Talk:Ivory Coast/Archive 5

There is certainly a lot to be considered when evaluating this discussion. I haven't actually counted but at a glance if we went by straight numbers we would arrive at yet another "no consensus" result. That is, in my opinion, not acceptable. Of course we don't do things that way anyway, but I wanted to be clear from the outset that strength of numbers was not a contributing factor to this close. On the topic of which is the more widely used name in reliable sources we have contradictory and sometimes unclear information. However, several users analyzed not only sheer number of hits but what type of sources those hits were coming from. Those analyses were quite helpful and appreciated The argument that "arguments have not changed since last time" is irrelevant and any such remarks were ignored when determining the close. Since there has never been a consensus on this issue it is only logical that arguments for both positions will be more or less the same. If this move had been unambiguously accepted or rejected in the past it would be a different story. The core issue here is "what is the purpose of an article title?" All other arguments about colonialism, respecting the locals, what atlases or even other encyclopedias say etc are not entirely without merit but are secondary to that concern. So, what this is about is not fairness or respect, it is about how best to serve our readers. The majority of people who are not editors of this page are more likely to be familiar with the term "Ivory Coast." When they type that in they will see exactly what they were looking for right away and will know they are in the right place. Anyone searching "Côte d'Ivoire" will almost certainly already be aware that "Ivory Coast" is another common name for this place and will not suffer that same confusion. As is indicated in the discussion, many of the sources that use Côte d'Ivoire are not journalistic sources but rather governments or NGOs. It would be impolitic of them to use Ivory Coast, but we do not need to worry about that. Therefore I conclude that the arguments to rename the article to "Ivory Coast" have more merit than the arguments to retain it at the current title. Beeblebrox (talk) 22:39, 8 July 2012 (UTC)

Côte d'Ivoire → Ivory Coast – All the major English-language news organizations use "Ivory Coast", including BBC, New York Times, AP, The Guardian, and CNN. This ngram shows that "Ivory Coast" is far more common than "Côte d'Ivoire" on Google Books. For every U.S. reader who types in "Cote d'Ivoire" as a search term, 35 type in "Ivory Coast", according to Insights. The numbers for Britain and Australia are similar. New timestamp so this doesn't start in the backlog. Jenks24 (talk) 11:50, 27 June 2012 (UTC) Kauffner (talk) 04:03, 12 June 2012 (UTC)

The numbers in parenthesis are for the past year. This is an arbitrary restriction I added to reduce ghosting because in some cases the raw numbers are implausibly high. (The New York Times site obviously doesn't have anywhere near 15,000 stories on this subject.)

• NPR has 333 results for "Ivory Coast", but only 49 for "Côte d'Ivoire". Even if the searches are restricted to just the last year, Ivory Coast is still nearly twice as common as Côte d'Ivoire, 30 to 16. --Taivo (talk) 01:47, 30 June 2012 (UTC)
  • I get 476 for Ivory Coast ("ivory coast" site:www.npr.org), 73 for "Cote d'Ivoire" ("cote d'Ivoire" site:www.npr.org). Kauffner (talk) 02:23, 30 June 2012 (UTC)
    • I actually go to the site and search instead of monkeying around with Google and trying to search the site without going there. --Taivo (talk) 05:50, 30 June 2012 (UTC)
• Merriam-Webster, recommended by the Chicago Manual of Style as the source "for the spelling of names of places" (§8.43) , uses "Ivory Coast". Kauffner (talk) 16:15, 6 July 2012 (UTC)

Note: this includes all of the somewhat centralized, formal discussions. There have also been lots of other discussions about the name, outside the bounds of these particular proposals; see the talk page archives linked above for details.

• 12 Nov 2004 - 17 Nov 2005 result: no consensus
• 8 Jan 2007 - 17 Jan 2007 result: no consensus
• 21 June 2010 - 5 July 2010 result: no consensus
• 11 July 2010 - 20 Jan 2011 RFC never closed, no clear consensus
• 19 June 2011 - 19 July 2011 result: no consensus

________

This history reminds me of the history of Yoghurt, which went through seven "no consensus" RMs over eight years before a move to Yogurt finally succeeded, and stability and peace was finally established. That history is documented at Talk:Yogurt/yogurtspellinghistory. Do we really want to go through something similar with this article? --Born2cycle (talk) 15:52, 29 June 2012 (UTC)

Several editors contributed their views while I still working on the draft at User:Kauffner/RM_incubator Kauffner (talk) 07:23, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

• Support - Until or if the French name becomes the predominant name in English-language sources, we should follow Wikipedia rules and use the current common name in English. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 07:13, 12 June 2012 (UTC)

Looks like that happened 20 years ago. TDL (talk) 02:08, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

Ok Danlaycock, good idea, if we take your reference then let's also move Mumbai back to Bombay, Yangon back to Rangoon, Zimbabwe back to Rhodesia or even Moldova back to Moldavia?? That one source is a load of rubbish. Bezuidenhout (talk) 09:16, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

Please recheck your inputs. I get a beautiful graph showing the change in usage shorty after Zimbabwe changed its name 1979. As for the others, these are hardly surprising. Bombay and Rangoon are both still widely used. TDL (talk) 21:00, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

• Support. Ivorians may call it Cote D'Ivoire in the same way Germans call their country "Deutschland". The convention on Wikipedia is to use the English name of the country. ~Amatulić (talk) 18:45, 21 June 2012 (UTC)

Correct, however unlike Deutschland, Cote d'Ivoire is also widely used in the English language (see Encyclopedia Britannica for example). The relevant question here is which is the WP:COMMONNAME. TDL (talk) 02:08, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

An argument that would require that we refer to Japan as Nippon.©Geni 20:32, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

Which we should, IF it were the most commonly-used name for that country in English. But it ain't. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 20:36, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

• Support. Follow most common usage in reliable English sources. --Born2cycle (talk) 00:29, 26 June 2012 (UTC)
  • Addendum: Also, and perhaps more importantly, per the recognizability naming criterion. Any English speaker familiar with the country is going to recognize "Ivory Coast"; not all will recognize the French name. This is essentially the same reason we have Burma, East Timor and Taiwan, despite their commonly used official names which are less recognizable. --Born2cycle (talk) 21:16, 28 June 2012 (UTC)

• Oppose - There's simply no evidence that Ivory Coast is more common. Google Ngram, Corpus of Contemporary American English, Google News (Cote d'Ivoire versus Ivory Coast) as well as nearly all major English-language encyclopedias and dictionaries (Encyclopedia Britannica, Columbia Encyclopedia, The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, Oxford dictionary, Cambridge dictionary, Collins dictionary, Google Maps and Bing Maps) all favour Cote d'Ivoire over Ivory Coast. TDL (talk) 02:08, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

• Support per common usage and Wikipedia's guideline on using English. "Ivory Coast" is routinely and usually used in English sources as the unqualified name for the country, i.e. without a parenthetical "Côte d'Ivoire" whereas "Côte d'Ivoire" often carries a parenthetical "Ivory Coast". Therefore, "Ivory Coast" is also preferable per the principle of least astonishment. As the nominee notes, educated readers who partake of multiple English news sources might be genuinely confused by seeing "Côte d'Ivoire" as a title. —  AjaxSmack  02:29, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

• Support per WP:COMMONNAME. --Taivo (talk) 02:40, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

• Oppose. Give it a rest, there are no new arguments. Misapplying "common usage" like that we might as well move United States to America and United Kingdom to Britain. Mewulwe (talk) 02:50, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

• Support per WP:COMMONNAME, and the fact that this is the English, Wikipedia and all. LHM 02:43, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

• Support, Wikipedia's guideline on using English, WP:SURPRISE, common usage all point to using "Ivory Coast" in modern English. Dictionaries, and Traditional Encyclopedias are repositories of knowledge, but do not dictate to people what words to use. There is no "Language Police" (regulatory body like the Royal Spanish Academy or Quebec Board of the French Language) for the English language, it evolves organically without a group of government regulators dictating "correct" terminology.--Education does not equal common sense. 我不在乎 02:56, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

Wikipedia's naming policies (WP:COMMONNAME) aren't based on what words people use, they're based on "prevalence in reliable English-language sources". Dictionaries, Traditional Encyclopedias and Maps/Atlases are precisely the types of sources we should follow. TDL (talk) 03:13, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

• Oppose - if the country calls itself "Côte d'Ivoire" officially, that is the name the page should be at. This is a country, not an entertainer or a President; it behooves Wikipedia to be precisely accurate when it comes to country names. - The Bushranger _{One ping only} 03:00, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

  So you are discounting Mexico, Spain, Germany, Russia, Venuzeula as examples of articles using the unofficial English variant of the country names?--Education does not equal common sense. 我不在乎 03:09, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

  Without looking into it, those might actually *be* the official names in English language. Just because "Côte d'Ivoire" originates from the French language doesn't mean it's not part of the English language too - nearly 30% of English word comes from French language. And of couse *it is* part of the English language since it's in all major dictionaries - Oxford Dictionary, Cambridge Dictionary, etc. Laurent (talk) 03:21, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

  And that's the problem, without looking into it you have no knowledge, and are just going with your gut. If you looked into it, you would find that none of these names are official, and English is not an official language in any of these countries, so there would be no reason to have official English names. --Education does not equal common sense. 我不在乎 03:29, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

  But how about you, did you look into it? I didn't because I'm pretty sure that "Spain" and "Germany", just like "Côte d'Ivoire", are the correct names in English language. Just to give you an example - here's Côte d'Ivoire and Spain in the Oxford Dictionary. For España, they just wrote "Spanish name for Spain.". For "Ivory Coast" they wrote "Another name for Côte d'Ivoire". Note that they didn't write "English name for Côte d'Ivoire" because "Côte d'Ivoire" is the English name. Laurent (talk) 04:08, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

  Neither "España" nor "Spain" is not the official name of the country in any language. The official name of "Spain" is: "Reino de España", which translates into English as "Kingdom of Spain", into French as "Royaume d'Espagne", etc. We are not concerned about the official name, as the common name is what is used. If "Ivory Coast" is another name for "Côte d'Ivoire" then it is also the English name for it. --Education does not equal common sense. 我不在乎 04:21, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

  Below you wrote that "Ivory Coast" appears 191 million times in your custom Google search and 189 million for "Côte d'Ivoire". By these results, are you seriously arguing that "Côte d'Ivoire" is not a common name? I'd say both seem to be equally common. Now we just need to choose which one is correct according to authoritative sources like dictionaries, encyclopedia, international bodies, etc. and not just according to biased English news agencies. Laurent (talk) 04:49, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

  Below, I was simply replying to/questioning on a comment. I did not argue any point. My reasoning for supporting "Ivory Coast" does not rest with only one "google search", or one Guideline, but a combination. You have to go deeper into the data. You have to look at the whole picture. Dictionaries, encyclopedias, maps, are "published" on a very infrequent frequent basis relative to news reports, and other current sources, many are copied from previous versions or other documents of the same type. You also have to take into account the regional origin of the sources, as news outlets closer to the subject tend to use the local language's terminology instead of more common English terminology. For example, English media in Québec, will use french terms like cégep instead of using the more widely recognized term college, this will affect "google search" results. And this discussion seems to be turning into more of a circular argument than a discussion in my opinion.--Education does not equal common sense. 我不在乎 05:15, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

  But per your own admission, per the dictionary results Côte d'Ivoire is also the English name for the country. Therefore the argument is going nowhere as both are English names for the country. Nil Einne (talk) 07:06, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

• Absurd. We use United States, the name most commonly used in reliable English sources, not the official name, United States of America. --Born2cycle (talk) 03:18, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

• Oppose Yet another move request, and this one brings nothing new to the table because it is too biased to begin with. The nominator chose his favorite sources and compiled some statistic from that, but it means nothing since he ignored all the numerous sources that go against his preferred name. As outlined by TDL, all major encyclopedia and reference books use "Côte d'Ivoire". Likewise, all the international organizations - the UN, UN agencies, sport organizations, etc. also all use "Côte d'Ivoire". Of course, "Côte d'Ivoire" is also the name of the country, and it's not like it's written in Chinese or Arabic characters - even English-speakers can read that. As for the principle of least astonishment, well readers often go astonished when they read encyclopedia, that's called "learning something" and there's nothing wrong with learning the correct name of a country. The title "Ivory Coast" is in bold in the lead anyway so there's no possible confusion. Laurent (talk) 03:00, 27 June 2012 (UTC)
• Oppose per Laurent. CIA factbook refers to it as "Cote d'Ivoire". As a note, google search rankings for "Ivory Coast" yield 118 million results, "Cote d'Ivoire" yields 135 million results, and "Côte d'Ivoire" yields 213 million results. Interestingly, that effect is almost reversed when the quotation marks are not included. (89.2 million, 36.5 million, and 56.5 million respectively) A similar search for English only sources yields 195 million, 151 million, and 201 million respectively when using quotations. I believe the searches highlight that "Côte d'Ivoire" is not only the official name, but is also the common name. Ryan Vesey Review me! 03:35, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

  Did you exclude "Wikipedia" in your searches? That does affect the results, and shows 191 million for "Ivory Coast", slightly lower than 195, and only 189 million for "Côte d'Ivoire", quite a larger drop from 201 million. --Education does not equal common sense. 我不在乎 04:37, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

  In any case, that would mean there is no common name at which point we get to choose. Without a common name, I prefer to use the official name used by the CIA and various government organisations. Ryan Vesey Review me! 05:20, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

• Oppose – the "evidence" is way too flaky. The n-gram demo by TDL seems to make it clear that the country's official French name is the name more commonly used in books in recent decades. One would need a better reason to change away from it. Dicklyon (talk) 04:08, 27 June 2012 (UTC)
• Support As with those who voted on support for move, likewise some foreign countries like Burma and East Timor have kept their localized names. ApprenticeFan ^work 04:16, 27 June 2012 (UTC)
• Support - per Kauffner. Khazar2 (talk) 04:18, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

Oppose - "Ivory Coast" has been a purely colloquial name for the country for years. Let's use the country's proper name, please. -Kudzu1 (talk) 05:03, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

• Comment changed to Oppose - I'm not sure how usual it is to have an unlisted pre-RM that doesn't show up on WP:AFRICA's alerts. I too was struck by the ngram per Dicklyon's comments. And frankly don't give a hoot what BBC says, there needs to be a WP essay WP:LOUSYSOURCES, that lists some of the weakness of news websites. I did a like-for-like search on both terms in Google Scholar with several key English hooks "+ africa" "+economy" "+trade" "+development" "+politics" and the results were:

• 17,400 for Cote d'Ivoire only
• 17,800 for Ivcry Coast only although a few were "Ivory Coast area" possibly meaning several countries

Not particularly different. I don't care either way. But it would have to be an RM argument presented using better methodology than Fox News rather than Britannica. Britannica is far from perfect, but it's a hell of a lot more encyclopedic than Fox News. In ictu oculi (talk) 05:20, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

change to Oppose - go with Britannica. Changed to oppose. Why? Saw Pam's note on Guardian style book below "Ivory Coast.. but isn't THE Ivory Coast" In other words "President of Ivory Coast". Well in that case "President of Cote d'Ivoire" gets more GBhits.

That and the fact that WP:AFRICA's alerts don't seem to be working, so WP:AFRICA editors may be unaware that this RM is even happening. In ictu oculi (talk) 07:59, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

• Support per Kauffner's nomination and my comments last year. This RM is probably a good case of why previous RM participants should not be notified of a new RM. The most recent one ended as "no consensus", so of course if you notify everyone who participated in that discussion it's a near certainty that the new discussion will also be no consensus. Jenks24 (talk) 05:26, 27 June 2012 (UTC)
• Oppose per Mewulwe, The Bushranger and Kudzu1. The official name should be used. MTC (talk) 05:28, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

We do not use "official names" in Wikipedia, else we would have "Republique du Francais", "Україна", etc. We use common English names. How do we determine common English names? Not just by looking up individual works such as Britannica, etc., but by looking at usage in media such as the New York Times, etc. So "Ivory Coast" appears in 20,300 results in the New York Times over the last year (the results seem way high, but I ran the search twice), but "Côte d'Ivoire" appears in only five results. In the Los Angeles Times "Ivory Coast" yields 37 results, while "Côte d'Ivoire" yields only four results. The Economist yielded four results for "Ivory Coast" over the past year and zero results for "Côte d'Ivoire" over the same period. It's not even a horse race when it comes to common usage in English, it is Ivory Coast. --Taivo (talk) 06:35, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

Your first point ("Not just by looking up individual works") is the key point here. Obviously individual publications will prefer one form or the other. But the majority of books published in the English language in last 20 years use Cote d'Ivoire. How can that possibly be if Ivory Coast is the common name? TDL (talk) 08:27, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

Like I've mentioned about Danlay, that source isn't too reliable as it still implies that we should us Stalingrad instead of Volgograd because it's "found more in books". What if in every book where Ivory Coast is written, they now also mention that an alternative name is (Côte d'Ivoire). Same for vice versa. Bezuidenhout (talk) 09:37, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

So then why did the usage of "Ivory Coast" drop at the same time as "Cote d'Ivoire" increased? Unless the world decided on mass to stop talking about the country at precisely the same time that it changed its name, this explanation makes no sense. Even if your explanation was true, the usage of "Cote d'Ivoire" is significantly higher (~33%) so there must be many books using that name alone. TDL (talk) 21:00, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

Adding "-Ivory Coast" doesn't seem to make much difference to the GBook results. A lot of the books that use "Cote d'Ivoire" are UN and official publications with specialist readership. Titles like Cote d'Ivoire: key indicators, Côte D'Ivoire - Selected Issues and Statistical Appendix, and Source Book for the Inland Fishery Resources of Africa give you the flavor. They must have OCR'd the IMF library. Kauffner (talk) 10:17, 28 June 2012 (UTC)

• Support - In watching/reading the news it's almost always Ivory Coast... even just this month BBC, LA Times and NY Times had articles on Ivory Coast. Does anyone really use Cote-dIvoire on a regular basis other than maybe France? Fyunck(click) (talk) 06:07, 27 June 2012 (UTC)
• Weak support Oppose: my gut feeling goes with an oppose, but the Guardian style guide, in which I have great faith, says "Ivory Coast" (but stresses that it isn't "The Ivory Coast"). PamD 07:05, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

But since then, although I've heard the BBC News using "Ivory Coast", I've found that the British Government uses "Côte d'Ivoire" as does the International Olympic Committee (though they list it as "Ivory Coast" among the Cs in the A-Z order on at least one page!). Clearly both names are very commonly used, but "Côte d'Ivoire" seems the way to go. PamD 07:56, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

• Oppose WP:USEENGLISH - We have two competing terms which are widely used in the English language. WP:IRS Wikipedia has continually improved to decide on content based on the reliablity of sources not on the shear number of them, a fact that WP:COMMONNAME also echos - Interesting in this connection is also WP:MODERNPLACENAME. The above numbercrunchings made by a few people show that the better sources actually favour the current title. The English language and with it the use of the terms we use for foreign countries and places is constantly evolving. We have to go with that flow and not try to stem the tide. Spain was mentioned as a counter example further above. The difference to Côte d'Ivoire is its respective age and importance in the English speaking world (remember the armada). My guess will be that if developments continue as now in 50 or so years Espania or even España will be at the stage Côte d'Ivoire is now. Somewhere along the line we will have that discussion again should we all live that long. Agathoclea (talk) 07:41, 27 June 2012 (UTC)
• Support - For the simple fact that everyone here in the UK uses Ivory Coast. Bezuidenhout (talk) 09:00, 27 June 2012 (UTC)
• Oppose - Thank you Laurent for putting a note on the corresponding French article. I strongly oppose this move for one reason as stated above. The official name of this country is "Côte d'Ivoire" not "Ivory Coast", though called the Ivory Coast in English. Ivory Coast can be redirected to Côte d'Ivoire and in the article's lead, the name Ivory Coast is already in bold. If Côte d'Ivoire is the name the inhabitants wish to use to refer to their country, then who are us to change it?Tamsier (talk) 11:39, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

Wikipedia does not base naming decisions on either official names or the desires of the residents. Its only criterion is common English usage. Read WP:COMMONNAME. --Taivo (talk) 12:19, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

• I'm sorry Tamsier but what a load of bulls**t, why don't you march on over to Burma and get that changed to Myanmar then? How about hop on over to South Africa and change that to Republic of South Africa (its official name). Could always change Bill Clinton to William Clinton, his official (birth) name?? I don't care about official names, this is about what WE call it, this is Wikipedia, not a foreign office. Bezuidenhout (talk) 12:27, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

• And since when do you have the right to say what inhabitants call it? If you look below you see that the inhabitants themselves call it Ivory Coast, I can't even imagine a person on the streets saying "Oh yes, I was born in "Cote d'Ivoire", English keyboards don't even have "ô" to spell the name correctly. Hence why in the past we use English alternatives for names such as Munich, Cologne or Copenhagen. Bezuidenhout (talk) 12:30, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

• Support. The evidence is clear. We call it what reliable English-language sources call it. And that's "Ivory Coast". We also aim to call it what a majority of readers would be expecting us to call it. And that's "Ivory Coast". Powers ^T 12:34, 27 June 2012 (UTC)
• Oppose; there are no new arguments here. We already know media uses both, in ratios that are possibly varying by context, sometimes geographically, and at least occasionally out of politics; and that it's possible to cherry pick sets that show almost exclusive use of one or the other. Picking one for the article name needs to be done as neutrally as possible (given that there are POV overloads on both version); and defaulting to what the country's official name is – and the name official bodies call it &nash; is the most rational action. USEENGLISH is a red herring, here, and smacks of colonialism. — Coren ^(talk) 12:38, 27 June 2012 (UTC)
  • Using the French name smacks of kissing up, which is something that wikipedia is not supposed to do. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 12:47, 27 June 2012 (UTC)
  • Furthermore, it was the French who originally colonized it. So retaining its French name is what really "smacks of colonialism". ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 11:23, 28 June 2012 (UTC)

• Oppose - but not overwhelmingly strongly. ALl the sources listed above in the box are news sources. News today is, in general, aimed at a comparatively illiterate audience. Even 30 years ago when I was in college (yes, I am that old) business periodicals were discussing that TV, including TV news, was more or less aimed at the average 14 year old - the same might apply to other media as well. I think perhaps a more reliable source for how the subject is discussed might be print books. I have only one right here in front of me, the first edition of the Appiah/Gates Africana encyclopedia, but it includes its article on this country under the name "Cote d'Ivoire." I do not see that the evidence provided above in the box necessarily helps decide how the subject is referred to in such sources, but I would consider those sources a better indicator, and the one I have here uses the Cote d'Ivoire name. Part of the reason for the print news not using the CI name is the "ô" in "Côte", which isn't really available on most English typewriters. If that is at least part of the reason, I would consider that to be a very weak basis or partial basis for changing an article name. John Carter (talk) 16:16, 27 June 2012 (UTC)
• Support Great to see Kauffner bringing one of his top-notch proposals to this topic. Burma and East Timor are the obvious examples. And the WP:COMMONNAME argument is unassailable; I doubt most English speakers can even pronounce "Côte d'Ivoire." --BDD (talk) 17:16, 27 June 2012 (UTC)
  • Another example is Taiwan, rather than the official Republic of China. --Born2cycle (talk) 17:21, 27 June 2012 (UTC)
• Support. It's the common, English name, as has been proven with reference to statistical data and individual, authoritative sources. Also, it's a lot easier and less surprising for readers to find and remember. Shrigley (talk) 17:28, 27 June 2012 (UTC)
• Neutral. Something seemed fishy about the ngrams. How could Kauffner's ngram be so different from TDL's ngram? I tried running them both with and without the mark over the "o" to see if that made a difference. Eventually, I figured out that TDL's ngram was using a lowercase "L" instead of an uppercase "i" - so, "lvoire" instead of "Ivoire". For whatever OCR mixed-up reasons, that seems to make a huge difference in results. So I ran another ngram, with all the permutations of "Ivory Coast", "Cote d'Ivoire", and "Côte d'Ivoire" with lowercase "l"s and uppercase "I"s. And what does it show? That "Cote d'Ivoire" caught and surpassed "Ivory Coast" around 1993. The greatest disparity was around 1997, but the gap has narrowed since, so that the two are nearly identical. To me, that indicates that either title is probably acceptable under WP's guidelines, as readers are about equally likely to encounter either title. If "Ivory Coast" continues to close the gap and regain predominance (does anyone know if ngrams will ever reach past 2008?), then we can revisit. But for now, there's no compelling reason to change. Dohn joe (talk) 18:48, 27 June 2012 (UTC)
  • COCA gives frequency numbers of 107 for "Ivory Coast" versus 6 for Cote d'Ivoire. So the above is a peculiarity of the Google Books database. Perhaps Googled OCR'd a shipment of UN-oriented material. Insights shows that vastly more readers are using "Ivory Coast" as a search term. Recognizability is Wiki's No. 1 titling criteria, per WP:NAMINGCRITERIA. Kauffner (talk) 19:29, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

Nope, it's not just a Google peculiarity. Using the NGRAMS downloaded from the COCA and COHA corpora of American English gives a frequency for Cote d'Ivoire of 245 and 140 for Ivory Coast.

And when I use the COCA without any filters I get a frequency of 469 for Ivory Coast, 245 for Cote d'Ivoire and another 210 for Cte d'Ivoire (obviously an OCR reading error of the former.) TDL (talk) 21:00, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

• Mind-numbingly obvious support. I'm both astonished and disappointed that previous volunteer time has to be wasted discussing something so breathtakingly obvious.

1. Côte d'Ivoire and Ivory Coast are both common names for the subject in various contexts.
2. One of them is French, the other is English
3. Since we're the English Wikipedia, the English translation is indicated.

This is exactly how the German, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, Dutch, Swedish, Hungarian, Danish, Polish, Norwegian and Czech Wikipediae deal with it, that's how we should deal with it. We definitely should not be pandering to nationalism, and it is ridiculous to politicise common sense with colonialist apologist nonsense, because that's all this should remain - common sense. WilliamH (talk) 20:25, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

Côte d'Ivoire is as English as afternoon tea. Just ask the Oxford Dictionary. Other language wikis are a) not reliable sources and b) don't base their titles on common usage in the English language. If Elfenbenskysten is the common name in the Dutch language than that should be the title and not Cote d'Ivoire. But that has nothing to do with the question of whether Ivory Coast is the common name in the English language. TDL (talk)

Since the other wikis obviously do not base their titles on English language, and that I am not citing them as reliable sources but instead for the bucket-loads of common sense they exude, both of those points are irrelevant. There is a clear and established measure of use of the anglo-centric term, therefore that's what should inform the English Wikipedia. I notice that some opposition calls for the country to be called by its official name — when can I expect to see the proposal to move Germany to Bundesrepublik Deutschland? WilliamH (talk) 22:12, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

You are comparing apples and oranges, Germany is called "Germany" in all English dictionaries, encyclopedia and media. The day "Deutschland" becomes the entry for Germany in the Oxford dictionary and Encyclopedia Britannica, I'm sure there will be discussion to change the name on Wikipedia. Laurent (talk) 01:34, 28 June 2012 (UTC)

• Oppose. This is a very long-discussed point of principle - that in WP:COMMONNAME we generally respect the right of a people to self-determination, as the UN does. This also hooks into the AmEng/BrEng issue as well (which always makes these discussions more fun) - using COCA as a source for a non-American subject is a surefire giveaway that the issue is being confused. It should remain at Côte d'Ivoire, until such time as the country changes its name. James F. (talk) 20:36, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

Err they are free to run their country as they see fit (well they aren't but unless you are suggesting war with France I think thats a bit outside our remit). That does not extend to being able to dictate to the English language how it should work.©Geni 20:43, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

I agree. As I said, we should not damage common sense with the irrelevant politicisation of language for its own sake. WilliamH (talk) 20:52, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

• Oppose per commonname and all the reasons mentioned in the last move discussion which failed to gain a consensus to move, nothing much changes in a a year, or is this an annual thing we have to keep discussing. MilborneOne (talk) 20:51, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

• Oppose No other argument than the politicization of the wiki.-Ilhador- (talk) 04:12, 28 June 2012 (UTC)
• Support per Kauffner. — JonC^ॐ 09:55, 28 June 2012 (UTC)
• Oppose Ok, this is enough. These regular RM's all across the project because WP:IDONTLIKEIT have now become disruptive to the project as a whole. The name of the country in English and French is Cote d'Ivoire. The well-used demonym "Ivorians" means very little: it is, after all, a "nickname" for all intents and purposes ... as is "Ivory Coast". Indeed, they do have the demonym "Ivoirian" as well. Once again, the term "Ivory Coast" itself is a region that expands beyond the borders of this country, and not a country itself. Yes it happens to be the direct translation of the actual name of the country. If you don't like the fact that the English Wikipedia happens to have names that appear to be French, I would invite you to stop using words in the project such as "transportation", and any other word that comes directly from French ... or indeed, those from other languages. (✉→BWilkins←✎) 11:34, 28 June 2012 (UTC)
• Support per nom. "Ivory Coast" is likely to be more recognizable than "Côte d'Ivoire". mgeo talk 20:03, 28 June 2012 (UTC)
• Support once more into the breach, dear friends, this is the common name, it is certainly what British television channels and most newspapers call its football team when it plays in the World Cup. PatGallacher (talk) 20:56, 28 June 2012 (UTC)
• Support - For the millionth time, Ivory Coast is supported by WP:AT and WP:ENGLISH, as it is Wikipedia policy to use English titles. It is more recognizable, and is what people will search for since it is easier to spell. The fact that the country calls itself that is completely irrelevant, as we don't call Germany Deutschland, etc. and it really makes no sense to keep it at Côte d'Ivoire any longer. P.S. I haven't been contributing to Wikipedia in a while, and I came to this page just to see of there was a move discussion so I could add my input once again. The fact that there just happens to be an open move discussion the 1st time I check is just sad. This issue is not going to go away, move the article already. --WikiDonn (talk) 22:48, 28 June 2012 (UTC)
• Support WP:COMMONNAME Bhny (talk) 11:16, 29 June 2012 (UTC)
• oppose and salt; either name is common, so default to official name of country. This continues to come up, and every time it ends with no consensus to move. This should be salted for at least 2 years before another nom can be put up - it's a waste of time.--KarlB (talk) 15:00, 29 June 2012 (UTC)
  • I know of no precedent (much less a policy or guideline) for defaulting to the "official name" in such cases. Did you just make that up? As far as I know, in a case like this -- where one name is clearly more recognizable (to English speakers) than the other -- we default to the more recognizable name. --Born2cycle (talk) 17:40, 29 June 2012 (UTC)
    • Here is the relevant guideline: [[3]]; to wit: "If no name can be shown to be widely accepted in English, use the local name."; there is a dispute about whether Cote D'ivoire or Ivory Coast is more widely accepted in English; thus, defaulting to the official/local name is a reasonable solution (and reading of the guideline). I point out simply that consensus has not been there for a move, and it's unlikely to be there this time. Why do people care so much? --KarlB (talk) 18:48, 29 June 2012 (UTC)
      • Well, sure, "If no name can be shown to be widely accepted in English,...". But that's not relevant here since Ivory Coast is widely accepted in English; that's not in dispute. --Born2cycle (talk) 00:14, 30 June 2012 (UTC)

"Ivory Coast is widely accepted in English; that's not in dispute." - Seriously? Have you been following this RM? That is the entire point of this debate. The guideline defines "widely accepted" as "the name most often used for this entity". While "Ivory Coast" is certainly used quite often, there is plenty of evidence that it isn't the most commonly used. I don't see how anyone can conclude that it is indisputably the most often used name for the country. TDL (talk) 01:14, 30 June 2012 (UTC)

• Oppose- Côte d'Ivoire is used in English and is the official name of the country. It is the best name and fine to use in an English encyclopedia. Bzweebl (talk • contribs) 19:31, 29 June 2012 (UTC)
• Oppose: The French name is official and widely used. --LauraHale (talk) 22:50, 29 June 2012 (UTC)
• Oppose The French name is the common name as well (and arguments can be made for both that or the Ivory Coast), but combining this stalemate with the fact that the French name is the official name means we should go with that one. Silverseren^C 01:13, 30 June 2012 (UTC)
• Comment Just a couple of minutes ago BBC News had a report on child labour in that country, it called it "the Ivory Coast". The BBC is one of the most important news sources there is in the English-speaking world. I rest my case! PatGallacher (talk) 01:22, 30 June 2012 (UTC)
  • See an online version of the report here: [4] . PatGallacher (talk) 01:33, 30 June 2012 (UTC)
    • See my recently added number above in the supporting evidence section for NPR in the US--almost seven to one in favor of "Ivory Coast". --Taivo (talk) 01:49, 30 June 2012 (UTC)
• Support The people I know from this country say they're from "Ivory Coast", because that's the only chance they have of being understood. Regardless of what the govt wants, saying Côte d'Ivoire when speaking English is like pronouncing Paris "Paree". — kwami (talk) 02:23, 30 June 2012 (UTC)
• No Consensus. Well there's a lot a material here and a lot to read. My personal experience is that it's always referred to as Côte d'Ivoire. Thirty-forty years ago that was not true. My big ol' atlas has Côte d'Ivoire. So does yours probably, again unless it's 30+ or so years old, since I would venture that few if any first-rate atlases use Ivory Coast. The nearby country of Sierra Leone is called that and not Lion Mountains, because that's what people call it. Same with Côte d'Ivoire, in my experience. Herostratus (talk) 04:14, 30 June 2012 (UTC)
  • You could spend less time with old atlases and take a look at news stories from the last week. Kauffner (talk) 10:48, 30 June 2012 (UTC)
    • Though I can understand why some want this move request, I keep being amazed that you're the one who started it. You must be British to be so one-sided. Though not British enough to care about all the British dictionaries and encyclopedia, which all go against your preferred name. Laurent (talk) 16:44, 30 June 2012 (UTC)
      • Well, if it comes down to it, I'd rather go with National Geographic and Rand-McNally etc. than Reuters and the BBC etc. It's a matter of choice I guess, which is why I say there's no consensus, so we might as well stick with the current state. Herostratus (talk) 16:56, 30 June 2012 (UTC)
        • It's because here in the UK we always hear Ivory Coast in football and in the news but NEVER do we hear of "Cote d'Ivoire". I would be really shocked if someone came up to me and asked if I watched the "Cote d'Ivoire" game, if someone would ask me if I've ever visited "Myanmar" I would understand and respond in terms of Burma but with Ivory Coast the distinction is not the same. Yes the dictionaries and government use CI, but then again those dictionaries (I will keep using this point) use United States of America. Bezuidenhout (talk) 16:59, 30 June 2012 (UTC)

Repeating your point about the USA doesn't make it true: [5], [6], [7], [8], [9]. TDL (talk) 17:57, 30 June 2012 (UTC)

• • • • • There's a political side to this discussion. Of course, British media, except the ones that *have* to be neutral if they want to be taken seriously (dictionary, encyclopedia - you know, like us), won't go for Côte d'Ivoire and will basically reject the wish of the Côte d'Ivoire government. Chinese media, on the other hand, who have lots of interest in Africa, won't reject the wish of the African governments and go with whatever name they want to use, in that case "Côte d'Ivoire". Laurent (talk) 16:46, 7 July 2012 (UTC)

• Support This is the English Wikipedia and if users are getting to a page via redirect from English to another language, the other language title would not be appropriate per WP:COMMONNAME. CityOfSilver 16:37, 30 June 2012 (UTC)

• Except, as has been argued above (and I point out just below), Côte d'Ivoire is the common name in English sources. Or at least it's more or less equal with Ivory Coast. Silverseren^C 20:00, 30 June 2012 (UTC)

• Supposing it was ever mentioned on a TV newscast, how did they pronounce it? ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 21:17, 30 June 2012 (UTC)

• Support It's about time this was changed. The "official"-based argument is absolute nonsense such as it is on the Derry article. In most media in the non-French Language it is known as the Ivory Coast, end of fucking story. People using the US-argument is a pathetic comparison from people who can't take everything as an individual case. --Τασουλα (talk) 18:33, 30 June 2012 (UTC)
  • You mean all of these non-French news sources that use Côte d'Ivoire? In fact, when I compare Côte d'Ivoire with Ivory Coast in Google News, I get 332,000 results for the former and 156,000 for the latter. Silverseren^C 20:00, 30 June 2012 (UTC)
    • How many times do I have bust this myth? Of the 154,000 examples of "Cote d'Ivoire" on Google News, 84,500 are in French. Kauffner (talk) 01:34, 1 July 2012 (UTC)
      • I'm still getting 332,000 results and 84,000 isn't enough to change that. Silverseren^C 02:00, 1 July 2012 (UTC)
        • That's not the number that comes up when I click the link you gave above. Kauffner (talk) 02:17, 1 July 2012 (UTC)
  • Can we please have no more of the Google-hit-counting tomfoolery? You should both be experienced enough to know that Google doesn't show the same thing to everyone, that counting Google page hits is not research, and that those numbers are only estimates anyway. Uncle G (talk) 12:17, 2 July 2012 (UTC)
• Comment - how about a moratorium on the naming issue until the article reaches Featured (or at least Good) status? There's seems a rather disproportionate amount of effort put into worrying about whether A is a redirect to B or vice versa, when it ought be abundantly clear by now that either is acceptable and neither is demonstrably superior to the other to the satisfaction of a majority of interested Wikipedians. Rd232 ^talk 19:04, 30 June 2012 (UTC)

Well I will go with whatever the outcome of this request move is and after this is finished (until the next RM) I will try and improve the article :) Bezuidenhout (talk) 19:57, 30 June 2012 (UTC)

• Oppose The usage in recent English news and academic sources is mixed with no overwhelming majority so there is no single common name to speak of. However, the current title is the official English name as sanctioned by ISO 3166. Since there is no single common name, it makes sense to go by what the internationally agreed upon English name is. 71.21.81.61 (talk) 05:34, 1 July 2012 (UTC)
• Weak support. "Ivory Coast" is an established English name. Very many of the interwiki links point to articles named "ivory coast" in the respective language, rather than "Côte d'Ivoire". I vaguely remember some Côte d'Ivoire politician demanding that the name of the country should be "Côte d'Ivoire" in every language in the world, but it wasn't actually taken seriously. JIP | Talk 07:12, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

strong support English Wikipedia and commonname; Its not even controversial jsut a translation unlike Macedonia and myanmar. At any rate, the official nam will alwyas be in the infobox and first sentence with bold ext.Lihaas (talk) 15:14, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

• Oppose. This has been debated on this page for years, and the arguments do not appear to have got stronger with time. The two names are more or less equally common in general English usage, which is what allows the debate to continue interminably; however, in such a case, it seems reasonable to go with what the expressed preference of the country, such as we can identify it. That provides a weak indicator for Côte d'Ivoire, but a weak indicator is all we're ever going to get here. Andrew Gray (talk) 14:49, 2 July 2012 (UTC)
  • The only claim of documented supported in this discussion for the use of the expressed preference of the country criterion is supposedly at Wikipedia:Naming_conventions_(geographic_names)#Use_English, but that says to use the "local name" only when "no name can be shown to be widely accepted in English", which is clearly not the case here. Many counter-examples from actual practice (search for "Taiwan" on this page) have been given above.

    Why should we follow a guideline that does not even apply when we can follow the recognizability criterion which obviously applies and is clearly laid out in policy? Ivory Coast is more recognizable to English users than is Côte d'Ivoire, which is borne out in the news reference stats from all over the English-speaking world, as provided in this proposal. Why do we have policy and guideline if we just ignore them? --Born2cycle (talk) 20:07, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

    • I am not sure I can agree with you that the "recognizability" argument automatically means using Ivory Coast - as a significant fraction of English-language uses refer to Côte d'Ivoire, it is presumably recognizable! The "use English" guideline is designed for cases where the local name and the English name are different; here, there are two widely used English names, one of which is the same as the local name. This is something of an edge case of the policy; we should be careful not to argue ourselves into an unhelpful result by reading it too closely. Andrew Gray (talk) 21:53, 2 July 2012 (UTC)
      • If you don't think "Ivory Coast" is significantly more recognizable than "Côte d'Ivoire" to most of our readers... we'll just have to agree to disagree. But surely "Ivory Coast" is more natural: "those that readers are likely to look for or search with as well as those that editors naturally use to link from other articles." Again this is criteria clearly stated in policy vs. a "use the official name" criterion that is not explicitly stated in any guideline, or implied by convention in practice. --Born2cycle (talk) 22:29, 2 July 2012 (UTC)
        • If I might butt in... I think the idea is that "Côte d'Ivoire" must be both recognizable and natural to an English speaker simply because a large number of English-language sources use it. If you encounter a term somewhere, then that term is how you recognize the subject. The question of recognizability is not "Which term sounds more English?", but "Which term is a speaker of English more likely to have encountered?" "Upper Volta" sounds much more English than "Burkina Faso". But sources now universally use the latter, so it is more recognizable and natural to use as the WP article title. Here, usage is quite split, as we've seen. But all that means is that recognizability and naturalness is a wash, and we have to look elsewhere to choose a title. Dohn joe (talk) 22:56, 2 July 2012 (UTC)
          • I think what we've seen is that references that favor official names, like certain encyclopedias do, tend to go with... the official name. But sources more frequently encountered on a daily basis - like major English papers, which is what both reflects and drives what is recognizable and natural - tend to go with Ivory Coast. --Born2cycle (talk) 23:53, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

"references that favor official names, like certain encyclopedias do" - Sorry, but that's just nonsense. I see plenty of examples of unofficial, common names being used by Britannica ([10], [11], [12], [13], [14]) and Columbia ([15], [16], [17]) encyclopedias. The article on Taiwan should be located at Taiwan (official or not) because that is its widely accepted English language name. However, in this case it's just not possible to look at all the evidence and conclude that Ivory Coast is the country's widely accepted English language name (ie the "name most often used for this entity"). Both names are often used in English with no convincing evidence that Ivory Coast is used any more frequently. TDL (talk) 02:06, 4 July 2012 (UTC)

Support let's use English name where it's applied. ༆ (talk) 18:45, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

AllAfrica: Côte d'Ivoire to Get More Than $4 Billion of Its Debt Cancelled By the IMF and World Bank

Jerusalem Post: Cote D'Ivoire endorses repatriation of migrants

Mail & Guardian Online: Cote d'Ivoire recruits child soldiers from Liberia

Global Times: UN concerned over detention conditions in Cote d'Ivoire's prisons

United States Central Intelligence Agency: COTE D'IVOIRE

United States Department of State: Cote d'Ivoire (Ivory Coast takes you to Cote d'Ivoire)

Come again? Silverseren^C 22:57, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

• Oppose, current usage is mixed. When there is no clear reason to do anything else, use the official local name. —Kusma (t·c) 09:09, 3 July 2012 (UTC)
• Strongly Oppose, The official name, as noted, is widely in use throughout the English press, by the U.S. State department, and is official at the UN. I don't understand Wikiluddites who have brought this issue up once again. Let's end this discussion and leave this article title alone. Charvex (talk) 18:18, 3 July 2012 (UTC)
• Support move to 'Ivory Coast' per WP:Naming conventions (use English). --→gab 24dot grab←22:03, 3 July 2012 (UTC)

  You did read the last sentance of Wikipedia:Naming conventions (use English)#Divided usage in English-language sources? Agathoclea (talk) 11:52, 4 July 2012 (UTC)

  Yes we did thanks, it says that if the usage of the name is mixed use the local. Well firstly locals of Ivory Coast introduce themselves to English-speakers as being from "the Ivory Coast", secondly (see above) usage in the media is overwhelmingly in favour of Ivory Coast anyway. Problem? Bezuidenhout (talk) 23:15, 6 July 2012 (UTC)

I thought we had already pretty thoroughly debunked that idea that "the media is overwhelmingly in favour of Ivory Coast." Why is it being asserted again? Dicklyon (talk) 00:11, 7 July 2012 (UTC)

Did you look at the chart in the nomination? On Highbeam, there are 43,582 hits for "Ivory Coast", 90 for "Cote d'Ivoire". Kauffner (talk) 07:23, 7 July 2012 (UTC)

Of course you get nearly zero hits for "Cote d'Ivoire" when you don't use the search tool properly. Highbeam actually gives 8,971 versus 36,075 for "Ivory Coast". And it's rather disingenuous to cite an article from 1963 (before the name changed) which use "Ivory Coast". Limiting the search to the last two years gives 3,598 for "Cote d'Ivoire" and 7,376 for "Ivory Coast". TDL (talk) 19:55, 7 July 2012 (UTC)

I stand corrected. English-language media usage for Ivory Coast in the last two years is "only" 67 percent of the total for Ivory Coast plus Cote d'Ivoire. What are the top two results for "Ivory Coast"? The Associated Press and the Christian Science Monitor. For "Cote d'Ivoire"? Press releases from the White House and the UN. I note that the usage rate for Ivory Coast is slightly higher (68 percent) in the last year. So if anyone is supporting the current title because they think there is a trend, they should think again. Kauffner (talk) 00:45, 8 July 2012 (UTC)

• Support If we're going to use a colonial language we may as well use the one we're all speaking. Either use Dioula or use English. ♥ «Charles A. L.» (talk) 16:51, 7 July 2012 (UTC)
• Note I requested closure of this at ANI. --KarlB (talk) 16:58, 7 July 2012 (UTC)

A few points of clarification:

• As I previously explained to the nominator the last time he proposed this move, the posted stats have failed to account for the limitations of the Optical character recognition software used to scan these books. When one properly takes this into account (ie that capital l's are frequently misinterpreted as small l's) a much more sensible ngram results: 30 years ago Cote d'Ivoire usage was near non-existent, but when the country changed its name in 1985, usage of this moniker began increasing rapidly while Ivory Coast dropped equally quickly. It overtook Ivory Coast around 1993 and has been more common ever since. Using the Corpus of Contemporary American English database one finds that Cote d'Ivoire has nearly double the frequency (245) of Ivory Coast (140).
• Cote d'Ivoire is far more commonly used in news sources. A Google news search shows that Cote d'Ivoire gets more than double the number of hits of Ivory Coast when restricted to English-language sources from 2012. Major news organizations such as The Economist and CNN prefer Cote d'Ivoire.
• Nearly all major English-language encyclopedias and dictionaries, including Encyclopedia Britannica, Columbia Encyclopedia, The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, Oxford dictionary, Cambridge dictionary, Collins dictionary, Google Maps and Bing Maps use Cote d'Ivoire over Ivory Coast.
• As for the Google insights numbers, they have relevance to WP:COMMONNAME which is dictated by "its prevalence in reliable English-language sources". Obviously random people who entered text into a search engine box aren't reliable. TDL (talk) 01:28, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

• It's good that you brought up the CNN entry, as it demonstrates the opposite of what you're claiming. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 01:42, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

• The use of the CNN link to support Coat d'Ivory is laughable. Every article linked from that page uses the English "Ivory Coast". —  AjaxSmack  02:30, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

• I guess he forgot to look at the details before he posted it. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 12:45, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

• Yeah, "Cote d'Ivorie" really is common on Google News. In French-language news sources. You know what? We heard this one before. Kauffner (talk) 02:19, 28 June 2012 (UTC)

• Yes, you're right! Cote d'Ivoire is more common! After this request move, can we move the article from Côte d'Ivoire to Cote d'Ivoire. I can't believe how silly we have been, you have clearly pointed out that without the "ô" is more common!!! LET'S HAVE ANOTHER REQUESTED MOVE.

Google Maps also used Ireland for Republic of Ireland, Myanmar for Burma and in Africa used "Congo" for the Republic of Congo. Bezuidenhout (talk) 13:47, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

• I realize this is original research but, in professional dealings with individual 10-20 Ivorians (although they were not UN/NGOcrats) over several years, I have only had one person introduce himself as from "Côte d'Ivoire". The remainder have simply stated they were from "Ivory Coast". So using the English name is clearly not a huge issue of contention or offense in this regard. —  AjaxSmack  02:30, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

• I checked the Corpus of Contemporary American English, but the frequency numbers I got were nothing like TDL's:

	2000-2004	2005-2009	2010-2012
Ivory Coast	142	53	107
Cote Ivoire	17	8	6

Kauffner (talk) 09:33, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

The numbers I posted comes from the raw NGRAMS data I downloaded from the COCA and COHA corpora of American English and gives a frequency for Cote d'Ivoire of 245 and 140 for Ivory Coast. Using your source (and taking into account OCR errors) gives:

	2000-2004	2005-2009	2010-2012	Total
Ivory Coast	142	53	107	469
Cote d'Ivoire	17	8	6	245
Cte d'Ivoire	26	126	45	210

Other minor corruptions I found where Cote d'lvoire (15) and Cte d'lvoire (8) (Totals). So again, there is no evidence that Ivory Coast is more commonly used. TDL (talk) 21:07, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

You are counting the OCR variants for "Cote d'Ivoire," but not for "Ivory Coast." This is hardly an honest effort. Even by the above numbers, "Ivory Coast" is still ahead. If you take the numbers as COCA gives them, "Ivory Coast" has almost twice the frequency of "Cote d'Ivoire". The usage rate for "Cote d'Ivoire" was 53 percent for 1995-1999, 10.6 percent for 2000-2004, 13 percent for 2005-2009, and 5.3 percent for 2010-2012. Perhaps usage is dropping rapidly, but more likely there is some problem with the earlier numbers. Kauffner (talk) 22:07, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

And it's equally plausible that there's a problem with the more recent data that you're using to support the move. You're using circular reasoning to dismiss any data that disputes your position as a "peculiarity" or a "problem" while justifying the move using data from the exact same sources that supports your position.

I looked for OCR variants of "Ivory Coast" as well and was unable to find any with significance usage. You are of course more than welcome to look for yourself and post your results. As it stands, the variants of "Cote d'Ivoire" outnumber those of "Ivory Coast". The claim that "Ivory Coast" is the common name just isn't supported by the evidence. TDL (talk) 23:09, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

If you want go by COCA data, please explain how 455 outnumbers 469. You are accusing me of committing circular reasoning by relying on COCA? The RM is based on the usage by news organizations, and doesn't even mention COCA. Kauffner (talk) 01:41, 28 June 2012 (UTC)

My apologies, I'll go slower this time. Adding up the "Cote d'Ivoire" variants we get: 245+210+15+8=478 > 469.

Your RM claimed Google NGRAM frequency data proved that Ivory Coast was the common name. When I demonstrated that in fact it actually showed the opposite, you dismissed it as a "peculiarity of the Google Books database" and argued that the COCA frequency data proved that Ivory Coast was the common name. Now that I've demonstrated that the COCA data doesn't show what you thought it did either, you dismissed it as a "problem with the earlier numbers" but continued to argue that the data proved your point. Every time the metric you choose ends up supporting Cote d'Ivoire you cherry pick the data that supports your position and dismiss any that disputes it as flawed. TDL (talk) 03:43, 28 June 2012 (UTC)

For 1990 to 1994, COCA gives a frequency of 140 (59 percent) for "Cote d'Ivoire." GNews suggests that there was near-zero English-language usage at this time. I knew about the problems with the COCA data before I posted my proposal, which is why I didn't include it. In my reply in Dohn joe, I pointed out that COCA shows a very different pattern of usage than Google Ngram does, and it does not appear that you are disputing this claim. Kauffner (talk) 05:10, 28 June 2012 (UTC)

• My search of the Economist also shows that the above claim about that publication is false. What the style guides to media say is irrelevant. What the journalists actually use is relevant. During the last year, four articles have used "Ivory Coast", zero have used "Côte d'Ivoire". Style guide be damned :p --Taivo (talk) 10:40, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

Perhaps your search failed; I see hundreds with cote d'Ivoire at www.economist.com in the past year. Dicklyon (talk) 21:59, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

No, Dicklyon, I used the Economist's actual web site search. I don't trust Google searches of a web site. --Taivo (talk) 03:37, 28 June 2012 (UTC)

Hmm, I get roughly 377 for Cote d'Ivoire using the Economist's website versus 39 for Ivory Coast. TDL (talk) 03:43, 28 June 2012 (UTC)

Ok guys, that's great to see that some American places are using the Coat d'Ivour, but not all English speakers are American, and in British English and South African English (since South Africa is on the same continent as Ivory Coast) they almost exclusively use "Ivory Coast" and these nations are the ones with the most relevance to the country as they are closer and have more historical ties! Bezuidenhout (talk) 07:21, 28 June 2012 (UTC)

Isn't The Economist a famously British rag? Anyway, both names are common in all English variants. Dicklyon (talk) 04:00, 29 June 2012 (UTC)

Yes it is. I was interested in the discrepancy, because such a difference could be relevant for the presentation of ghits in future. I think I can explain some of the difference. I went to the 10th page returned by Dicklyon's search and chose the phrase "Côte d'Ivoire capital" added the word "capital" to Dicklyon's search and re-ran it. It returns about 295 pages. What seems to have happened is that the Economist has internal links on 294 pages to the same one article. An internal Economist search returns just one page. That probably accounts for the difference. Looking at TDL's returns, it is not set to just the last year like Dicklyon's was. It is not clear to me how to set the Economist's search to just the last year. But one thing of note is that the Economist also lists where on its site the the article was originally published. But one should not rely on hits alone for example see the last paragraph of this Baobab (correspondent's blog) article "Côte d'Ivoire's UN peacekeepers: A cross-border attack" (June 10 2012) by S.A., it is a correction and includes the statement "Also a reference to the country as the Ivory Coast was left it when it should have been changed to Côte d'Ivoire." Which is a good example of why counting search returns without looking at them can be misleading. -- PBS (talk) 10:39, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

• I've opposed the move, but I'll add my latest research: the online Oxford English Dictionary defines "Ivorian" as "Of or pertaining to the Ivory Coast." or "A native or inhabitant of the Ivory Coast.". Not what I was hoping to find - but how often do they update the terminology used in their definitions, as opposed to the actual headwords of the dictionary, I wonder? Anyway, there it is. But please, let's just toss a coin and decide one way or the other and get back to improving the encyclopedia. This is so finely balanced that 49% of editors are going to be unhappy whichever way it goes. Just provide redirects from all imaginable heading, including all the lousy spellings which non-francophone readers might try, and get on with it. PamD 11:01, 28 June 2012 (UTC)
  • I won't be unhappy. It will simply provide more ammunition for the ongoing battle to prevent the English wikipedia from becoming the French wikipedia. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 11:17, 28 June 2012 (UTC)
• And another bit of research, this time on UK use: searching Hansard, the verbatim account of speech in the House of Commons, for exact phrases, finds 335 uses of "cote d'ivoire" and 713 of "ivory coast". Certainly not "almost exclusively", but a broad majority of use for the "Ivory Coast" version. PamD 11:08, 28 June 2012 (UTC)

• • Let's be honest here, how many people on wikipedia really type in "Côte d'Ivoire", there's so many places where you can make a spelling or grammatical mistake that I bet the majority of people on this wiki just type in Ivory Coast and wait to see if it redirects or not. I still have no idea how to get a "ô" using my keyboard, and I really doubt that people who aren't used to typing with funny accents and umlauts know how to either. So it seems that Côte d'Ivoire will almost always be found via a redirect. Bezuidenhout (talk) 11:35, 28 June 2012 (UTC)

You're right. Although I use a bilingual keyboard, I'm a lazy fucker and simply type Cote d'Ivoire ... so what? (✉→BWilkins←✎) 11:46, 28 June 2012 (UTC)

That is the purpose of redirects. They redirect from alternate names or common spellings. 99% of the people who use Côte d'Ivoire will type Cote d'Ivoire because it is easier to type and they know it will get them to the same page, not because they believe Côte d'Ivoire should be replaced with Cote d'Ivoire. Personally, I type Ivory Coast to get to Côte d'Ivoire. It isn't the correct title, but it is easier for me to type. What was the argument in your statement anyways? Ryan Vesey Review me! 13:57, 28 June 2012 (UTC)

The most important quality of a title is recognizability, according to WP:TITLE. In other the words, when the reader glances at the title, he should be thinking, "Yeah, this the article I'm looking for" not, "I wonder if I got misdirected to French Wikipedia." Kauffner (talk) 14:13, 28 June 2012 (UTC)

My point is some media really so use "Cote d'Ivoire", so all these sources claiming IV and CI are the same frequency is somewhat misleading as the later includes both spellings. Bezuidenhout (talk) 14:32, 28 June 2012 (UTC)

I think it is also worth checking some print media, as I said before. If anyone wanted to check The Statesman's Yearbook 2012, which I think is an extremly highly regarded reference source, it lists the country under the name Cote d'Ivoire. Other than Timor-Leste, one of the other listings, I think it is one of the few if only listings in that source in other than English. On that basis, I think that there probably is sound basis for saying that in several works, the English translation of the name of the country is, for whatever reason, unusually not used in this case, and, maybe, Timor-Leste. But I do think that book, and the fact that this is one of the few countries whose name is not presented in English translation in this book, is further evidence that the CI name perhaps should be used here. John Carter (talk) 17:40, 30 June 2012 (UTC)

• Comment: This talk page is now over 100 kilobytes in size, and only consists of discussion about the name of the country. I'd bet there is no other country in the world whose Wikipedia article has caused such a thing. JIP | Talk 04:45, 3 July 2012 (UTC)

Wikipedia's Burma and Taiwan are pretty similar beasts. Fyunck(click) (talk) 06:36, 3 July 2012 (UTC)

Let's look at what the Wikipedia:Naming conventions (geographic names) guideline has to say:

• Wikipedia:NCGN#Widely_accepted_name (first criteria):

-"Consult English-language encyclopedias (we recommend Encyclopedia Britannica, Columbia Encyclopedia, Encarta, each as published after 1993). If the articles in these agree on using a single name in discussing the period, it is the widely accepted English name."

-In our case, Encyclopedia Britannica, Columbia Encyclopedia and Encarta all use "Côte d’Ivoire". This is pretty strong evidence that it is the widely accepted English language name.

• Wikipedia:NCGN#General_guidelines

-"When a widely accepted English name, in a modern context, exists for a place, we should use it. This often will be a local name, or one of them; but not always. If the place does not exist anymore, or the article deals only with a place in a period when it held a different name, the widely accepted historical English name should be used. If neither of these English names exist, the modern official name, in articles dealing with the present, or the modern local historical name, in articles dealing with a specific period, should be used."

-At the very least, the evidence clearly shows that usage is divided. The guideline states that we should use the official name (Côte d’Ivoire) in the absence of a widely accepted name.

• Wikipedia:NCGN#Use_English

-"If a native name is more often used in English sources than a corresponding traditional English name, then use the native name."

-"If no name can be shown to be widely accepted in English, use the local name."

-This is in direct opposition to those who have argued that we should favour "Ivory Coast" because in their view it's real English. In fact, the guideline suggests that we should favour the local name (Côte d’Ivoire) in the absence of a widely accepted common name.

• Wikipedia:Naming_conventions_(use_English)#Divided_usage_in_English-language_sources

- "When there is evenly divided usage and other guidelines do not apply, leave the article name at the latest stable version."

-Again, usage is clearly divided and the guideline suggests that we should keep the article at the stable version. TDL (talk) 04:09, 29 June 2012 (UTC)

• • • The average reader has probably only ever heard of Ivory Coast, if that even. Meanwhile, since you can't type the name with a normal keyboard, some redirects will be needed. "Coat Diver", for example. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 04:49, 29 June 2012 (UTC)

The redirects are already effective for anyone who prefers to type Ivory Coast, whether they know how to use their keyboards to type accented letters or not. Dicklyon (talk) 04:54, 29 June 2012 (UTC)

So, you have no objections to my creating the Coat Diver redirect? Because I don't speak French, so I can't remember its French name. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 05:01, 29 June 2012 (UTC)

Sorry but this is getting ridiculous all those points you've mentioned above can be used for the same argument for moving Burma to Myanmar. Same goes for moving Republic of Ireland to Ireland. In terms of official names then lets move Derry to Londonderry (the official name is Londonderry but Derry is more common). And regarding the media, it is overwhelmingly for Ivory Coast so there is no "fine line" there. Can we also consider a move from United States to United States of America? Since the later is both the official name, but not really used as much in the media (such as in the case of IC/CI) Bezuidenhout (talk) 08:00, 29 June 2012 (UTC)

That's in WP:NCGN too: "Consult major news sources, either individually, or by using Lexis-Nexis, if accessible. If they agree in using a given name, it is widely accepted." And then there is this rule as well: "If a name is used in translating or explaining the official name, especially in texts addressed to an English-speaking audience, it is probably widely accepted." Here is Encarta: "Côte d’Ivoire (French for “Ivory Coast”)". We obviously can't follow all the NCGN rules. These rules don't exist just for their own sake anyway. They are tools to help us find the title that is recognizable to the most readers. Kauffner (talk) 00:20, 30 June 2012 (UTC)