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Archive 1Archive 2

Please stop the madness and deal with mass renaming of articles against Wikipedia:NC/GN now

Mass renaming (samples only)
Link Name of Voivodeship Number of search results
[1] "Warmian-Masurian Voivodeship" -wiki About 1,840,000 results
[2] "Warmińsko-mazurskie Voivodeship" -wiki ✗ About 15,900 results
[3] "Kuyavian-Pomeranian Voivodeship" -wiki About 1,140,000 results
[4] "Kujawsko-pomorskie Voivodeship" -wiki ✗ About 66,500 results
[5] "Greater Poland Voivodeship" -wiki About 3,130,000 results
[6] "Wielkopolskie Voivodeship" -wiki ✗ About 11,500 results
[7] "Łódź Voivodeship" -wiki About 745,000 results
[8] "Łódzkie Voivodeship" -wiki ✗ About 11,700 results
[9] "Lubusz Voivodeship" -wiki About 297,000 results
[10] "Lubuskie Voivodeship" -wiki ✗ About 8,350 results
(and more)
— LMK3 (talk) 06:05, 10 August 2011 (UTC)


The English language forms province (województwo) names differently than the Polish language. Polish uses the adjective form (e.g., "Warmińsko-mazurskie", which some render in English as "Warmian-Masurian"). English uses the noun form ("Warmia–Mazury").

For "Warmińsko-mazurskie", Google gives "Warmian-Masurian", 1,070,000; "Warmia–Mazury", 2,400,000.

Nevertheless, without checking all 16 Polish provinces on Google, I doubt that Google is going to give us a coherent set of English equivalents.

Two consistent approaches do come to mind, for rendering the Polish province names in English:

1. Use the original Polish adjectival versions, as just introduced by Spacejam2 ("Warmińsko-mazurskie");

2. Use the Polish-noun forms ("Warmia–Mazury").

Either approach seems preferable to the present arbitrary, inconsistent set of names on Wikipedia. Of the two approaches, the second is more consistent with normal English-language practice. Thus, in Canada there is no "Quebecian", "Nova Scotian", "British Columbian" or "Prince Edward Islandian" Province.

Nihil novi (talk) 07:51, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

There may be something to be said for changing these names, but it needs to do through a proper discussion and decision process, not just one editor deciding to change them all unilaterally. I've reverted the moves back to the names they were all at before; if anyone has a proposal to change them, please make it through the normal channels.--Kotniski (talk) 09:05, 10 August 2011 (UTC)
The main problem with the above given searches is that just putting "-wiki" doesn't do crap to screen out Wikipedia mirrors, LLC books and the like. It doesn't even screen out hits that have the word "wikipedia" in them. Looking at google books is much more illustrative. Just as an example, take "Warmian-Masurian Voivodeship" -wiki" vs. "Warmińsko-mazurskie Voivodeship" -wiki. "Warmińsko-mazurskie Voivodeship" gets only 9 hits, but all of them are legit outside sources. "Warmian-Masurian Voivodeship" appears to get 312 hits, but every single one is a Wikipedia reprint [11]. As with other cases, these "hits" are too an (erroneous) Wikipedia invention, not to anything that can be called "English naming".
Additionally the European Union and other English speaking organizations use the "Warmińsko-mazurskie Voivodeship" format for all these. Hence, the moves are in fact applying Wikipedia:NC/GN.
And frankly, I disagree with Kotniski. Naming conventions are a god awful mess that do nothing but cause trouble and nobody that isn't paying attention to them 24/7 knows exactly what the hell is going on with them, and even then they're ridiculously confusing and often self-contradictory. Moving all of them in this way is just applying "be bold" in a constructive manner.Volunteer Marek (talk) 09:20, 10 August 2011 (UTC)
Also agree with NN that the "Warmian-Masurian" format is about the worst possible. Why not "Wyomingian state"? "Suffolkian county"? Volunteer Marek (talk) 09:22, 10 August 2011 (UTC)
It's not constructive to make lots of moves which you know are controversial and are likely to be reverted. We have a system for proposing and deciding this sort of thing without creating drama - let's use it.--Kotniski (talk) 09:36, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

Google Books advanced search, not a eureka moment

Google Books advanced search (without PoD publishing)
Link Name of Voivodeship Search Description of individual items in Books
[12] "Warmian-Masurian Voivodeship" -Wikipedia -LLC -VDM 2 results 1. Debbie Jenkins (2008) Buying Property in Poland
2. MobileReference (2007), European History for Smartphones
[13] "Warmińsko-Mazurskie Voivodeship" -Wikipedia -LLC -VDM 8 results
(1 from UK) 		1. Poland UNDP Polska (Agenda ONZ), Social Exclusion and Interration in Poland
2. (repetition) Magdalena Muras (2006), Social exclusion and integration in Poland
3. Poland Polskie Towarzystwo Socjologiczne (2008), Polish sociological review
4. Italy Università commerciale Luigi Bocconi (2001), Rivista internazionale di scienze
5. Poland Edyta Banaszkiewicz-Zygmunt (2000), Poland: an encyclopedic guide
6. Poland Muzeum Archeologiczne (1999), Światowit Volume 42
7. Johanna Möhring (2005), Business clusters: promoting enterprise
8. Poland Instytut Geografii (2005), Europa XXI Volumes 12-14
9. Poland Instytut Historii (2006), Archeologia Polski Volume 51
[14] "Warmian-Masurian Province" -Wikipedia -LLC -VDM 1 result Krystian Heffner, Marek Koter Poland (2007), Regions in the process of European integration
[15] "Warmia–Mazury Voivodeship" -Wikipedia -LLC -VDM 2 results 1. Sylvain Giguère (2007), Baltic partnerships: integration, growth and local governance
2. Julian Auleytner (2006), Polish social policy: the forging of a social order
[16] "Warmia–Mazury Province" -Wikipedia -LLC -VDM 2 results 1. Bicentennial Pub. Corp (2000), New horizon Volume 25
2. Mike Bent (2005), Cantabrian Summer, Baltic Winter
— LMK3 (talk) 18:14, 10 August 2011 (UTC)
Google Books advanced search (without PoD publishing) <<-- NOT TRUE
Link Name of Voivodeship Search Description of individual items in Books
[17] "Warmian-Masurian Voivodeship" -Wikipedia -LLC -VDM 2 results 1. Debbie Jenkins (2008) Buying Property in Poland <-- looks like vanity press, and actually it says "Warminsko-Mazurkskie (Warmian-Mazurian). It's also at least partly based on Wikipedia [18]
2. MobileReference (2007), European History for Smartphones<<-- based on Wikipedia [19]
[20] "Warmińsko-Mazurskie Voivodeship" -Wikipedia -LLC -VDM 8 results
(1 from UK) 		1. Polska (Agenda ONZ), Social Exclusion and Interration in Poland Author is listed as "UNDP Polska" team; page 18 and thereafter: all units defined as regions, not as voivodeships, i.e. "Wielkopolskie, Mazowieckie, Małopolskie, and Pomorskie regions"... "Lubuskie, Wielkopolskie and Świętokrzyskie regions"... "Opolskie, Śląskie and Lubelskie regions"... and so on. Please compare, pages 18-20.[21]
2. (repetition) Magdalena Muras (2006), Social exclusion and integration in Poland <-- Actually this is United Nations, not "Polish" - "Polska" here refers to the subject not the publisher. [22] This is a reprint of the above, with identical layout, but more color added in plates.
3. Polskie Towarzystwo Socjologiczne (2008), Polish sociological review <-- Published in Poland, but nonetheless an ENGLISH language publication, with works by many non-Polish authors: [23] Please click on "From inside the book" and search further. Inspite of making changes in spelling the phrase "search - Warmińsko-Mazurskie Voivodeship - did not match any documents."
4. Università commerciale Luigi Bocconi (2001), Rivista internazionale di scienze <-- No, this is an English language journal which is published at University of Michigan. Author happens to be Italian, that's all. Text is in English. The author is not only from Italy, he writes his dissertations in Italian, see: inauthor:"Tullio Bagiotti". Who's the translator?
5. Poland Edyta Banaszkiewicz-Zygmunt (2000), Poland: an encyclopedic guide
6. Poland Muzeum Archeologiczne (1999), Światowit Volume 42
7. Johanna Möhring (2005), Business clusters: promoting enterprise
8. Poland Instytut Geografii (2005), Europa XXI Volumes 12-14 <-- Academic journal published in Poland but in English [24]
9. Poland Instytut Historii (2006), Archeologia Polski Volume 51
[25] "Warmian-Masurian Province" -Wikipedia -LLC -VDM 1 result Krystian Heffner, Marek Koter Poland (2007), Regions in the process of European integration
[26] "Warmia–Mazury Voivodeship" -Wikipedia -LLC -VDM 2 results 1. Sylvain Giguère (2007), Baltic partnerships: integration, growth and local governance
2. Julian Auleytner (2006), Polish social policy: the forging of a social order
[27] "Warmia–Mazury Province" -Wikipedia -LLC -VDM 2 results 1. Bicentennial Pub. Corp (2000), New horizon Volume 25
2. Mike Bent (2005), Cantabrian Summer, Baltic Winter
Let's not split hairs. — LMK3 (talk) 05:15, 11 August 2011 (UTC)
? Volunteer Marek (talk) 09:12, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

Google Books, Google Scholar and general search summary (sample)

Google advanced search (without PoD publishing) beginning from current title
# Warmian-Masurian Voivodeship (województwo warmińsko-mazurskie) General search Books Scholar
1. "Warmian-Masurian Voivodeship" -Wikipedia -LLC -VDM ~ 1,560 K    [28] 2    [29] 8    [30]
2. "Warmia-Masuria Voivodeship" -Wikipedia -LLC -VDM ~ 1 K    [31] 0    [32] 0    [33]
3. "Warmińsko-Mazurskie Voivodeship" -Wikipedia -LLC -VDM ~ 14 K    [34] 9    [35] 45    [36]
4. "Warmia-Masuria Province" -Wikipedia -LLC -VDM ~ 30 K    [37] 2    [38] 5    [39]
5. "Warmian-Masurian Province" -Wikipedia -LLC -VDM ~ 4 K    [40] 1    [41] 7    [42]
6. "Warmińsko-Mazurskie Province" -Wikipedia -LLC -VDM ~ 11 K    [43] 7    [44] 53    [45]
That's how Betamax died. — LMK3 (talk) 17:49, 12 August 2011 (UTC)
Again, the two gbook hits for "Warmian-Masurian Voivodeship" in fact are PoD/Wikipedia mirrors.Volunteer Marek (talk) 09:14, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

As you probably already know, Google results are often greatly overestimated. When you add a word at the end of the phrase (e.g. "and"), and choose the option of showing 100 results every time, you get more reliable results:

"Warmia-Masuria Province and" = 8

"Warmian-Masurian Province and" = 6

"Warmia-Masuria Voivodeship and" = 31

"Warmian-Masurian Voivodeship and" = 57

So the differences seem to be less than 10-fold, rather than 1000-fold Sylwia Ufnalska (talk) 20:20, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

I'm not sure what "option of showing 100 results" means, but my personal favorite, ""Warmia-Mazury Province and", gets 96. So someone at least shows good sense. Nihil novi (talk) 06:23, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

Polish provinces in Anglophone sources

"Local government in Poland is organized on three levels. The largest units, at the regional level, are the województwa (provinces), which were consolidated and reduced in number from 49 to 16 in 1999. At the next level are some 300 powiaty (counties or districts), followed by about 2,500 gminy (towns and rural communes)."

Page 931 features a map of Poland with the province locations indicated, and below it an alphabetical listing of the 16 provinces by their Polish names, complete with diacritics, without any attempt to Anglicize.



"Following the reform of the administrative structure in 1973-1975, the number of provinces (województwa) was increased from 22 to 49, of which three are the metropolitan cities of Warsaw, Łódź, and Kraków.... [I]ncreasing the number of provinces meant the reduction of each in size. In this way Warsaw was able to dilute the political importance of the provincial party chiefs."

Page 302 alphabetically lists the former 49 Polish provinces, named for principal city, explicitly as "provinces".

Nihil novi (talk) 05:22, 19 August 2011 (UTC)


GOVERNMENT... Administrative divisions: 16 provinces (wojewodztwa, singular–wojewodztwo): Dolnoslaskie (Lower Silesia), Kujawsko-Pomorskie (Kuyavia-Pomerania), Lodzkie, Lubelskie (Lublin), Lubuskie (Lubusz), Malopolskie (Lesser Poland), Mazowieckie (Masovia), Opolskie, Podkarpackie (Subcarpathia), Podlaskie, Pomorskie (Pomerania), Slaskie (Silesia), Swietokrzyskie, Warminsko-Mazurskie (Warmia-Masuria), Wielkopolskie (Greater Poland), Zachodniopomorskie (West Pomerania).

The same information appears in the online CIA World Factbook ("Government" --> "Administrative divisions")
Please note: Above, where "English translations" of province names are given, they are in the noun ("Silesia"), not the adjective ("Silesian"), form.

Nihil novi (talk) 01:43, 2 September 2011 (UTC)

Basic question

When foreigners coming to Poland hear for the first time "Greater Poland Voivideship", what do they usually associate it with? I guess that they think "something greater and Polish, but I have no idea what it is". When they hear "Wielkopolska Province", they simply think "a large administrative unit named Wielkopolska". Some Wikimedians say that we're not responsible for what happens outside Wikipedia. But we want Wikipedia to be a source of reliable and understandable information, used by everybody. Don't we? Sylwia Ufnalska (talk) 22:49, 8 October 2011 (UTC)

Very well said.
Which is why Encyclopaedia Britannica, The Encyclopedia Americana, The Columbia Encyclopedia, and The CIA World Factbook ("Government" --> "Administrative divisions") render "województwo" as "province".
I agree about keeping "Wielkopolska" in the original Polish rather than rendering it as "Greater Poland", if only to prevent confusion with "Greaters" such as Greater London, Greater Khorasan, or the Greater German Reich. Nihil novi (talk) 04:29, 9 October 2011 (UTC)
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