Talk:Quebec City

Infobox title

It strikes me as a little peculiar that there are three names for Quebec City in the infobox. I agree that both "Ville de Québec" and "Quebec City" should be in there in whatever order, but I'm not convinced just "Québec" belongs in there. Let alone first on the English Wikipedia.--MTLskyline (talk) 06:00, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

I gave it the same setup as the title in the Montreal article. Ville de Québec is now in the "official name" field, and Quebec City is in the "other name" field. --MTLskyline (talk) 03:49, 18 February 2010 (UTC)

The name of the city is Quebec. Before there was a province of Quebec, there was only "Quebec", not "Quebec City". Now, the name Quebec City is often used in English, but Quebec remains a possible name, and is often used when there is no risk of ambiguity, in much the same way that "New York" can be used in lieu of "New York City." In fact, the official name is "New York", I believe. 82.120.187.159 (talk) 16:47, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

No one outside of Quebec would use "I'm going to Quebec" over "I'm going to Quebec City" ... There is never "no risk of ambiguity". It would cause confusion. New York is used because of it's overwhelming popularity over the State of New York. Po' buster (talk) 17:55, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

The federal government of Canada in Ottawa does use "city of Québec": [1] (Google search for "city of Québec" on gc.ca domain, counting only documents in English)

..and the same government also uses (to a lesser extent) "at Québec": [2] (Google search for "at Québec" on gc.ca domain, counting only documents in English) -- Mathieugp (talk) 19:56, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

"City of Quebec" is not "Quebec" ... Plus it's common English usage, not some random government document which determines what is used. Quebec is the name of the province, which is much more known than Quebec City, therefor "Quebec City" is used. If there was a "Manitoba City" it wouldn't be referred to as "Manitoba". It would create confusion. Po' buster (talk) 20:29, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

We're still doing this? I thought this was settled a thousand times. Dbrodbeck (talk) 10:50, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

The point was to show that the federal government, not just the government of Québec, 1) does use Québec with an accent even in English and 2) that "at Quebec" is used much in the same manner as in French when we say à Québec. Also, the only official name of the city is Ville de Québec, in any language, anywhere on the Earth or in the Universe, as per the city's charter of incorporation[3]. Same for Ville de Montréal. Of course, we understand that Montreal City and Quebec City, without accents, are common in English, possibly most common, but in official documents by the federal government, it is not uncommon to see Québec and Montréal. Probably because some of the people in Ottawa actually read our laws at some point! ;-) -- Mathieugp (talk) 14:09, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

This topic has been debated in full already. Done. Po' buster (talk) 14:16, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

That's not the issue. Nobody is questioning the general guidelines at WP:CANSTYLE/WP:PLACE. They make perfect sense. And there is nothing in those guidelines stating that what is commonly used by the federal government is not worthy of mention. Maybe putting all possible variations of a name in the lead is not a good idea, but in a note maybe? -- Mathieugp (talk) 17:02, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

Yeah, I think a footnote is a good compromise. I don't think the lead or the infobox should be filled up with alternate (but more or less equivalent) terms. Quebec City is by far the most common version in English, but if the federal government recognizes it as just "Québec", then I think it should definitely be mentioned in a footnote.--MTLskyline (talk) 00:18, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

I think the most basic English name for the city is Quebec, not Quebec City. We say (or said) "the Quebec Nordiques", not "the Quebec City Nordiques". I added Québec as a possible name in English some time ago, since it is the official name. It was removed by Po'Buster, but I've now added it back. 82.124.231.13 (talk) 07:41, 15 May 2010 (UTC)

Not sure my comments are intended to change anything, but people outside Quebec must use the word "city" to distinguish it from the province. Granted, when used as an adjective for a sports team or whatever, the "city" is unessential, since it is implied. Student7 (talk) 12:17, 18 May 2010 (UTC)

The official name of the city (in Canadian English) is Québec, while the province is Quebec (with Québec being optional), according to the Canadian Style available on TERMIUM. "All other municipalities have only one authorized form: thus Montréal and Québec (the city) retain their accents in English." This also serves to differentiate the city from the province in written English and negates the requirement of placing 'city of' before the name every single time. Also, the applicability of the 'common usage' argument is slightly dubious in this case, as the accents are most often omitted simply because the vast majority of people don't use Canadian French keyboard layouts, and thus the addition of the accent is either impossible or incredibly inconvenient and time consuming.Trackratte (talk) 00:38, 26 March 2012 (UTC)

Wikipedia uses common names in preference to official names, see WP:COMMONNAMES. In, for instance, news media stories, books, and practically any other source, "Quebec City" is far, far more common. -- P.T. Aufrette (talk) 01:21, 26 March 2012 (UTC)

Absolutely, which has been discussed ad nauseam. I'm not advocating touching the article title or the text. There is no 'English name' or French name for the city, there is only one name, and that is Québec, which is maintained by the city itself (which is pretty much the authority on how to spell it's own name), as well as the Province of Quebec, and the Government of Canada (all in English). Thus, the title in the infobox should be Québec, with Ville de Québec underneath to be in line with the rest of the city articles such as Vancouver, Calgary and Montreal (it's not City of Montreal / Ville de Montréal, it's just Montréal / Ville de Montréal), and should remain as Quebec or City of Quebec for the entirety of the article. While the actual name would be in the infobox, the common and accepted name would be in the article title and the article text, meeting the intent of Wikipedia's guidelines, while seeing reasonable accommodation to both sides of the argument. Trackratte (talk) 03:19, 26 March 2012 (UTC)

Absolutely not. Wikipedia english articles use the common english usage. It's Quebec City. UrbanNerd (talk) 03:28, 26 March 2012 (UTC)

Which Wikipedia itself states is not a hard and fast rule, but advice to guide editors, a principle which would continue to be followed, without blithely misspelling the name in the infobox. In any event, both spellings are used in common usage (google news) on a daily basis, but that's largely irrelevant. I'm positing that either something like (officially Québec) be added at the very beginning, or Québec be added to the info box in line with other articles to highlight that common usage is not in line with official usage (such as Canadian Coat of Arms, Government of Canada, etc), as well as to offer a suitable compromise to both sides of the debate. Trackratte (talk) 03:48, 26 March 2012 (UTC)

We already have an official_name field in the infobox, as you've noted. Wikipedia isn't a platform to advocate or promote a preferred usage; rather, we describe the existing common usage, which is observed to be overwhelmingly "Quebec City". Using common names is a pretty firmly established practice; generally we deviate from it only in certain exceptional circumstances, for instance where the common name might introduce confusion or ambiguity (animal or plant species might have several different common names in different countries or regions, or many different species might share a common name like "dogfish" for instance). In the case of Quebec City, there isn't any such ambiguity or confusion. -- P.T. Aufrette (talk) 06:32, 26 March 2012 (UTC)

• Note that even the city's own website says "Québec City" in its English pages (see [4] and several others).
• Also the National Assembly website also refers to "Québec City", at [5]

-- P.T. Aufrette (talk) 07:01, 26 March 2012 (UTC)

That's exactly my point. Where you place the word city isn't really the issue, as it's just a descriptor. The issue is the accent (é). Normally when what is seen to be common usage deviates from truth, it is noted within the article. In any event, I'm not even sure about the lack of the 'é' constituting common usage. All three levels of government (federal, provincial, and the city itself) use 'Québec' in English. The Montréal MoS says to use 'City of Québec' in English and not 'Québec City' (City of Calgary not Calgary City, City of Vancouver not Vancouver City, etc). The Oxford Guide to Canadian English Usage (2007) notes both spellings on page 476 (which is based off of common usage, for example when words fall out of usage, they are removed from subsequent editions). A quick google news search yields both 'é' and 'e' versions. Most English media outside Quebec (Globe, CP) seem to use the 'e' version in their MoS. One would think that the burden of proof would fall to proving that the official use is decisively out of common usage and not the other way around. Regardless, it hardly matters, save that I think such widespread use of both versions in Canadian English warrants at least a mention. Something like "Quebec City (officially known as the City of Québec)...." for example, would fit Wikipedia's guiding policy, as well as nicely dovetail official with perceived common usage, and negate any further discussion of the matter. Trackratte (talk) 07:22, 26 March 2012 (UTC)

It's not "City of Québec" or some other variant, it's specifically "Quebec City" that is the overwhelmingly common usage that can be observed. Like "Mexico City", it's an integral part of the name. It's not an optional descriptor à la "New York City" or "City of Rio de Janeiro". Regarding accents, if we work backwards from the observed common usage (eg, in the Montreal Gazette, etc) to try to derive some kind of rule of thumb, the practice for terms of Quebec French origin seems to be to retain accents in almost all cases because the French pronunciation is used in English too; however, in the very few cases where a thoroughly Anglicized pronunciation has existed for a couple of centuries and has been used for all that time by native residents of English mother tongue, then using the accents seems like an affectation. Thus, we pronounce "Kwuh-bek" and write "Quebec", but if talking about the region "Centre-du-Québec" we keep the accent and the French pronunciation (perhaps mangled a bit to "Kay-bek"); likewise we pronounce "Monn-tree-all" and write "Montreal", but for the university we write "Université de Montréal", with accents and with French-like pronunciation. PS, you seem to draw a sharp distinction between common usage and "truth", but if you are descriptivist rather than prescriptivist, the common usage is the truth. -- P.T. Aufrette (talk) 15:29, 26 March 2012 (UTC)

Also: governments may have an interest in promoting certain linguistic or orthographic usages or practices, but Wikipedia does not. Wikipedia does not provide a platform for publicizing and promoting any particular usage. Even if a government decrees a name change by fiat, we wait a while to see if it really has been adopted by the majority in practice. It took a few years before we changed the names of the articles about the former Bombay, Madras, and Calcutta, because for a time newspapers and other media kept using the old names (and a few still do). We still have an article at Mecca because Makkah has not caught on. We have an article at Dollard-des-Ormeaux rather than Dollard-Des Ormeaux because in practice the officially-prescribed orthography is ignored by English-language news media and by the city itself. And so forth. -- P.T. Aufrette (talk) 15:58, 26 March 2012 (UTC)

Right, but if we're so hung up on everything being English and common use, why is the 'official name' portion of the infobox in French? My whole point is that City of Québec is the official name in English. This would also bring it inline with all of the other infoboxes for other cities. My original contention wasn't with the title or the text, but with the infobox. Trackratte (talk) 17:11, 26 March 2012 (UTC)

The common english usage is "Quebec City" therefor that is what is used. Period. UrbanNerd (talk) 02:25, 27 March 2012 (UTC)

- Thankyou P.T. Aufrette for all the time and effort in your replies. I appreciate that name=Quebec City is thoroughly entrenched (although in passing, New York City has just New York in the infobox). However, offical_name= is in French. Being an English language Wikipedia, and with the abundance of references pointing to there being only one official name for it (regardless of language), why have we translated "City of" to French? For infobox official names for example, NYC has simply "The City of New York", Panama City has "Panamá" (with accent), and Mexico City has "City of Mexico" in both English and Spanish. Should this article, within the official title box, not then read either "Québec" or "City of Québec", with or without the French translation (although it was already mentioned somewhere as being tedious to have three names)? Trackratte (talk) 05:57, 27 March 2012 (UTC)

Given that the only official language of Quebec is French, I'm not sure there is an official English name. "City of Québec" sounds like an English translation of the official French name rather than an official English name. In any case, you don't find that phrase, written as such, at the city's website http://ville.quebec.qc.ca or at the official repertories of names at http://www.mamrot.gouv.qc.ca/ or http://www.toponymie.gouv.qc.ca/ ; by contrast, "Ville de Québec" is prominent on every page of the city's website. Regarding Mexico City, I don't know; perhaps the local authorities have actually given themselves an official name in English, or perhaps the editors of the Mexico City article have simply taken it upon themselves to provide an English translation of the official name, for the benefit of readers who don't know that "ciudad" means "city" in Spanish; their choice to do so doesn't necessarily set a precedent for us. Regarding simply "Québec", there are actually native_name and native_name_lang fields available if we were so inclined. The official name wouldn't be the plain name, it would be the legal status + the plain name, in French, eg, "municipalité de paroisse de X", "municipalité de canton de Y", "municipalité des cantons unis de Y", "municipalité de village de Z", "ville de A", etc. -- P.T. Aufrette (talk) 14:23, 27 March 2012 (UTC)

15.04 Names of inhabited places Only two municipalities in Canada have two official forms of their names, one in English and one in French: Grand Falls and Caissie Cape in New Brunswick, which are also known officially as Grand-Sault and Cap-des-Caissie. All other municipalities have only one authorized form: thus Montréal and Québec (the city) retain their accents in English. - The Canadian Manual of Style, p. 264, Dundurn Press, Toronto

I'm completely on board with whatever works best for the article according to the consensus already established for this article. However, if we are going to have an "official name" in the info box in an English Wikipedia, I believe that it should be the official English name, which according to the linked MOS and the GoC, does exist (Québec). Which, to be in line with every other city, requires the "city of" differentiation, thus "City of Québec" for the official name, and Quebec City for the common name. Trackratte (talk) 07:55, 4 April 2012 (UTC)

Mya was here boo boo I think that this page should be Québec City or Québec (city). To someone from the province, Quebec completely looks wrong. In addition to the above discussion, colloquially people are from Québec, not Ville de Québec or Québec City. "Québec" is by all means an adequate name for the city. The French wiki has it listed as (Québec (ville)). In addition for the accent to be included, at the English website, Québec is always spelled Québec and never Quebec. Let's spell the bloody thing properly. :) Captain Courageous (talk) 21:47, 13 March 2010 (UTC)

This has come up several times, there are guidelines which have been written for this exact scenario. Common english spelling is used on english wikipedia. The guidelines can be found at WP:CANSTYLE/WP:PLACE. Po' buster (talk) 22:13, 13 March 2010 (UTC)

It is not useful to install foreign accent marks in the English Wikipedia. Searches don't always uncover these references. Which is one of the reasons why the Wikipedia standards were written that way.Student7 (talk) 19:56, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

Pictures = TERRIBLE!

The photos in the infobox go beyond not doing this city justice, they verge on slander. Ville de Québec is the jewel of North America, one of the very, very few places where the controversial European notion that a city should not look like complete shit managed to take hold. They make it look like just another small and unremarkable North American city. I don't know if this was done by an editor who just got dumped by a girl from Quebec, or one with Aspergers with an unfortunate bent toward futurism, who thinks modern architecture is anything but misanthropic violence in building form. Either way, GET RID OF IT! 71.234.198.222 (talk) 03:55, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

Find a better picture, and upload it. Oh and don't slag people with Asperger's. Dbrodbeck (talk) 03:59, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

Or make your own montage; there are quite a few good composite pics (see the commons link) on Quebec City. Chensiyuan (talk) 03:11, 11 April 2011 (UTC)

"Boroughs"

Should we translate arrondissements into "boroughs"? Is a translation necessary? We don't do that for the ones in Paris. 99.130.28.232 (talk) 23:25, 25 January 2011 (UTC)

A translation might be useful. Arrondissement means nothing in English. Preserving it serves no useful purpose IMO. At first I thought borough a little unusual since it is only used in a few Middle Atlantic US states, but maybe it is better understood abroad? I would have preferred "township" or "town" or even "municipality." Wikipedia seems to prefer "district." Whatever that means!  :) Student7 (talk) 18:52, 28 January 2011 (UTC)

"Famous People"

Someone should add a section for notable people Quebec City. I am sure this beautiful and historic city has more than a few.24.235.119.2 (talk) 21:18, 25 February 2011 (UTC)

pls see List of people from Quebec City.Moxy (talk) 21:55, 25 February 2011 (UTC)

GA Review

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This review is transcluded from Talk:Quebec City/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Reviewer: Dana boomer (talk) 00:16, 25 March 2011 (UTC)

Hi! I'll be reviewing this article for GA status, and should have the review up shortly. Dana boomer (talk) 00:16, 25 March 2011 (UTC)

GA review (see here for criteria)

1. It is reasonably well written.

   a (prose): b (MoS for lead, layout, word choice, fiction, and lists):

   • Sections should not be composed of only a link, as in the Notable people section. Either create a summary paragraph or move the link into another section.
   • I am seeing much outdated information, such as crime rates from 2007. This is partially a problem of old sources (see comment below)
   • The lead should be longer for an article of this length. WP:LEAD recommends three to four paragraphs, and while there are currently three paragraphs, they are all quite short. The lead should be a summary of the body, and not include new information, which it currently does.
   • Because of the other issues with the article, I have not checked prose.

2. It is factually accurate and verifiable.

   a (references): b (citations to reliable sources): c (OR):

   • This article has an extreme lack of sources. This is especially evident in sections such as "Climate", where statistics are given with no reference (and a citation needed tag is located), and "Demographics", which also gives statistics without references. The lack of references also makes it hard to determine if there is original research in the article.
   • There is a citation needed banner in the Partner cities section that has been there since 2008.
   • Many of the references are missing vital information, such as publishers and access dates.
   • Many of the references are outdated, with community profiles from 2006 and climate data that reaches only to 2000.
   • Reference #2 is a dead link.
   • There are hundreds of books and magazine and journal articles about Quebec City and the surrounding area. Some or many of them would probably be helpful in fleshing out this article to meet even the broadness criteria of GAN.

3. It is broad in its coverage.

   a (major aspects): b (focused):

   • Has the governance structure changed at all over the course of the city's history? Are there any media organizations/newspapers based in the city? What are the primary and secondary schools like and how are they organized? These and other questions become evident from even a quick scan of the article.

4. It follows the neutral point of view policy.

   Fair representation without bias:

5. It is stable.

   No edit wars, etc.:

6. It is illustrated by images, where possible and appropriate.

   a (images are tagged and non-free images have fair use rationales): b (appropriate use with suitable captions):

   • Text should not be sandwiched between images or between an image and a box, as it is in many places in the article. Overall, this article looks cluttered, with the graphics overwhelming the text. Because of the number of images and the need to remove a few of them, I have not checked image licensing.

7. Overall:

   Pass/Fail:

Because of the number of issues with this article, especially those related to references, I am failing this article. There is, I believe, too much work that needs to be done for it to happen in a reasonable time frame. Once the above issues have been addressed, the article may be brought back to GAN. Please let me know if you have any questions, Dana boomer (talk) 00:42, 25 March 2011 (UTC)

GA Drive

I am interested in organizing a concerted effort to get this article up to GA Standards. I will do my best to popularize this effort at Wikimedia Canada. We're hosting a Wikimedia Canada Sign up page, all are welcome to sign up. Alan.ca (talk) 09:47, 26 March 2011 (UTC)

wow lots of work here for GA status...will help when improvement drive is up and ruining.Moxy (talk) 10:03, 26 March 2011 (UTC)

picture selection

Alan.ca has removed the only picture of an aerial view of the city; removed the only (two) pictures representing street scenes of the city; and replaced the typical multi-panel infobox image with one depicting largely just the Chateau. The reasons offered in the edit summaries are not convincing. Chensiyuan (talk) 03:07, 11 April 2011 (UTC)

I am open to your selection, we need to thin out some of the photos to move this article closer to passing a GA review. There should be a relationship between the article text and photographs included. If people are looking for a photo tour of the city, they typically click the commons link near the bottom of the article. Alan.ca (talk) 04:01, 11 April 2011 (UTC)

The images left in the article are now clichéd. They concentrate on the monumental buildings. There are two and a half shots of the Château Frontenac. One street scene, if representative, is required. Abductive (reasoning) 06:04, 11 April 2011 (UTC)

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Québec or Quebec

Québec (with the acute accent) is the city's official name in both French and English. [6] [7] — Preceding unsigned comment added by Gilbertus (talk • contribs) 19:35, 23 September 2011 (UTC) [8] [9] [10] --Gilbertus (talk) 19:08, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

That's fine (and well understood), but irrelevant. We do not defer to official names; articles on en-Wikipedia are titled based on the name used most commonly in the English language. See WP:CANSTYLE#French names for more information. --Skeezix1000 (talk) 20:03, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

This has already been discussed above. In the info box under official name, Ville de Québec is written, while the title is in line with common usage. Also, both spellings are mentioned in the lead. Trackratte (talk) 04:28, 14 November 2012 (UTC)

Pronunciation

An IP editor: ‎216.221.37.56 has been removing one of the common pronunciations. I have twice reverted and will not vioate 3RR, but I thought I would let others know and perhaps weigh in on this. Dbrodbeck (talk) 12:59, 7 December 2012 (UTC)

It's not a common pronunciation, it's a butchered way of pronouncing it by people who don't know how to pronounce it, and that is perpetuated by pseudo-references on the internet. I live in Montreal, Quebec, and all the anglophones pronounce it [kebɛk], only once in a while you get an outsider who will not pronounce it that way and it's because they don't know how to pronounce it properly, it's not a reason to include a bad pronunciation in an encyclopedia. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.221.37.56 (talk) 13:34, 7 December 2012 (UTC)

Most of our readership are so called 'outsiders'. That pronunciation has been there going back at least to Aug 20, (the 50th oldest edit on the history page). Indeed, going back a long way, to Jan of 2011, you will find it there. Dbrodbeck (talk) 14:34, 7 December 2012 (UTC)

Remove Placentia

Someone wrote that Placentia is older than Quebec City, and that it was the capital of French North America. Placentia was established as a permanent settlement in 1626 and was the capital of French Newfoundland with a local governor from 1655 to 1713. The Governor-general of New France was always in Quebec City. So "Placentia (Plaisance, the capital of French North America from 1655-1713)" is removed.--131.137.247.6 (talk) 13:01, 27 June 2013 (UTC)

Name, again

An IP has added, then twice reverted [11] a long treatise, ok that might be a bit strong, but what seems to me like way way too much detail on the name and the use of accents. I have asked the IP to discuss it but to no avail. I have warned the IP about edit warring, or am about to, and I am opening this discussino here. I amaware BTW, that we have discussed this, and WP:CANSTYLE is, I think, pretty clear on this. Dbrodbeck (talk) 11:16, 4 September 2013 (UTC)

I have to say, I think that the IP edits were truly good-faith edits, and did add to the article. I think that they were mostly contentious because they used pretty value-laden words ("typically", "legitimate", etc.) I have fought a bit with the text to make it clearer about its sources, but would welcome further improvements. I think that the fact that this discussion is in a footnote is a perfect place for the kind of discussion included. AshleyMorton (talk) 13:52, 4 September 2013 (UTC)

I think the footnote reads quite well now and is fair and balanced. --Skeezix1000 (talk) 18:26, 4 September 2013 (UTC)

Yeah seems reasonable. Dbrodbeck (talk) 19:13, 4 September 2013 (UTC)

TY, particularly AM. I simply sought to add well-referenced detail about the variations of the name - which is rather warranted given the several variations in the lead - instead of a particular editor accusing me falsely of making a point about it. 174.89.39.112 (talk) 03:06, 6 September 2013 (UTC)

It struck me that way, if it was not your intent then I apologize. This all could have been avoided with a simple talk page discussion. Dbrodbeck (talk) 03:18, 6 September 2013 (UTC)

External links modified

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