Talk:Sister city/Archive 2

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[Please do not remove or archive this section, for attribution purposes]

This article was created from two former pages, Twin towns and Sister city.

• The first of these contained both general information about town twinning (mostly from the European viewpoint) and a large list of twinning arrangements; since the majority of edits were to the list, rather than the information, it was moved to List of twin towns and sister cities - please see the history of that page prior to November 10, 2004 to identify the contributors of that part of the text.
• The second page, Sister city, was then merged by hand with the informational text from this first; I realise now I should have moved it here, and done the merge the other way round, so at least that part of the history would be easily accessible, but unless/until an admin merges the histories, you have to access the history of that page separately, too.
• The discussion page for the first page is now at Talk:List of twin towns and sister cities; like the page history, it mostly concerns the list part of the page. Talk:Sister city also retains a small amount of old discussion.

Apologies for any confusion caused during this reorganisation. - IMSoP 21:46, 10 Nov 2004 (UTC)

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Move? (March 2009)

The following discussion is an archived discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was moved to more common name. Aervanath (talk) 03:31, 21 March 2009 (UTC)

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• Town twinning → Sister cities — More common name for the concept, used in far more locations, and the the term "sister cities" has been used for several decades more than "town twinning". — TJ Spyke 21:19, 15 March 2009 (UTC)
• The usual expression here in England is "town twinning" or "twin towns". Anthony Appleyard (talk) 22:45, 15 March 2009 (UTC)
  • True, but "sister cities" is used in North America, Asia and Australia. The term "sister cities" has also been used at least 30 years longer than "twin towns" or "town twinning". I think it would make more sense to use the term that has been around longer and is more widely used. TJ Spyke 00:00, 16 March 2009 (UTC)
• I'm also more familiar with "twin town" (Canada). There's also "partner city". In the several times I've tried to sort out the vexed issue of those cross-refs around the wiki, I always use combinations of twin/sister/partner and town/city/cities/agreements to look for reliable sources. The perception may also be somewhat skewed by the existence ofSister Cities International which is widely taken as a definitive source on-wiki for these arrangements, but is also a commercial organization (non-profit maybe, but it charges money to be a member). I see no compelling reason to move the title.Franamax (talk) 07:47, 16 March 2009 (UTC)
• Oppose - town twinning is an equally valid name for the concept (and as mentioned above, is what is used exclusively in the UK), no need to move. - fchd (talk) 17:21, 16 March 2009 (UTC)
• Strong support. Clearly there are several valid names for this. So the name with the oldest or widest use should be what is selected. Clearly at this point Sister cities is the choice that the evidence supports. As an official term, sister cities predates twinning by 30 years. Also for much of the world twining is not a word that is really used much and when it is it refers to the use of twine. The Merriam-Webster dictionary does not really show town twining as a use, the reference to twinning meaning couple may be the closest. In general use, calling something a brother or sister clearly means establishing a relationship. So moving would replace an obscure word for many with one that, even if not used formally, should be understood in most of the English speaking world. Also the wiki article on sister cities dates back to 2002-01-15. Town twinning appears to date to 2003-12-23 and was moved to List of twin towns and sister cities which may have been done to address the multiple terms that are in fact used. So the article at town twinning appears to not be the oldest and hence should not be where this winds up. Vegaswikian (talk) 16:19, 18 March 2009 (UTC)
• Support per Wikipedia:Naming conventions (common names). The search results are pretty far apart:

	Google Web	News	Books
Town Twinning	169,000	621	643
Sister Cities	670,000	19,300	1,412
(Ratio)	4:1	31:1	2:1

The same searches using "Twin towns" is comparable though not returning quite as extreme a disparity on the news search.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 01:11, 20 March 2009 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

Move back to Town twinning (August 2009)

The following discussion is an archived discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was no consensus to move –Juliancolton | ^Talk 04:46, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

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Sister cities → Town twinning — Looking at the previous move discussion, I see little sign of consensus (6 users, 3 supporting, 3 opposing), so I'd like to re-open the debate. - IMSoP(talk) 17:40, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

Reasons I prefer "town twinning" (apart from being British, which bias I will admit):

1. "Town twinning" is an abstract noun describing the concept, whereas "sister cities" is a concrete noun describing the towns themselves. [Incidentally, if we do use this term, we should use the singular "sister city".]
2. The term "sister city" may be ambiguous, as was the problem with "twin town" and "twin city" early in this page's history. By contrast, "town twinning" is unlikely to be used for anything else.
3. Fuhghettaboutit's Google test was badly chosen, since few discussions would talk about "town twinning" as a process, but this doesn't prove the term is uncommon. The smarter search "town twinning" OR "twin town" OR "twin towns" returns 621,000 web results,news results, and 968 books results.

- IMSoP (talk) 17:40, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

The first entry on that search, like many of the others, refers to Minneapolis and Saint Paul, Minnesota. They are commonly called twins - but not in the sense of this article. Oppose, per the previous discussion. This is not the place for language reform. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 20:36, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

oppose I had never heard of this concept being called "town twinning"; I don't think the term is used at all in the US. Whereas even in places where "town twinning" is more common, the "sister cities" is apparently used/understood.-- The Red Pen of Doom21:00, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

Oppose Sister cities is by far the more common term (not conclusive, but "Sister cities" gets over 20 times as many Google hits as "Town twinning". 168K for "town twinning" [1] vs. 2.33 million for "sister cities"[2].), the organizations behind linking cities uses the "Sister cities" term" as well. TJ Spyke 22:11, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

Support IAW WP:COMMONNAMES. Regardless of what all our personal feelings may be, the references that are currently in the article predominantly use "Town twinning". Either the guidance in COMMONNAMES means something, or it doesn't (in which case, it should be de-listed as a guideline). The term "Sister cities" is established by a single references, so it should be included in the lead. Since all others use "Twin cities" then that's verifiably "the most common name". Google searches can be suggestive where a lack of referencing exists or the referencing does not provide an answer, but we should not be at all beholden to the whims of Google's search program.
— V = I * R (talk) 15:43, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

• First of all, that is not true; two references use sister cities.
• More importantly, following the references to the article is a rule of thumb; it assumes that they are representative of English usage, which is not true here.
• Most importantly, it does not relieve us of the rule of civility in WP:ENGVAR. Articles should not be translated from American to British English (as here), nor from British to American, without some benefit to the encyclopedia outside the conflict of dialects. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 18:55, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

  If we're going to abide by the civility clause that your'e citing in WP:ENGVAR (which is generally a good idea), then clearly we must move the article back to' Town twinning.
  — V = I * R (talk) 23:16, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

  Not at all. It was moved to this name by consensus - on grounds largely independent of dialect - and has been stable for months. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 20:31, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

  Rubbish. It was moved on 21 March 2009 and challenged on 4 April 2009. Stable for months? It just about managed to go a fortnight! Skinsmoke (talk) 04:35, 13 August 2009 (UTC)

• Oppose per Wikipedia:Naming conventions (common names). Since you chose to refer to my Google results and suggested a different criterion, I hope you don't mind being hoisted up by your own petard. Please note that many, many results for "twin towns" are in fact false positives (I have eliminated one source by taking out the movie by that name set in "swansea"), and yet sister city/cities is still far more common. I have also included results from the Times of London to show that even there "sister city" is near on par with "twin town" as well as results from each of Australia's and South Africa's largest newspapers. For the newspaper results I cannot use a boolean search so I did the three "OR" variations separately.

	Google Web	News	Books	Scholar	Times of London	Herald Sun	Sunday Times	NYT
"town twinning" OR "twin town" OR "twin towns" -swansea	[3]	7,930	[4]	[5]	[6], [7] & [8]	3,32 &32	[9], [10] & [11]	[12], [13] & [14]
"sister cities" OR "sister city"	1,410,000	67,600	1,920	7,430	[15] & [16]	64 &64	[17] & [18]	[19] & [20]
(Ratio)	2.8 to 1	8.5 to 1	2 to 1	4.6 to 1	---	Approx. 2 to 1	Approx. 4 to 1	Approx 15 to 1

--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 01:26, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

Comment The references from The Times do not refer to sister cities in the sense used in the article, and reflect the British use of the term. That is not the same concept as the American use of Sister Cities, which is the equivalent of Twin Towns in Britain. Check out the references, and it becomes obvious that they have, with one exception, no relevance to this dispute (Manchester and Salford, for example, are sister cities because they are adjacent to each other and share a common history, not because they have any formal partnership link). The problem with the term Sister Cities is that, outside the United States, most of the organisations involved in them are not cities. Germany usesPartnerstadt (Partner Town/City), France uses Ville Jumelée (Twin Town/City), but not sure about other countries. Perhaps we need to look for a completely different term that doesn't have the ambiguity of Sister Cities.Skinsmoke (talk) 07:32, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

This ignores the wide variance in local dialect in the meaning of city; in California, for example, it means "any incorporated municipality". Septentrionalis PMAnderson 17:46, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

Exactly the second point I was making. City may mean practically any town in the United States; elsewhere it doesn't. That is why the American term is not really appropriate for this article. Skinsmoke (talk) 04:40, 13 August 2009 (UTC)

There seems to be a clear case being made here for two separate articles. I see no obvious reasons why both couldn't co-exist (with appropriate hatnotes on each article), making this debate a moot point. Based on the current state of this article, it seems most logical to move it back to Town twinning and allow this page to (re)develop with Sister city specific content.
— V = I * R (talk) 05:29, 13 August 2009 (UTC)

That's not all that bad an idea, as the two things operate under different umberella organisations/organizations. Mosttown twinning is not done under the banner of Sister Cities International. Perhaps we were trying the impossible in combining two similar concepts into the one article. Skinsmoke (talk) 06:48, 13 August 2009 (UTC)

Actually, looking at the content of this article - which largely divides into "Europe" and "North America" - I think that's quite a sensible solution. The obvious downside is that there are a few things to say that apply to the concept in and of itself - basically, the lead and Criticism section of this article - which it would be unfortunate to duplicate.

I notice also that Sister Cities International has been a stub since January, whenit was purged of (alleged) copyvios. So a combined article dealing with the history of the concept (in North America, and that part of the world) and the organisation might be appropriate? - IMSoP (talk) 22:37, 14 August 2009 (UTC)

• Oppose. The fact that the article has not been revised since the rename is not a reason to rename it back. The references will be cleaned up over time. And new references will be added. Vegaswikian (talk) 01:53, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

Name of article

Taking into account the information in the lead paragraph, and thehistory of origin of this page, would ‘Twin towns and Sister cities’ not be a more appropriate name for this article?

I believe the term ‘Sister cities’ is most common in the US.

I live in UK, where the term ‘Twin Towns’ seems to be most commonly used. (In the UK, when you enter a town, on the signposts it has a list titled ‘Twin Towns’, as is the case on most official local government websites) The term ‘Sister Cities’ is also sometimes used in UK, but usually when referring to a town or city in the US. (I've also seen the term used sometimes for cities outside Europe, mainly South America.) There does not appear to be any particular ‘standard’ on Wikipedia, with a range of titles being used. Usually there no differentiation between the different names, but sometimes they are under separate headings (as in this example)

On European town/city websites (as well as Wikipedia) I have seen various terms used; ‘Partner Cities’, ‘Town Partnerships’, ‘Town Twinning’, ‘International Partnerships’, ‘International Relations’, '‘Twin Cities’' etc.

I understand that there is a subtle difference between ‘Twin Towns’ and ‘Sister cities’ and they are administered by different organisational bodies. Town twinning originated in Europe (Germany, I think) as a way of improving postwar relationships for peace and understanding between towns in Western Europe[21]. Sister cities generally refers to the links and the list maintained and administered by Sister Cities International [22] an organisation based in Washington DC.

As Wikipedia is designed for an international audience, I think we should take this into account and propose we come to a consensus on both the naming of this article and a standard on the section headings of individual town articles. --Marek.69 ^talk 03:46, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

Couldn't agree more. I have never seen or heard the phrase "sister city" anywhere in Europe and assume it is an Americanism. It's interesting that almost all of the images and references in the article refer to twins, not sisters. I have travelled extensively in France, Italy, Germany and Spain and in all cases the phrase used is the local language version of twin, as in the UK. Emeraude (talk) 12:28, 5 May 2009 (UTC)

The local term in German would be "Zwilling" and I've never heard that one. Over here's it's a Partnerstadt (partner city). That's also the term used in the German Wikipedia. Peterbruells (talk) 16:33, 21 May 2009 (UTC)

The term "sister cities" was first used in England in 1905 as far as I can tell. So it may be an Americanism now, but was originally English. And it pre-dates "town twinning." Rees11 (talk) 18:27, 30 September 2009 (UTC)

A suggestion to rename

How about a compromise to encompass both concepts, renaming the article Twin towns & sister cities, a title which already exists in many Wikipedia town/city/municipality articles. Marek.69 ^talk 19:39, 21 September 2009 (UTC)

I would like make a proposal to move the article to ‘Twin towns and sister cities’ for the reasonsstated above.

Any objections or support? -- Marek.69 ^talk 23:39, 9 October 2009 (UTC)

I am mildly opposed, as I prefer a short title, and "sister cities" seems to be the older term. But I don't feel strongly about it either way. Rees11 (talk) 17:09, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

The two main terms ‘Twin towns’ and ‘Sister cities’ are subtly different, which is why I am proposing to include both terms in the title rather than choosing one over the other. -- Marek.69 ^talk 01:56, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

Requested move (December 2009)

The following discussion is an archived discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was page moved. This was a controversial case, so I'll explain my closing rationale.

The two concepts of twin towns and sister cities are not different names for the same thing in different varieties of English, but they refer to different phenomena. Town twinning, as practiced in Europe since 1920, is a practice that involves formal "twinning charters". Sister cities, on the other hand, is a designation tracing its roots to the US in 1931, and is affiliated with SCI, Sister Cities International. A more general name, such as "inter-municipal partnership", does not appear to be in common use, while the two distinct terms "sister cities" and "twin towns" are in common use, each in their respective domain.GTBacchus^(talk) 22:13, 27 December 2009 (UTC)

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Sister cities → Twin towns and sister cities — The term ‘Sister cities’ is used primarily in United States and links to cities in US. ‘Twin towns’ is common usage in UK and Europe, as previously discussedhere -- Marek.69^talk 03:24, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

• Oppose per above. Even if it were move, the only name I think I could support is "Sister Cities and twin towns".NES Wii (talk) 16:40, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

I can go with that, as it basically the same idea, just in a different order :-) Marek.69 ^talk 21:46, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

The reason I suggested the other way was that the majority of lists already in existence on this subject are already named‘List of twin towns and sister cities of...’

Please see ‘Lists of twin towns and sister cities’ for verification of this. -- Marek.69 ^talk 21:58, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

Somewhat I oppose this article, because if we have to give 2 terms for 'Sister Cities', we would have to change all the templates to pleased both U.S. and Europe term, e.g. format for typing date (May 4, 1983 or 4 May 1983), format for typing numerals (100,000 or 100.000), format for words (glamor or glamour). BTW I think there is one better format in Paris, they use term 'International Relations'. But then again, they divide the content into 2 sections: Sister city and Partner city, I have no idea what's the differences between Sister and Partner. -- Rochelimit (talk) 05:53, 17 December 2009 (UTC)

Rochelimit, This proposed renaming refers to the name of this article (currently 'Sister cities', which was merged with the 'Twin towns' article). I've simply suggested that we use both terms in the title of this article.

Btw, I agree with you on splitting into two lists under 'International relations', but that is a different discussion. --Marek.69 ^talk 09:45, 17 December 2009 (UTC)

Oops sorry, well in that case I'm still opposing this, although I don't really know what's a strong reason to oppose this. My only reason is this: http://www.sister-cities.org/. So I say, stay with the 'sister city' --Rochelimit(talk) 10:01, 17 December 2009 (UTC)

The problem is that most international relations between European towns and cities do not come under Sister Cities International; they are governed by a different organisation. Skinsmoke (talk) 03:41, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

• Support Splitting the baby here seems good since, as has been discussed in the previous move requests, the two phrases do have mildly different meanings—maybe not enough to warrant separate articles—but enough so that the suggested title is not just a listing of two synonyms to appease both sides of the previous move debate. I do not care about the order, though I do find the Tees followed by the esses version more pleasing to my ear for some reason.--Fuhghettaboutit(talk) 23:11, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

• Mild oppose – Awkward and unnecessary. Rees11 (talk) 03:29, 17 December 2009 (UTC)

• 'Support There are slightly different concepts involved in Sister Cities and Twin Towns and there are two separate organisations governing each. It was perhaps never a good idea to combine the two into a single article! If we persist with the single article option, and using both titles does not find favour, how about something like Town and city partnership links or Town and city friendship agreements? Skinsmoke (talk) 03:31, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

I like that idea. Separate articles would be silly, so a generic term that encompasses both concepts would be perfect, if we can agree on the term. Rees11 (talk) 04:05, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

• Opposed I view this as an WP:ENGVAR situation. We don't change the titles of articles using "Color" or "Colour" simply for the purpose of changing the spelling, and I see no reason to do something similar here. Both titles redirect to the same article, and the first sentence clearly identifies all of the possible names, so I don't see a real problem here.
  —V = I * R(talk to Ω) 04:29, 18 December 2009 (UTC)
• Here in England such pairs of towns or cities always called "twin towns" and the process is called "twinning". Anthony Appleyard (talk) 06:14, 18 December 2009 (UTC)
  • Not just in Britain. As far as I know, everywhere apart from America uses the phrase "twin towns" or the equivalent in the local language. To insist on maintaining the status quo is a brash example of American imperialist thinking - we do it so that's fine and the rest of you are wrong. It has been suggested above that this somehow impinges on whether to adopt only US or UK spelling in articles (it doesn't - non-Americans are quite OK with US spellings) or having to standardise on US or other date formats (when, in reality, the formats cited are all acceptable in the US and other regions). These are irrelevancies; the key issue is whether Wikipedia should have an article title that is completely unknown to the vast majority of readers of English, whether as their first language or a second language. It is ridiculous to insist on a minority view. SupportEmeraude (talk) 11:19, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

Do you have a source for that assertion? The article says otherwise. Rees11 (talk) 12:42, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

I'm sorry. Which assertion is that? I've stated my opinions but as far as I'm aware the only assertion is the on in the article that says "In the United Kingdom the term twin towns is most commonly used, generally referring to town-twinning with Europe, differentiating with the term sister cities which is used for twinnings with the USA": this, of course is unsourced!!! My "assertion" is based on 58 years living in the UK and travelling extensively in Europe, but if you want an example you could do worse that look at the first image in the article which, in German refers to "partnership", in French to "twinned with" and in Italian to "twinning". Further useful research might be done by examing the foreign language Wikipedias, such asfr:Jumelage or it:Gemellaggio. Emeraude (talk) 13:04, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

I supported above for a reason that contains no ad hominem speculation on the thinking of all people of a particular country to sully the very point I was making. I'm wondering why you couldn't get yourself to do so?--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 13:45, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

I'll make you guys a deal. If you agree to allow me to run around changing all instances of "Colour" to "Color", I'llgladly support a rename here.
— V = I * R (talk to Ω) 15:18, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

• What's there to say that we can't have both? I would also like to note that the comments on "color" and "colour" are an ignoratio elenchi, since we're not really talking about an "either or" situation here - we could not reasonably have an article with both titles in that instance, but here we're talking about an expression which is not exclusively traceable to either English variety. So, yes, Support, whatever order. Dahn (talk) 19:00, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

• Thank you for clarifying this point Dahn, this is not an either/or rename discussion ('Sister cities' versus 'Twin towns') as the previous discussions have been. The suggestion is simply to include both terms (as many Town and City official websites are already starting to do)

In the UK, I notice that 'twinnings' generally refer to links with European towns & cities, whereas the US version of this partnership is referred to as a 'Sister city' (and listed on the Sister cities International website)

I would like to give for example a typical UK town, Eastleigh, where the two terms are listed separately on Wikipedia and on the town's official website

These two systems have separate histories (on two continents) and are administered by two different bodies/agencies. The two terms also had separate Wikipedia articles, which were merged together into this one. I feel that the title should reflect this and refer to both, instead of having a US vs. UK name change discussion every few months which achieves nothing. I too am not particularly bothered by the order. I simply Support a title which has both terms. --Marek.69 ^talk 06:30, 20 December 2009 (UTC)

• Support either a title with both terms or a neutral term - it may end up looking unwieldy, but the very fact that this discussion has come up so many times suggests that using one term or the other is always going to lead to conflict. Actually, I think a neutral term like some of those that Skinsmoke has suggested might be the way to go; if and when we end up with enough region- / scheme-specific information, it can be naturally shifted out to Sister Cities International (currently a stub) and a Europe-specific article - at Town twinning, say - with discussion of the concept kept here. -IMSoP (talk) 18:28, 20 December 2009 (UTC)

• Oppose move to twin cities - I was asked to contribute to this discussion by the nominator (thank you!) as I have been working on the twin/sister and other kind םכ agreements between cities/towns and other kinds and levels of local government. Since twin and sister agreements do not cover the whole range of agreements and cities and towns do not cover the range of local government involved (that also includes villages and municipal districts), I wish to propose a move to municipal partnerships as this is a truly location-neutral all-covering term for these partnership agreements. For the record, I object to a change from sister cities to twin cities (or vica versa) as these terms are imho equally bad and perWP:ENGVAR. gidonb (talk) 21:04, 20 December 2009 (UTC)

  I think municipal partnerships is the best compromise presented so far, and would support a move to this name. -IMSoP (talk) 21:26, 20 December 2009 (UTC)

Sorry, just to clarify, the original proposal was to change from 'Sister cities' to Twin towns & sister cities to cover both concepts and names.

I've nothing against municipal partnerships though :-) -- Marek.69 ^talk 21:40, 20 December 2009 (UTC)

It looks like you didn't get the move template quite right at the top, so it wasn't actually displaying what your proposed name was - I've fixed it now, so hopefully there'll be slightly less confusion! - IMSoP (talk) 22:49, 20 December 2009 (UTC)

Thank you Marek and IMSoP. I am having second thoughts. Municipal partnerships are mostly private-public partnerships. Between municipalities is intermunicipal partnerships, however these are usually service provision pacts of adjacent municipalities. The search goes on. gidonb (talk) 23:36, 20 December 2009 (UTC)

• Mild support - "International Partnerships" may be a suitable substitute. JB82 (talk) 23:56, 21 December 2009 (UTC)
• Oppose. There is no good case made to change this again. The article started out with this name and the proposals to change come close to arguing WP:ENGVAR as the reason. The proposal to use International partnerships is flawed as it is a totally ambiguous name. Vegaswikian (talk) 07:08, 22 December 2009 (UTC)

"Municipal partnerships"? "International Partnerships"? What possible reason can there be for inventing an article title that has no relationship to what people say in the real world? Some people (in the US mostly) say "sister city"; other eople (everywhere else mostly) say "twin town". Although the two concepts are not identical, they are not dissimilar and their coverage in a single article makes sense - hence the proposal that the article name reflect this. But to suggest that the discussion be halted and a made-up name that no one use should be used simply beggars belief. Emeraude(talk) 11:26, 22 December 2009 (UTC)

The article says "sister cities" is used in North America and Asia, not just the US. If you have sources (not OR) that say otherwise, the article should be changed. I agree that a made up name would be ridiculous. Rees11 (talk) 13:10, 22 December 2009 (UTC)

• Per WP:ENGVAR we should move back to Town twinning, it was a mistake to move the article to sister cities earlier this year. I could live with Twin towns and sister cities as an awkward compromise - but moving Town twinning tosister cities because there are more references in American English than English is a bad precedent that was unhealthy for Wikipedia. ϢereSpielChequers 19:08, 22 December 2009 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

What does it actually mean

the article mentions what the aims are, and lists a bunch of twin towns, but what does it actually entail? What is a concrete example of an exchange twin cities might have? —Precedingunsigned comment added by 80.86.74.123 (talk) 01:20, 8 January 2010 (UTC)

I also read the article and don't get what it really means. Who initiates it and why? What are the actual implications?kestasjk (talk) 09:24, 21 June 2010 (UTC)

I came to the talk section for that very reason. I don't quite understand why people would do this, aside from a vague mention of "promoting culture" or something. 67.247.208.32 (talk) 18:41, 5 September 2010 (UTC)

Agreed, the most important section of this article is missing. Mbarbier (talk) 01:34, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Agreed. After reading the article I am none the wiser about the implications of two cities being twins... other than the ability to make fancy signposts. --130.228.251.5 (talk) 13:10, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

My suspicion has long been that twinning means almost nothing in practice. I hoped this article would disabuse me of that impression. Instead, I arrive here to find an article that means almost nothing. — Preceding unsigned comment added by67.252.64.112 (talk) 00:16, 21 August 2011 (UTC)

I think that they do it because similair properties between cities. like population, area, shape, ... or such to help goverments of city adress similair problems. but not sure. your research should go on that direction if you are stuck.78.2.83.128 (talk) 19:16, 18 August 2011 (UTC)

After reading this article, I still have no idea what town twinning is supposed to mean. I actually feel DUMBER. Wikipedia seems to do that a lot, vomit a few pages full of datapoints without actually GETTING to the POINT!69.196.147.226 (talk) 14:50, 6 September 2011 (UTC)Eldarby

I feel much the same way. As an example of its meaninglessness, I've started including towns with so-called "friendship agreements", "community links" and so on, even though they're apparently informal and below sister cities and twin towns proper. In my opinion, they're really the same thing in practice. Outrune (talk) 03:56, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

I went to one of the links, Twinning.org, and found the page entitled | A quick overview, yet I still can't make heads or tails of what twinning actually *is*. My best guess is that it is an "excuse" to learn about the culture and issues of people from a specific city other than one's own, maybe involving some sort of mutual exchange. I imagine that as a device it is greatly underused today compared to its original intent. Tha Pyngwyn (talk) 20:50, 30 November 2011 (UTC)

I feel similarly about town twinning. It is really meaningless. It is just an excuse for mayors to mention far off lands in one town or another and act as an excuse for local bureaucrats to congradulate themselves and have a party. I hate that town twinning editors have been so persistent and have put these pointless links on everypage about a city. Anyone who actually thinks these foster cultural/eduactionsal/economic exchange is just kidding themselves. I am sorry but I have no where else to vent about this 50.80.146.188 (talk) 03:40, 7 January 2012 (UTC)

Is this the queue for the confused people? I wonder does anyone know what the whole thing is actually for? It seems completely pointless. You get a signpost that you speed past, yeah, but is that it? Are there any shady backhanders going on?Shtanto (talk) 22:52, 3 June 2012 (UTC)

I can attest to the fact that this article has never had any pertinent information in it, regardless of all the various moves and complete rewrites, for all the years it has been on Wikipedia (which is significantly longer than the dates on this talk page suggest). I have found myself occasionally directed here for several years now and never have I found a single insight as the what the hell this means, who does it, etc. 08:56, 5 September 2012 (UTC)~~ — Preceding unsigned comment added by69.122.28.117 (talk)

I think the original idea was that people in the twin towns would build community links, particularly at a time when international communication was limited, foreign travel expensive and reconciliation the buzzword.This piece says: "According to the Council of European Municipalities and Regions (CEMR), twin towns should not be merely symbolic, but about citizens developing links in social and economic issues, sustainable development and environment. No mention of tawdry tradition and businessmen." In practice in the UK at least the whole thing has generally degenerated into at best a means to promote a town abroad, at worst just an excuse for councillor junkets. Timrollpickering (talk) 02:29, 21 April 2013 (UTC)

Not sure of the official Wikipedia name for this, but it's not good encyclopedia writing

"It was originally administered as part of the National League of Cities, but since 1967 it has been a separate organization, Sister Cities International (SCI), which is a nonprofit citizen diplomacy network creating and strengthening partnerships between U.S. and international communities in an effort to increase global cooperation at the municipal level, to promote cultural understanding and to stimulate private business and economic development. SCI leads the movement for local community development and volunteer action by motivating and empowering private citizens, municipal officials and business leaders to conduct long-term programs of mutual benefit."

That passage reads like it was copy and pasted from the group's ad copy (actually it probably was). Someone want to fix this?99.23.127.141 (talk) 18:21, 8 July 2010 (UTC)

It's been flagged...even though it's pertinent and notable, there's still the question of copyright. I looked at the group's page, and it's not a direct quote, although it could qualify as a close paraphrase. --Alan the Roving Ambassador (talk) 19:02, 8 July 2010 (UTC)

Earliest twinning date doubtful

The first twinning between cities is given as Le Mans and Paderborn in 836 [sic]. The next earliest examples are from the 20th century. This to me looks rather doubtful. Sure, the source referenced for the date also gives 836, but there it looks very much like a typo (for "1836") to me: a much more believable explanation than the totally silent continuity of such an institution through more than a thousand years quite eventful to the geopolitical and cultural landscape of Europe. Can we find any confirmation elsewhere? If the date should indeed be correct, it needs some more context in the article to get more believable. 89.246.189.125 (talk) 14:05, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

Lifelongresident (talk) 07:46, 4 November 2011 (UTC)Muscatine is currently burdened by Sister Cities' insistance on becoming "friends" with terrorists. Should Muscatine be a Sister-City of Ramallah?

The Palestinian city recently held citywide celebrations for the release of 1,027 Palestinian prisoners from Israeli jails in exchange for one Israeli soldier, 25-year-old Gilad Shalit.

Gilad was kidnapped by Hamas, the Palestinian terrorist organization, more than five years ago and held hostage incommunicado for 1,941 days without even being allowed a visit from the International Red Cross or any contact with his family.

And who are these Palestinian prisoners who were being honored in Ramallah? They are convicted terrorists and criminals, many guilty of vicious mass murders of Israeli women and children.

Ramallah is the newest Sister-City of Muscatine.

Thus, Muscatine is now associated with a city that honors terrorists and murderers as "freedom fighters and holy warriors." Thus Muscatine is now associated with a city that has named many of its streets and plazas after terrorists and murderers. Thus Muscatine is now associated with a city whose mayor is in a political partnership with Hamas, that terrorist organization recognized as such by the United States, the European Union, Israel and other countries, and whose charter calls for the destruction of the state of Israel and the genocide of the Jewish people.

Sister-Cities International is an outstanding organization and we applaud Muscatine's efforts over the years with their sister cities programs. However, we are surprised and saddened by Muscatines blinded leadership lending its good name to a city like Ramallah.

Read more: http://muscatinejournal.com/news/opinion/mailbag/article_581ea110-048c-11e1-9693-001cc4c002e0.html#ixzz1cif4a5qk

Doubtful equivalents

The article states "In Europe, a variety of terms are used; most commonly twin towns, but partnership towns, partner towns and friendship towns, are also used." And again: "North America, South America, South Asia, Australasia and Asia generally use the term sister cities. In the former Soviet Bloc countries twin towns is used, as well as the term brother cities." Now English is not the official language throughout "Europe, South America, South Asia, Australasia and Asia", nor is it in the "former Soviet Bloc countries". Then why give English phrases for the indigenous names of the twin towns/sister cities movement? To compound the mistake, the "equivalent" is more often than not inadequate. I can say the expression is "Miasta partnerskie" in Poland and "Породнённые города" in Russia (incidentally, neither translates as "twin towns" or "brother cities", contrary to the general statement in the article), but as I'm unable to supply either a general phrase or any number of individual ones applied in the individual countries, I'm not going to edit the article. But it definitely /should/ be amended. Pan Brerus (talk) 17:18, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

Main Picture

Being English Wikiedpdia, wouldn't it make more sense to use a sign from an English-speaking country? I understand the importance of showing foreign-language signs to indicate the international aspect, but I think they would fit in later on in the article. — Preceding unsigned comment added bySaintDaveUK (talk • contribs) 23:29, 15 March 2012 (UTC)

When town A lists town B but

Town B omits town A from its list of twins/sisters, how do we tell which article is accurate? Is there a particular website that can be considered as authoritative?

Specific examples: Füssen claims Airdrie andHelen as twins, but neither of the latter admit to the relationship. —72.244.204.128 (talk) 01:23, 25 September 2012 (UTC)