Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Singapore-related articles

Main page: Wikipedia:Manual of Style

The following guidelines apply to all Singapore-related topics under the purview of the SGpedians' notice board. While contributors are encouraged to implement them for consistent presentation, they are also free to ignore all rules so long that it is reasonable to do so.

Naming conventions

People

In general, a biographical article should be named in the way the name of the person who is the article's subject usually appears in English-language publications in Singapore.

Singaporeans with Chinese names

Article titles should follow Wikipedia:Naming conventions (Chinese). In particular, this means that names more familiar to most English readers, and which are normally used in English-language publications in Singapore, should be used with no specific preference for any Chinese dialect or romanisation system. Thus, Lee Kuan Yew (Hakka; local romanisation) and Huang Wenyong (Mandarin; Pinyin) are both acceptable for being commonly used in English.

Where a specific romanisation system is used, conventions used by that system should be adhered to. Hence, Pinyin names should have no spaces in the first name (Huang Wenyong, and not Huang Wen Yong), and diacritics should not be used in the article name.

Where a Chinese person usually indicates their surname at the beginning of the name, the use of the hatnote {{family name hatnote}} is recommended.

The names of Singaporeans with both Chinese and Western names are set out in a variety of ways:

• Western name + surname only, Chinese name omitted, e.g., "Janine Tan".
• Surname + Chinese name + Western name, e.g., "Tan Mei Yi Janine".
• Western name + surname + Chinese name, e.g., "Janine Tan Mei Yi".
• Western name + Chinese name + surname, e.g., "Janine Mei Yi Tan".

In most cases, the first option is the most commonly used. However, the use of this short form increases the likelihood of similarly named articles. Where it is necessary to disambiguate the article as a result, either the full name (e.g., Tony Tan Keng Yam) or a disambiguating term in parentheses (e.g., Christopher Lee (Singapore actor)) should be used: see Wikipedia:Disambiguation and Wikipedia:Naming conventions (people).

Singaporeans with Indian names

Article titles should follow the manner in which the subjects of the articles normally appear in English-language publications in Singapore, e.g., "Balaji Sadasivan", not "Sadasivan Balaji". When persons do not usually use the abbreviations s/o ("son of") or d/o ("daughter of") in their names, these words should not be added (e.g., "Balaji Sadasivan", not "Balaji s/o Sadasivan"). Likewise, where persons usually have these words in their names, the words should not be omitted. Use of the hatnote {{Indian name}} is recommended. Where the name of an Indian person contains a patronymic and lacks a surname, to avoid the article being incorrectly sorted by the patronymic, add a {{DEFAULTSORT}} tag and a comment as shown in the example below:

{{DEFAULTSORT:Balaji Sadasivan}} <!--Do not sort by "Sadasivan" as this is
a patronymic, not a surname.-->

Singaporeans with Malay names

Article titles should follow the manner in which the subjects of the articles normally appear in English-language publications in Singapore. When persons do not usually use the words bin (Malay for "son of") or binte ("daughter of") in their names, these words should not be added (e.g., "Zubir Said", not "Zubir bin Said"). Likewise, where persons usually have these words in their names, the words should not be omitted. Use of the hatnote {{Malay name}} is recommended. Where the name of a Malay person contains a patronymic and lacks a surname, to avoid the article being incorrectly sorted by the patronymic, add a {{DEFAULTSORT}} tag and a comment as shown in the example below:

{{DEFAULTSORT:Zubir Said}} <!--Do not sort by "Said" as this is
a patronymic, not a surname.-->

Places

The official English name for places should be used. For example, "Hougang", which is used officially in English, should be used in preference to "Aukang" even though the latter is often used locally. Also, "Punggol" should be spelt as indicated when referring to the town, but as "Ponggol" in the road name "Ponggol Seventeenth Avenue" as that is the official name of the road in English.

If a name refers to the Singapore place much more than to any other place (that is, the Singapore place is significantly more commonly searched for than other places), the article can be named after the Singapore place without any qualifications (see Wikipedia:Disambiguation#Is there a primary topic?), for example: "Orchard Road" and "Yishun". Where it is necessary to disambiguate place or structure names, place the disambiguating term after a comma instead of enclosing it in parentheses (see Wikipedia:Disambiguation#Naming the specific topic articles and Wikipedia:Naming conventions (settlements)), for example, "Chinatown, Singapore" and "Woodlands, Singapore".

Content

Currency

In accordance with Wikipedia:Manual of Style (dates and numbers)#Currencies, the first time a Singapore-dollar amount appears in an article, indicate it like this: "[[Singapore dollar|S$]]100" (result: "S$100"). Subsequently, the "S" may be omitted (for example, "$100") unless this would be unclear (for instance, if two or more currencies are referred to in the article).

Dates

Dates are usually indicated with the day before the month, that is, "9 August" and "9 August 1965". Therefore, in accordance with Wikipedia:Manual of Style (dates and numbers)#Strong national ties to a topic, in articles:

• dates should be set out with the day before the month; and
• the parameter "df=yes" ("df" standing for "day first") should be used with the templates {{Birth date and age}}, {{Birth year and age}}, {{Death date and age}}, {{Death year and age}}, and related templates.

Infoboxes

In general, see Category:Singapore infobox templates for infoboxes designed for Singapore-related articles.

• Places. To state the name of a place in Singapore in the four official languages of Singapore (English, Malay, Mandarin and Tamil), use the {{SG neighbourhood}} infobox.

Lead section

• Where appropriate, in the lead section of Singapore-related articles (such as articles about Singaporean festivals), the article title in English in boldface should be followed by translations of the title in parentheses in the three other official languages, ordered alphabetically as follows: Malay, Mandarin and Tamil.
  • For place names, use of the {{SG neighbourhood}} infobox is recommended.
  • For Chinese names, use simplified Chinese characters and provide a Pinyin transcription. Use the {{zh}} template as follows:

{{zh|s=NAME IN SIMPLIFIED CHINESE CHARACTERS|p=NAME IN PINYIN}}

• Alternative, non-English names should usually be listed once. If the article has an infobox, the names should be listed there. If not, the names should go in the first sentence of the lead.
• If the names have a complex history or vary considerably from language to language (e.g., Tekka Centre and Pedra Branca, Singapore), this should be discussed in a separate section and not in the lead.

Measurements

Measurements should be set out using the metric system, with measurements in the Imperial system in parentheses after the metric measurement. This can be done conveniently using the {{Convert}} template.

Spelling and grammar

As a Commonwealth country, Singapore has inherited many elements of British culture. Singapore-related articles generally follow spelling and grammar conventions of British English: see Wikipedia:Manual of Style#National varieties of English.

Templates

See Category:Singapore templates for templates designed for Singapore-related articles.