The punctuation police investigate superfluous upper case in the definite article

[Almor]

Gonna get in touch with The Gambia then and tell them they're wrong?

They appear to believe that you are wrong. the Gambia website

Er, some of the time

 

[laptop]

* Waves at entire population of The Gambia *

Er, where are we going to get 1,593,256 hobnobs?

Meanwhile... it's another one for the local style book.

Oddly enough, last time I looked, the Times style book insisted that the "the" in The Times be capitalised but that other newspapers' shouldn't be

 

[Donna Ferentes]

Do you look at their style book a lot?

 

[purves grundy]

Er, some of the time

Hahahaaa!!!

 

[laptop]

Do you look at their style book a lot?

Not for years, truth be told.

But that was a quirk that stuck with me. You may be the only other poster who'd understand its appeal

 

[Mrs Magpie]

I dunno, I've got the BBC Pronunciation dictionary.

 

[laptop]

I dunno, I've got the BBC Pronunciation dictionary.

I'll see your Pro-nun-ci-ation Dic-tion-ary and raise you a 1933 Fowler (both Modern English Usage and the king's English)

 

[Mrs Magpie]

I havent got a 1933 one, but I have three editions of Fowler and countless Partridges, to say nothing of Dictionaries of Euphemism, Acronyms and Jargon....

 

[Mrs Magpie]

..and if Donna says I should consult them more often I shall sulk...

 

[laptop]

Ooh, I want a looky-up-words-book of Euphemism!

 

[Mrs Magpie]

Faber & Faber.

 

[Maltin]

For the reason I state. It's superfluous.

Whilst the capitalisation may be superfluous, if that is what the event or place is called, then the The is part of its title.

For instance, The Walkers Stadium is the name of Leicester City's ground, whilst the Reebok Stadium is the name of Bolton's ground.

The events/venues you quote are similar, in that it is the organisation that uses the capitalisation. I would accept your moan if it was other people capitalising the The for no apparent reason.

The Football Association uses the capitalised The. This capitalisation differentiates it from other football associations eg writers in Scotland may use the term the Football Association (meaning The Scottish Football Association), but if they were to use The Football Association, there is no doubt that they were referring to the original one ie English.

The Open Championship tries to differentiate it from other Open Championships, of which there are probably many, as with The Valley and The Oval.

With regard to Tesco, the s is definitely superfluous. The company is called Tesco. If anyone writes or says that they are going to Tescos/Tesco's, they are incorrect, so the correct usage or the apostrophe is moot.

 

[DexterTCN]

I have become aware, somewhat to my dismay, of a recent tendency to capitalise the T of the when writing the name of certain sporting events and venues. Examples include The Open Championship, The Valley and The Oval. You can even find the last of these usages on the BBC, a fact I find even more distressing than their inability to list the rugby league fixtures correctly.

What possible function is served by this capitalisation? If the purpose is to make it clear that it is a specific venue or event that is referred to - the Valley, the Open Championship - has that not already been achieved by the use of the definite article?

Well simply put, you can copyright 'The Open' but you can't copyright 'the open' or 'the Open' because of fair usage. And apart from that, they are proper nouns.

 

[laptop]

Whilst the capitalisation may be superfluous, if that is what the event or place is called, then the The is part of its title.

For instance, The Walkers Stadium is the name of Leicester City's ground, whilst the Reebok Stadium is the name of Bolton's ground. ...

Do you work in PR?

Big, brash confident publications and their Chief Subs apply their own rules - which increasingly involve lower-case as far as possible.

And I personally refuse to insert ads in copy: the above are going to be "the Leicester City ground" or "Somewhere Street" - and so forth.

 

[laptop]

Well simply put, you can copyright 'The Open'....

No you can't. You can try to trademark it - for certain uses only. (If The Open is trademarked for sporting events, I can still open a bar called The Open.)

And, yes, trademarks should be capitalised. But if you manage to get a silly trademark, you'll get people either simply describing the thing or, where they can get away with it, getting sarcastic about "The Open®™".

 

[Mrs Magpie]

"Somewhere Street"

Ah, now there's an interesting one...street, road, avenue etc always used to be lower case. My Granny (who was probably of the last generation to use 'shew' rather than 'show') never used a capital letter in something like Bond street.

 

[Maltin]

Do you work in PR?

No, but I have been known to eat some crisps of said manufacturer and wear a certain make of sporting goods.

I prefer the name Arsenal Stadium to the proposed Emirates Stadium and it would be good if journalists ignored the blatant advertising when referring to the venue, but in answer to the OP, I was just explaining the fact that certain names have the The in their official title and therefore probably should be used if you are using the official name but others don't.

 

[Donna Ferentes]

The events/venues you quote are similar, in that it is the organisation that uses the capitalisation. I would accept your moan if it was other people capitalising the The for no apparent reason.

This is precisely why the capitalisation is illegitimate. Language is not there to be abused by commercial interests for their own benefit. If you capitalise "the" in (say) The Walkers Stadium then you must also do so in The British Museum. The owners of the former may own the stadium, but they do not own the language. If you are inconsistent then you are not being inconsistent in the interests of communication, you are being inconsistent in the interests of a particular organisation, which is an abuse of language.

The Open Championship tries to differentiate it from other Open Championships, of which there are probably many, as with The Valley and The Oval.

No, it does not. What does that is the use of the definite article. The capitalisation does not in any way make the Championship (or Valley) referred to more specific.

 

[Poi E]

No wonder some languages don't bother with the definitive article!

 

[BL2ALLb]

years ago we used to write/apply/fix the words 'Public Limited company' after every business name.....this then got shorter to.....'plc'....then it vanished ?

 

[Poi E]

years ago we used to write/apply/fix the words 'Public Limited company' after every business name.....this then got shorter to.....'plc'....then it vanished ?

I'd settle for business just having a fucking number outside their door. Posties in the UK must have extra-sensory abilities.

 

[laptop]

years ago we used to write/apply/fix the words 'Public Limited company' after every business name.....this then got shorter to.....'plc'....then it vanished ?

No we didn't. The legal term "Public Limited Company" stems from one of Thatcher's first major acts in government: amending the Companies Acts so that her garagiste pals with closely-held Limited Companies didn't have to reveal so much about themselves to the unwashed. "plc" was introduced as a new abbreviation for these companies with publicly traded shares at the same time. Before that they were all, stock-market listed or limited-by-guaantee, plain "Ltd".

 

[Maltin]

This is precisely why the capitalisation is illegitimate. Language is not there to be abused by commercial interests for their own benefit.

Language is abused by everybody, not just those with a commercial interest.

You earlier claimed that the capitalisation was a recent tendency.

However, Charlton first played at The Valley in 1919; Norwich played at a ground called The Nest from 1908 to 1935; and Millwall’s old ground, The Den, was so named in 1910.

As well as not being a recent tendency, I doubt the capitalisation of The in the above cases was for commercial purposes, it was just part of the name given to the ground, and therefore, in my opinion, should be capitalised.

You also refer to inconsistent use. Unfortunately, the English language is full of inconsistencies.

Just because The Valley is The Valley, it does not necessarily mean that the British Museum becomes The British Museum, although their website address, home page and company name indicates that it now should be!

 

[Citizen66]

Oh Citizen, you've lost your sharpness. I thought it was funny, and I got the joke.

I skim-read the thread and got defensive

Like, errr, Doh

PS Would you have found it funny if you didn't get the joke?

 

[Donna Ferentes]

Language is abused by everybody, not just those with a commercial interest.

So what?

However, Charlton first played at The Valley in 1919; Norwich played at a ground called The Nest from 1908 to 1935; and Millwall’s old ground, The Den, was so named in 1910.

And those were capitalised, were they?

You also refer to inconsistent use. Unfortunately, the English language is full of inconsistencies.

Of spelling and pronunciation, mostly. Not of grammar and punctuation.

 

[Maltin]

And those were capitalised, were they?

Of spelling and pronunciation, mostly. Not of grammar and punctuation.

Sorry to go on, but I have had a quick look into those names. Unfortunately, my earliest football book is only from 1981 but this refers to The Valley.

The resource that I used for the other names were Rothmans Football Yearbook 1988-89 and The Football Grounds of Great Britain by Simon Inglis (1990 reprint).

The only historic reference to the names of any of the grounds on the internet that I could find was a Charlton website http://www.lungrot.fsnet.co.uk/prog/ which has images of programmes from Charlton through the ages.

From reading the miniscule text on the images, I can see that in 1952 the programme refers to The Valley but one from 1950 refers to the Valley.

So it seems that Charlton started to use the name The Valley from at least 1952.

If your reference to a recent tendency meant over the last 50 years or more, I apologise for wasting your time. However, as you are apparently younger than that, I assume that you were not.

As regards your other point, the only consistent thing with looking through websites, books and newspaper reports over the ages is the inconsistency, including grammar and punctuation.

This makes it difficult to prove conclusively whether the capitalised The is part of the name or not, or when the style changed.

For instance, a newspaper cutting of 21 December 1957 reporting on Charlton's 7-6 victory over Huddersfield still refers to their ground as the Valley.

As mentioned in my earlier post, the British Museum seems confused as to whether the The is part of its name or not.

Who is right, who is wrong? Who cares?

For me, the names of those grounds are not Valley, Den or Nest (or Dell). They are, and always will be, The Valley, The Den, The Nest and The Dell.

 

[bigbry]

*

Oddly enough, last time I looked, the Times style book insisted that the "the" in The Times be capitalised but that other newspapers' shouldn't be

This is because The Times is the title on the masthead but Independent or Daily Mail for example do not habe 'The' in the mast head thus their definite article is lower case.

 

[laptop]

This is because The Times is the title on the masthead but Independent or Daily Mail for example do not habe 'The' in the mast head thus their definite article is lower case.

Banner.

"Masthead" is, strictly, the bit above the leader articles that says who the editor/s is/are. (I think. I have to go to sleep very soon.)

It's also because the style guide I was looking at was pre-Murdoch - back in the days when they could think of The Times as "The newspaper" without giggling.