Wookieepedia talk:Manual of Style

Genderized Ships
"# Referred to by feminine pronouns (she, her)" - I think it would help establish a more encylopedic tone to refer to all starships as "it". Naval officers and starship captains may refer to their ships as "shes", but we are neither of those. It would help keep an objective feel. If a particular character, such as Han Solo, commonly refers to a ship as a particular gender, it should be noted in the article. Otherwise, it would be ethno/xeno-centric to assume that from an IU perspective, all species are bi-gender, or have a naval history dominated by heterosexual males. --SparqMan 22:45, 3 May 2005 (UTC)


 * I agree, for the record --Fade 22:47, 3 May 2005 (UTC)
 * If you think an encyclopedia does not use the feminine pronoun in reference to ships, I refer you to this Wikipedia article, which is one of many. Calling a ship "it" is often considered an insult to both the crew and the ship's builders.
 * "Naval officers and starship captains may refer to their ships as "she", but we are neither of those."
 * Neither are some of us subjects of the British empire, but it is still considered courtesy to refer to Her Majesty as such. Some of us are not Jewish, but it would be courtesy to don a Yarmulke when entering a temple. Referring to a ship as "she" is likewise traditional and courteous.
 * "...all species are bi-gender, or have a naval history dominated by heterosexual males."
 * Which is true of His Imperial Majesty's navy, which was the dominant navy of the galaxy. I do not think it too far a stretch IU to make such an assumption of all navies. for a RW reference, the Japanese navy does not use ship prefixes, but many western authors use HIJMS, which is used to prevent accusations of the author considering that navy unequal to others.--Eion 22:59, 3 May 2005 (UTC)

I'd say it's a pretty grey area, given the sheer scope of the galaxy, and the relatively fleeting existance of the Empire. Open to personal preferance perhaps? Personally, I find it jarring to read it in the feminine style, but I'm sure there are others that have the opposite opinion. I don't suppose we can really say until we have more information from the material? --Fade 23:29, 3 May 2005 (UTC)
 * I think it would be fair to say that Imperial warships would be referred to as "she"; I don't think that is too much of a leap of faith. The Rebellion might refer to their ships in some neutral manner. The problem is we need a universal standard. I was merely trying to apply the universal standard of our universe to this one. Using "she" also prevents pronoun confusion in long articles, b/c "she" is used only to refer to specific ships, not classes.--Eion 23:35, 3 May 2005 (UTC)

Ship type (not class)
Unless a ship's proper name includes the type of ship, it should not be capitalized. For example: "Carrack-class light cruiser" vs. "Carrack-class Light Cruiser". We might want to include this. --SparqMan 23:35, 3 May 2005 (UTC) One sticking point will be Star Destroyers. Is Star Destroyer a ship type (an unfortunate situation if it is), or is it part of their proper name? --SparqMan 01:36, 4 May 2005 (UTC)
 * agreed--Eion 23:38, 3 May 2005 (UTC)
 * In all my guides, Star Destoyer is capitalized when referring to classes (ex: Victory-class Star Destroyer)
 * Ship classes in the SWU seem to fall into two levels, "normal", and "Star". A Carrack-class light-cruiser is levels of magnitude less powerful than a Thunder-class star cruiser (okay, I just made that name up). But, there is no clear consensus on this yet. Star Destroyer is also a general name for any large, wedge shaped ship of GE and NR. There is much confusion.--Eion 01:57, 4 May 2005 (UTC)