclopaedia standards, rather than amateur and compromised–commercialist ones. I'm not and we should not be holding our breath, for that!

Finally, here's the Japanese film company's own official book of their history of themselves, from 1950–1980, according to the Yale University (USA) full bibliographic record: "Kindai Eiga Kyōkai no 30-nen, 1950-1980 / 近代映画協会の30年, 1950-1980 / ", also Google Book.

——--macropneuma 12:41, 25 December 2012 (UTC)

Please discuss on the respective pages, judging each move on its merits, and according to the policies. JoshuSasori (talk) 13:06, 25 December 2012 (UTC)

I'm discussing the WikiProject Japan general concerns, using one example of your editing as an example now in operation, including the risks to the project of your demonstrated lacking of respect for the holistic policies.——--macropneuma 13:19, 25 December 2012 (UTC)

Yes, I'm sure you are. JoshuSasori (talk) 13:23, 25 December 2012 (UTC)

Neither will sarcasm get you very far, with me.——--macropneuma 13:27, 25 December 2012 (UTC)

JoshuSasori wrote in their last edit summary only this code

Joshū!Sasori wrote in their last edit summary (diff) only this code: "v1PBptSDIh8" (?) :→ 1 → 2 ∴ (everyone?) : QED! ——--macropneuma 13:48, 25 December 2012 (UTC)

That was the result of my cat running over the keyboard. What a strange coincidence that it links to that video. JoshuSasori (talk) 13:51, 25 December 2012 (UTC)

QEDx2! ——--macropneuma 13:53, 25 December 2012 (UTC)

Cat's do not carefully, selectively, hold down the shift key while running over keyboards. !!! Bad BS! –much more important is to get what we learn by viewing of JoshuSasori's clear choice of this hinted at web page, their silly, buried, coded hint of their intentions, in their singular edit summary code "v1PBptSDIh8" (the diff) —their meaning becoming clearer and clearer everyday from their WP actions—→ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v1PBptSDIh8. What is important is for everyone to get to learn this meaning Q.E.D., which they sillily buried in their coded hint. ——--macropneuma 10:27, 29 December 2012 (UTC)

Requested move notifications 2

Two more requested moves, this time in the opposite direction: Shōtarō Ikenami‎, Tsurutarō Kataoka‎. JoshuSasori (talk) 13:49, 25 December 2012 (UTC) Also Kompeitō. JoshuSasori (talk) 01:22, 27 December 2012 (UTC)

A question regarding the MOS

Why do we use western naming order for all Japanese people born after the Meiji Restoration? It seems to go against the general policy, since for many of them not a single reliable source can be found that gives their name in this order. Some authors, poets, etc. are only discussed in academic literature that exclusively uses Japanese order, and some are only discussed in Japanese-language sources. It seems to me that on other, similar issues (the macron...) we go first by what the people themselves use, then reliable/encyclopedic sources, then what other English sources typically use, and then finally if none of these apply we revert to Misplaced Pages-style. But in the case of naming order for modern Japanese people it seems to work in reverse -- we apply a style-guideline (which in many cases would contradict the intuition of editors who have read about the subject in reliable sources), and only in extreme cases (Edogawa Rampo) do we allow an exception.

What's up with that? elvenscout742 (talk) 00:50, 27 December 2012 (UTC)

By the way, I am not suggesting that I want to move Junichiro Koizumi to Koizumi Junichiro or Koizumi Jun'ichirō (or Koizumi Zyun'itirô!). This is merely a query as to the logic behind a particular policy point that seems to be inconsistent. elvenscout742 (talk) 00:50, 27 December 2012 (UTC)

Reliable sources discussion for Jim Breen dictionary

There is a discussion here regarding the reliability of Jim Breen's Japanese dictionary. elvenscout742 (talk) 05:17, 27 December 2012 (UTC)

Toasty

On 9 August 2005, esteemed Misplaced Pages contributor 24.157.87.20 created an admirably concise article on one Tadhiko okawa :

Tadhiko Okawa was a Japanese artist best known for his 1983 recreation of the Mona Lisa from bits of burnt toast.

Years have gone by, and the article on Tadahiko Ogawa now tells the world:

Tadahiko Ogawa was a Japanese artist best known for his accurate 1983 recreation of the Mona Lisa from bits of burnt toast.

It does however sport a link to this dodgy looking page.

Is the WP article on Tad(a)hiko Ok(dakuon)awa so bad it's good, or should it be toast? -- Hoary (talk) 15:52, 27 December 2012 (UTC)

TO seems to now be a faculty member at Shukugawa Gakuin College: ReaD database entry. I assume this is the same man because it mentions "Woody Mona Lisa" as one of his works. This JST page in Japanese is linked from there. Here are some cool pictures of TO and his work. JoshuSasori (talk) 20:57, 27 December 2012 (UTC)

I just had a search for sources, and while there are a few mentions in books and news articles, they all seem to be about the toast Mona Lisa. I don't think that fact alone is worth making a biography about, so I would support merging it somewhere, but I don't think it quite falls under WP:BLP1E, so an AfD might go either way. — Mr. Stradivarius 10:13, 29 December 2012 (UTC)

• The artwork may be individually notable. — Crisco 1492 (talk) 03:25, 12 January 2013 (UTC)

My Darling Is a Foreigner title

Hi! I posted a comment for discussion on Talk:My Darling Is a Foreigner not long ago. The title has a couple of somewhat odd issues (the "official English title" used on the Japanese and Hong Kong posters doesn't use any capitalization) and I'm not sure how to deal with it by myself, so I haven't directly made a move request. elvenscout742 (talk) 01:44, 28 December 2012 (UTC)

Requested move Jūzō Itami to Juzo Itami

Please see this discussion. JoshuSasori (talk) 03:45, 29 December 2012 (UTC)

Requested move Yūzō Kayama to Yuzo Kayama

Please see Talk:Yūzō Kayama. JoshuSasori (talk) 13:36, 29 December 2012 (UTC)

Requested moves: Sōka Gakkai, Tōru Iwatani

Requested moves:

• Sōka Gakkai -> Soka Gakkai - discuss at Talk:Sōka Gakkai#Requested move to Soka Gakkai
• Tōru Iwatani -> Toru Iwatani - discuss at Talk:Tōru Iwatani#Requested move to Toru Iwatani

JoshuSasori (talk) 08:36, 30 December 2012 (UTC)

Joshu, I count five different sections on this talk page right now (in the last five days) from you about requested moves. These posts of yours are becoming disruptive. You don't need to post here every single time you propose an article be moved based on macrons. — HelloAnnyong 14:44, 30 December 2012 (UTC)

No, I think it's probably better that he at least informs us. I wish he wouldn't go around requesting pages with macrons to remove the macrons and never the other way around, even when the subject uses macrons him/herself, but it's better that we at least know about it. In fact, it would probably better for the consistency and academic integrity of the encyclopedia if the MOS was amended so as to either use macrons in all but the most exceptional cases, or to treat macrons/non-macrons like national varieties of English and ban arbitrary name-changes. elvenscout742 (talk) 16:46, 30 December 2012 (UTC)

Fair enough, but rather than flooding this page with threads, there are better ways to handle it. One can open a thread here requesting changes to the MOS, for example. — HelloAnnyong 18:23, 30 December 2012 (UTC)

That also already happened. elvenscout742 (talk) 00:39, 31 December 2012 (UTC)

Funny article opening

Tsuchigumo (土蜘蛛?) is not an extant kind of spider. It has the meanings listed below: elvenscout742 (talk) 08:57, 30 December 2012 (UTC)

Looks like a malformed machine translation to me. I've cleaned it up slightly. Evanh2008  09:10, 30 December 2012 (UTC)

Requested move: Shōhei Imamura to Shohei Imamura

Requested move: Shōhei Imamura -> Shohei Imamura - discuss at Talk:Shōhei Imamura#Requested move to Shohei Imamura. JoshuSasori (talk) 01:42, 31 December 2012 (UTC)

List of kigo merge to Kigo??

I posted a comment on Talk:List of kigo a few days ago. The existence of a separate page for this seems redundant, since the Kigo article is already basically a narrative list. Any ideas? elvenscout742 (talk) 11:07, 4 January 2013 (UTC)

I don't see a problem keeping both pages, since there seem to be plenty of common examples to comprise a separate list, but the number of examples on Kigo should be culled or deleted altogether. Boneyard90 (talk) 13:21, 4 January 2013 (UTC)

Thing is, the list seems to be based on the somewhat flawed understanding of the Japanese word kigo. There are thousands of kigo, many of which have only the loosest relation to their assigned season, and if we tried to provide a comprehensive list it would be extremely long. That's not a problem in itself, but if it remains as it is now (providing images and descriptions and so on), then it would become a monster. If we are only providing a few classical/representative/notable examples, then really that just belongs to the article Kigo. Also, if the list were to be turned into a pure list of words and what their seasons are, we are getting into WP:NOTDICTIONARY territory (most Japanese dictionaries mention the relevant season in their entries for all notable kigo). elvenscout742 (talk) 14:06, 4 January 2013 (UTC)

I don't think the last part, overlapping with dictionary format, is a real concern; neither is the monster list possibility. Not every Wiki-list has to be comprehensive, and from what I've seen, most are not. I agree that some of the descriptions and images can be culled to reduce the clutter. Boneyard90 (talk) 14:49, 4 January 2013 (UTC)

Requested moves Kamakura (disambiguation), Tales of Moonlight and Rain, Densha Otoko (film)

Three Japan-related requested moves in progress:

• Tales of Moonlight and Rain -> Ugetsu Monogatari - discuss at Talk:Tales of Moonlight and Rain#Requested move
• Densha Otoko (film) -> Train Man (film) - discuss at Talk:Densha Otoko (film)#Requested move
• Kamakura → Kamakura (disambiguation) - discuss at Talk:Kamakura#Requested move

JoshuSasori (talk) 01:41, 7 January 2013 (UTC)

JoshuSasori, while I appreciate your posting reminders here about move requests, there is a place on the project page itself here for you to post such reminders. It is also troubling that you have a tendency to invite other users to these discussions, and then accuse them of harassing you when they don't support your side of the discussion. elvenscout742 (talk) 05:43, 10 January 2013 (UTC)

Why did you not add your recent requested moves (for example, Tadao Sato, Kindai Eiga Kyokai, and Tales of Moonlight and Rain) to the above page? JoshuSasori (talk) 06:12, 10 January 2013 (UTC)

I wasn't aware of it until just now when I began to sympathize with a previous user who had requested you to stop opening topics on this talk page for new move requests, and went to check the project page if there was any more appropriate alternative. In fact, at the time I made the request for Tales of Moonlight and Rain (is over a month ago "recent" in Misplaced Pages time?) I thought that specifically coming to WikiProject Japan to ask my fellow Japan scholars for help and not going to every possibly relevant WikiProject with the same information would violate WP:CANVAS, so I decided to leave it to the community in general. elvenscout742 (talk) 07:12, 10 January 2013 (UTC)

Ōmishima, Ehime/Ōyamazumi Shrine

I was here yesterday, these are both fascinating topics with not enough written on them in English. My Japanese is still very poor, can someone help beef these 2 (Ōmishima, Ehime, Ōyamazumi Shrine) up? Thank you!--Kintetsubuffalo (talk) 03:54, 7 January 2013 (UTC)

MOSJ issue with municipality-names

The Manual of Style says that we should For cities, use the form ]; for example, Otaru, Hokkaidō. Exception: For designated cities, use ] without appending the prefecture unless disambiguation from another city or prefecture is necessary.

I can understand the exception for designated cities, although I think it would be better if we made the exception for cities that have the same name as their prefectures and used, say, Okinawa (city).

However, a more significant issue is one I recently raised in the current move request at Talk:Kamakura. We have a huge number of articles on Japanese municipalities where either they are the only usage of their name, or they are the clear primary topic, and so we have ] redirecting to ]. This seems somewhat counter-intuitive, since the only reason we need the prefecture name is for disambiguation. Other countries' municipalities don't seem to follow this convention (Tubbercurry, Huludao, etc.), so why do we? Having a redirect from a simple form to a complex one just seems wrong...

elvenscout742 (talk) 01:15, 11 January 2013 (UTC)

Doesn't a similar issue happen with the names of several United States municipalities? For example, the city of Orlando in Florida is clearly the primary usage of "Orlando", but the article is still located at Orlando, Florida, because of some weird pre-existing standard on when you only refer to a city by its name in the American press. I don't see why Japan should be treated any different.—Ryulong (琉竜) 02:47, 11 January 2013 (UTC)

Articles Need Renamed

The article Kansai Kannon Pilgrimage should be given its REAL name "Saigoku 33 Temple Pilgrimage" like the Chugoku 33 Kannon Pilgrimage. Kansai Kannon Temple Pigrimage is, as stated on the article Talk Page, not even used colloquially to refer to it let alone as the standard. The last temple isn't even in Kansai.

Also, the article Kibitsu Jinja should be Kibitsu Shrine like all the other shrines. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 121.83.129.3 (talk) 07:10, 11 January 2013 (UTC)

It would be a big help if you could supply a reference which supports your claim. JoshuSasori (talk) 07:34, 11 January 2013 (UTC)

Well, for the second point, it's Misplaced Pages policy to use "shrine" instead of "jinja" and 2 different users brought it up on the talk page. I assume the WikiProject Japan is aware but if you need me to find the page where it states that, I could try.

As for the Kannon Pilgrimage, it's hard-pressing (if not impossible) to find reputable sources that support the current name. One bit of proof is simply that "Saigoku" is the name. 西国= 'Saigoku', not 'Kansai'. It's described in the "Traveler's Guide to Japanese Pilgrimages" the homepage of one of the temples says Saigoku , actually all of these books say "Saigoku" . It seems that many more have mistakenly used "Saikoku"

About trivias of Tokugawa Ieyasu

It seems much content inzh:德川家康#逸事and ja:徳川家康#人物・逸話 is poorly cited and caused my doubt. I tried to ask in Misplaced Pages:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2013 January 8 but there are few useful advises given. Here is some trivias as in the Chinese article(some are different from that in the Japanese article)

• Hobbies in late age：Mount Fuji, eagle and eggplant.He liked to go hiking in Mount Fuji and hunt with eagle, while eggplant is his favorite food; he described eggplant as "food of the conquerors".
• He was the wealthiest among the daimyos in Japan, prabably due to the support of Chinese merchant Li Dan.
• He was a master in the Bows, Swords, Cannons, Horses and Swimming; he learned from a number of skilled warriors.
• People he admired include: Liu Bang, Zhang Liang, Han Xin, Jiang Ziya, King Wen of Zhou, Zhou Gong Dan, Minamoto no Yoritomo, Ashikaga Takauji.
• His favourite books: Lotus Sutra, Azuma Kagami, Analects, Six Secret Teachings, Three Strategies of Huang Shigong, Records of the Grand Historian, Doctrine of the Mean, Book of Han
• Palmistry: He had a Single transverse palmar crease.
• Other hobbies: he had a wide variety of hobbies; he liked Sarugaku and learned Japanese tea ceremony and Go.
• He was a square man with height 156-160 cm and waist circumference 120cm.
• One claim says he died because of poisoning from sparidae tempura.

.... --Inspector (talk) 06:48, 11 January 2013 (UTC)

Nihongo template

Could a user fluent in Japanese check the transliterations at List of literary works published in Asia Raja? I don't read Japanese, and my transliteration is based on the commonly used Indonesian styling of the centre's Japanese name. — Crisco 1492 (talk) 07:26, 11 January 2013 (UTC)

Done. JoshuSasori (talk) 07:32, 11 January 2013 (UTC)

• Thanks a lot. Google clunked out at 啓民 and 指導所. — Crisco 1492 (talk) 07:39, 11 January 2013 (UTC)

The whole word "啓民文化指導所" appears in Google books here. There is more information in Japanese here. There is a picture in romaji and a text in English here if you scroll down. The Misplaced Pages usage is to write shidōsho with a bar over the first o like "ō", which is slightly different from that in that text. JoshuSasori (talk) 08:13, 11 January 2013 (UTC)

• Thanks a lot. If I ever get around to making an article on the institution I know where to turn. I am (vaguely) aware of the o/ō convention, but not speaking Japanese I wouldn't know if it's shidōsho, shidoshō, shidosho, or shidōshō, and the sources did not use an over bar (sp?). — Crisco 1492 (talk) 08:29, 11 January 2013 (UTC)

That phrase 啓民文化指導所 (?keimin? bunka shidōsho) is a curious one for me to search for within Japanese dictionaries, partly by the wayside of the question here. Yes 文化指導所 (ぶんか　しどう　しょ, bunka shidōsho) checks out as simple to find in the dictionaries and the most obvious correct reading (in hiragana and romaji, in other words the correct reading and pronunciation).

Hence from the 啓民 dictionary check, i tried and got keimin as one of many possible combinations of readings.

Therefore, back to the question here, is it certain (from sources) that it is read as and pronounced as shown in romaji as keimin (Japanese: けいみん (hiragana))?

The first kanji character 啓 is used in several kanji compound words to give those words the meaning of enlightened or similar meanings; (and as a single kanji word alone, not in a compound word, WWWJDIC gives for it, for example: "disclose; open; say").

Of course, the second kanji character 民 is a more commonly known kanji, meaning people, nation, etc., (eg. WWWJDIC: "people; nation; subjects"). On this question, ultimately it is just my curiosity for checking the dictionary sources when i can quickly find tricky examples, as we discussed elsewhere on whether WWWJDIC is or is not a reliable dictionary source. So, just curious here! ——--macropneuma 12:07, 11 January 2013 (UTC)

• Linguistic questions aside (fascinating, and I really should try and learn the language) sources for the romanisation include this (with two overlines), this book review, this encyclopedia entry (which gives Shidoso, no H), and, for the sake of variety, these two English sources. — Crisco 1492 (talk) 12:36, 11 January 2013 (UTC)

• As a side note, the article Cinema of Indonesia gives the translation "Office of Cultural Enlightenment" — Crisco 1492 (talk) 12:40, 11 January 2013 (UTC)

The final kanji of the word, '所' is written "sho" but not "shō", so the book with the two overlines is in error. The '導' kanji might be written either "do" or "dō". The "dō" version with the extra line above the o, called a macron, is the usual way it's done in English-language Misplaced Pages, but the "do" version is widely used too. JoshuSasori (talk) 07:02, 12 January 2013 (UTC)

• Alrighty, thanks. — Crisco 1492 (talk) 07:05, 12 January 2013 (UTC)

Requested move at Talk:Kamakura

Greetings! I have recently relisted a requested move discussion at Talk:Kamakura#Requested move, regarding a page relating to this WikiProject. Discussion and opinions are invited. Thanks, Tyrol5 00:42, 14 January 2013 (UTC)

Someone should also mention that Kyoto was moved against consensus, as well, to Kyoto (city) and there's a discussion about that as well.—Ryulong (琉竜) 02:22, 14 January 2013 (UTC)

Importance scale question

I recently attempted to change the importance of the article Ugetsu on WikiProject Japan's importance scale from "High" to "Mid" to match its source material, but was immediately reverted without explanation. I was motivated by the fact that within the scope of Japanese society and (pop) culture, the film is significantly less important than the book, and seems to have only attained its "High" rank based on its importance in world cinema outside Japan. Within Japan, the film is relatively obscure, while the book is a universally known classic. If this is the case then the film should have a "High" ranking in WikiProject Film, not WikiProject Japan. In order to clear up the relative discrepancy between the book and film, I then changed the ranking of the book (not a sockpuppet -- I don't know how to log in on my phone), but now this book ranks above the probably more important The Love Suicides at Sonezaki and Chūshingura, and the definitely more important Ogura Hyakunin Isshu. Can I get some clarification on what the criteria for these importance scales are and how they are determined? elvenscout742 (talk) 02:52, 15 January 2013 (UTC)

To clarify, my concern is that to be "High" or "Top" on WikiProject Japan's concerns, the article's topic should be of high or top importance to Misplaced Pages's coverage of things Japanese. I just noticed that the film is already "Core" to WikiProject Film. Can I get some input of JoshuSasori's unilaterally deciding that this film is more important than the book on which it is based and, by extension, The Love Suicides at Sonezaki? elvenscout742 (talk) 04:38, 15 January 2013 (UTC)

Ugetsu was marked as "high importance" by User:Doctor Sunshine, not me. JoshuSasori (talk) 06:03, 15 January 2013 (UTC)

I know that, but he/she also never provided a justification, and you are the one who still didn't provide a justification when I presented an opposing argument. The number of articles covered by this project has more than doubled in the intervening 6+ years, and given how a lot of articles have probably been deleted or merged ... well, things change. Additionally, at the time, the Tales of Moonlight and Rain article didn't exist (it split from Ueda Akinari the following year, which was only assessed last year). All in all, I have no idea what inspired Doctor Sunshine to rank the film as he/she did, but given that he/she has made no edits in over 3 years, I don't think it's worth invoking the original assessor in this case. Are we basically in agreement, though, that it should go something like (from least important) Ugetsu (film)<Tales of Moonlight and Rain<Oku no Hosomichi? elvenscout742 (talk) 06:31, 15 January 2013 (UTC)

By the way, JS, according to the project page you're not supposed to assess articles unless you are a member of WikiProject Japan. I know it's just a formality, but if you want to revert me or any other WikiProject Japan member when we re-assess articles, you may wish to become a member yourself. elvenscout742 (talk) 08:09, 15 January 2013 (UTC)

No article should be marked as Top importance without a discussion by the project. Any of the others are open to interpretation by individual project members unless someone disagrees, in which case there should be a discussion (kind of like this one). ···日本穣 · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe · Join WP Japan! 08:13, 15 January 2013 (UTC)

Good, good, I'm all in favour of that! (By the way NJ, I noticed on Talk:Rashōmon that you posted several years ago in favour of moving the page. I decided to be bold and posted a formal move request, if you are interested in participating.) elvenscout742 (talk) 08:21, 15 January 2013 (UTC)

With or without macron?

There have been several articles moved to macronless article name recently and I've seen that kind of move before. I thought about it.

Basically, Romanization dose not need sources. The Hepburn is one of the ja Romanization systems and we adopt it. We only have to follow the system. The information about someone in his/her official site or printed books on him/her can be well-sourced information and should be used in his/her article, but the romanization on the official site is not. I don't think almost all sources specify thier Romanization policy/MoS and the system they use. Their Romanization is unreliable. Even if they specify, that is thier policy/MoS, not ours. Our MoS says "use the Hpburn". Why should we follow other sites' or books' MoS? What if someone's official site specifies that they use the kunrei or nihon-shiki? Which one should we give priority? The official site's kunrei/nihon-shiki or our Hepburn? Some editors may say the majority of sources support macronless names and it's a matter of our "common name" policy. But I think the policy should be applied to the totally different names like Sea of Japan vs. East Sea, Senkaku Islands vs. Diaoyu Islands or Ogasawara Islands vs. Bonin Islands. Not this with or without macron name. I think this is a matter of strict vs. less strict transcription. I support the strict transcription because it's precise. As for our macronless names, I don't want to put macrons on Tokyo, Osaka, Kyoto, etc. They are household names in English speaking countries. You can see them on newspapers and hear them on TV almost every day and they will be that way in the future. But most of the modern personal names will not survive in decades. As for Tsurutaro, his name is not a household name in en speaking countries even today. I think our exceptions should be kept a few. The fewer the better. I suggest articles moved macronless titles should be moved back to macroned titles. Oda Mari (talk) 09:35, 15 January 2013 (UTC)

That's EXACTLY what I have been saying! I would add that a lot of these "official English websites" are produced by freelance translators who get paid the same whether they bother with macrons or not, or, worse, Anglophone web-designers who are given the text and don't even understand why Japanese romanization uses macrons. Additionally, technical restrictions on passport information pages means that virtually every Japanese person who has a long vowel in his/her name and has ever traveled abroad has some "official" name that doesn't have a macron, but it doesn't mean we should follow that rule. The problem is that the MOS appears to have been modeled on general English Misplaced Pages guidelines regarding "reliable" or "official" sources, without consideration to the special status of Japanese topics. The only way around this is to amend the MOS, but there would need to be overwhelming consensus to do that... elvenscout742 (talk) 13:43, 15 January 2013 (UTC)

Why should Japanese topics be treated as different?—Ryulong (琉竜) 13:50, 15 January 2013 (UTC)

Because "reliable sources" are preferred on Misplaced Pages because they tend to have more accurate information, not because they spell things a certain way. This is essentially the same national variants of English. I found that twice as many reliable print sources use the spelling neighborhood as use neighbourhood, but Misplaced Pages policy specifically bans attempts to move the article Neighbourhood. When it comes to different ways of romanizing Japanese names, they often drop the macron solely because of their own style preferences, which clash with Misplaced Pages style preferences. There isn't actually any reason we should spell any Japanese words except very commonly-known names and possibly the names of living people any different than the standard Hepburn. The preference for "reliable sources" clearly shouldn't apply to how we romanize words in Japanese. Otherwise, redirects for variant romanizations would only be making allowances for unverifiable original research -- isn't that ridiculous? elvenscout742 (talk) 14:10, 15 January 2013 (UTC)

Additionally, I just noticed that the current tendency explicitly violates MOS:FOREIGN, which directly states that for words whose native spellings are not in the roman alphabet, we should use a systematic romanization style except when there is a common English spelling. Obscure Japanese authors and the like clearly don't have "common English spellings", even if one considers the no-macron spelling to be a "common English name" rather than just a simplified/inaccurate romanization. elvenscout742 (talk) 14:38, 15 January 2013 (UTC)

This is an amusing piece of circular logic: because our style guide says to use Hepburn romanization, we should alter our style guide to Hepburn romanization. I imagine that things are much easier for Russian or Korean Wikipedians: when they want to put a Japanese name in their language they simply use the straightforward rules for transcription. Too bad we cannot do that since Japanese people express preferences about how to write their names in English. JoshuSasori (talk) 14:43, 15 January 2013 (UTC)

You have a much too liberal definition of "preference", as demonstrated by what must be more than a dozen move request in the last few weeks. You seem to think that if a musicians latest album uses no macron, but his earlier album used a macron, it means his current preference is not to use a macron -- even when they sign their own name in roman with the macron. elvenscout742 (talk) 15:13, 15 January 2013 (UTC)

WP:OWN/WP:HARASSMENT on Japanese cinema articles

One user has been following my edits to numerous articles on Japanese cinema very closely and marking virtually every edit I make, including the addition of Wikilinks, as questionable. All of my edits to Tadao Sato, Kuroneko, Ugetsu, Sansho the Bailiff and Double Suicide of Sonezaki have been closely scrutinized and many of them have been whitewashed out of existence by this one user who, has also been consistently unwilling to compromise. In the case of the latter article, the user went so far as to move the article from its original title to a questionable English title (that comes from a vaguely NY Times review rather than any official source), apparently just to remove my attempt to provide a translation of the Japanese title à la Ran (film) from the article.

I am posting this here because I have already tried WP:ANI, WP:RSN, WP:NORN, and gone to an objective user for informal mediation, but I am not sure where to go next. I was wondering if anyone has any advice on how to deal with this issue? Thanks!

elvenscout742 (talk) 01:21, 16 January 2013 (UTC)

Let's review how this spat started. What happened was that you went through my list of created pages and started moving them to blatantly incorrect names. You also added your own absurd original research conclusions to multiple articles. You vandalized Ugetsu by first moving the page to Ugetsu (film) then changing the redirect to point to Tales of Moonlight and Rain, without making the slightest effort to change any of the affected pages. There are currently two editors on Sansho and three editors on Ugetsu who strongly disagree with you about the change you have made to the lead section. JoshuSasori (talk) 02:05, 16 January 2013 (UTC)