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Question regarding American/Commonwealth Spellings

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eroock Since: Sep, 2012
#1: Dec 27th 2022 at 9:17:26 AM

American and Commonwealth Spellings lists four items as a guideline on how to handle the differences in English spelling to prevent editing wars over it:

What I am missing is the concern about consistency. Let's say, a page (that is not thematically British or American) was started in British English, then a couple of years later there is now 80% American and 20% British spelling present because: users. If I come in today, I would not know which spelling came first and I am not tempted to check the history to make sure. What I am seeing is an overridingly American-styled text.

Shouldn't the guideline at this point be to go with the flow and allow the few examples of British English to be changed to American instead of insisting on what came first? Whoever was to complain about my "consistency fix" clearly did not care about it in the past.

Opinions?

Edited by eroock on Dec 27th 2022 at 7:21:19 PM

SebastianGray (4 Score & 7 Years Ago)
#2: Dec 27th 2022 at 9:23:02 AM

[up]I have always seen it that there should be consistency within individual examples, not necessarily across the page itself. Individual examples are meant to stand on their own after all.

Karxrida from Eureka, the Forbidden Land Since: May, 2012 Relationship Status: I LOVE THIS DOCTOR!
#3: Dec 27th 2022 at 3:03:21 PM

While examples should obviously stand on their own, it's still incredibly jarring when reading down the list and seeing two completely different spellings for the same word.

I've personally wanted to implement a site-wide standard for years, but obviously that's not going to happen. I do think individual pages should be consistent, at least.

SeptimusHeap from Switzerland (Edited uphill both ways) Relationship Status: Mu
#4: Dec 28th 2022 at 12:28:07 AM

I think one problem might be that not everybody can keep to a consistent style. Many people only know one of the two spellings.

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Tabs Since: Jan, 2001
#5: Dec 28th 2022 at 12:56:57 AM

You also can't expect someone who wants to add an entry to read the entirety of the page, determine which style it uses (including national ties and/or which came first), and write in the style.

bowserbros No longer active. from Elsewhere Since: May, 2014
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#6: Dec 29th 2022 at 9:59:19 PM

Another problem has to do with the fact that American English isn't recognized as correct by many Commonwealth English spell-checkers, and vice-versa. I've had a few moments where I changed styles of English because they were marked as wrong by my browser's spell-checker and I didn't realize that they were correct Commonwealth spellings (e.g. "defense" vs. "defence").

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#7: Dec 29th 2022 at 10:24:40 PM

Right, I've done it before too.

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Karxrida from Eureka, the Forbidden Land Since: May, 2012 Relationship Status: I LOVE THIS DOCTOR!
#8: Dec 29th 2022 at 11:02:29 PM

I only know some of the spellings through osmosis (plus I have relatives in England that I've visited), but some still slip through.

It's way too easy to violate the rule without realizing it.

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#9: Dec 29th 2022 at 11:24:56 PM

I'd be adamantly against picking one or another spelling standard if for no other reason than we'd have to rename Grey-and-Gray Morality and the two different spellings is too poetic to discard.

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Karxrida from Eureka, the Forbidden Land Since: May, 2012 Relationship Status: I LOVE THIS DOCTOR!
#10: Dec 29th 2022 at 11:49:01 PM

Even if we did standardize the spellings, I don't see why that trope specifically needs to have its name changed. Plus Americans apparently use both anyway.

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#11: Dec 30th 2022 at 11:43:10 AM

[up] American here, we do use both spellings.

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#12: Dec 30th 2022 at 11:44:13 AM

I use both just because I always forget which one is "correct", lol.

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Mrph1 he/him from Mercia (4 Score & 7 Years Ago) Relationship Status: This is not my beautiful wife!
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#13: Dec 30th 2022 at 11:59:39 AM

I have always seen it that there should be consistency within individual examples, not necessarily across the page itself. Individual examples are meant to stand on their own after all.

That's my view as well. Consistency across the whole page breaks down (or adds a whole lot of extra complexity) once you start crosswicking.

I'd actually go a step further - when we end up with two- and three-bullet indents, I'm comfortable with each being considered in its own right, rather than everything under the top-level single bullet having to stay consistent.

Essentially, I think tropers shouldn't have to stray from their own version of English unless they absolutely have to. Which makes editing easier for everyone, hopefully. As ever, ymmv.

Edited by Mrph1 on Dec 30th 2022 at 8:30:00 PM

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#14: Dec 30th 2022 at 4:11:53 PM

[up] Plus the arguments over which one is the "correct" English would be a colossal headache.

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Karxrida from Eureka, the Forbidden Land Since: May, 2012 Relationship Status: I LOVE THIS DOCTOR!
#15: Dec 30th 2022 at 7:13:26 PM

American here, we do use both spellings.

I use both just because I always forget which one is "correct", lol.

I'm also American, I just didn't know what the default one was supposed to be lol.

bowserbros No longer active. from Elsewhere Since: May, 2014
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#16: Dec 30th 2022 at 8:14:15 PM

From the looks of it, "gray" vs. "grey" seems to be in a similar position as "disc" vs. "disk." Both are acceptable spellings in American English, but are more appropriate for different contexts. The difference though is that with the gray/grey distinction, it's a lot more ambiguous than disc/disknote .

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Wyldchyld (Old as dirt)
#17: Jan 6th 2023 at 5:36:24 AM

I've always interpreted it as consistency within an entry and not across an entire page.

There is a big problem with the "entire page" option in that it'll automatically become "American English only" even if that's not the official policy (making it a back-door policy by accident). That's because it's very common for tropers to go through an entire page and change it all to American English. This has happened to me several times in the past, where I've created a page from scratch, so it's in British English from start to finish, then a troper comes along later on down the line and changes the entire page to American English. These days, I'd PM the troper about "first come" policy, but even today, I'm not sure I'd change it back.

As to implementing a one-standard policy across the site, I don't think that'll work. Just as people here are saying they do get caught out at times because their spellcheckers don't acknowledge Commonwealth spellings as correct, the same is true in reverse. It's an international site, and just as many Americans don't know what's acceptable Commonwealth spelling (I constantly catch people by surprise with my spelling of "focusses", for example), the rest of us don't always know what's acceptable American spelling. I thought I was pretty aware of the American spellings, but I do get caught out on occasions.

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Mrph1 he/him from Mercia (4 Score & 7 Years Ago) Relationship Status: This is not my beautiful wife!
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#18: Jan 6th 2023 at 5:42:13 AM

[up] All of this. I send notifiers if I spot someone changing International spelling/grammar when it's not a wider rewrite of the example, but changing it back often feels like a poor use of time.

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