This is a problem with more than place names. A practice of routinely adding the birthdate to the name for articles on people would also help context (so would words like "chemist" etc. but birthdate is sometimes considerably easier to figure out) ~~~~
On 6/14/07, Charlotte Webb charlottethewebb@gmail.com wrote:
On 6/14/07, Tony Sidaway tonysidaway@gmail.com wrote:
"Paris, France" is also a bit pedantic. When we refer to Paris in normal speech, the French capital is assumed. For less prominent place names, the country or state name helps to jog the memory and remove ambiguity.
In the previous post I was referring to the practice of adding both the state name and country name at the end, such as "Grand Rapids, Michigan, United States", which I believe would be helpful for at least a portion of non-U.S. readers, and redundant but not harmful to the everyone else.
If a paragraph said "Shaftesbury, Dorset" or "Dartford, Kent" it would only raise more questions than it answered, for a typical American reader.
Sometimes it depends on the context. If the subject of the biography (the actor in this case) is crossing the pond for a notable, life-changing event, I think the article would be more likely to completely spell out place names. Doing so might even be considered a necessity rather than a concern.
—C.W.
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