Misplaced Pages

Talk:The Gambia

Article snapshot taken from Wikipedia with creative commons attribution-sharealike license. Give it a read and then ask your questions in the chat. We can research this topic together.

This is an old revision of this page, as edited by Herostratus (talk | contribs) at 17:40, 1 October 2023 (→Ngram: I am a member of the tribe "humans"). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

Revision as of 17:40, 1 October 2023 by Herostratus (talk | contribs) (→Ngram: I am a member of the tribe "humans")(diff) ← Previous revision | Latest revision (diff) | Newer revision → (diff)
This is the talk page for discussing improvements to the The Gambia article.
This is not a forum for general discussion of the article's subject.
Article policies
Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL
Archives: 1, 2Auto-archiving period: 6 months 

Template:Vital article

In the newsA news item involving The Gambia was featured on Misplaced Pages's Main Page in the In the news section on 5 October 2013.
Misplaced Pages
Misplaced Pages
A fact from this article was featured on Misplaced Pages's Main Page in the On this day section on 22 dates. February 18, 2005, April 24, 2005, February 18, 2006, April 24, 2006, February 18, 2007, April 24, 2007, February 18, 2008, April 24, 2008, February 18, 2009, April 24, 2009, February 18, 2010, April 24, 2010, February 18, 2011, April 24, 2011, April 24, 2012, February 18, 2014, April 24, 2014, February 18, 2015, April 24, 2015, February 18, 2016, April 24, 2016, and February 18, 2017
This article has not yet been rated on Misplaced Pages's content assessment scale.
It is of interest to the following WikiProjects:
Please add the quality rating to the {{WikiProject banner shell}} template instead of this project banner. See WP:PIQA for details.
WikiProject iconAfrica: Gambia Top‑importance
WikiProject iconThis article is within the scope of WikiProject Africa, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of Africa on Misplaced Pages. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.AfricaWikipedia:WikiProject AfricaTemplate:WikiProject AfricaAfrica
TopThis article has been rated as Top-importance on the project's importance scale.
Taskforce icon
This article is supported by WikiProject Gambia (assessed as Top-importance).
Please add the quality rating to the {{WikiProject banner shell}} template instead of this project banner. See WP:PIQA for details.
WikiProject iconCountries
WikiProject iconThis article is within the scope of WikiProject Countries, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of countries on Misplaced Pages. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.CountriesWikipedia:WikiProject CountriesTemplate:WikiProject Countriescountry
WikiProject Countries to-do list:

 Here are some tasks awaiting attention:
Template:WP1.0
This article has previously been nominated to be moved. Please review the prior discussions if you are considering re-nomination.

Discussions:

  • RM, The Gambia → Gambia, No consensus, 17 January 2008, discussion
  • RM, The Gambia → Gambia, Not moved, 11 March 2010, discussion
  • RM, The Gambia → Gambia, Not moved, 20 August 2021, discussion
  • RM, The Gambia → Gambia, Not moved, 20 December 2022, discussion

Archives

1, 2


This page has archives. Sections older than 180 days may be automatically archived by Lowercase sigmabot III when more than 4 sections are present.

RfC about proper usage of this country's name

Given a lack of consensus of prior RfCs on the issue of names for this country in article text, I have initiated a new RfC at WikiProject Africa to settle this manner rigorously. –LaundryPizza03 (dc̄) 05:41, 31 December 2022 (UTC)

The admin in the above discussion suggested future discussion should take place at WP:THE. Pathawi (talk) 17:20, 31 December 2022 (UTC)
These are slightly different issues. WP:THE and the above discussion were with regard to article title. The new RfC appears to be about the name when it occurs mid-sentence in article text, which would fall under MOS:THEINST. --FyzixFighter (talk) 14:34, 4 January 2023 (UTC)
I don't think MOS:THEINST is the right guideline—it's about the use of the definite article with institutions, independent of name. The RfC at Misplaced Pages talk:WikiProject Africa explicitly cites the above discussion as motivation. Pathawi (talk) 05:34, 8 January 2023 (UTC)

Transport

Wondering why there is no "Transport" section in the article, not even a brief mention about the country's transportation. Rasnaboy (talk) 17:23, 5 February 2023 (UTC)

Well, just added one from another article. Nevertheless, the section needs more citations. Will try to find more on these. Rasnaboy (talk) 17:35, 5 February 2023 (UTC)

What next for capital "T" in The Gambia?

I'm starting a discussion at Misplaced Pages talk:Manual of Style#What next for The Gambia? about how to followup on the RfC which changed Misplaced Pages style to use a capital "T" for The Gambia mid-sentence and mid-article title. Please participate in the discussion there. Thank you,  SchreiberBike | ⌨  04:01, 22 February 2023 (UTC)

That discussion can now be found at Misplaced Pages talk:Manual of Style/Archive 227#What next for The Gambia?. —⁠ ⁠BarrelProof (talk) 19:33, 14 June 2023 (UTC)
The RfC was later changed to "no consensus". The discussion referenced above is now archived as described above. I should have noted that change here when the closure was changed; my apologies for any confusion. SchreiberBike | ⌨  00:48, 16 June 2023 (UTC)

A Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion

The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion:

Participate in the deletion discussion at the nomination page. —Community Tech bot (talk) 15:26, 23 March 2023 (UTC)

Ngram

FWIW, I was dorking around with learning some of the operators in google Ngrams and got this result, which, if I'm doing it right, seems to indicate:

  • Instances of the occurrence of the term "Gambia" in the phrases "Gambia River" or "River Gambia" are practically negligible for our purposes here (that is, people writing "Gambia" were seldom doing so to refer to the river. This seems odd to me but if I'm reading it right, it's true.)
  • When the Term "Gambia" was used, about half the time it is part of the phrase "T/the Gambia", and about half just "Gambia" not preceded by "T/the".
  • I would think that when the phrase "T/the Gambia" and the term "Gambia" without the article (and the river is not being referred to), it would mostly be referring to the name of the country or something deriving from the name of the country (e.g. "T/the Gambia International Airport" / "Gambia International Airport" and so forth.
  • When "Gambia Iron Company" and "Gambia Airport" etc are used, this supports "Gambia" as the name of country, while "T/the Gambia Iron Company" and "T/he Gambia Airport" supports "T/the Gambia" as the name of the country.

Sure Ngram is a somewhat blunt instrument. "...then take a left at the Gambia Iron Company building..." and "In The Gambia, you will find Gambia Linen, Gambia Coconuts, and Gambia Poptarts" will give false results. But I'm going to guess that these aren't a big part of the results (particularly the latter example, where the adjectival form would be used mostly ("In the Gambia, you will find Gambian linen..."), and in addition that these instances would probably cancel each other to some degree. Blunt instrument, but I'm going to assume plenty sharp enough for our purposes

So, the result gives about 50% "T/the Gambia" as the name of the country, and about 50% just "Gambia" as the name of the country. (Actually more like 60%+ for just "Gambia", but I'm being generous, considering all the false results we are probably getting.)

Not suggesting a name change for the article, good Lord no. Shoot me rather than going thru all that again. However, I do think this gives me sufficient support to make these additions (show in bold):

1) Top of the lede: "The Gambia, officially the Republic of The Gambia, sometimes shortened to just Gambia, is a country in West Africa."

2) In the Etymology section, start of second paragraph: "The Gambia is one of a small number of countries for which the definite article is commonly (although far from universally) used in its English-language name...

And I have done so. Revert as you all wish, but for that I think the argument would have to be something along the lines of "The percentage of people who refer to T/the Gambia without using the definite article is so negligible that informing the reader that these people even exist is unwarranted or misleading" which I doubt that that can be demonstrated (willing to be proven wrong).

Also my wording may not be optimal, of course. Maybe "often shortened to just Gambia" or "commonly used in its English-language name, but not always... or whatever is better. Herostratus (talk) 17:18, 1 October 2023 (UTC)

Categories: