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Requested move 20 July 2016

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: No consensus to move after extended discussion. — JFG talk 10:14, 12 August 2016 (UTC)


San Jose State UniversitySan José State University – To agree with article's text and sources, and with the big university logo at the top of the article. It is normal and routine for Wikipedia to include diacritics, including for American topics, when they are reliably sourced (see, e.g., José James, Häagen-Dazs, Española, New Mexico, and thousands of others). The pseudo-wikiproject pushing removal of accents from US topics (or even all topics on English Wikipedia) was shut down and deleted. Time to clean up after the mess they created.  — SMcCandlish ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ʌ≼  00:20, 20 July 2016 (UTC) --Result probably depends on the result of Talk:San Jose, California#Requested move 23 July 2016. Give another week — Andy W. (talk ·ctb) 23:44, 27 July 2016 (UTC)

  • Sources: San José State University uses the accent, even in their all-caps logo [1] and even in internal, employee material [2] (though instances without the accent can be found on their main website, this seems to be a decision of their website people, presumably for text-entry expediency; printed material consistently uses the diacritic [3][4][5][6][7][8]. Some airport-specific sourcing (see related RM at its talk page, also discussing the city article's title) : the airport's own website uses the diacritic [9]. More general sourcing: Books frequently retain the diacritics for the city [10]. It's mostly newspapers that drop it, because (in 'Merica) they hate diacritics generally and drop them every chance they get. WP:ISNOT#NEWS and does not follow news style. The city government site uses the diacritic quite consistently [11] (except in "sanjoseca.gov", since they have a basic ASCII domain name like 99.999¯% of the Internet).  — SMcCandlish ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ʌ≼  07:22, 20 July 2016 (UTC)
  • Comment. I'm confused by your reasoning here and on the other RM discussion. Yes, it is normal and routine for Wikipedia to include diacritics per WP:DIACRITICS, but they may be included as long as they follow WP:COMMONNAME and follow the general usage in reliable sources that are written in the English language (including other encyclopedias and reference works). First your comments are initially relying on the WP:OFFICIAL, which not necessarily may be the WP:COMMONNAME. Second you seem to be misapplying WP:ISNOT#NEWS to totally dismiss considering the usage by reliable news sources (WP:NEWSORG). WP:ISNOT#NEWS (and for that matter the entire Wikipedia:What Wikipedia is not) is referring to article content and what is permitted on pages -- it is not related to WP:NEWSORG, let alone WP:RS, WP:COMMONAME and the like. I'm not defending the views of that ill-advised pseudo-wikiproject, whose sole purpose was to undermine WP:DIACRITICS and other Wikipedia policies, but I feel that you are misapplying WP:AT here. Zzyzx11 (talk) 16:02, 20 July 2016 (UTC)
  • Comment I agree, there is much work to be done to clean up the mess made by the deleted project for trying to remove accents for an unknown or US-centric bias reasoning. ✉cookiemonster✉ 𝚨755𝛀 16:07, 21 July 2016 (UTC)
    • But this university is in the United States, and thus shouldn't we still consider WP:TITLEVAR and MOS:TIES? If most American reliable sources still do not use the accent, they should not really be used in the title either. How can a subject be "too US-centric" when it is still based in the United States? Zzyzx11 (talk) 04:22, 24 July 2016 (UTC)
      • What? Are you even reading what you're citing? TITLEVAR says not to manually move an article (if the move may be controversial), without a consensus discussion supporting it. The entire point of RM is that it is that consensus discussion. MOS:TIES has nothing whatsoever to do with such questions, and only addresses differences between English-language dialects. There is no such thing as a national variety of English in which diacritics are never used. Your argument is like responding to your child's request for a cookie with "No, because you didn't ask first, and no because beer is only for grownups." You also seem to imagine that Americans do not use diacritics in Spanish names that call for them; only someone who has never lived in a part of the US with a lot of Spanish placenames could believe this, and it's quite false. The entire "we shouldn't use a diacritic because this is in the US" argument is fallacious.  — SMcCandlish ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ʌ≼  19:12, 1 August 2016 (UTC)
  • Support – Though the accent is often dropped in English, it's much more clear and meaningful with it, and that's also not uncommon in better English sources. If we want to include ourselves among the better, doing such names right is a good idea. And note that Jose is not the same name as José. Dicklyon (talk) 18:59, 23 July 2016 (UTC)
    • "The accent is often dropped in English" seems to me like something to establish WP:COMMONAME. IMO, comments like we should "include ourselves among the better" and others here and on the other similar San Jos[e/é] RM discussions, without considering established WP:AT Wikipedia policies, seem to be heading toward the opposite extreme POV end than what the deleted former WikiProject English was doing. Zzyzx11 (talk) 04:22, 24 July 2016 (UTC)
      • The use of sources better than web pages is explicitly encouraged by WP:DIACRITICS. With both forms being in common use, leaning toward the official one that cues the pronunciation of this Spanish name seems preferable. Dicklyon (talk) 15:34, 25 July 2016 (UTC)
      • See #Extended RM discussion, below, for a more detailed response to Zzyzx11's argument.  — SMcCandlish ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ʌ≼  19:12, 1 August 2016 (UTC)
  • Comment – While the city's style is to drop the accent when styled all-caps, the university goes so far as to retain it even in all-caps, as in the logo in the article and the official university and spartans web pages under external links. Their style guide makes it explicit, and also allows exceptions for web and email use: The proper spelling of San Jose State University includes the accent over the "e" in José, when printing the name in both title case and in all capitals. ... Exception: Web and email text does not require the accent over "e." And while I'm not a proponent of adopting "official" styles in general, this does explain the difference between web and print sources. – Dicklyon (talk) 04:22, 26 July 2016 (UTC)
  • Oppose the move for now. We should let the San Jose, California move discussion play out, because this move is partially dependent on that one.  ONR  (talk)  00:21, 27 July 2016 (UTC)
  • Oppose for now. In articles on American universities, it's usual for Wikipedia to stick to the common name where it differs from the school's official or preferred name. For example, it's Virginia Tech, not "Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University"; Ohio State University, not "The Ohio State University"; Pennsylvania State University, not "The Pennsylvania State University"; Florida A&M University, not "Florida Agricultural and Mechanical University"; Louisiana State University, not "Louisiana State University and Agricultural and Mechanical College"; and Rutgers University, not "Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey". As there's no evidence that the format with the accent mark is more common here, we should defer to the common name.--Cúchullain t/c 14:53, 27 July 2016 (UTC)
    • @Old Naval Rooftops and Cuchullain: The university, city, airport, sports teams, etc., are all discrete entities, and the analysis for each of them is independent. The RM for the airport has already concluded in favor of the diacritic. If someone attempted to move San Jose Sharks to use the accent, that RM would fail, because it is not part of the name of the team and almost never used as if it is. Please look at the evidence for this topic, not some other topic.  — SMcCandlish ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ʌ≼  16:07, 1 August 2016 (UTC)
I'm not sure we should look at these various San Jose articles in complete isolation from each other, but if we did it actually strengthens my point. It's one less argument in favor of going against the common name.--Cúchullain t/c 17:03, 1 August 2016 (UTC)
I didn't say "complete isolation" (I was the one who posted the pointer to the airport RM closing in favor of diacritics, after all). And your conclusion doesn't follow from the premise. COMMONNAME is not a style policy; it's about whether the name is San Jos[é|e] State University (however it is styled) versus Saint Joseph State University or the State University of San Jos[é|e]; once we know the answer is the first one, the style matter is covered by other policypages, which tell us to use the diacritic if the RS tell us it belongs there (even if it is sometimes ignored); see the #Extended RM discussion section for a detailed policy analysis of this. And besides, even if we did have a policy to "use the most common style" (never going to happen) it, like COMMONNAME, would apply to discrete topics; it is literally impossible for these separate though related topics to "auto-share" the same common name if we do properly treat them as separate. Plus, the sources prove conclusively already that they can be styled differently; the sports teams do not have a diacritic in them, period, as a matter of trademark fact. No amount of misplaced belief that COMMONNAME trumps all other considerations results in us applying fake, made-up versions of names to article titles, which would be the case with "San José Sharks". COMMONNAME isn't actually even one of the titling criteria at all; it's the default, and overridable, way to most likely arrive at a title that will satisfy the actual WP:CRITERIA. The more people try to provide a policy rationale to back up these WP:IDONTLIKEIT !votes against the diacritic, the more the case to remove it is shown to be weak.  — SMcCandlish ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ʌ≼  20:09, 1 August 2016 (UTC)
I don't dislike (or like) diacritics. In fact, I'm usually in favor of including them where applicable, barring a good reason not to. However, the fact that we've seen no evidence here or elsewhere that the accented form is remotely as common as the unaccented form is a good reason not to. WP:AT does say that "Article titles are based on how reliable English-language sources refer to the article's subject". That's also the spirit of COMMONNAME, and is what commentors are referring to here. San Jose State would hardly be the first American university to prefer a variant of its own name that's different in some way from what's common in the wider world. As I say, in such cases, the standard practice at Wikipedia is to go with the more common form rather than the one preferred by the school.--Cúchullain t/c 20:47, 1 August 2016 (UTC)
  • Support per nom. Corkythehornetfan 20:45, 27 July 2016 (UTC)
  • Oppose per what I said at the San Jose discussion, and per Cuchullain. Nohomersryan (talk) 05:20, 28 July 2016 (UTC)
  • Comment - Certainly the university does use the accent, but (as the nom notes) they don't apply it consistently. A Google search of other top sites related to the university shows the non-accented form to be more frequent. This is different from something like Häagen-Dazs where the accented form does appear more frequently in general search results even when searching without the umlaut. Because of this I initially leaned slightly toward oppose; however, since there's a closely related active discussion at the city article, I think it'd be good to consider its result. ╠╣uw [talk] 10:33, 28 July 2016 (UTC)
  • Support, per nom, common sense (it's the real name of the University), and correct as to the original name of the city. The airport page has already been renamed without the city page (which should be changed eventually), so this one is consistent with that. Randy Kryn 14:42, 29 July 2016 (UTC)
    • San José, with the accent, is still actually the current name of the city. :-)  — SMcCandlish ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ʌ≼  16:12, 1 August 2016 (UTC)
  • Support per nom. —MRD2014 T C 14:43, 30 July 2016 (UTC)
  • Comment: The RM on the airport of the same name has recently closed in favor of the diacritic.  — SMcCandlish ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ʌ≼  15:38, 1 August 2016 (UTC)
  • Oppose per Cuchullain, WP:COMMONNAME, and WP:CONSISTENCY - the city is San Jose so this should be San Jose.

Extended RM discussion

A policy analysis in response to arguments by Zzyzx11 and a few others at this and related RMs

It's important to read COMMONNAME closely; it nowhere even suggests that it covers style matters, and we've been over this literally thousands of times before in RM after RM after RM. The only time WP adopts a divergent stylization from what we would normally accept (and based on MOS rules, not anything at WP:AT), it's when the sources overwhelmingly do so (as they do for iPod, Deadmau5, and k.d. lang, but not "Alien3", "e.e. cummings", "Ke$ha", "SONY", or "P!nk", all of which are redirects. In all those cases, as with stripping of the diacritic from San José, it's a marketing stylization found sporadically in logos, website materials, and sports team names, not a formal, encyclopedic English practice. WP:COMMONSTYLE covers all of this in much more detail.

Zzyzx11's argument above is a misreading of WP:DIACRITICS (which needs some copyediting for clarity). It says "follow the general usage in reliable sources that are written in the English language (including other encyclopedias and reference works)." It does not at all suggest that newspapers should be consulted, much less that their style should be followed, and MOS does not rely on news style for much of anything. The WP:NOT#NEWS policy has many implications, but can be summarized as: WP is not, and is not like, a news source, and is not bound to follow any journalism practice; we do not follow journo definitions of adequate sourcing, use news article layout, or even use journalism definitions of primary and secondary sources, nor do we write in a journalistic tone or follow news style guide norms, deriving ours almost entirely from academic and general-audience style guides. Journalism is a specialized form of writing, shaped by four primary concerns: speed of writing and publication, grabbing attention, rapidity of reading (often having only seconds to get the gist across), and (in traditional newspapers) condensation of prose for tight, multi-column layout.

WP:DIACRITICS also clarifies: "If there is no consensus in the sources, either form will normally be acceptable as a title." Style matters in the NC guidelines are derived from MOS. The controlling, more detailed guidelines here are: A) MOS:PN#Diacritics: "Wikipedia normally retains these special characters, except where there is a well-established English spelling that replaces them with English standard letters."; and MOS:DIACRITICS: "their usage depends on whether they appear in verifiable reliable sources in English and on the constraints imposed by specialized Wikipedia guidelines" [none of which apply to this case]. The MOS:PN exception is for anglicizations that, in English, have totally supplanted the original and the example given is Aragon, Spain (spelled Aragón in Spanish); this is rarely the case except when a name has been used (and modified) in English for centuries, and may not hold even then (see, e.g., São Paulo). San José is not such a case.

One common source of confusion is this line in WP:DIACRITICS: "The policy on using common names and on foreign names does not prohibit the use of modified letters, if they are used in the common name as verified by reliable sources." This absolutely does not read "if they are the most common spelling". What it means is, if "Foo/Føø" and "Bar" are both names for the same topic, and "Foo/Føø" is more common than Bar, then use either "Foo" or "Føø"; if reliable sources verify that the modified letters are used in the name [it need not be used all the time, just well-attested in modern sources we trust], then use the "Føø" version. Why? Because of the MOS:PN rule quoted just above. An enormous amount of pointless drama and editorial time-drain would be eliminated if people with a bone to pick about some MoS line-item would stop looking for imaginary loopholes in WP:AT with which to try to "trump" MoS. They are not there.

Note also that WP:DIACRITICS warns: "Search engines are problematic unless their verdict is overwhelming". The sources show, for SJSU, the opposite of a verdict that the diacritic is not used; it appears very frequently in independent sources, and with near uniformity in SJSU's own publications, excepting parts of their website, presumably due to one of their tech people not following SJSU's house style guide [12]. The diacritic is very commonly used in independent and official sources for the city, the airport, and the university. It is only near-universally dropped for some local sports teams and other business names, which are trademarks and corporate registrations, not placenames. It is dropped in those cases because marketing/PR style generally eschews diacritics, and trademarks are stronger the less they match natural-language constructions and are instead unique proprietary inventions.

Finally, the idea that misinterpretation of COMMONNAME as a style policy permits content forking the title from the content in such matters is another illusion easy to dispel, per MOS:DIACRITICS: "Spell a name consistently in the title and the text of an article." The sources tell us that the proper name San José State University includes the diacritic; the fact that some subset of sources choose to drop it is ultimately of no consequence. Once it has been sourced that the diacritic belongs there, the fact cannot be magically erased, especially not in some PoV campaign against diacritics in English, an intellectual ghost that has been perennially rising from the dead and being re-exorcized here for years. The only thing that will erase the diacritic is an actual change in usage that becomes virtually universal for this particular place, as happened long ago with the similar accent in Los Angeles (it was on the A).
 — SMcCandlish ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ʌ≼  19:12, 1 August 2016 (UTC)

Again, I seem to fail to understand the link between WP:NOTNEWS and WP:AT. On the one hand, WP:NOTNEWS says "Wikipedia is also not written in news style". On the other hand, news sources seem to frequently be used in various RMs to determine WP:COMMONAME. After all WP:COMMONAME says, "the term or name most typically used in reliable sources is generally preferred". So many Wikipedians interpret that as using WP:RS as an guide, including WP:NEWSORG (reliable news sources). Furthermore, there is at least one naming guideline, Wikipedia:Naming conventions (geographic names)#United States, that uses a news manual of style (The Associated Press Stylebook) as a reference to determine the naming of a U.S. city articles (vis a vis whether to append the state name like on this article or not). And since WP:COMMONSTYLE is an essay, for which widespread consensus has not been necessarily established, I'm not sure that some of this policy analysis is shared by the broader community on a wider scale (with you currently being the only contributor[13] or what currently is a relatively a small list [currently less than 50] on Special:WhatLinksHere/Wikipedia:Common-style fallacy). Zzyzx11 (talk) 06:06, 2 August 2016 (UTC)
I actually already addressed most of that. Short version: WP is not written in news style. WP style does not come from news sources. WP editors follow WP's manual of style, not that of the Associated Press (or The Guardian, etc.). How many other ways does it need to be said? COMMONNAME is not a style policy, it's the policy that tells us whether the name of the band is Motley Crue (sometimes styled Mötley Crüe) versus "Motley Crew" vs. "My Earlobes are Huge"); after we know the name is the first one, MoS rules tell us whether to include the optional stylization (nothing at all in WP:AT addresses this or needs to, and the naming conventions guidelines does not contradict MoS on this matter, or any other matter – if they did, they'd be normalized to stop doing so). NCGEO does not use the AP Stylebook as a style guide; it is using the US gazetteer the book includes as a source of placename data (The AP Stylebook is/contains more than one thing, ranging from a style guide to a libel law manual for journalists). PS: No "consensus for" any essay is established; essays contain reasoning, and we write them to avoid re-re-restating the same detailed reasoning over and over in long form. Essays are not guidelines or policies and thus contain no rules about which consensus needs to form. Essays either present logic that is sound or logic that can be refuted. No one has refuted WP:COMMONSTYLE. All essays are written by someone; they do not magically appear out of nowhere as if by the gods. If they're cogent, they do not need further editing. If they are recent, or what they address is not an everyday matter, they may not be cited on thousands of pages, but only when a discussion occurs in which the matter comes up and someone does not seem to understand. Your position boils down to "no one said this before, and it is not being said every day by everyone"; this is a fallacious argument, a hand-wave that avoids addressing any of the content. The obvious proof that the essay's reasoning is correct is the fact that WP articles observably do not drop diacritics for names that properly have them, even if the majority of English-language sources do so. This is the result of a decade-and-a-half of consensus discussions. If your view of this were correct and the essay's were wrong, it simply would not be possible for hundreds or thousands of RM discussions to have arrived at that result, and for WP to have explicit rules permitting diacritics, and the main one on the topic saying to use them when they can be reliably sourced (at all, not just in the majority of English-language sources).  — SMcCandlish ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ʌ≼  02:01, 3 August 2016 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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Old, unlabeled messages

File:Sanjosestatefootballteam1941.jpg
Image you might want to incorporate into the article of the San Jose State University football team in Honolulu, Hawaii, cancelling a game with the University of Hawaii to volunteer with the Honolulu Police Department after the December 7, 1941 attacks. This photo has them training at Honolulu Police headquarters.

Redirects: San Jose State, SJSU, San José State University, San José State, California State University, San Jose, San Jose State College

ElKevbo (talk) 01:18, 26 November 2019 (UTC) (not really my messages and date is also not correct; this is only added so the messages are autoarchived by the bot)

Name of article

SJSU vs. CSU San Jose

Would someone please elaborate on the use of the adjective anti-California in the following quote, which appears in the SJSU article as of today, Feb. 13, 2006?

"In 1972 SJSC was granted university status, and the name was changed to California State University, San Jose. However, in 1974, despite the fact that the school's CSU name was a modernized restoration of the school's original California State Normal School identity, anti-California alumni at the school succeeded in lobbying the California Legislature to change the school's name to "San Jose State University"." CSU Spartan

Also, someone should probably elaborate in the later "CSU Spartans" paragraph on why those of the pro-"CSU San Jose" persuasion feel the current name is so inferior to the 1972-74 name. I personally don't see much difference and don't understand the motivation. Is it pride for the state of California? Do they dislike those particular individuals who lobbied for the name change in 1974? Does San Jose State University sound too much like San Jose City College (or community college names in general)? I'm not seeing the significance, so please explain. --66.160.179.84 22:59, 13 February 2006 (UTC)

Great questions. Yes, pro-California and pro-CSU students and alumni in San Jose believe our identity as the oldest California State University campus (founded in 1862) is far superior to the failed, provincial and non-sensical "SJSU" identity. Your statement that it sounds like a community college name is very apt. The CSU reform and restoration movement in San Jose was founded by MBA alumni and students in 2003, and currently numbers several hundred students and alumni in multiple groups. For more info see http://www.californiastatebell.com. Historical entries in the Wikipedia about (1) the "San Jose State" putsch against the California State University, San Jose, in 1974, and (2) the development and continued growth the CSU reform and restoration movement,are accurate and relevant contributions to the Wikipedia regarding the history of the CSU campus in San Jose. Attempts by persons like NeoChaosX to censor this history and totally exclude any acknowlegement of the existence of this movement, in favor of his own views and interpretatons, is a violation of the five pillars of the Wikipedia. CSU Spartan 02:16, 07 October 2006 (UTC)
It's the people from the GoState organization using Wikipedia as a soapbox for their platform (something that's against Wikipedia policy, I believe). It's been taken care of anyway, but I imagine they'll be trying to change it again when they see their additions have been removed. NeoChaosX 02:16, 21 February 2006 (UTC)
As part of an apparent campaign of disinformation, NeoChaosX is even attempting to rename the CSU Restoration movement in San Jose. There is, of course, nothing called the "GoState" organization or movement. This was coined by detractors of the CSU reform and restoration movement as part of their efforts to spread disinformation and malign and minimize this movement. The CSU reform movement was born with the creation of the "CSU Spartans" group by MBA students and alumni in October 2003. "GoState" is, and always has been, simply the name of the website http://www.gostate.org which was founded in March 2004. CSU Spartan
Your comment could be interpreted as a personal attack, and they are not necessary nor acceptable. Comment on content, not contributor. SolarianKnight 05:26, 16 October 2006 (UTC)
I agree with NeoChaosX. The GoState people also made changes to the California State University article that needed to be dealt with, and there is an explanation of the 'flagship campus' controversey and issue on the Talk:California_State_University page. I suggest to the GoState people that they create their own article, cite evidence, records and authorities, and allow us to inspect, research and comment as to the accuracy of the statements made... this is not a bulletin board but rather an encyclopedia, so if all the GoState people are doing is advocating or advancing their own cause then the statements should not be placed here but rather on their own already-existing website. Streltzer 18:06, 27 February 2006 (UTC)
The founder of GoState.org, Michael Harold, has been repeatedly flogging his agenda in blogs and messageboards since he started the organization. Biggeek 23:26, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

From an outsider's perspective (for what it's worth), I believe being called Cal State or Cal State University, San Jose sounds a lot better than San Jose State University. Cal State Spartans sounds like a team that belongs in the Pac 10, San Jose State Spartans sounds...well WAC. However, we must stick to the facts. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 170.3.8.253 (talk) 17:47, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

I've created a stub about their campaign at GoState. NeoChaosX 18:56, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

San Jose State Name Change Student Vote

I have many citations for this section. For example, see: http://www.ktvu.com/news/11307189/detail.html How do I add this to the page. The citations section was not editable. —Preceding unsigned comment added by CSU Spartan (talkcontribs) 05:47, 2 July 2008 (UTC)

San Jose vs. San José

Accent marks (San José State University vs. San Jose State University) are included because they are part of the official name of the university (cf. its website) Joelwest 07:05, 8 Dec 2003 (UTC)

  • This is true. even the city of San José is very adamant about that " ´ " in its name. Davodd 07:17, Dec 8, 2003 (UTC)

I've never seen San Jose spelled with an accent. The San Jose newspaper doesn't use an accent. http://www.sanjose.com/ doesn't use an accent. http://www.sanjosesharks.com/ doesn't use it. If they do it on their official websites, that's decidedly odd. Do we start putting accents on Los Angeles? RickK 16:36, 2 Jan 2004 (UTC)

To jump in on this, as both a San Jose resident and a SJSU alum, the city and the university are pretty much the only instutitions that use the accent, the rest of us ignore it. I believe the accent was adopted in the late 1980s or early 1990s to show off our "cultural heratige" as the oldest city in California. It is a symptom of SJ's inferiority complex. Gentgeen 22:46, 2 Jan 2004 (UTC)

The website http://www.sanjose.com/ is a cybersquatter that has no official standing other than they grabbed the name first. The Sharks can call themselves whatever they want -- just as a business could call itself San Jose Bar & Grill or San Josie Bar & Grill -- but it's not as though the city leaders would change their city name to reflect that. (This is reverse causality).

Gentgeen is right that the switch is comparatively recent. I personally agree with him it's a silly affectation, or, more likely, kotowing to political correctness. As a voter in San José and an employee of SJSU, I am not doing this because I agree with the names, but because I want Wikipedia to come up with unambigous guidelines to head off edit wars.

Whether the name choice is serious or silly, the principle seems quite clear. If Cassius Clay wants to call himself Muhammad Ali or Louise Ciccone wants to call herself Madonna, the press, electronic databases and paper-based reference materials honor that. For an organization, whether the Girl Scouts of America or the Department of Defense, the only fair test is what they choose to call themselves. For wikipedia, the only practical test is what name is used on the official organizational website. By such tests, both the city of San José and San José State University require an accent. Joelwest 06:17, 11 Jan 2004 (UTC)

On a side note, my mom's a fairly high level voluanteer in the local council of the Girl Scouts, so I know their official name to be Girl Scouts of the United States of America[14]. I should go and suggest they move the article, but NAH.
Back on topic, the use of the accent isn't universal within the city. The fire department[15] and the public library[16] use it, the police[17] and chamber of commerce[18] do not. The city charter has no accent mark over the "e", and neither do the seal (the bundle of wheat thingie) nor the logo (the sunset thingie with "The Capitol of Silicon Valley" under it). Now, SJSU's a little different, as the accent is used universally, except for the university's seal, which does not have the mark. I personally don't care where the articles reside, but do think that wherever is chosen, the other needs to be a redirect.Gentgeen 07:49, 11 Jan 2004 (UTC)
I'm not sure it actually matters what they call themselves as our naming policy states we use whatever is most common in English, which is not necessarily the same as what the city decides to call itself. See Wikipedia:Naming conventions (common names) and Wikipedia:Naming conventions (use English) for example. Angela. 19:32, Jan 12, 2004 (UTC)
I agree the question is "most common", but "most common" among what universe. Gentgeen is right we have to redirect all variants (as is already policy). For that matter, I have no problem with having the main database link be without accents (whether for San José or anything else) since people won't tend to type them. It just seems as though the proper name should be listed in the beginning of the entry (as with any other dictionary or encyclopedia) cross-referenced to common variants. Joelwest 22:56, 31 Jan 2004 (UTC)

I don't care whether the accent is used or not, but either way, it should be consistent. The article currently uses both "San Jose" and "San José" multiple times. -anon, 20 June 2006

San Jose vs. San José - Round #2

The article on the city has been moved to a title without the accent- San Jose, California - because there is no question that that is the more common usage, per WP:NC. Likewise, the most common usage would appear to be "San Jose State University", regardless of what is on the university's website. For example, the San Jose Mercury News writes about "San Jose State".[19] Is there any objection to moving this article, and subsidiary articles like San José State Spartans plus the Category:San José State University and subcategories, to "San Jose"?   Will Beback  talk  22:15, 24 October 2009 (UTC)

Seeing no objections, I'll move the articles and request that the category be moved as well.   Will Beback  talk  18:48, 2 November 2009 (UTC)
Reopening this. As a current student there may be some confusion as to why there is this discrepancy in the naming of the school. For all official intents and purposes, the university is titled with the accent on the 'e', but just due to the laziness of English speakers, the accent is very often omitted. It is directly apparent in the visual guidelines of the university, the logos and marks themselves, and has been decreed by its president in 1970. (please note the reference in the edit for sources)Kaigenji (talk) 05:12, 21 July 2014 (UTC)
The CSU system isn't using the accent yet, but it appears the campus is. If you're going to add it, however, be consistent; don't just add it to a couple random spots. --Drmargi (talk) 07:41, 21 July 2014 (UTC)
I think it's pretty clear the accent should appear wherever the full name of the university appears within the article since the accent is part of the official name and appears on ALL official SJSU documentation including the university's own website. Informal names for the university including "San Jose State" used within the article may be spelled without the accent since informal references to the school in everyday life often do not include the accent. As for the city of San Jose, since some official SJ city entities use the accent and others do not, I would suggest not using the accent in this article when referring only to the city of San Jose. Also, older versions of the university name (pre-1974) to my knowledge did not use the accent. I've gone through the article and tried to standardized accent use in accordance with these basic guidelines. Also, I do not think it's necessary to spell the full name of the university with and without the accent in the lead sentence since there is really only one official name. Previous versions of the lead sentence that attempted to acknowledge both spellings (one correct and one incorrect) were awkward and unnecessary. I DO, however, think it's reasonable to reference the informal "San Jose State" moniker (without the accent) in the lead. Londonfifo (talk) 18:52, 2 December 2014 (UTC)

Note of admiration from a random wiki-bystander The stock for humanity in general ticked up for me after reading over this ambiguity question regarding the accent. Both sides made their cases, it never devolved into flaming or even worse edit wars, and ultimately the correct, sensible decision was arrived at and implemented. Nobody was called a nazi sympathizer (rather, and it kills me inside that nowadays I must specify: nobody was unjustifiably called, rather) and nobody was demeaned being called a floating water droplet crystalline pattern.

Way to human, everyone who participated in this thread. Wikipedia users appreciate that this kind of thing can be correctly sorted out, which is a tiny but necesarry part of what makes wikipedia so great. I am going to go make another small donation to the organization that runs this whole thing, and I encourage anyone else reading this right now to do the same. 96.41.85.137 (talk) 20:44, 29 April 2021 (UTC) - Laced8

California State Normal School

An anonymous user (who I'm guessing is User:Michaelch7) proposed on Wikipedia talk:WikiProject California that California State Normal School be restored to its own article. My take on it (as an outsider, although I am from SJ and was a devoted listener of KSJS in my high school years) is that it seems like it would be OK, as long as that article focuses solely on the California State Normal School system as a teacher's college. The History section of this article as well as that in California State University could be summary sections (see Wikipedia:Summary style) of the other article. After all, College of California is its own article, and it might be expandable (with enough research) to be more than what would properly fit either the CSU or SJSU articles. Anyway, I leave it you for discussion. howcheng {chat} 20:20, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

Thanks Howcheng. It's nice to see a reasonable response from a Wikipedia admin. And don't let NeoChaosX bamboozle you, like he has the others. He claims the California State Normal School article is related to the CSU restoration movement, but is it really? It simply discusses an entity that existed, and was more than "SJSU" (as it also included what is now UCLA) and less than the current "CSU" Michaelch7
My take on it (as the person who nominated the original article for deletion) is a no. In the CSU talk page, it became pretty clear that User:CSU Spartan/Michaelch7 was a member of a small group that wants to rename San Jose State, and the CSNS article was just used to promote this group and their agenda, in violation of the policy that Wikipedia is not a soapbox. The fact that the original article seemed to partly focus on the naming of the school and the school's "identity" just supported this viewpoint.
Additionally, from the College of California's article, it appears to have a relationship to the UC system similar to Minns Evening Normal School has to the CSU system (as a separate private college from which a public college system was created), and the Minns School doesn't have it own article (the name redirects to an aritcle about it's founder). On the other hand, the entity that was CSNS is now San Jose State, and their histories are one in the same (the history part of the CSNS article was mostly a re-treading of what was already in the SJSU article), which is why I advocated for the article to be a redirect. For the issues of redundancy and considering the creator's motive, I would keep it as a redirect. NeoChaosX (he shoots, he scores!) 20:53, 10 November 2006 (UTC)
Actually, the violation of Wikipedia rules that has occurred here as clearly been committed by NeoChaosX and other militant supporters of "City-Statism" within the CSU system. It is obvious that there mission is to totally suppress and censor any view that doesn't comport with their city-statist views, in clear violation of the Wikipedia's neutrality guidlines. Evidence of this could clearly be seen earlier this year, when they deleted the images of all CSU campuses except the city-state campuses of San Jose State, San Diego State and San Franciso State. They also threw in a picture of Cal Poly to cover their tracks. Thankfully, their destructive influence on the Wikipedia has now been diminished as more reasonable editors have entered the fray. Michaelch7
OK, here's what we can do. Whoever it was that proposed the restoration of the article (Michaelch7 or CSU Spartan), why don't you work on the article in your user space. Create a page User:Michaelch7/California State Normal School (replace the username with your username if you are not Michaelch7) and write the article there. I expect it will be a scholarly article about the California State Normal School system and its history, well cited etc etc. When you are done, let people here know and if it's a good article, we can put it back in article space. To me, that sounds like a reasonable compromise -- this allows you to prove that you can write such an article that's not a soapbox for GoState, and it also (for the time being) preserves the consensus that was made in the deletion debate. How does that sound? howcheng {chat} 21:20, 10 November 2006 (UTC)
Thanks, that is exactly what I'll do. By the way, your comparison to the College of California is very apt. The California State Normal School was an institution that gave birth to both "San Jose State" and the entire CSU system. It is an important part of California history, and something different and distinct from both the current "SJSU" and the CSU system. The only difference is that the College of California article isn't under attack by a band of city-statist zealots working to usurp California and CSU history, and impose their own distorted city-statist views and perspective on everyone else, in clear vioaltion of Wikipedia precepts. Michaelch7
HowCheng, as per your instructions, the California State Normal School article revisions are complete and it is submitted in honor of the State of California for reinclusion in the Wikipedia as part of the Project California: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Michaelch7/California_State_Normal_School Thank You. Michaelch7 27 December 2006

Restored link to this article, which has been restored by the Wikipedia as part of the Wikipedia Project California Michaelch7 31 December 2006 (UTC)

US Rankings

please update all University of California and California State University rankings. This years rankings are at the us ranking page. https://www.usnews.com/best-colleges — Preceding unsigned comment added by USA Eagle01 (talkcontribs) 02:23, September 14, 2021 (UTC)

A Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion

The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion:

Participate in the deletion discussion at the nomination page. —Community Tech bot (talk) 16:38, 18 October 2021 (UTC)

Edit war to insert lots of details about the university's Air Force ROTC unit

An unregistered editor has begun an edit war to add a new, three-paragraph section about this university's Air Force ROTC unit. This includes a significant amount of information that is not unique to this university's unit but is about how all Air Force ROTC units operate e.g., "San Jose State Students enrolled in ROTC participate in a number of mandatory activities in order to earn their active duty commission as military officers. This includes physical fitness training, drill & ceremony, leadership courses, a 4-week boot camp, summer programs (Freefall Parachute, Glider Pilot, Base Visits & Internships) and skill evaluations." This editor also removed the link I inserted into the section to Air Force Reserve Officer Training Corps so this entire section is about a topic for which we already have a detailed article but doesn't link to that article and instead (independently) reproduces portions of it.

This material should be cut down and leave the generic details about Air Force ROTC to the article we already have dedicated to it. The unregistered editor believes that the information should all remain in the article simply because it is all "supported by citations." I strongly recommend that our unregistered colleague review WP:NOT, WP:DUE, and WP:UNIGUIDE; we do not include information in an article only because it is supported by sources. ElKevbo (talk) 01:15, 26 November 2021 (UTC)

I second your comments above. The addition of a hyper-detailed and redundant section on the ROTC program is inappropriate. If every academic and staff department at the institution had its own detailed special section the article would literally be hundreds of pages long. Londonfifo (talk) 01:01, 26 February 2022 (UTC)
Additionally, the entry was not properly cited, despite the unregistered editor's claim to the contrary. After a lengthy search for information about the history of Detachment 045, I was unable to verify it is "one of the oldest AFROTC programs in the country" or that it moved to SJSU from Stanford University. While it's true Stanford's ROTC program was dismantled in 1973 amid fierce anti-war sentiment on campus, I could not verify its AFROTC detachment, if it even had one, ever relocated to SJSU. Londonfifo (talk) 02:10, 26 February 2022 (UTC)