Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Biography

"Biography" section in a biographical article?

I've seen any number of biographies in which the entire biography is organized within a single, large section entitled "Biography". Case in point just now is Pablo Casals. This seems entirely redundant - the "Biography" section might just as well be omitted and the included subsections elevated to regular sections. I've done that before with biographies (no complaints), and contemplate the same with this Casals article. But it happens so often, that I thought I would check here regarding the issue; am I missing something? Is this just a bad habit that editors have fallen in to? And/or perhaps this MOS ought to provide some guidance on this point (couldn't find it anyways...) Thx! Bdushaw (talk) 07:49, 6 April 2026 (UTC)

I'd just promote all its subsections up one level. The page itself is the "Biogrpahy". —Bagumba (talk) 07:52, 6 April 2026 (UTC)

That’s what I’ve done as well. Sometimes the “biography” section is so short that there are no sub-headings, so I just delete the “biography” heading. I don’t know that we need to put a direction in the MOS; seems like micro-managing. Mr Serjeant Buzfuz (talk) 09:53, 6 April 2026 (UTC)

I just remove the section heading or re-name it, with the explanation that the bio article is a biography. They're (the 'Biography' section headings) holdovers from Wikipedia's early years. GoodDay (talk) 10:08, 6 April 2026 (UTC)

There are roughly 120 FAs that have a section "Biography", including a recently promoted one Mary Fortune. It is obviously a small percentage out of more than 1,500 FA bios, but it is large enough to say that such a section is acceptable as long as the author desires to have it. Kelob2678 (talk) 20:24, 6 April 2026 (UTC)

Have to agree with Good Day here, the entire article is a biography. Having a 'biography' section is just poor writing. GiantSnowman 20:52, 6 April 2026 (UTC)

It's large enough to say that the FA process is not perfect. —Bagumba (talk) 23:23, 6 April 2026 (UTC)

It's patently not true that every article about a person is only a biography. -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 23:47, 6 April 2026 (UTC)

I have to agree - the example that came to my mind was Mary Mallon ("Typhoid Mary"), someone whose notability has less to do with their lives, and more to do with events they find themselves in. I could see that the article about Mary would start with a brief biography before describing the typhoid epidemics she sparked. That said, that article again is organized in a lengthy "Biography" section...other than it being just "inertia", that organization does not seem logical or effective. Just a bad habit, it seems to me. Bdushaw (talk) 12:16, 7 April 2026 (UTC)

Yeah, that's still a biography... GiantSnowman 17:05, 7 April 2026 (UTC)

'Things happening to a person' - oh wow, how novel! GiantSnowman 17:52, 7 April 2026 (UTC)

It's patently not true that every article about a person is only a biography: Nobody claimed they all were. —Bagumba (talk) 17:53, 7 April 2026 (UTC)

• "Life, Career, Works" are often workable alternatives, but many if not most short articles of most types just have too many sections, which can be merged. Johnbod (talk) 12:23, 7 April 2026 (UTC)

  Or if it's really short, the article doesn't need sub-headings at all in the body of the article. Mr Serjeant Buzfuz (talk) 12:35, 7 April 2026 (UTC)

Main headings should reflect the main things people are coming to the article to read. That would be things like Early life, Career, Personal life, Works. Some people's careers are so intertwined with their personal life that separating the two is not ideal, and so it might be better to break things up chronologically. Either way, a Biography section seems appropriate if the article contains non-biographical sections that are of equal importance. This is the case for people who are culturally significant, like Jesus. Clearly his article is not solely (or mainly) an account of his life; his cultural impact is of at least equal importance. Wh1pla5h99 (talk) 12:45, 7 April 2026 (UTC)

Utterly pointless and removed whenever I see it. Divide directly into subheaders if necessary, leave as a single block if not long enough to subdivide. It's not hard. -- Necrothesp (talk) 10:42, 15 April 2026 (UTC)

Don't agree at all. The first part of the article is about the life, divided into early, middle, late as necessary; then there follow all the bits that aren't the subject's life as such, like accolades, honours and distinctions, lists of works, bibliography, perhaps reception of their works and actions, i.e. the article falls naturally into two parts, what they did and what others did or said. Chiswick Chap (talk) 07:35, 4 May 2026 (UTC)

They're all part of the biography! An article on an individual is, by definition, a biography. -- Necrothesp (talk) 10:57, 15 May 2026 (UTC)

Piping knighthoods

I have been considering an RFC making a change to Knighthoods, lordships, and similar honorific titles saying that links to knighted individuals should not be piped in article text just to add Sir to the link; as an example Sir Robert Peel instead of Sir Robert Peel. WP:NOPIPE already seems to suggest the first method is the preferred usage but editors are using both methods and the existing guideline may not be strong enough? Ecrm87 (talk) 10:17, 28 April 2026 (UTC)

My position would be that I disagree with the convention and "Sir" ought to preferably be in the link if it is being used. It is part of the name. I understand that others disagree and don't feel too strongly about it. Also, is this a frequent source of controversy? Are there lots of edit wars over it? Seems fine to leave it to discretion? john k (talk) 16:37, 28 April 2026 (UTC)

I feel this is clearly covered by WP:NOPIPE already ("Avoid making links longer than necessary"), with the example to avoid being President George Washington. To me this is exactly the same as Sir Robert Peel. Unless the honorific is part of the page title (not redirects), don't include it in links. pburka (talk) 01:09, 29 April 2026 (UTC)

It really is not exactly the same as President George Washington is the thing. "Sir" is part of Peel's name in a way that "President" is definitely not for Washington, and in many cases "Sir" is part of the most common name, and is only not part of the article title because of specific naming conventions that say it should not be. john k (talk) 13:21, 29 April 2026 (UTC)

It seems to me that the issue of 'Sir' being a part of someone's name has already been settled in that it's been removed from article titles except in the case of numbered baronets, which is understandable given that baronets often have the same name. Ecrm87 (talk) 14:05, 29 April 2026 (UTC)

I have absolutely no problem with *omitting* "Sir", which obviously people do all the time, but I think when it is used it should typically be included in the link, at least for lists and infoboxes (running text I have only the mildest preference) john k (talk) 16:34, 4 May 2026 (UTC)

It's not very common, but I think I have occasionally seen "Sir" used for natural disambiguation in the name of a knight. But let me make sure I understand, using an excerpt from a list of sheriffs, material that's familiar to both of us. You find that

• 16 November 1621: Sir George Booth, 1st Baronet
• c. November 1622: Sir Thomas Smith
• c. November 1623: Sir Richard Grosvenor, 1st Baronet

is preferable to

• 16 November 1621: Sir George Booth, 1st Baronet
• c. November 1622: Sir Thomas Smith
• c. November 1623: Sir Richard Grosvenor, 1st Baronet

am I correct? Choess (talk) 23:59, 29 April 2026 (UTC)

"Sir" is borderline, but e.g. Lord Palmerston should clearly be linked or the Duke of Wellington. Jahaza (talk) 02:14, 29 April 2026 (UTC)

See the discussion above and MOS:SIR. "Sir" and "Lord" are weird anomalies compared to most other titles in that they are often coupled to the forename even in informal use. In lists of blue-linked people, the unlinked "Sir" looks jarring, to my eye. I don't think it matters as much in running text. Choess (talk) 02:20, 29 April 2026 (UTC)

Yes, that's the distinction I'd make as well. "Sir" linked in lists if it's mentioned at all (which it doesn't necessarily need to be), but not in running text. john k (talk) 13:18, 29 April 2026 (UTC)

Totally disagree. They should definitely be piped. They look stupid otherwise. -- Necrothesp (talk) 10:55, 15 May 2026 (UTC)

MOS:NB

Why does MOS:NB redirect here rather than to the same target as MOS:NOTE? 𝕁𝕄𝔽 (talk) 19:11, 4 May 2026 (UTC)

NB: NB also means non-binary. pburka (talk) 19:23, 4 May 2026 (UTC)

Thank you, I guess I should have thought of that one. (I have to say that it seems weird to give priority to that usage over the far more common meaning (nota bene) but I don't plan to waste time trying to change it.) 𝕁𝕄𝔽 (talk) 20:54, 4 May 2026 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 13 May 2026

pleas change 'if a person exclusively goes by neopronounes such as ze/hir then the singular they should also generally be used instead of neopronouns' if a person goes exclusively by neopronouns that is also appropriate and should be used at least more than they ~2026-28746-58 (talk) 00:24, 13 May 2026 (UTC) pleas fix this i will keep asking

 Not done: it's not clear what changes you want made. Please detail the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format and provide a reliable source if appropriate. – Callmemirela 🍁 00:34, 13 May 2026 (UTC)

How do you do nicknames in Eastern name order?

I feel like this must be said somewhere, but I can't figure it. For nicknames that aren't a common hypocorism, we do First "Nickname" Last. In Eastern name orders, do the same principles still apply, and we do Last "Nickname" First. So, imagining that the Barbra Streisand article was written in Eastern name order, would it be Streisand "Barbra" Joan Barbara? That doesn't feel right to me, but I can't think of a better alternative. 1brianm7 (talk) 03:10, 14 May 2026 (UTC)

Seems right to me. Can't remember if I've ever seen it anywhere, but it seems like the logical option. Dingolover6969 (talk) 05:33, 5 June 2026 (UTC)

Inconsistent Handling of Chosen Names “Slave Names”

Recently there has been new discussion surrounding the use of slave names for black people who have since adopted a new chosen name. (The video that sparked this new conversation is by zaydupree on TikTok, which I believe is worth watching to understand the topic.)

The reasoning behind the current state of things seems to be the fact that they were notable and known under this slave name. Because of this, they're referred to using their slave name for the period of their life before they changed their name.

However, I believe this should be reevaluated. It seems this isn't consistent with other style guide policies. We don't refer to transgender people by their deadnames, not even for their pre-transition life. We don't refer to married women by their maiden names up until the point they got married.

Using their slave names might be confusing to readers, but more importantly, it's also highly offensive and racist.

There is already a topic on Kareem Abdul-Jabbar's talk page, and it's probably best to unify the conversation here. Cloweee (talk) 02:02, 24 May 2026 (UTC)

here’s the video in question on YouTube: https://youtube.com/shorts/6qFpNzNRmW0. — Aurora :3 • (📭|edits) 18:34, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

+1, it's completely inconsistent with this site's other naming policies Fivework (talk) 02:12, 24 May 2026 (UTC)

+1 it helps to smooth out an inconsistency in the way we handle naming, on the talk page for Kareem Abdul-Jabbar I linked this Article from ESPN that shows I believe the AP stylebook’s (if not ESPN’s own) handling of chosen names which we could definitely draw from. Jkpowers (talk) 02:25, 24 May 2026 (UTC)

With gender identity, most cases probably involve only a change in their given name. People are usually referred to by their surname per MOS:SURNAME, so deadnaming is less of an issue than with people like Abdul-Jabbar who change their surname for religious reasons. —Bagumba (talk) 04:58, 24 May 2026 (UTC)

That’s true, but maybe there could be a culturally specific guideline like there is for places where people don’t commonly use their surnames? WhoIsConfused ( talk ) 21:38, 24 May 2026 (UTC)

Well, in Abdul-Jabbar's case, he also changed his given name (from Lew to Kareem). It seems the general question for people (regardless of race, religion, or gender) is when is it suitable to mention their historical name and when should their newer name be used. —Bagumba (talk) 22:47, 24 May 2026 (UTC)

We don't refer to married women by their maiden names up until the point they got married.: It probably depends. Michelle Obama's page refers to her maiden name, Robinson, in her early life sections. —Bagumba (talk) 05:25, 24 May 2026 (UTC)

1. I've added {{Not a ballot}} to this as the first three comments came from accounts with 27, 125, and 15 edits, and were all posted within 23 minutes.
2. Noting that the section title betrays that the OP was composed off-wiki.
3. Is this an actual concern in reliable sources? Ed ^{[talk] [OMT]} 05:31, 24 May 2026 (UTC)

   What do you mean by point 3 exactly? Cubnorth (talk) 13:53, 24 May 2026 (UTC)

   Uhh, there's no need for reliable sources for a discussion about Wikipedia's policies? This isn't about adding this inconsistency on Wikipedia's MoS to the article's text, it's about the inconsistency itself. Octolin (talk) 17:16, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

It’s one of the stranger inconsistencies present on Wikipedia, because it’s not the case for most women but First Ladies of US the are referred to in this way (see Jill Biden, Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, Mamie Eisenhower,etc.) Jkpowers (talk) 06:03, 24 May 2026 (UTC)

Not just those; see Christiane Vulpius, Aloysia Weber, Constanze Mozart – never referred to by their married name, except in the article name for the latter. Fanny Hensel and Clara Schumann switch after their marriage. In short: it depends. -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 06:58, 24 May 2026 (UTC)

The Manual of Style states:

"Any subject whose surname has changed should be referred to by their most commonly used name. If their most commonly used name includes their earlier surname, and you're discussing a period of their life before the surname change, refer to them by their prior surname."

Note the "and" there. The example the Manual of Style gives is:

"For example, when discussing the early lives of Hillary and Bill Clinton, use 'Rodham met Clinton while they were students at Yale', referring to Hillary using her then-current surname."

Hillary Clinton's current full name is Hillary Diane Rodham Clinton, thus meeting both criteria. Likewise, in your example with Michelle Obama, Robinson is still part of her current, most commonly used name, thus meeting both criteria.

In Abdul-Jabbar's case, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar is his most commonly used name. This name does not include his prior surname, so even when discussing the period of his life prior to his name change, we should use Abdul-Jabbar.

As long as there's a redirect, and as long as his birth name is included in the parenthetical at the beginning of the article ("Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (born Ferdinand Lewis Alcindor Jr., April 16, 1947)"), I don't think using Abdul-Jabbar throughout the remainder of the article would cause noteworthy confusion. Geoffreylikespie (talk) 19:15, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

Frankly I don't see any reason why we shouldn't be using people's current names in articles throughout. A person doesn't become someone else when they change their name. I think this goes for any situation in which someone has changed their name for personal reasons, but especially when you factor in the implications of continued use of former names associated with slavery and the like. Hopefully a more robust policy can be made here because it seems to have slipped under the cracks. Cubnorth (talk) 13:52, 24 May 2026 (UTC)

There is a WP:COMMONNAME element to this, and another example is Kanye West. He's been wanting people to call him "Ye" and did legally change his name, but his birthname remains his COMMONNAME last we checked. – Muboshgu (talk) 14:06, 24 May 2026 (UTC)

That being said, most people who weren’t UCLA fans in the 60s only know the individual who sparked the conversation here as Kareem Abdul-Jabbar rather than his given name of Lew Alcindor, which is totally different than Kanye West. What we are trying to do here is uniformly handle chosen names, which this is something that the frustrating realization here is that there is no uniform way that Wikipedia handles chosen names. Jkpowers (talk) 17:27, 24 May 2026 (UTC)

"Ye" is his "chosen name". And we still call him Kanye West. – Muboshgu (talk) 00:51, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

I believe that's exactly the point Jkpowers was getting at. We still tend to call Kanye West "Kanye West", not "Ye". We do not still tend to call Kareem Abdul-Jabbar "Lew Alcindor", so West isn't a good comparison. Geoffreylikespie (talk) 19:19, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

+1 —Myceteae‍🍄‍🟫 (talk) 20:30, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

There might be at least two cases to consider here:

1. How to refer to him in his own biography before his name change.
2. How to refer to him in other pages about his activities before his name change (e.g. 1968–69 UCLA Bruins men's basketball team).

—Bagumba (talk) 00:56, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

Since his common name is Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and his surname is not included in his birth name, I think it’s only appropiate we should use Abdul-Jabbar instead of Alcindor per MOS:SURNAME in the biography section.

Same goes for his activities before the name change since Abdul-Jabbar is still the common name.

Tschusstachelly (talk) 17:06, 27 May 2026 (UTC)

• There is no one “right way” to handle name changes. We have to look at each case individually. Were they notable prior to the name change (under the previous name)? If so, we should probably use the old name in historical context, and then shift to the new name in more modern context. Blueboar (talk) 23:06, 24 May 2026 (UTC)

  we should probably use the old name in historical context, and then shift to the new name in more modern context: For comparison, MOS:GENDERID reads:

  In articles on works or other activity by a living trans or non-binary person before transition, use their current name as the primary name (in prose, tables, lists, infoboxes, etc.), unless they prefer their former name be used for past events.

  —Bagumba (talk) 23:27, 24 May 2026 (UTC)

  This is actually handed by MOS:BIO#Anachronistic names (that paragraph is written strangely, but the last sentence makes it clear that it should apply here). That would advise using Alcindor for the parts of the article that cover him prior to his name change. Ed ^{[talk] [OMT]} 02:25, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

  I understand where you're coming from, but the logic here just doesn't hold. The example given is for a pope, who's new name is explicitly tied to his position at the time, which is a very different situation.

  Even if we assume that guidance should apply in other situations, the page you linked then immediately goes into numerous exceptions. There's no reason another exception can't be added, especially when we're talking about African Americans shedding the name they got from the person who enslaved their ancestors. ~2026-31178-68 (talk) 06:11, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

+1. Using a former name is just plain disrespectful and unnecessary. Like why even do it? Are we worried that someone reading his Early Life section is going to see "Jabbar" and say "Who??" MartinTDR (talk) 05:06, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

Regardless of the controversial term 'slave name', there's WP:SELFID and WP:COMMONNAME. Kareem Abdul-Jabbar legally changed his name. It's not his stagename or a nickname. I would mention his birth name and refer to the person by his chosen name, which is also the one most commonly used. See a Google ngram of the names used. For future reference, go by SELFID first (legally changing a name takes precedence), COMMONNAME second. My two cents. soetermans. ^{↑↑↓↓←→←→ B A TALK} 07:06, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

For transparency, this discussion was first raised in this YouTube Shorts video. I agree with the fundamental issue at play here, as § Anachronistic names is not ideal and already de facto at odds with our current practices re. trans people. A Black person moving away from a slave name isn't analogous to a performer choosing a new stage name, but is something much more deeply personal, and more comparable to some extent to a trans person moving away from their deadname. Of course, I don't pretend to speak for Black people – who are still underrepresented here, part of why it took so long for this topic to be brought up – and I would be happy if folks more familiar with the matter could weigh in. Chaotic Enby (in solidarity · talk · contribs) 15:03, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

Since this is getting a lot of support, the next step should be to draft a proposal and submit it as a broader request for comment to the community, to get input beyond the video's viewers and avoid canvassing/local consensus concerns. Chaotic Enby (in solidarity · talk · contribs) 15:17, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

It's not yet clear to me yet if a proposal should deal strictly with "slave names" or more broadly with name changes in general. We seem to be revisiting concepts that previously were only narrowly afforded for gender ID. —Bagumba (talk) 15:35, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

I think both are relevant discussions to have, but a broader one about name changes can obscure various specific dynamics (re. my example with stage names), and an RfC on that broader theme should involve a proposal for issue-by-issue determination. Chaotic Enby (in solidarity · talk · contribs) 15:40, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

Yes. I'd suggest continuing the discussion here a bit to further gather ideas. Most RfCs fail from not vetting out obvious issues and rebuttals from the start. —Bagumba (talk) 16:06, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

+1 that this should be RFC'd, but it seems pretty straightforward that we should use be applying our (in my opinion very successful) guideline of MOS:DEADNAME to chosen names more broadly. 🌸⁠wasianpower⁠🌸 (talk • contribs) 16:30, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

The MOS:DEADNAME policy is a good precedent to apply to all chosen names. Article titles should still be under WP:COMMONNAME like Stokeley Carmichael and Kanye West, but they should be referred to as their preferred names Kwame Ture and Ye West within the article, and their name changes should be mentioned. Scooglers (talk) 16:47, 26 May 2026 (UTC)

Having the article title differ from the name chosen throughout seems confusing and inconsistent, though. Gawaon (talk) 17:27, 6 June 2026 (UTC)

I agree. An RfC will bring more people to the discussion, which is important. — Aurora :3 • (📭|edits) 16:31, 6 June 2026 (UTC)

I'd fully agree to remove the use of slave names. Now, I do think that a persons birth name should be mentioned (not used throughout, but just briefly mentioned) if they were notable before their name was changed (this is how we deal with those who have undergone a name change due to them coming out as transgender), but if they were only notable post-name-change, then I'm a bit unsure. On one hand, I think that more info is always better. But, on the other hand, I think this rule should remain consistent with the policy on trans people. Obviously, they are two completely different groups, but it seems to be a similar issue nonetheless. Obviously, I want to make it clear that I'm not particularly well versed on either trans culture or african american culture, so someone please correct me if I'm wrong. Gaismagorm (talk) 16:29, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

Regarding wording for a potential RFC, IMO narrowing this to slave names and deadnames only leaves open the door for further issues of this nature. As an idea for how we could broaden this to chosen names more broadly, here's an example of a generalization of MOS:DEADNAME, with new portions underlined:

In the event that a person has requested to go by a name that is different than one previously used by that person, refer to that person using the name which reflects the person's most recent expressed self-identification as reported in reliable sources, even if it does not match what is most common in sources. Unless that person was notable under a former name, the former name should not appear in any page (including questions, lists, redirects, disambiguation pages, category names, templates, etc.), even if reliable sourcing exists. Treat the pre-notability name as a privacy interest, as in these examples:

• From Laverne Cox:
  Laverne Cox (born May 29, 1972) ...
• Avoid phrasing like this:
  Jane Doe (formerly John Smith; born May 1, 1980) ...

The birth name or former name (professional name, stage name, or pseudonym) should be included in a minimal fashion in the lead sentence of their main biographical article only if they were notable (by Wikipedia's standards) under that name. Introduce the prior name with either "born" or "formerly". For example:

• From Chelsea Manning, notable under birth name:
  Chelsea Elizabeth Manning (born Bradley Edward Manning, December 17, 1987) ...
• From Elliot Page, notable under former professional name:
  Elliot Page (formerly Ellen Page; born February 21, 1987) ...

Outside the main biographical article, generally do not discuss in detail the changes of a person's name unless pertinent. In articles on works or other activity by a person notable under a former name, use their current name as the primary name (in prose, tables, lists, infoboxes, etc.), unless they prefer their former name be used for past events. If they were notable under the name by which they were credited for the work or other activity, provide it in a parenthetical or footnote on first reference; add more parentheticals or footnotes only if needed to avoid confusion.

Throwing this out as a first draft, welcome feedback on it. 🌸⁠wasianpower⁠🌸 (talk • contribs) 16:42, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

Really like this! The part I'm surprised isn't mentioned there is how to apply this to people who were notable under their birth name, but still changed it for one of the reasons we've mentioned. In that case, we would still like to only briefly mention it, but use their current name throughout their biography. Chaotic Enby (in solidarity · talk · contribs) 16:50, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

@Chaotic Enby I've added this text, also modified from MOS:DEADNAME! 🌸⁠wasianpower⁠🌸 (talk • contribs) 16:58, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

Thanks a lot, looks great! Chaotic Enby (in solidarity · talk · contribs) 17:20, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

(edit conflict) In Kareem Abdul-Jabbar's case, he was already notable under his former name, Lew Alcindor. Should he be referred to as Abdul-Jabbar or Alcindor on his page during the period before his name change? —Bagumba (talk) 16:50, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

@Bagumba - I added in an edited version of the next few sentences of MOS:DEADNAME to address this. 🌸⁠wasianpower⁠🌸 (talk • contribs) 16:56, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

@Wasianpower: Abdul-Jabbar's lead currently reads: Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (born Ferdinand Lewis Alcindor Jr., April 16, 1947) .... Later in the lead, it has: Abdul-Jabbar was known as Lew Alcindor when he played at Power Memorial ... Do we present the subject's common (WP:COMMONNAME) alternative name at the time when it's a variation of their birth name? —Bagumba (talk) 23:41, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

@Wasianpower: What, if anything, would we do with content in the body of Abdul-Jabbar's page that mention his former name, such as:

1. During the offseason, Alcindor and Robertson joined Bucks head coach Larry Costello on a three-week basketball tour of Africa on behalf of the State Department. In a press conference at the State Department on June 3, 1971, he stated that going forward he wanted to be called by his Muslim name, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, its translation roughly "noble one, servant of the Almighty [i.e., servant of God]".
2. He stated that he was "latching on to something that was part of my heritage, because many of the slaves who were brought here were Muslims. My family was brought to America by a French planter named Alcindor, who came here from Trinidad in the 18th century ...

—Bagumba (talk) 23:51, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

The first one doesn't have to mention its old name, as it is obvious enough that he wouldn't be changing his name from Abdul-Jabbar to Abdul-Jabbar. In the second case, it isn't using "Alcindor" as his name but as that of the slaver who forcefully brought his family to America. The fact that we shouldn't refer to him as "Alcindor" in Wikivoice doesn't mean all instances of the name should be hidden. To use once more the analogy of trans people, as he was notable under that name, it isn't to be treated as a privacy interest. Chaotic Enby (in solidarity · talk · contribs) 05:02, 26 May 2026 (UTC)

+1 🌸⁠wasianpower⁠🌸 (talk • contribs) 14:15, 26 May 2026 (UTC)

In the event that a person has requested to go by a name that is different than one previously used by that person, refer to that person using the name which reflects the person's most recent expressed self-identification ...: That proposed wording would require Kanye West to instead be referred to as simply "Ye", superseding WP:COMMONNAME. —Bagumba (talk) 13:55, 26 May 2026 (UTC)

Definitely support this, but with the detail that WP:COMMON NAME would still supersede chosen names for article titles, like Kanye West and Stokeley Carmichael. Scooglers (talk) 16:49, 26 May 2026 (UTC)

• Question: What names should we use for Malcolm X? I don't think he was notable under his birth name, but it's widely known, so not a privacy concern. But he later changed his name to el-Hajj Malik el-Shabazz, which most readers probably wouldn't recognize. pburka (talk) 17:54, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

  I would say we handle his various name changes quite well. No need to change it. Blueboar (talk) 18:09, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

  I think the proposal above would require us to suppress his birth name and refer to him as Shabazz. pburka (talk) 18:17, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

  If that is the case, then I would object. The fact that he rejected the birth/slave name “Little” and adopted the name “X” is part of his notability. It needs to be mentioned. The birth/slave name does not need to be highlighted or used beyond a brief historical mention … but it does need to be mentioned.

  As for the subsequent “Shabazz”, that should also be noted, and perhaps mentioned a bit more… but since he is most notable as “Malcolm X”… that name should get the focus.

  It all comes down to following the sources. Blueboar (talk) 18:56, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

  "Following the sources" is easy enough for high profile people like Malcolm X, Muhammad Ali, or Elliot Page, but it's harder for more obscure figures where we may not have many recent reliable sources following a name change. I do think that we need better guidance on chosen names, but I worry that if we adopt the very strict guidelines we use to protect transgender biographies, we're going to discover some unintended consequences. For example, I don't think we want to move John List (murderer) to his chosen name, Robert Peter Clark. pburka (talk) 21:03, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

  Perhaps we need a carve-out for non-BLPs for whom using a different name would be excessively confusing to readers, if consensus is established on the talk page. I agree it would likely be unhelpful to move Malcom X's article. 🌸⁠wasianpower⁠🌸 (talk • contribs) 14:12, 26 May 2026 (UTC)

To offer a comparison, the article for Chappell Roan refers to her as "Roan", which the Huffington Post reported in 2024 is only her stage name. Why can't we do the same for people who stop using a slave name? HemlockLeaf (talk) 20:21, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

There are several questions that need to be asked:

1) was the bio subject notable prior to the name change (ie notable under the “old” name)? If so we probably need to mention the “old” name somewhat extensively while covering that era of their lives.

2) did the person become notable after the name change? If so, we probably don’t need more than a passing mention, and maybe not even that.

3) did the person become notable because of the name change? Rare, but it does happen. Here we probably need to look at the specifics.

Remember that our job is to inform… and information is not always comforting. Blueboar (talk) 21:02, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

I don't really see a reason for the old name to be mentioned "extensively" when discussing their life pre-name change. Surely a passing mention of their previously known name is less confusing and still understandable, especially when the subject remained notable under their new name. I also don't understand your mention of the information not being "comforting"? Cowlan (talk) 08:11, 26 May 2026 (UTC)

Proposal. Let's just keep things simple and address the immediate problem, which, I think, is inconsistent use of older names within biographies. I propose that we introduce some wording saying that the person's common name (usually the page title) should be used throughout the biography, even if they've used other names or it's not their legal name. Editors can mention other names where appropriate, but never refer to them directly using that name, except in a direct quote. In quoted material, the name may be substituted with their common name in square brackets, if appropriate. If the old name isn't well known, it should usually be treated as a privacy concern and be omitted, especially in a BLP.

Examples:

• Malcolm, who was still using the surname Little, ...
• Abdul-Jabbar, competing as Lew Alcindor, ...
• John was born Reginald Kenneth Dwight on 25 March 1947...

Is this satisfactory? pburka (talk) 16:50, 26 May 2026 (UTC)

Oppose - first this depends on whether someone became notable after or before the name change. For those who became notable before the change, I would use either the modern name or the COMMONNAME for the title… but I would mention all names in the lead, and for running text I would use historical names in historical contexts… we can explain the name change in running text so readers won’t be confused as they read. Blueboar (talk) 03:39, 27 May 2026 (UTC)

Can you provide a specific example of a biography where you think this would be confusing? Surely using one name for the subject throughout the biography will be less confusing to our readers than switching names depending on the time period. pburka (talk) 04:03, 27 May 2026 (UTC)

I think that your proposal presents a useful and clear framework for dealing with these inconsistencies, especially when considering similar practices for married women and transgender persons. It also creates a clear and standardised framework for other articles with name changes, which will prevent similar disputes in future.

Further, the entire purpose of disambiguation & redirect pages, along with the clarifications notes at the start of articles, is to kill ambiguities like those @Blueboar takes issue with before they can become an issue. Consider that Cassius Clay already redirects directly to Muhammad Ali. I see no good reason for making a double standard between black people & slave names verses transgender people & deadnames. L.H. (talk) 04:33, 27 May 2026 (UTC)

Our Muhammed Ali article is actually a good example of what I suggested above. Since Ali was notable before the name changed, the article uses “Clay” when discussing his early life and Olympic boxing… it then informs the reader why and when his name changed… and switches to “Ali” for the remainder of the article when discussing his later career. Blueboar (talk) 11:20, 27 May 2026 (UTC)

Ali on his birth name: I didn't choose it and I don't want it. In addition to certainly not being less confusing, switching surnames mid-biography is (verifiably, in this case) an insensitive denial of a subject's self-identity.

Regardless of what name we choose "primary" (for the named articles, existing guidelines and local consensus already appear to be solving this), I would like to see us ditch Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Biography § Anachronistic names and consistently use a single surname throughout. I would not like a guideline which treats trans deadnames and slave names as politically radioactive exceptions to the rule. In my mind, the rule makes little sense. Biographies are told from the present-day perspective, so "anachronistic" phrases like As a boy, Pope Paul... and Young Hillary Clinton met Bill Clinton in college... are perfectly cromulent. –RoxySaunders 🏳️‍⚧️ (talk • stalk) 14:16, 27 May 2026 (UTC)

I very much disagree with the idea that biographies should be written from a “present-day” perspective. Biography as a genre is a sub-set of History… and so should be written from a historical perspective.

For biographies about living people, it is appropriate to blend historical and modern perspectives (depending on what is being discussed)… but once the person dies, the writing should shift to historical. Blueboar (talk) 16:54, 27 May 2026 (UTC)

@Blueboar Would you refer to Elliot Page as "Ellen" whenever his first name is brought up in the article, for the period before he publicly transitioned? I would hope not. The same courtesy should be extended to any person who changed their name for any reason. It's not our place to judge whose name changes are more "valid" than others. Royz-vi Tsibele (talk) 01:14, 31 May 2026 (UTC)

Any broad proposal needs to avoid whitewashing criminals who have gone by a variety of aliases. Test case: British far-right activist now commonly known as "Tommy Robinson", previously known as "Stephen Yaxley-Lennon" and various other names. 𝕁𝕄𝔽 (talk) 18:02, 27 May 2026 (UTC)

Why confuse readers by referring to the same person with multiple names? Biography articles should refer to their subjects using the same name that's in the title of the article. So Kareem Abdul-Jabbar should refer to him as "Abdul-Jabbar" throughout (yes, it should state what his birth name was, but refer to him by the article title name, as in "Abdul-Jabbar was born Ferdinand Lewis Alcindor, Jr...," or "Ali was born Cassius Clay..."), basically what pburka said. Anything else is just confusing for no good reason. Aside from confusion, this practice is also offensive when applied to deadnames (which thankfully we don't do) or slave names (which unfortunately we still seem to do) (btw I bet that's because there are more trans editors than Black editors on this website, and while it's great that we have gender identity diversity, it's a damn indictment of how not-racially-diverse the editor population is). Levivich (talk) 20:18, 29 May 2026 (UTC)

I bet that's because there are more trans editors than Black editors on this website Editor demographics almost certainly contribute. I have no idea how many trans or non-binary editors we have, but only ≈‍1% of editors from the United States are Black or African American and globally editors outside Europe and North America are severely underrepresented. This also reflects the issues that are particularly prominent in society at the moment. As I noted in one of the related threads down below, the slave name question is just not a hot button issue in the world today while gender ID and dead naming are a major focus of media and scholarly writing. In contrast, we did add MOS:RACECAPS guidance in recent years, which more or less reflects the approaches now favored by leading style guides and many (predominantly white) institutions. I think @Tamzin summed it up nicely down below: The reason [we added MOS:GENDERID guidance] is because a lot of editors are trans or know trans people. Not a lot of editors are mid-20th century Black Muslims, or Aboriginal Australians, or other groups with rules about changed names that aren't intuitive to the average Wikipedian. And so we wind up with a strange kind of systemic bias that treats one minority community as special but refuses to extend the same logic of human dignity to other groups. @Levivich, although this thread isn't closed, do consider joining the newer thread at #Self-identity and COMMONNAME. —Myceteae‍🍄‍🟫 (talk) 20:46, 29 May 2026 (UTC)

Thanks, though that thread seems to be about a different but related topic? I see the RFC has been closed and I'm not seeing a thread where a new RFC is currently being workshopped, so I'll just leave this comment here for whatever it's worth: I think we overthink this. Once we define a term, we should just use that same term to refer to the same thing every time; this consistency avoids confusion. We name the subject of an article in the article title, and we should use the article title to refer to the subject of the article in the article text. So if the article is Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, refer to him as "Abdul-Jabbar." If the article is Lady Gaga, refer to her as "Gaga," etc. This is how the reader -- including the reader who jumps into the middle of an article without reading from the beginning -- will know we're talking about the article subject and not someone else. Levivich (talk) 21:24, 29 May 2026 (UTC)

I had started #Self-identity and COMMONNAME to understand the history of GENDERID more and see if there might be other parallels to this topic. —Bagumba (talk) 21:35, 29 May 2026 (UTC)

I think there will and should be another RFC eventually, hopefully sooner than later. I find the discussion at #Self-identity and COMMONNAME illuminating and see it as a continuation of this and the related discussions and part of a broader BEFORE to a subsequent RFC. Someone could start a more focused RFC workshopping thread at any time. In my mind, the question is whether to hold a dedicated slave name RFC or develop a broader approach. These aren't mutually exclusive but one might be ripe sooner than the other. Personally, I'd like to see #Self-identity and COMMONNAME play out for a bit to reduce the number of concurrent discussions but if someone starts another thread I'll be happy to jump in. —Myceteae‍🍄‍🟫 (talk) 22:46, 29 May 2026 (UTC)

If a person used a chosen name different from the name they were assigned to at birth for any reason, then that should be reflected in their Wikipedia article. The name assigned at birth should be mentioned briefly in the "early life" section and maybe briefly in the opening, but hardly anywhere else in the article. Doesn't matter the reason why they made the change. If trans people, women, and celebrities are allowed to change their names, then Black people who wished not to be known by their "slave names" should be allowed to do so as well.

If you think differently, consider why that is the case and how you may be influenced by wider societal influences.

Royz-vi Tsibele (talk) 01:08, 31 May 2026 (UTC)

+1. Like the previously established case for those who have changed their names to abandon a previous identifier in relieving themselves of what to them was an inappropriate term, same applies to those who change their names based on ethnicity, nationality, or race concerns. In the case of Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, the article explicitly identifies his birth name, interpreted by Abdul-Jabbar himself, as being untrue to his identification as a Black person, satisfying the "inappropriate clause". Although stated as a decision to preserve his Yoruba ancestry/history in the face of what he identifies as the riddance of Black peoples' heritage and history, Abdul-Jabbar is ultimately making the decision to keep to a truer identification of self, throwing away a now disgraced label; not dissimilar to a person who, for example, has transitioned. Both root from the preservation of the individual's self-identification, regardless if it is what was given to them at birth, or regardless before that moment of change.

If people's names are to be respected regardless of however supposedly popular their deadnames may be, then so should people who have abandoned slave names (or, for that matter, any other name they see as being untrue to their roots/truest identity), as both, in truth, rely on the same foundation. WikiLurchker (talk) 22:53, 2 June 2026 (UTC)

But maybe it's a bad idea to be so absolute? WP:COMMONNAME considerations should certainly play a considerable role too. Gawaon (talk) 07:20, 3 June 2026 (UTC)

RfC: Consistency in chosen and former names in biographies

The following discussion is an archived record of a request for comment. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.

Withdrawn, as many people have pointed out below, the ill-thought-out poorly-worded options I proposed are distracting from productive, efficient consensus-building. Though there's been much participation, WP:RFCEND seems to give me the unilateral authority to withdraw this RfC, which I've decided to do with the recommendation of others. I welcome another to create a better RfC on this topic, after further workshoping. Thanks, Feeglgeef (talk) 23:21, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

---

In the above section, a discussion was started on the use of former names for subjects that have adopted, legally or personally, new names, and multiple editors have called for an RfC.

The section of this MOS page on anachronistic names says that the subject should be referred to by the name they used at the time being described. (e.g., referring to Kareem Abdul-Jabbar as Lew Alcindor)

Many have argued above that this may create a double standard compared to the section on the very same page on gender identity (retroactively applying a transgender person's chosen name) and our handling of maiden names in other biographies. As pointed out by zaydupree on TikTok (whose video kicked off this discussion), this distinction may be culturally insensitive when applied to Black individuals who explicitly no longer use a birth name they consider a "slave name". On the other hand, others have raised concerns that retroactively applying names could confuse our readers or conflict with historical accuracy, particularly to subjects that were highly notable before their name change.

Therefore, how should the Manual of Style guide the use of former names in biographical prose?

• Option A: Universally use the current name when referring to a subject throughout the running prose (while still noting the former name in the lead and at the point of the name change)
• Option B: Use the current name universally, unless the subject was highly notable under their previous name prior to the change.
• Option C: Create an exception targeted solely to names linked to slavery, colonization, or religious conversion, mandating retroactive use in these cases.
• Option D (Status quo): Continue to apply MOS:BIO#Anachronistic names as written.

Thanks, Feeglgeef (talk) 17:58, 27 May 2026 (UTC)

Courtesy pings: @Cloweee, Fivework, Jkpowers, Bagumba, Whoisconfused, The ed17, Cubnorth, Octolin, Michael Bednarek, Geoffreylikespie, Muboshgu, Tschusstachelly, Blueboar, MartinTDR, Soetermans, Chaotic Enby, Wasianpower, Scooglers, Gaismagorm, Pburka, HemlockLeaf, Cowlan, Dinosaur Rider, RoxySaunders, and JMF: this should be all participants in the above section. Feeglgeef (talk) 19:09, 27 May 2026 (UTC)

Option A > B > C, although with a caveat that this applies to deliberate name changes when the subject desires to cut the ties with their birth name, instead of pure stage names or other reasons for name changes (Augustus being a great example). I acknowledge that the distinction can be difficult to make in some cases, in which case, if reliable sources and self-identification don't provide a clear answer, we should err on the side of privacy and respect the individual's most recent name choice. Chaotic Enby (in solidarity · talk · contribs) 19:16, 27 May 2026 (UTC)

I would say Option B. I don't think any Wikipedia rule can be applied 100%, but exceptions should be kept only for cases where it could cause serious confusion to the reader. For example, name changes that are being done for publicity stunts (like Joe Lycett), criminal reasons like mentioned above, etc. I would also argue for one name to be used throughout the article, and I'm again going to reference how gender identity is handled: when someone uses multiple pronouns, one pronoun is chosen for consistency. I think this should go for names as well. Cubnorth (talk) 19:42, 27 May 2026 (UTC)

Option D as the discussion above demonstrates, there's simply too much variation in circumstance to make a general rule, and stringent application doesn't help us. Some articles are going to be better served by a chronological approach and introducing new names according to when it happened, others by using the same name throughout. This is an excessively broad change that doesn't deal with the numerous issues inherent in a blanket approach described above. And most of these described cases aren't a privacy issue at all. Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs ^talk 20:00, 27 May 2026 (UTC)

A > B > C per Chaotic Enby and Cubnorth. Feeglgeef (talk) 20:06, 27 May 2026 (UTC)

Option D - Sometimes “inconsistency” is a good thing. David Fuchs says it well, when it comes to name changes, taking a one-size-fits-all approach is simply not appropriate. Our current guidance gives us flexibility to deal with name changes on a subject by subject level - as it should. Blueboar (talk) 20:13, 27 May 2026 (UTC)

Option A*: Use the common name (i.e. the article title) throughout. This is slightly different than A above, which says "current name". We should use the same name as the page title, regardless of whether it's the subject's most recent name (e.g. Malcolm X, not Shabazz). This is both respectful to our readers (someone jumping into a section on Muhammad Ali's Olympic career may not know who "Clay" is), and it's respectful to our subjects. pburka (talk) 20:42, 27 May 2026 (UTC)

On the other hand, consider someone who has never heard of Muhammad Ali (unlikely, but possible), but has read that some guy named Cassius Clay won an Olympic gold medal in boxing, and wants to know more… that reader would be confused if the article didn’t at least mention the name “Clay”. They would probably think they were misdirected to the wrong article. Nor would they discover why Clay changed his name to Ali. In the case of Ali, his rejection of “Clay” and adoption of “Ali” is an important part of his life story. We need to cover it. Blueboar (talk) 21:09, 27 May 2026 (UTC)

Option A already addresses both your points (did you read it?), it explicitly states that the original name can be stated twice in the article, at both of your concern points. Feeglgeef (talk) 21:11, 27 May 2026 (UTC)

FWIW, I think we should be permitted to use the former name as many times as necessary, as long as we're not using it to directly reference the subject. e.g. This is fine: "Before the match, Ali mocked Patterson, who was widely known to call him by his former name Cassius Clay, ..." pburka (talk) 23:07, 27 May 2026 (UTC)

We need to discuss his name change, absolutely! It's an important part of his biography, and it's also worth explaining that many people refused to call him by his chosen name for decades and continued to use "Clay" as an explicit sign of disrespect. But I believe that, in wikivoice, we should consistently refer to him as "Ali", not switch between "Clay" and "Ali" depending on the time period. pburka (talk) 21:50, 27 May 2026 (UTC)

Option D, with the caveat that consensus can (and should) lead to a different usage on an article-by-article basis. (MOS:BIO#Anachronistic names states that the anachronistic names style principle is "also usually employed in the subject's own biography", but it's not universally used required, so consensus can override things when it makes sense.) —Carter (Tcr25) (talk) 20:42, 27 May 2026 (UTC)

Option D, Tcr25 pretty much says exactly what I would have said. I almost favoured Option C until I got to mandating retroactive use in these cases. 𝕁𝕄𝔽 (talk) 22:43, 27 May 2026 (UTC)

Option A* - Option A with the same caveat @Pburka proposed seems like a nice middle ground which fixes the consistency issue, keeps articles accessible to the general public and respects the subjects.

We already have a solid base in order to help us determine the title of an article (see WP:COMMONNAME), so I believe that's the name that should be used all throughout the article too. Although this can be overridden (title name not matching the name used in article) in cases where the new name is relevant enough, such as in the case of Kanye West's article using Ye in it in order to not end up being outdated; or in cases where it might come off as disrespectful towards the subjects, such as ones related to gender identity or an express desire to cut ties with the previous name such as in the case of Muhammad Ali. Tschusstachelly (talk) 22:31, 27 May 2026 (UTC)

• Tcr25's D; it is generally clearer and more accurate to reflect the name used at the time. BilledMammal (talk) 03:59, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

Option A. I do not see a clear argument for clarity or accuracy introduced by the "contemporary names" style. It is normal and common, to use a present-day proper noun to refer to a person/place/thing in the past. In the lead of Hillary Clinton, the reader is meant to intuit from the sentence In 1975, Rodham married Bill Clinton that she took his last name (a specific and decreasingly universal practice within some Anglophone western nations) in order to understand the next sentence where "Clinton" suddenly refers to her and not to Bill.

Using someone's "slave name" which they have denounced is about as offensive as using a trans person's deadname, and off-site commentators are fully correct to treat it as an embarassment and an injustice that Wikipedia has not already fixed these articles. –RoxySaunders 🏳️‍⚧️ (talk • stalk) 06:08, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

WP:NOTCENSORED; we don't base our articles on whether something is offensive. A better option would be to follow reliable sources, and if reliable sources typically use a contemporary name to refer to a person then we should do the same, but I think that is aligned with Tcr25's D. BilledMammal (talk) 06:11, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

But the point here is that, when it comes to name changes and self-identification, we do take into account not "offending" people regardless of the reliable sources, as evident by the very first paragraph of MOS:DEADNAME:

Refer to people whose gender might be questioned using the name and gendered words (man, woman, person) that reflect the person's most recent expressed self-identification as reported in the most recent reliable sources, even if it does not match what is most common in sources. [...] This holds for any phase of the person's life, unless they have indicated a preference otherwise.

"[The subject's self-id] holds for any phase of the person's life" goes directly against the guideline of avoiding anachronistic names by using the name they were referred to at the period being described, but we make an exception to that for trans and nonbinary people to respect their current self-id (in other words, to not "offend" them).

And to be clear, I agree with this exception, it is unnecessarily rude to deny people's current names in their biographies just for "historical accuracy", but it makes no sense (and completely justifies the off-wiki criticism in my opinion) why that exception isn't extended to other types of name changes, such as religious conversion (Muhammed Ali, still referred to as Cassius Clay in his biography section until his name change in 1964) or disassociation from a slave name (Malcolm X, referred to mononymously in his biography section, but not as Malik el-Shabazz, even after his name change (except when Shabazz Academy is mentioned, due to it having his full name), and still being referred as Malcolm Little in his "Memorials and Tributes" section). Octolin (talk) 11:40, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

The thing is, when we have trans people who were notable under their old names it usually isn't a problem as last names usually (with exceptions) aren't gendered/perceived by society as belonging to a certain gender, and that really enables the guideline to work while having a minimal impact on the encyclopedic value of our articles. That wouldn't really be the case if we extended it to cover any name change, first name or last name, for any reason. ⹃Maltazarian ^{ᚾparley$\lor$investigateᛅ} 11:59, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

But the thing is, we do apply the MOS:DEADNAME guideline for trans people's last names as well. Case in point, maia arson crimew who's referred to as Tillie Kottmann in every source before her legal name change in 2022, and yet she's still referred to as crimew instead of Kottmann throughout her biography, which again ignores the "avoiding anachronistic names" guideline. She was just as notable in 2020-2021 as Tillie Kottmann as she is from 2022-present as maia arson crimew, but her article still uses her current last name in the period of 2020-2021. Octolin (talk) 12:16, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

I specifically stated with exceptions and minimal impact, not no exceptions and no impact. In fact, I'm aware of the exacr article you linked, which doesn't follow the MoS (sentence case in titles overrules lower case proper nouns) and hasn't been the subject of a formal discussion on this matter, so I think gendering of Slavic last names is a bit better of an example.

That said, my idea for option B involves disregarding pre-name change sources which I think would work out in the maia case. ⹃Maltazarian ^{ᚾparley$\lor$investigateᛅ} 13:01, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

Sorry, I legitimately didn't notice the "with exceptions" part. What is your idea for option B though? I couldn't find it in here. (/genuine) Octolin (talk) 18:56, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

In my opinion there is a clear difference here, and that's that the concept of unchanged names being "slave names" applies to everyone who hasn't changed their names or doesn't desire to change them too. What makes something a deadname is that a person has ceased going by it, but for "slave names" the underlying idea is that everybody of a certain origin has them. It's independent of whether or not somebody sees their name as a "slave name". So for us to embrace that idea seems ridiculously offensive to all the people who do not view their own names like that, as we would implicitly be saying they have "slave names" that they haven't changed. ⹃Maltazarian ^{ᚾparley$\lor$investigateᛅ} 06:28, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

Well, then why don't apply it just to abandoned slave names? Like, if a person has a name that could be considered a "slave name" but they don't view it as such and have not changed it, then keep it as is. But if a person does view their former name as a slave name and have changed it to remove that association (Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Muhammad Ali, Malik el-Shabazz (a.k.a. Malcolm X), etc), then we treat it just like a trans person's MOS:DEADNAME. Octolin (talk) 11:59, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

Wouldn't this same argument apply to deadnames? If we honor a hypothetical trans woman's name and refer to her as say "Michelle" rather than "Sam", I believe your logic would conclude that we are implicitly declaring that "Sam" is not a feminine name, despite many women using that name comfortably. Geoffreylikespie (talk) 21:03, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

I understand the distinction you're trying to make but this misses the point. If someone changes their name and invokes the slave name concept, this reflects a personal point of view about the old name which is at least similar to the concept of a dead name. Honoring that individual preference is not a referendum on the same or similar names as used by other people. Also, some people are offended by the concept of dead naming and the so-called "gender ideology" behind it. —Myceteae‍🍄‍🟫 (talk) 21:43, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

I don't think this needs to be an issue.

"People who have requested to not be referred under a slave name should have that wish respected" is an entirely different statement to "any use of a slave name on wikipieda is offensive and immoral."

How would we even police that? Track down the genealogy of every person on Wikipedia just to check if an ancestor of theirs was renamed and then harass them untill they give us a new name? HemlockLeaf (talk) 21:53, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

Option D: anachronistic names should be the exception (in the event of privacy/deadnaming concerns or similar, or local consensus for any other reason), not the rule. Rosbif73 (talk) 06:25, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

Option D, but let's workshop B. I'm not going to vote for a guideline without knowing what it will actually say, so I can only judge off what is currently being said. I was going to go with an example of how the proposed options have unintended consequences wrote a bit about how it would affect Augustus before seeing that Chaotic Enby had already noted that, which is somewhat funny. I do think it's worth mentioning that Augustus is a title (see Augustus (title)) rather than his name, which poses additional difficulties, and he is far from the only person known better by their title than their name.

Option C is entirely off the table for reasons that I stated above, in addition to likely having WP:NPOV issues, but I will say that Option B is better than Option A, and I think it has potential to be workshopped into something I'd support. That said, its current phrasing is inviting disaster: "highly notable under their previous name prior to the change" is worded in such a way as to only care about contemporary notability, which means sources talking about the person written after the name change can't be used to establish notability under a certain name unless they explicitly state that the person was notable even before the name change happened. How would work in practice for historical figures? As I said before, I can't really vote for something unless I know what it will actually look like when written into the guidelines, so that kind of forces me to go with Option D here, but I would encourage further workshopping of Option B. ⹃Maltazarian ^{ᚾparley$\lor$investigateᛅ} 07:20, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

Option A, I understand why some might think this phrasing is too restrictive, but it's important to remember that the style guide is in fact a guide. We're not writing hard rules here. Any exceptions can still be made and discussed separately for those articles. While I do prefer Option A, Option B would also be an improvement. Cloweee (talk) 10:46, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

Right, but why wouldn't we just be able to discuss exceptions separately for articles we have issues with under the current guidelines? ⹃Maltazarian ^{ᚾparley$\lor$investigateᛅ} 12:08, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

It’s just about changing the default from here on out. I feel like the current guidelines have too many exceptions and are just very inconsistent overall, so these new guidelines would provide a more robust standard that isn’t riddled with exceptions and inconsistencies that make it almost mandatory to discuss every single change we make to articles. Tschusstachelly (talk) 12:15, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

Yeah, but it's a poorly thought out default, as I have commented on above. If we go with Option A as written we would have to refer to Augustus as 'Gaius Julius Caesar' by default. That's an extreme example, but we would have a lot of cases like it that can be forced all the way to an RfC because the guidelines are on the side of the editor who insists on calling them something akin to 'Gaius Julius Caesar'. I'm not against changing the guidelines, but it has to be done while considering the consequences of how we word the guideline carefully. ⹃Maltazarian ^{ᚾparley$\lor$investigateᛅ} 12:26, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

I get what you mean and you make a really good point. the RfC’s wording is quite confusing and it lends itself to speculation, particularly option B, so I feel like maybe we could rephrase it in a clearer way and also use WP:COMMONNAME guidelines as a basis to determine article titles and names used in the body of the article.

Honestly, option B seemed very appealing to me but the wording was strange, so I voted for a modified version of A which is quite frankly very similar to option B. Tschusstachelly (talk) 17:20, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

Light option B, I personally think that they can be referred to by a past name if they are the most notable under a past name. For example, Malcolm X later changed his name, but pretty much everybody knows as Malcolm X. Gaismagorm (talk) 11:39, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

Option A > B per Chaotic Enby, Cubnorth and Cloweee; though I also believe it's worth to consider the WP:COMMONNAME addition proposed by pburka and Tschusstachelly

Octolin (talk) 12:34, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

I'm going to be contrarian and advocate for Option C. Bluntly there's a reason this feels different for Kareem Abdul-Jabbar then it does for Kanye West. Furbybrain (talk) 13:56, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

My concern with Option C is mandating exclusive use. There are cases like Cat Stevens/Yusuf Islam where there was a clear religious reason for the person to reject a name that they later came to use again to one degree or another. Option B comes closer to mirroring the guidelines in MOS:DEADNAMES by including a notability test for previous names (and which would probably mean we continue to favor use of Sinéad O'Connor over Shuhada' Sadaqat under Option B, but not Option C). Not sure how we would have handled Prince/File:Prince logo.svg/TAFKAP in the 1990s under Option C or B. —Carter (Tcr25) (talk) 14:19, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

Note that the Cat Stevens article uses all three names in different parts of the article body. —Myceteae‍🍄‍🟫 (talk) 23:05, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

Option D I am not opposed to workshopping option B, but I do think that there is a lot of variation in circumstances to make a general rule. --Enos733 (talk) 15:07, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

Option C. The reason this whole debate got started was to solve the issue of slave names, and this approach targets that issue specifically. A and B are proving to be difficult to implement without widespread unintended consequences. This was never about Kanye West or emperor Augustus: the issue at hand is slave names.

The MOS guide will still remain a guide, so exceptions to this can be, should be and will be debated under individual articles. Coupled with C's smaller scope, this lets us address the root problem while minimising the game of talk-page exception Whack-A-Mole that would come out of A or B. (See Clowee's vote and the ensuing discussion underneath)

Failing C, my preference would be a workshoped A or B, then A or B as written. I have a fundamental moral objection to the current status quo and I cannot support D. HemlockLeaf (talk) 18:27, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

• Abstain Not a support for the status quo, but the presented options are incomplete (see #Discussion (below)), and this RfC was started prematurely, while discussion was still ongoing at #Inconsistent Handling of Chosen Names “Slave Names” (above). More workshopping is needed.—Bagumba (talk) 19:34, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

  The options are not set in stone, they're ideas, and you're welcome to add your own whenever you want. Feeglgeef (talk) 19:35, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

  Ideally, but this is a wall of text at this point. Better to close, workshop, and start anew. Regards. —Bagumba (talk) 19:52, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

  No, editors have already put plenty of time into establishing consensus here. Another discussion is unnecessary. Feeglgeef (talk) 20:04, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Option D per Rosbif73 and Blueboar. It would be extremely strange to refer to a girl growing up in Slovenia as "Melania Trump" at a time when she had never met anyone named Trump. —⁠ ⁠BarrelProof (talk) 20:18, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

Option D but with some level of preference for preferred name when it doesn't affect clarity in historical context. I'm honestly less sure how to deal with cases where the person is best known for a name that isn't their latest preferred name (Kanye West, Malcolm X). In both cases strictly following their latest/last preference would likely confuse readers which would hurt the idea of sharing knowledge. Springee (talk) 20:30, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

Option C with more refinement needed; or B with additional guidance. The specifics need more work but "slave names" in particular are a special case that warrant special consideration. The approach should be similar to that of MOS:DEADNAME but probably not identical. Religious conversion may be treated as a separate category although there is overlap with the slave name changes, especially in several prominent examples that have been discussed. In all cases, pre–name change notability, personal preference, and widespread usage in reliable sources carry some weight. —Myceteae‍🍄‍🟫 (talk) 20:45, 28 May 2026 (UTC) Edit: Partial strike. The 'additional guidance' needed for B effectively amount to an Option C. —Myceteae‍🍄‍🟫 (talk) 20:53, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

Eh, I've edited this again. This needs more refinement with respect to mandating retroactive use. —Myceteae‍🍄‍🟫 (talk) 21:57, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

Discussion

Option A comment ... while still noting the former name in the lead and at the point of the name change ...: For someone like Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, what about a page like 1967–68 UCLA Bruins men's basketball team, where his name is not (currently) in the lead and the page covers a period before his name change?—Bagumba (talk) 21:38, 27 May 2026 (UTC)

In my opinion, that page should call him Abdul-Jabbar, with a parenthetical noting that he was called Lew Acindor at that time. The reader is far more likely to recognize him as Abdul-Jabbar, and shouldn't need to click through his former name to learn who this Acindor guy is. (This is how we usually treat screen credits, for what it's worth. In Nightingales (American TV series), for example, we use Roxann Dawson, rather than the name that appeared in the credits, Roxann Biggs.) pburka (talk) 22:04, 27 May 2026 (UTC)

My issue is that this RfC option didn't address this scenario, regardless of how it's recommended to be handled. —Bagumba (talk) 22:28, 27 May 2026 (UTC)

I agree. I think the RfC needs some further refinement before any change is implemented. In my opinion the current guidance on anachronistic names is plain wrong. Using the name the subject is currently commonly known as is no more anachronistic than using the name "mercury" in historical contexts, rather than than historical terms for the element like "hydrargyrum" or "quicksilver". pburka (talk) 23:02, 27 May 2026 (UTC)

Yeah, the anachronistic names guidance seems off or at least incomplete. The pope use case doesn't seem broadly applicable, since it will often be important even in a passing reference to clarify whether the subject had assumed the role of pope the time of whatever event is being discussed. On the other hand, a sentence like She attended the same high school as Lady Gaga and graduated the same year is less problematic. I haven't tried to look for other examples but I suspect actual practice varies and different approaches are appropriate depending on the subject and the in-article context. I'm reminded here of a similar question regarding place names that came up recently. —Myceteae‍🍄‍🟫 (talk) 21:19, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

Option B comment ... unless the subject was highly notable under their previous name prior to the change ...: That's exactly the case with Abdul-Jabbar. What is the guidance for mention or not of Lew Alcindor, his notable former name?—Bagumba (talk) 21:38, 27 May 2026 (UTC)

I'm not sure if your assertion that he was notable under his old name is true, but if it is, Option B would specifically not apply to it. Feeglgeef (talk) 22:13, 27 May 2026 (UTC)

While you are not sure, I can assure you that he would have already had an article in college named Lew Alcindor if Wikipedia existed back then as it does today. Option B would specifically not apply to it: Which leads back to the original question of what is the guidance for his case? —Bagumba (talk) 22:33, 27 May 2026 (UTC)

Then the guidance would be the status quo, I believe. Feeglgeef (talk) 23:20, 27 May 2026 (UTC)

Option D comment. How do supporters of the status quo think we should write the lead for Elton John? Currently it says:

John learnt to play piano at an early age, winning a scholarship to the Royal Academy of Music. In the 1960s, he formed the blues band Bluesology, wrote songs for other artists alongside Taupin, and worked as a session musician, before releasing his debut album, Empty Sky (1969).

Should we change that to this?

Dwight learnt to play piano at an early age, winning a scholarship to the Royal Academy of Music. In the 1960s, he formed the blues band Bluesology, wrote songs for other artists alongside Taupin, and worked as a session musician. In 1969 John released his debut album, Empty Sky (1969).

pburka (talk) 22:23, 27 May 2026 (UTC)

I'd say that Elton John is a case where consensus might well lead to deciding that the anachronistic names principle shouldn't apply in part based upon WP:COMMONNAME and a lack of notability under his birth name. Cat Stevens/Yusuf Islam is a more complex case (and I'm not sure if the current use of Stevens there is the best solution or if it is the best solution now but might not have been in 2008).—Carter (Tcr25) (talk) 23:00, 27 May 2026 (UTC)

• Question If prose mentions of Cassius Clay are removed at Muhammad Ali, what would happen to the image caption at Muhammad Ali#Amateur career, "Cassius Clay and his trainer Joe E. Martin, January 1960." Would it be changed to "Muhammad Ali and his trainer Joe E. Martin, January 1960." That almost seems incorrect. ~WikiOriginal-9~ (talk) 23:46, 27 May 2026 (UTC)

  It's not incorrect: it's just two names for the same person. It's as natural as saying "Muhammad Ali was born in 1942 and died in 2016." It doesn't matter that he changed his name at one point. But the caption could also say "Ali (then Clay) and his trainer...", especially if the name might cause confusion (e.g. if it's visible in the photograph). pburka (talk) 03:52, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

Not sure how no one noticed this yet, but people here keep saying that the "Anachronistic names" section says that the subject should be referred to by the name they used at the time being described, when... it doesn't say that?

It actually says A person named in an article of which they are not the subject should be referred to by the name they used at the time being described, only noting at the end that The principle of avoiding anachronistic naming is also usually employed in the subject's own biography, which means that avoiding anachronistic names is a guideline when mentioning people in other articles ("of which they are not the subject") but just a common practice when talking about people in their own articles (of which they are the subject).

By that logic, John learnt to play piano at an early age would still be correct under the current "Anachronistic names" guideline "as written", since it only states that we shouldn't use anachronistic names when referring to them in articles where they're not the focus like, per example, how Bluesology (Elton John's first band, pre-name change) uses "Dwight" all throughout it, and then mentions that Dwight used the names of fellow band members Elton Dean and John Baldry to create his new solo stage name of Elton John in "Later activities", when describing what the group's members did after the band separated. Octolin (talk) 10:19, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

FWIW, the "usually employed in the subject's own biography" text was added in this edit on 17 October 2020. pburka (talk) 19:59, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

• Option B comment: I think an acceptable Option B to me would be something along the lines of If a person has changed their name, use the name favoured for the relevant period of their life by reliable sources published after the name change took place. This solves the thing about historical figures as modern sources would be acceptable, it allows us to use someone's new name regardless of what part of their life we are discussing if reliable sources do so, while also not allowing sourcing to get distorted by stuff published before the name change. There are some details that might need to be worked out, like with people referred to by titles instead of names, but the general idea could work out I think. ⹃Maltazarian ^{ᚾparley$\lor$investigateᛅ} 12:18, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

  I agree my option choices were poor (I should have put more thought into them, though people can always propose their own of course), but we can't exactly change them now that many others have commented. Maybe in another RfC if this turns out without consensus. Feeglgeef (talk) 19:03, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

  Could that be simplified to just using their (present-day) WP:COMMONNAME? —Bagumba (talk) 19:13, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

  Wouldn't (always) using the present-day COMMONNAME just be Option A? I read Maltazarian as wanting to make a distinction between how present-day (or post–name change) sources refer to the subject when specifically discussing events before the name change. —Myceteae‍🍄‍🟫 (talk) 21:53, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

  Option A mentions "current name", not COMMONNAME. So presumably that would require using Ye (his current legal and preferred name) over Kanye West. —Bagumba (talk) 21:58, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

  I had intended the current common name by current name. Feeglgeef (talk) 22:04, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

  This raises additional questions. I see the distinction Bagumba is making, which I still read as different from what Maltazarian suggested. I realize I've been approaching this RfC mostly from the perspective of an article where the COMMONNAME is the subject's preferred name and is therefore also the article title, as in Muhammad Ali, even though the RfC statement doesn't address this. —Myceteae‍🍄‍🟫 (talk) 22:26, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

• Comment just informing you guys that the author of the original TikTok that kicked this off has explicitly canvassed his followers to Wikipedia talk pages. Feeglgeef (talk) 14:04, 28 May 2026 (UTC)
• (edit conflict) Comment: The RFC seems like it was written in a way that mostly offers slightly different flavors of forced use of anachronistic names. It doesn't seem to show much respect for the idea that anachronistic name usage should generally be avoided or at least not mandated. Also, when I first read the RFC, I thought "current name" meant the name that was current at the time of the events that are being described, but that doesn't seem to be what it means. —⁠ ⁠BarrelProof (talk) 20:18, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

  That's option D, no? If it's not, please do add your own, I recognize that my choice of options was not comprehensive. Feeglgeef (talk) 21:08, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

• Option B comment: My issue is with universally here. This needs more refinement, including addressing some of the scenarios others have raised here. Maybe that's just Option C but I think the wording of the proposal and the actual discussion taking place makes the implementation of 'B' unclear. —Myceteae‍🍄‍🟫 (talk) 20:51, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

  Eh, I guess the 'universal' part isn't really my problem here. B lacks nuance and guidance on how exactly to approach pre–name change notability. —Myceteae‍🍄‍🟫 (talk) 21:46, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

• Option C comment: The mandating retroactive use provision gives me pause. We should develop specific guidance for slave names and related name changes, and possibly for religious conversions. The approach should be similar to MOS:DEADNAME, with some flexibility for subjects who were notable under their former name. —Myceteae‍🍄‍🟫 (talk) 22:10, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

  D'you think there'd be a consensus to close this RfC early, workshop the options, and then open a new one? I admit my option choices were poorly thought out and poorly worded. Feeglgeef (talk) 22:16, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

  I'd back an early closure. We're spending more time playing rules lawyer here than actually debating the merits of seperate approaches. HemlockLeaf (talk) 22:31, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

  I'm in favor of workshopping this more. I don't know if there is broad consensus to close this early but I see multiple editors stating a preference for multiple options and/or calling for additional clarification of one or more options. I would favor an RfC that has a clearer scope and addresses more of the use cases and considerations raised here and in the initial thread on this. —Myceteae‍🍄‍🟫 (talk) 22:34, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

  The use of "mandate" in C is misleading. WP:MOS is a guideline, and exceptions are encouraged when nessecary. It seems to me that many contributors believe that C would be a blanket ruling with no nuance. I support C, but I would welcome any change to how it's phrased that makes it easier to understand. HemlockLeaf (talk) 22:29, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

  Sure, few things are mandated on Wikipedia. But the wording is too strong even if one doesn't apply the strongest possible wording. I think my !vote and my discussion comment here expresses my view as concisely yet completely as I can muster. —Myceteae‍🍄‍🟫 (talk) 22:45, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

  I've boldly del-ins'd the word mandate, I hadn't meant to use it. Feeglgeef (talk) 22:47, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

  I reverted it. Multiple editors have already !voted on the original wording, with at least one unqualified supporter and several others who ranked or otherwise opined on their preference for C relative to the others. Changing the wording at this stage will only complicate the assessment of consensus if this keeps going and is moot if we close it early to workshop this further. —Myceteae‍🍄‍🟫 (talk) 22:52, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

  At this point the whole thing is botched. We're not voting on the original proposals anymore, and the discussion has become so convoluted that any newcomer might miss the one spin-off of a spin-off of a proposal they actually agree with underneath the sea of text. This is especially concerning given that getting input from newcomers is the entire reason we started the RfC in the 1st place. HemlockLeaf (talk) 23:05, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

  I'm inclined to agree. I really should have put much more thought into the proposed options (I didn't think them through at all, actually), even omitting them would have probably been better. WP:RFC seems to give me the unilateral authority to withdraw, regardless of any other factors, something I'm considering doing. Feeglgeef (talk) 23:12, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

  Withdrawing now is a good call. —Myceteae‍🍄‍🟫 (talk) 23:14, 28 May 2026 (UTC)

  Done. Feeglgeef (talk) 23:21, 28 May 2026 (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.

Self-identity and COMMONNAME

This is a followup to the recent discussions on the use of former names. In the case of MOS:GENDERID, WP:COMMONNAME is preempted by self-identification even if it does not match what is most common in sources. I wasn't involved in the past gender discussions. What would be objections, if any, to broadening self-identification w.r.t. former names beyond the area of gender identity. For example, dealing with a name change due to self-identifying with a new religion? Or is the handling inherently unique to gender id? If so, why? —Bagumba (talk) 00:59, 29 May 2026 (UTC)

I think one of the main reasons Malcolm X hasn't been changed is because of his importance (I'm not supporting this myself, just commenting). I think, if, say, Barack Obama or Dolly Parton were to come out as transgender and change their name, there'd be much more opposition to the use of MOS:DEADNAME. Feeglgeef (talk) 01:06, 29 May 2026 (UTC)

I don't know. We've had a highly visible Olympic champion come out as transgender, and I don't think there was much opposition to immediately calling her Caitlyn. pburka (talk) 01:25, 29 May 2026 (UTC)

My interpretation of the genderid rule is that it is, at least in part, intended to prevent harassment and edit wars. It's unclear to me that other groups currently require the same level of protection. Formulating a broader chosen-name guideline is full of pitfalls. Some examples where we don't use the subject's latest chosen name include Cat Stevens, Malcolm X, Kanye West, and John List (murderer) (I'm sure there are more). It's unclear to me that changing all or any of these improves the encyclopedia. (Procedurally, I'll note that WP:COMMONNAME isn't in-scope for the MOS. Also, I don't think there's much evidence that COMMONNAME is broken, but perhaps there are disputes I'm unaware of.) pburka (talk) 01:23, 29 May 2026 (UTC)

Something else I forgot to mention: many subjects aren't celebrities. When Elliot Page came out, there were no shortage of reliable sources using his chosen name. But the average biographical subject isn't nearly that famous, and it may take months or years to accumulate enough independent reliable sources. I don't think we want to wait that long. (This isn't specifically related to gender ID, of course.) pburka (talk) 14:00, 29 May 2026 (UTC)

I wasn't involved in prior MOS:GENDERID discussions, either, but my sense is that this stems from a sensitivity to the underlying reasons for and importance of the name change from the perspective of the subject. It is not "merely" a preference. I think this makes sense but it's not clear it should courtesy should only be extended to trans and non-binary subjects. I think you are right that it also serves to prevent harassment and edit wars. Whether or not Cassius Clay is a slave name is just not a hot button issue in the world today (which is not to say it is unimportant and doesn't matter to anyone). I would quibble with assertion that WP:COMMONNAME is preempted by self-identification. I can't recall the subject's name, but there was an RM fairly recently involving a Brazilian singer who had very recently changed their name and expressed what could be described as gender dysphoria stemming from their old name. In the discussion, editors felt that the post–name change sourcing was too scant to warrant a page move per WP:NAMECHANGES, COMMONNAME, and even GENDERID. Hopefully someone who sees this will remember which article I'm talking about as it might be another instructive case study. In most of the prominent examples that have been raised in discussion or that spring to mind, the trans or non-binary person is alive or recently living at the time of their name change and has substantial, enduring notability thereafter. There is also fairly widespread adoption of the new name in the cases I'm thinking of (except the Brazilian singer). This also reflects the increasingly widespread practice adopted by external style guides with respect to gender identification. As you've noted, COMMONNAME is out of scope, but we might in some cases make a distinction between the article title and usage in the article body. Usage between should probably be aligned most of the time but the series of recent discussions has highlighted several prominent exceptions, including US first ladies and some well-known African Americans. Note, WP:SPNC is a relevant guideline for subjects who are not covered by GENDERID. —Myceteae‍🍄‍🟫 (talk) 01:58, 29 May 2026 (UTC)

I would quibble with assertion that WP:COMMONNAME is preempted by self-identification: Perhaps a poor assumption on my part. I just assumed if deadnames are supposed to be minimized, that the page title would change in conjunction with the MOS-related prose changes. —Bagumba (talk) 03:03, 29 May 2026 (UTC)

I think that is probably right most of the time. As @Pburka points out above, we have prominent examples of a few celebrities where there is ample coverage about the name change itself. It's fairly common to see someone post an RM within days of a corporate name change or a celebrity announcing a new stage name. These are often rejected as WP:TOOSOON to make a proper WP:NAMECHANGES assessment and editors typically reject coverage of the name change itself as supporting the change. I suspect there would be a much lower threshold in GENDERID cases. Preempt seemed a little strong but in practice you may be right. —Myceteae‍🍄‍🟫 (talk) 15:12, 29 May 2026 (UTC)

So in extreme cases, the page title could remain the former name, but the prose is updated per GENDERID, such as noting former name in the lead sentence and changing pronouns throughout the page. —Bagumba (talk) 16:11, 29 May 2026 (UTC)

I think it's possible, and would be a case-by-case assessment. I'm sort of thinking "out loud" here. We have different standards for article titles, bolded long names and alternative names in the lead, and usage throughout the article body. The title and body should usually be aligned but we already tolerate and even encourage all sorts of exceptions. —Myceteae‍🍄‍🟫 (talk) 16:52, 29 May 2026 (UTC)

To be clear, my statement immediately above was just to understand current practices. It wasn't a change proposal. —Bagumba (talk) 17:12, 29 May 2026 (UTC)

I didn't think so. My sense of the current state is that GENDERID gives considerably more deference to the subject but is not an absolute trump card or veto. I wish I could find the RM about that Brazilian singer. I think I may have followed the discussion but decided not to !vote because I wasn't comfortable with my own conclusion on the matter. —Myceteae‍🍄‍🟫 (talk) 18:08, 29 May 2026 (UTC)

My biggest concern is that if we cast too wide a net, we risk setting off irrelevant edit wars. (West, List, Augustus, ect.) The handling of MOS:GENDERID doesnt have to be unique, as the discussion surrounding Ali, Abdul-Jabbar and X has shown, but it shouldn't be the default. HemlockLeaf (talk) 15:47, 29 May 2026 (UTC)

I wrote up User:Tamzin/wild ideas/Disfavored name years ago and stand by it as the solution here. It's great that we added MOS:DEADNAME in recognition of the weight that disfavored past names have on trans people. The reason that happened is because a lot of editors are trans or know trans people. Not a lot of editors are mid-20th century Black Muslims, or Aboriginal Australians, or other groups with rules about changed names that aren't intuitive to the average Wikipedian. And so we wind up with a strange kind of systemic bias that treats one minority community as special but refuses to extend the same logic of human dignity to other groups. The solution is to generalize MOS:DEADNAME's logic to all disfavored past names, which is what my long-dormant draft proposal seeks to do. -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (they|xe|🤷) 16:06, 29 May 2026 (UTC)

I support adopting something like User:Tamzin/wild ideas/Disfavored name or another more generalized approach based on/similar to DEADNAME. I would need to re-read carefully and consider various use cases but this is a good direction. Thanks for sharing. —Myceteae‍🍄‍🟫 (talk) 17:03, 29 May 2026 (UTC)

Yeah it's just a starting point. Someone in the past pointed out that it should have an exception for literal impostors, which is a good point. Really, more generally, anyone whose preferred name is a false statement of fact. COMMONNAME should prevail, so Emperor Norton but not Gregor, Cazique of Poyais. The obvious caveat is that "false" is a high bar and does not apply to, say, Jean-Christophe, Prince Napoléon, or for that matter to a name change that some people would disagree with for political reasons (like a trans person). -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (they|xe|🤷) 17:19, 29 May 2026 (UTC)

It seems the biggest conflict might be Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Biography § Anachronistic names and its claim that former names are preferred in the subject's own biography. —Bagumba (talk) 17:22, 29 May 2026 (UTC)

Yeah, this is intentionally a weakening of that. I mean, it doesn't have to be, but I think a weakening would be for the better. There are times when it makes sense to change names throughout someone's life, like a pope pre-papacy. There are times when it's just confusing, like Gerald Ford, where that article's editors have reasonably decided that it's silly to use a different name for the first four years of his life, and just call him "Ford". -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (they|xe|🤷) 17:55, 29 May 2026 (UTC)

§ Anachronistic names already seems at odds with current practice. Lady Gaga is a featured article and the lead article in the featured topic Overview of Lady Gaga. The article calls her "Gaga" throughout so you find statements like Gaga began playing the piano at age four at Lady Gaga § 1986–2004: Early life. The adoption of her stage name is discussed later in the article. At Prince (musician) § 1991–1996: Name change, Diamonds and Pearls and The Gold Experience and the following article section, he is referred to as "Prince" although File:Prince logo.svg and "the Artist Formerly Known as Prince" are discussed. Elton John was brought up in the previous discussion. In the TikTok/YouTube short that kicked off this series of discussions, the creator said that most Wiki biographies of married women who have changed their name do not refer to them by their maiden name throughout, with a major exception being first ladies of the United States. I haven't personally verified the claim by reviewing biographies of married women but that is consistent with MOS:SURNAME, which says to list the surname in the lead but: Generally speaking, subjects should not otherwise be referred to by their given name. MOS:SURNAME gives several exceptions, including royalty and the Hillary Rodham Clinton examples that were raised in prior discussions on this page. Whether or not a former name is truly an anachronism depends on context and in some (many?) cases is debatable. One straightforward reading of § Anachronistic names is that it applies to all former names. As noted, this does not reflect actual practice, at least not consistently. Another plausible reading is that it applies especially to anachronisms. For popes, the name communicates the status as pope and the wrong name may alter the meaning. —Myceteae‍🍄‍🟫 (talk) 19:24, 29 May 2026 (UTC)

As an addendum to this, Vivian Wilson changed her surname to her mother's specifically to distance herself from her father politically. Her early life section recognises this change retroactively. HemlockLeaf (talk) 20:29, 29 May 2026 (UTC)

This is promising. Excited to see where this goes. HemlockLeaf (talk) 17:21, 29 May 2026 (UTC)

User:Tamzin/wild ideas/Disfavored name includes an example of a former child star who announces a name change on social media long after he has left the limelight. That example falls outside of GENDERID because of other details of their situation, but how do we currently approach this for GENDERID and non-GENDERID subjects who have been low-profile for years or even decades? —Myceteae‍🍄‍🟫 (talk) 23:59, 29 May 2026 (UTC)

We apply GENDERID even when the person hasn't been notable since their transition, provided the transition is verifiable and public. It can get a little messy because sometimes you need to cite one source for the core claim and a second source to establish that someone mentioned in it has changed their name, but an {{efn}} will clear things up when needed. -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (they|xe|🤷) 05:24, 30 May 2026 (UTC)

What if someone changes their name to a name that RS unanimously avoid? For example, Anders Behring Breivik, the Norwegian terrorist, infamously changed his name legally to "Fjotolf Hansen" (a Hitler reference) and was insistent about being called this, which RS did not obey. We don't even mention this in the lead. Should we, following the "disfavored" rule, not change the article to be "Fjotolf Hansen"? Well, actually his new favored and legal name is "Far Skaldigrimmr Rauskjoldr av Northriki". This is not the only case of criminals doing such shenanigans.

And before people say no one would ever suggest we move this, why wouldn't we? This isn't really such an extreme example, comparing it to what GENDERID has at times been applied to; there are not going to be policy exceptions for bad people, nor should there be. We on occasion do GENDERID moves for serial killers: Talk:Aida Vila#Requested move 16 April 2026 (also, technically, we're misgendering the perpetrator of the murder of Jun Lin (who is a transgender woman and goes by the name Violette, which we do not mention in the article despite GENDERID) ), so I don't see why we shouldn't obey the "disfavored names" of such criminals in other circumstances. But I feel this is something other people would object to much more if it was extended outside the very limited circumstances of gender, and broadening it from just gender would cause many issues imo. PARAKANYAA (talk) 20:02, 30 May 2026 (UTC)

I agree that we need to avoid making special rules for "criminals". Muhammed Ali, Malcolm X, and Chelsea Manning are all criminals who rejected their birth names. I think Breivik's name change is manipulative and not good faith, but that's obviously somewhat subjective. pburka (talk) 20:26, 30 May 2026 (UTC)

Yeah, that's what I'm trying to get at, we cannot subjectively decide that some people are not meaning it and others are, but this in many cases would lead to ridiculous results. Breivik by all accounts genuinely adheres to his ideology so is the name change any less a genuine reflection of his beliefs than another? Other fringe people have done the same (there is at least one notable neo-Nazi who legally changed his name to, and went by, RaHoWa). I mean, the beliefs in question are bad, but that there are no rule exceptions for bad people. Constrained to gender is one thing but I think the idea to always prefer a preferred name outside of that context I don't think will be workable/inspire ridicule. PARAKANYAA (talk) 20:45, 30 May 2026 (UTC)

I think there could be a workable standard like if an overwhelming consensus of reliable sources that are aware of the new name refuse to use it, or there is a legitimate question as to the sincerity of a person's asserted name change and most such sources do not use the new name, an article may instead use the name that most such sources do use. This would also cover cases like where, as a transphobic joke, a man claims to have transitioned and asserts some new name. -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (they|xe|🤷) 21:43, 30 May 2026 (UTC)

That runs the risks of transphobes citing transphobic publications refusing to use a trans person's chosen name as justification for continuing to use a deadname here. We can hope that such publications would not meat the "overwhelming consensus of reliable sources" standard, but is that good enough? Thryduulf (talk) 22:02, 30 May 2026 (UTC)

What is the "legitimate question as to the sincerity of a person's asserted name change" in the case of Breivik? He was racist and he chose a racist name. I wouldn't call that lacking in sincerity. It also can be hard to judge when there is a paucity, or total absence, of sources addressing the name change; for example, if an obscure trans person changes their name, we can cite a blog post or something for their preferred name, but extending this to non-gender cases I think it would become massively problematic. PARAKANYAA (talk) 22:30, 30 May 2026 (UTC)

Oh wait, I misread or as and, forgive me. I still think the first suggestion is problematic in the case of historical people where social mores and therefore coverage in the "overwhelming majority of sources" were different, and the second, well again, who are we to decide what is sincere? PARAKANYAA (talk) 22:41, 30 May 2026 (UTC)

@PARAKANYAA @Thryduulf: I've taken a stab at adding exceptions to the draft, refined based on y'all's feedback to require the sources to have made a case-specific affirmative determination. I'm actually not sure whether Breivik would or wouldn't qualify at this point, but I suppose that's a good thing; hard cases make bad law and it shouldn't be worried just to guarantee a specific outcome. -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (they|xe|🤷) 05:01, 31 May 2026 (UTC)

Sure, but my problem is the very nature of the circumstances that lead to a "disfavored" name leads to a disproportionate amount of hard cases. As I often edit about crime and the morally abhorrent, these examples are probably more of a concern for me than you, but it isn't like Wikipedia has only a handful of articles about crime or bad things happening to people. Policies are, of course, not applied differently if the people are bad, and imagining the results of such a scheme applied in those topic areas, due to the various ways and reasons name changes and strong abandonment/disfavoring of names can intersect with crime, seems like it would be bad and in some cases make articles far less understandable. Additionally, outside of clear cut cases like Muhammad Ali, the ambiguities inherent in figuring out if a name is or is not disfavored, especially for historical figures, gives me pause. I see what you are going for here but I am wary of this. PARAKANYAA (talk) 06:02, 31 May 2026 (UTC)

This isn't directly related to the discussion on self-identity and COMMONNAME specifically, but I'm posting it here since this is currently the most active forum for the discussion as a whole.

Zay Dupree has posted a follow-up to his original video, this time explaining his position on Wikipedia's naming policy specifically. I'd recomend everyone involved here watch it to get a clearer picture his position.

This is the 2nd time he's spoken publicly regarding the discussions on the MOS/Biography Talk page. The 1st time was in a now deleted, much more informal video on his alt account. As noted in the archived RfC, he engaged in canvasing. Thankfully, in his new video, he explicitly notes Wikipedia's policy against canvasing, and states that he deleted his second account video because of it. (Presumably, he only became aware of the policy after posting the video on his second account.)

If we move to create a new RfC after this discussion is concluded, it might be useful to link to this video to introduce his position. HemlockLeaf (talk) 22:45, 30 May 2026 (UTC)

I see people citing WP:COMMONNAME a lot, but why shouldn't that apply to the whole article? If the name is common enough for the article title, I don't understand why it shouldn't be used throughout. Even if you remove all the racism and potential implications, it just feels like adding unnecessary convolution. Cubnorth (talk) 23:13, 30 May 2026 (UTC)

With women and their maiden names it has always struck me as misogynistic to rewrite a woman's whole life as using their husband's surname. Unless there are pertinent identity issues where using another name can demonstrate harm (e.g. gender) the best choice is almost always using the name they had at the time to describe them at the time. Otherwise it becomes confusing fast. PARAKANYAA (talk) 01:24, 31 May 2026 (UTC)

@PARAKANYAA If there are records of a woman having actively disliked being known by their husband's surname, then it would be perfectly acceptable to refer to them by their prerferred name in their article. However, the whole point of this discussion is that it is not our place to judge or assume the validity of a person's name page. If we can accept that a woman can change her name for marriage and that a celebrity can change their name to achieve fame, then we can certainly accept that a Black person can change their name to grapple with and handle the legacy of the horrors of American chattel slavery. It doesn't matter if someone's name change is "confusing" or "invalid;" the right thing is to accept it. Their name at birth can be referenced in the article's lead and "early life" section to clear up confusion, but that's it.

Perhaps you should reflect on why someone may accept that deadnaming a trans person causes harm, but do not accept that deadnaming a Black person causes harm. Royz-vi Tsibele (talk) 01:36, 31 May 2026 (UTC)

That isn't what I was talking about with maiden names, but the practice of using multiple names in an article; Cubnorth was writing that they disagreed with the current, common practice in its entirety, in my interpretation. The current practice is to refer to people when discussing the past by the name they were known as at that time, regardless of name change. I agree with this being common practice because otherwise it is extremely confusing. We are trying to discuss where the line is in disregarding that. The only line we have firmly established is gender. There are plenty of other circumstances where names are preferred or not preferred for other reasons. What would you suggest the line be? Just black people? Or should this rule apply to anyone who has changed their name and has expressed a disfavoring of it, as has been suggested? PARAKANYAA (talk) 01:50, 31 May 2026 (UTC)

@PARAKANYAA My suggestion would be that name changes should always be properly respected and referenced, aside from incredibly exceptional circumstances like the neo-nazi brought up earlier who clearly changed his name to escape law enforcement. That certainly was not the case for Muhammad Ali or Malcom X; not only are their new names the ones they are most understood by, they did so not because they "felt like it," but to properly grapple with the legacy of slavery. It's not discriminatory in favor of Black people, as you appeared to imply in your message. As a matter of fact, we can and should apply this rule to almost anyone who has ever wished for their name to be changed. Transphobes often say that it's "confusing" to keep track of changed names; we shouldn't echo similar sentiments with another marginalized community. Royz-vi Tsibele (talk) 04:57, 31 May 2026 (UTC)

@Royz-vi Tsibele: The question is what "properly respected" means for a given name change. For a trans person it will usually mean always use the current name, although not always; personally I use my birth name when referring to myself pre-transition. In contexts where name changes are less associated with distancing oneself from the past, it's a lot harder to predict. My father's article refers to my mother by her maiden name pre-marriage, and I know she never minded that because I asked her once. Keep in mind that what name is used to describe a person may not just matter to them for preferential reasons, but also professional ones. The thread below this one is spurred by a case where a trans person is concerned that obscuring her previous name will make it harder for people to find her professional accomplishments under it. So we absolutely should respect all name changes, but that doesn't always mean handling them identical to the default MOS:DEADNAME approach. -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (they|xe|🤷) 05:17, 31 May 2026 (UTC)

@Tamzin I suppose if there's evidence that a person preferred to be referred to by the name assigned to them at birth in certain contexts, then we can reflect that in the article. However, the historic Black figures that this thread is discussing (Muhammad Ali, Malcom X, Kareem Abdul Jabar, etc.) had all made it clear throughout their lifetime that they no longer wished to be referred to by the names assigned to them at birth under any circumstances. This is emphasized by their names assigned to them at birth having nowhere as much presence in public consciousness as their chosen names. If anyone who has changed their name would want their name assigned to them at birth emphasized in their article, that's fine, but the default should be confining the name assigned at birth to brief mentioning in the article lead, "early life" section, and the point where they officially changed their name. Better safe then sorry on that front, in my opinion. Royz-vi Tsibele (talk) 18:16, 31 May 2026 (UTC)

Malcolm X is an example of us not using the subject's preferred name. Instead, we follow the overwhelming majority of reliable sources, especially those published after he adopted the name Malik Shabazz, which continue to call him Malcom X (including his posthumously published autobiography). In cases like this, where there are many high quality sources available that postdate the name change, we should follow the sources. pburka (talk) 19:07, 31 May 2026 (UTC)

Most people who change their names do so for routine reasons, not to distance themselves from the past. At least in Western countries, the vast majority of name changes are by people getting married (usually but not always a woman marrying a man), and usually do not convey any negative feelings toward a past name. There are also cultures where someone changes their name as a routine part of getting older. Furthermore, many people change names upon moving to a new country, without any negative feelings toward their native name. -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (they|xe|🤷) 19:27, 31 May 2026 (UTC)

I didn't suggest it would be discriminatory in favor of anything. Limiting such a name rule as a descendant-of-slaves analogue to GENDERID would be, if anything, less objectionable to me than applying it to everyone, which I think would result in ridiculousness and making this encyclopedia less readable and understandable. PARAKANYAA (talk) 05:23, 31 May 2026 (UTC)

@PARAKANYAA That seems like a good middle ground to me. I would just be concerned about setting a precedent for being able to argue that someone's name change isn't "valid," as some editors have attempted to argue when it comes to Black people distancing themselves from their original "slave names." But as long as we as a community accept that those name changes are valid in that context, I can agree with that. Royz-vi Tsibele (talk) 18:19, 31 May 2026 (UTC)

I think that requiring or pressuring women to take their husbands' names is misogynistic. But I also think it's potentially confusing for our readers to use multiple names within one biography, especially since readers often skip to sections without reading the whole article. Imagine if we used eight different surnames for Elizabeth Taylor! I think there are ways to subtly remind our readers that a person's name changed while still using their common name consistently throughout their biography. pburka (talk) 02:37, 31 May 2026 (UTC)

Use of a woman's married or maiden name for pre-marriage parts of life is going to be a per-person preference. If they were notable and asked to choose I strongly suspect that my mother and my aunt would pick different options and both are white British women who grew up in England as part of the same generation. Thryduulf (talk) 02:58, 31 May 2026 (UTC)

This is why my proposal is to leave it to per-article discretion rather than mandating either way. The question should be first what the subject wants, and second what's least confusing to the reader. That second question can depend on a lot of factors such as whether it's the person's bio or another article, whether it's a brief mention or a long one, whether the mention relates to them as an individual or is merely an in-text citation, whether they're much better-known under one name than the other, etc. -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (they|xe|🤷) 05:11, 31 May 2026 (UTC)

One thing which may or may not be relevant but unless I missed it doesn't seem to have been mentioned. A commonish trend nowadays for women who do change their name when marrying is to keep their maiden name for their professional life, but their married name for their personal life. This is especially the case when the woman was already somewhat established e.g. academics with a publishing record. AFAIK, in most of these cases, most sources will generally use their professional/maiden name assuming they're predominantly talking about their professional life/career which is what makes then notable as it generally is and so we follow this per common name etc. AFAIK even if it's clear the person uses or even prefers the married name for their personal life, we generally mention the married name, but the personal life section otherwise continues to use the maiden name for consistency with the rest of the article. Nil Einne (talk) 03:44, 2 June 2026 (UTC)

I often encounter situations like this but where all reliable sources use only the professional/maiden name, and where the married name is only to be found through unreliable web searches. In such cases I don't even mention the married name (and there may well not be a personal life section). —David Eppstein (talk) 04:01, 2 June 2026 (UTC)

Obviously any name that cannot be reliably sourced must not be in the article, regardless of what sort of name it is (or is claimed to be). In some cases names of that sort which are added are suppressible, for example alleged deadnames of people who are not openly trans. Thryduulf (talk) 09:56, 2 June 2026 (UTC)

Just noting that we have another section of this guideline at MOS:GIVENNAME which deals with "culture-specific usage" such as patronymics and Vietnamese names. We also have additional naming conventions for some languages, peoples, and countries that have specific guidance on personal names (e.g., WP:JTITLE). Thus there is additional precedent for exceptions to the standard approach that recognize specific aspects of the subject's life and name. Religious names and rejected slave names reflect both personal identification (à la GENDERID) and cultural practices. —Myceteae‍🌈 (talk) 01:34, 12 June 2026 (UTC)

The take away on all of this is that we can’t have a consistent “one-size-fits-all” rule when it comes to names. Between COMMONNAME (source usage) and the various historical and cultural variations, we have to be flexible and discuss what name(s) to use at the subject specific level. Blueboar (talk) 12:56, 12 June 2026 (UTC)

Well said. The broad guidance and specific carve outs work in most cases, probably the vast majority, but on close inspection the guideline is full of internal contradictions and it is trivially easy to find well-developed articles that deviate from the MOS. —Myceteae‍🌈 (talk) 15:27, 12 June 2026 (UTC)

Deadnames and subject's expressed preferences

MOS:GENDERID currently states Do not use gendered noun forms (mailman, waitress) that do not match their most recent self-identification. This holds for any phase of the person's life, unless they have indicated a preference otherwise. (emphasis mine). However the guideline currently has no provision for respecting the subject's preferences with respect to deadnames, i.e. if a transgender person expresses a preference that we include their former name in an article or redirect (even if they were not clearly notable under that name) then following the guideline as written would have us disrespect that preference. I can see no obvious reason for this, and in my opinion following the expressed preference is unambiguously following the spirit of the guideline, however at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2026 May 27#Brion Vibber some editors are arguing the contrary position. Accordingly it seems useful to have a general discussion about whether subject's whose clearly expressed wishes are contrary to what we do as a default should be respected or not. Obviously this only applies when there is no doubt that it is actually the subject's wishes, but that's no different to the existing language regarding pronouns (which, as far as I am aware, has never been an issue).

I will link to this discussion in the RfD. Thryduulf (talk) 14:03, 29 May 2026 (UTC)

My initial reaction is that this case is sufficiently unusual that WP:IAR ought to cover it. pburka (talk) 14:57, 29 May 2026 (UTC)

My initial reaction is that the This holds for any phase of the person's life [...] sentence can (and probably should) be taken as applying to the whole of the paragraph, including the bit about names, not just to the sentence about gendered noun forms quoted above. Rosbif73 (talk) 15:08, 29 May 2026 (UTC)

In practice, biographers (like me) of trans and otherwise gender-variant people (like me) have long treated the "unless they have indicated a preference otherwise" line as de facto applying to the whole section. It simply wouldn't make any sense to treat it any other way. Why would it be our place, as editors, to omit information we would normally otherwise include, in the name of the subject's dignity, when the subject doesn't see it as necessary to preserve their dignity? That makes no sense, and is unfair to people who deviate from the Western liberal stereotype of what it means to be trans/gender-variant. I also disagree that this is actually that uncommon. Brooke's perspective on her previous name, for instance, is quite common for people who transitioned later in life, in my experience. My perspective on my previous name, which is that I use it when referring to my pre-transition self, is also pretty common among trans and especially nonbinary people; it's a minority approach, but not a tiny minority by any means. So this guideline really shouldn't assume universalities.

I would simply move the exception to the start of the section: When referring to a person whose gender might be questioned, follow the guidance in this section unless they have indicated a preference to the contrary. Use the name and gendered words ... -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (they|xe|🤷) 15:48, 29 May 2026 (UTC)

I would simply move the exception to the start of the section: That seems like a simple and elegant way forwards. Thryduulf (talk) 16:15, 29 May 2026 (UTC)

+1 —Myceteae‍🍄‍🟫 (talk) 16:34, 29 May 2026 (UTC)

I share Tamzin's and Rosbif73's assessment. The guidance begins with (emphasis added): Refer to people whose gender might be questioned using the name and gendered words (man, woman, person) that reflect the person's most recent expressed self-identification… It would be bizarre to follow a subject's self-ID for their profession (mailman) but not their name. Note: There may be other reasons not to include some information (redirects, content, whatever) that the subject wishes we would include. The usual situation is this: There is some personal detail that meets all other relevant inclusion criteria but the subject objects to it, so we exclude it. The reverse is not necessarily true. If there is consensus that something does not meet the other standards for inclusion or is otherwise inappropriate or harmful, I don't think we are obligated to include it just because a trans or non-binary person has asked us to. To use a trivial example, if a famous trans woman briefly worked as a "mailman" and asks us to include that detail in her biography, but editors have already determined that this part of her life and career does not warrant coverage, I don't think we are required to include this. —Myceteae‍🍄‍🟫 (talk) 16:12, 29 May 2026 (UTC)

Yes, I was thinking about the same nuance, and whether there should also maybe be a footnote, in the wording I've suggested, saying something like People mentioned in articles can opt out of some or all of this section's provisions, either to be treated as if this section did not apply to them at all (e.g. "Please follow the normal rules under MOS:CHANGEDNAME when referring to me prior to my transition"), or to request some other approach, which should be honored if it is reasonable and policy-and-guideline-compliant (e.g. "Please avoid using any pronouns when referring to me prior to my transition"). -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (they|xe|🤷) 16:38, 29 May 2026 (UTC)

The distinction in my mind is inclusion vs. exclusion, or perhaps addition vs. removal, although these are incomplete formulations. I'm not sure how best to clarify this concisely or if it is necessary. I think simply moving the exception to the beginning of the section clarifies things and does not represent an actual change to the guidance. I hesitate to list specific examples unless these cover recurring disputes and there is a broadly applicable consensus approach. —Myceteae‍🍄‍🟫 (talk) 17:51, 29 May 2026 (UTC)

Yeah that's fair. -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (they|xe|🤷) 17:55, 29 May 2026 (UTC)

I have added Tamzin's suggested wording to the beginning of MOS:GENDERID. I kept the final sentence of the first paragraph intact because the first part (This holds for any phase of the person's life) important for defining the scope even if the second part (unless they have indicated a preference otherwise) is now somewhat redundant. I have no objection to someone removing the last part if they feel the entire paragraph reads better without it and is still sufficiently clear. —Myceteae‍🌈 (talk) 16:48, 5 June 2026 (UTC)

Works for me. I've removed that "unless", as well as the one about pre-transition names, as it's also now redundant. It felt weird to remove those clauses, since it felt like removing that guidance, but I think to anyone reading this section for the first time it would look like repeating ourselves, and raise the potential interpretation that somehow the first sentence' general caveat applies more to those two provisions than to the rest of the section. -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (they|xe|🤷) 17:54, 5 June 2026 (UTC)

I'm ambivalent about removing the second "unless". I take your point that is redundant and may even weaken or alter the reading of the opening caveat. On the other hand I think dead names have special prominence in the eyes of many editors, readers, and subjects to whom the provision applies. Also, using different names throughout the article may be seen as confusing (though the same can be said for pronouns) and is subject to a number of special considerations and guideline provisions, as discussed in multiple concurrent threads on this and other pages. In tables, infoboxes, image captions, and other high visibility content areas, inconsistent usage is especially likely to stand out and there is typically less room to provide in-text clarification or explanation. To be clear, I support the current approach and think it may warrant special emphasis so long as it does not imply a different approach. Perhaps we should add detail to the opening, along the lines of: When referring to a person whose gender might be questioned, follow the guidance in this section unless they have indicated a preference to the contrary. When the article's subject uses different names or gendered language for different parts of their life or career, the subject's usage is generally followed. Use the name and gendered words… I'm not thrilled with the particular wording, and maybe it's too much/unhelpful. —Myceteae‍🌈 (talk) 18:42, 5 June 2026 (UTC)

I like that approach, but to refine on it, how about When referring to a person whose gender might be questioned, follow the guidance in this section, both when referring to them in present tense and in earlier phases of their life, unless they have indicated a preference to the contrary. Then put a paragraph break to really emphasize that those two sentences apply to the whole section. Then also cut "This holds for any phase of the person's life." -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (they|xe|🤷) 19:03, 5 June 2026 (UTC)

 Done —Myceteae‍🌈 (talk) 19:10, 5 June 2026 (UTC)

Discrepancy between MOS:BOLDREDIRECT and MOS:NICKCRUFT (and other problems)

The Joseph John Aiuppa example in the table at MOS:NICKCRUFT indicates that the nicknames "Joey O'Brien" and "Joey Doves" should not be bolded in the lead. MOS:BOLDREDIRECT (part of Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Text formatting) says that alternative name should be bolded in the lead if there is a redirect from the alternative name to the target article (or section). The BOLDREDIRECT guidance is also referenced at WP:RSURPRISE (part of Wikipedia:Redirect).

Setting aside the special case of redirects, bolding just two alternative names in the lead hardly seems excessive. The Joseph Aiuppa example doesn't seem meaningfully different from the other approved example in the table, which does set two alternative names in bold:

• Y Genghis Khan (born Temüjin; c. 1162 – August 1227), also known as Chinggis Khan

The actual article Joey Aiuppa currently does bold both nicknames (Joseph John Aiuppa (December 1, 1907 – February 22, 1997), also known as "Joey O'Brien" and "Joey Doves"), although neither of them are redirects to the article. It's not uncommon to list more than two bolded alternative names in the lead of biographies (e.g., Sean Combs) and non-biographical articles (e.g., Ethanol). I don't think we should try to define exactly how many alt names are excessive but I don't find the Aiuppa example helpful or reflective of typical practice. —Myceteae‍🍄‍🟫 (talk) 20:18, 29 May 2026 (UTC)

Notices placed at Wikipedia talk:Redirect and Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Text formatting —Myceteae‍🍄‍🟫 (talk) 20:22, 29 May 2026 (UTC)

Notic placed at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Lead section —Myceteae‍🌈 (talk) 17:19, 2 June 2026 (UTC)

Yeah, I agree that allowing bold for alternative names notable enough to be mentioned in the lead (sentence) seems simple and consistent. Whether a redirect exists is a detail that shouldn't influence how the article is formatted, and having a separate "notable enough for inclusion, but not notable enough for bolding" category seems confusing and impractical. Gawaon (talk) 07:48, 30 May 2026 (UTC)

Whether a redirect exists is a detail that shouldn't influence how the article is formatted. I disagree, although bolding isn't the only option and editors should consider other approaches depending on the circumstances. —Myceteae‍🍄‍🟫 (talk) 14:57, 30 May 2026 (UTC)

If a nickname is not a redirect, then it shouldn't be bolded: Avoid using boldface for emphasis in article text (MOS:NOBOLD). A conflict exists if a redirect is created for obscure nickname is a redirect: Alternative names that are not well known to our readers may not need to be in the lead at all (MOS:NICKCRUFT). Then there are cases where the redirect just shouldn't exist per WP:RFD#DELETE. —Bagumba (talk) 17:25, 30 May 2026 (UTC)

Here the bolding is not for emphasis, though, but to mark the article's topic, which is expressly expected. Gawaon (talk) 20:07, 30 May 2026 (UTC)

mark the article's topic, aside from the article title (or redirect), is not a supported use case listed at MOS:BOLD. —Bagumba (talk) 04:51, 31 May 2026 (UTC)

MOS:BIOALTNAME and MOS:LEADALT suggest an assessment that is independent of redirects (but see below—much of the time there should also be a redirect from the alt name). —Myceteae‍🌈 (talk) 17:16, 2 June 2026 (UTC)

I think this is backwards. Any nickname important enough to mention in the lead should have a redirect (or be disambiguated if there's another primary topic at the name). pburka (talk) 20:30, 30 May 2026 (UTC)

I agree, in principle. Ideally the order of operations should be to first determine that the phrase is a synonym, alternative name, etc. of the sort that should normally be bolded and then to create appropriate redirects. If editors encounter bolded alternative names that seem appropriate but don't have redirects, they should create the redirects unless there is another primary topic. If the redirect cannot be created because there is a different primary topic, that alone shouldn't negate the initial assessment that the bolded alternative name is appropriate. —Myceteae‍🌈 (talk) 17:10, 2 June 2026 (UTC)

Redirects shouldn't matter in this context; we're writing the article for the general reader (WP:READER), not for the 0.5% percent of readers coming from a redirect. In my opinion, all alternative names should be bolded (regardless of whether they're also redirects), but there shouldn't be an excessive number of alternative names in the lede sentence. If there's too much bolded text in the lede, the problem is that there are too many alternative names listed, not that they shouldn't be bolded. FaviFake (talk) 19:08, 2 June 2026 (UTC)

I don't think the bolding in that example is normative, just the names offered. MOS:BOLDREDIRECT should be followed, as should MOS:BOLD (although arguably that should be changed to bold every synonym of the title in the lead whether or not we redirect to it). We should perform the procedure you suggest elsewhere in this conversation to update the lead of that article and redirects to it, and then update the example in this MOS section accordingly. Dingolover6969 (talk) 05:31, 5 June 2026 (UTC)

I have updated the table at MOS:NICKCRUFT so that "Joey O'Brien" and "Joey Doves" are in boldface. I'm seeing broad agreement that bolding two prominent/well-known nicknames in the lead is appropriate and reflective of actual practice. This is also more consistent with the guidance at MOS:LEADALT. There are some differences of opinion with respect to large numbers of alt names and exactly how redirects should figure into the determination. I'm satisfied to set those questions aside as they don't seem to represent areas of recurring dispute nor is the existing guidance so clearly out of step with practice. (Also, I've created the redirect Joey DovesJoey Doves and I've added Joey Aiuppa to the hatnote at Joey O'Brien and to the Joseph O'Brien dab page.) —Myceteae‍🌈 (talk) 16:32, 5 June 2026 (UTC)

Using a first name in an article

Hello, I'm aware of MOS:SURNAME and general "exceptions" to it (like royalty, mononyms, and so forth). I'm working on Élisabeth Le Bas' article. So far I've referred to her mostly by her first name due to how confusing and strange it sounds to jump back and forth between her maiden name (Duplay) and married name (Le Bas), given how many times Duplay and Le Bas family members are also mentioned, and given that she wrote her memoirs later in life.

So, to break it down:

1. Her maiden name was Duplay
2. She wrote her memoirs later in life, when she was known as Le Bas, but the memoirs cover her time as Duplay and as Le Bas. So a hypothetical revision could be the following, which sounds so strange to me: Duplay and Philippe continued to see each other under supervision of a chaperone ... Le Bas wrote in her memoirs that, during this time ...
3. The Duplay family is referred to frequently in the article
4. The Le Bas family is referred to frequently in the article, including:

• her first husband and son (both named Philippe Le Bas)
• her second husband (Philippe's brother, Charles Le Bas) and her second son (also named Charles Le Bas)

In my opinion, it sounds so much clearer to use her given name. There's already so much overlap to manage with names in the article (and I didn't even list how technically there's overlap with her birth name and her older sister). That being said, I also want to follow the manual of style. So my questions are: is there ever a case like this where we just throw up our hands and say "Let's use the given name, for the sake of readability?" Can a decision like this be made with local consensus, like on the Talk page or similar? Or is the answer really: "Make the surnames work". (And if the answer is "Make it work", would anyone have advice for how to refer to what she wrote about her time as Duplay when she was known as Le Bas?) Thank you all for your time! Chao Garden 🌱 ~ say hello 21:48, 6 June 2026 (UTC)

I oppose using given names except when strictly necessary, especially for women, as it can have an unintentional effect of infantilizing the subject. My preference is to use the surname from the article title (i.e. the subject's common name) throughout the biography, although this is a somewhat controversial topic (see anachronistic names). I would write Le Bas throughout, or just try to use pronouns where it would be too confusing. pburka (talk) 22:35, 6 June 2026 (UTC)

Thank you, that's a good point. I'll do that. Chao Garden 🌱 ~ say hello 23:07, 6 June 2026 (UTC)

I haven't read the whole article, but I agree that something like this is the right approach. Defafault to using Le Bas throughout. Duplay can be used when necessary and helpful, such as when describing when she met her (then-future) husband. Her first name should be avoided and used only very rarely, if at all. First names may be helpful when, for example, describing events involving multiple family members with the same last name, and would be more appropriate when describing events from her childhood, but often it will be possible to rewrite the sentence. —Myceteae‍🌈 (talk) 16:52, 7 June 2026 (UTC)