At first, I kind of took the lazy way with French given and surnames, leaving out the accent marks. These are just as much a part of the name, and how one pronounces the name, as anbey of the letters in it though, so I started fixing those. I also don't think it will affect other Ancestry members' ability to find my ancestors in search results once the trees are made public.
Location names are a little trickier. I can type in Québec with no qualms, for the same reason as I put accent marks into people's names. Aside from the accent, any anglicized version of the province or city name will be spelled identically to the French form. The challenge, for me, comes in the following two situations:
Abbreviations. This is particularly relevant in my research to the names of French towns. Take, for instance, Sainte-Anne-de-Beaupré. Do I type the full name in? Or, do I type in the common abbreviation, which is commonly used to refer to saints in English as well, Ste-Anne-de-Beaupré? Does it even matter since the two versions are so similar?
2) Location names that are spelled much differently than their anglicized name. Specifically, I am concerned with Germany, or Deutschland. My family tree presently lists the country as "Germany." However, I find myself often keying in "Bayern" rather than "Bavaria." Sometimes I write "Munich," but other times I write "Munchen." This results in some location names having both the German spelling of certain pieces and the anglicized spelling of at least the country itself. Which do I choose? Then, if I decide to use the German spelling of Munich, do I write "München," or do I write "Muenchen" (adding the "e" in there substitutes for the umlaut in the German language)? Similar issues can be found for other locations. Take Haifa, Palestine, for example. I have to type the name in using our English alphabet.
What if the country at issue has multiple official languages? In Switzerland, there are three primary languages (although there are four official ones): French, German, and Italian. Which language, if any, do you use to input the country name? Should it depend on which section of the country the city you're citing is located in?
I'd like your input, especially if you work with these kinds of situations! Frankly, I think this might be a choice based on personal preference. However, I get concerned because there ARE people on Ancestry, who may not speak English at all, with common ancestors. I want to connect with them, too! Are any of you also struggling with this issue?
I think you should put both words Munich/Munchen, or Munich (Munchen) If you have the accent marks it would be good, but people in North America do that capability on their keyboard.
ReplyDeleteI do wonder when I read the original wording is how are those words pronounced.
What I downloaded on my Genealogy blog is an app that will translate into about six other languages. It may not be perfect but it get the translation across.
ReplyDeleteI like how Ancestry has a "Description" field for every event. You can add qualifying information there to explain the "Date," "Location," etc. Many of my ancestors came from Prussia, which of course no longer exists. In some records it's called Prussia, others Germany, yet others Poland. My policy is to use the name of the present-day location in English, in hierarchical format (city, county, state, country), but add the former name in the "Description" field. I think the most important thing is to be consistent. It has the added benefit that when you click on a place-name, Ancestry won't find places in Prussia, because the Ancestry Places app is based on Microsoft's Bing Maps.
ReplyDeleteIn my opinion, you should call it whatever it was called when your ancestors lived there (in the native language), and ultimately whatever is going to help advance your research (if that means accent marks, etc., then so be it). I agree with MNFH though ... be consistent with whatever you choose; otherwise, you'll be taking two steps forward and one step back. (Yes, that's reversed for genealogy. Isn't the point to go backward?) :)
ReplyDeleteI'm constantly struggling with how to write French/French Canadian place names ... dashes, abbreviated, etc. Very confusing. I'm not sure I'll ever get it figured out.