Talk:Intendant

Merge Comment

Good idea to merge. Vivaverdi 22:30, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

With what? Lycurgus 14:59, 12 August 2007 (UTC)

Interwiki Semantic Clash

Entries in other IndoEuropean lang wikis concentrate on theatrical usage of the term. The interwiki links on some of them don't come back to this article because they ignore this, the most frequent, English connotation. Have rectified to the extent appropropriate by adding See Also §. This sort of thing is normal and acceptable in a cross-cultural encyclopedia .Lycurgus 14:59, 12 August 2007 (UTC)

Delete Argentina section

I suggest for the 'Argentina' section to be deleted, since although the word used in Argentine Spanish is "intendente", it is the exact same thing as a mayor, or 'alcalde', as they say in most of Latin America and Spain.

In fact, Spanish-language media outside Argentina tend to use the word 'alcalde' to refer to mayors of Argentinean cities. In the same way, English-language media refer to Argentine cities' heads of government as 'mayors', not 'intendants'. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 181.1.0.193 (talk) 08:37, 19 March 2012 (UTC)

Not an English Word

If someone had for once picked up an actual dictionary, they would have realized that intendant is not an English word (unless you mean the historical, i.e. obsolete military/ administrative position). That is the problem with this entry. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.225.52.204 (talk) 08:11, 22 March 2014 (UTC)

Requested move 27 September 2021

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: moved. (closed by non-admin page mover) Vpab15 (talk) 18:44, 5 October 2021 (UTC)

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Intendant (government official) → Intendant – This was moved in January 2019, I infer because of the (apparent) UK meaning of the word as "[opera] theatre manager", so perhaps the intent was to create a DAB. However the article Theater manager, to which Intendant (opera) redirects, gets around a third of the views that Intendant (government official) gets. Intendant (opera)Intendant (opera) itself has had a mere 1949 views in 32 months. The official is plainly the PT.

All other titles starting "Intendant" are "Intendant of" somewhere and thus would be WP:PTMs. Stats since January 2019 here. 85.67.32.244 (talk) 05:46, 27 September 2021 (UTC)

• Pinging @Espoo: who moved the page at 13:09 on 19 January 2019, and @Gerda Arendt: who created the redirect Intendant (opera)Intendant (opera) at 15:58 same day. 85.67.32.244 (talk) 05:53, 27 September 2021 (UTC)
• Comment: In Germany, Intendant means mostly opera manager, not government, but when I linked that I arrived at misleading destinations and was surprised. I'll watch. We should have disambiguation. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 06:12, 27 September 2021 (UTC)

Intendant already redirects to Intendant (government official)Intendant (government official), there's a hatnote to both theater manager and opera manager. Nevertheless, opera manager only had 733 hits since 1 January 2019, whereas the official had 28,035 and the redirect Intendant 35,259. I think it is safe to say people are not clicking through the hatnote very often. I noticed you created Intendant (theatre)Intendant (theatre) at the same time, but not Intendant (theater). 85.67.32.244 (talk) 07:27, 27 September 2021 (UTC)

• Support. No idea where anyone got the idea that "intendant" commonly means a theatre manager in British English. It's incredibly obscure and probably antiquated. The principal meaning is very definitely the government official. -- Necrothesp (talk) 13:06, 30 September 2021 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

"Intendente (Macau)" listed at Redirects for discussion

The redirect Intendente (Macau) has been listed at redirects for discussion to determine whether its use and function meets the redirect guidelines. Readers of this page are welcome to comment on this redirect at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2025 October 17 §  until a consensus is reached. Rusalkii (talk) 23:47, 17 October 2025 (UTC)

Discussion regarding terminology for local heads of government (Argentina)

Hello. I'm opening this section to discuss recent reverts regarding the terminology used for local heads of government (mayors) in Argentina in this article and to reach a consensus. ​In Argentina, the official term for a municipal head of government is intendente (for a male mayor) and intendenta (for a female mayor). Using only the masculine term intendente when referring generally or to a female official is inconsistent with both standard Argentine usage and current legal/administrative language. Additionally, using general generic terms rather than the specific local titles misses the accurate regional context. ​To avoid an edit war, I ask that we discuss the phrasing here instead of making further reverts. I welcome input from other editors so we can agree on the most accurate and neutral presentation. Oupals (talk) 07:21, 12 September 2026 (UTC)

This is a purely a style issue and not by any means a qualitative property of the intendant title use in Argentina. There is no reason to gender split the term only in a single spanish speaking country, and insisting in doing so responds more to an ideology of neutrality in language rather than the core of this article. As gender neutrality is not core to the article, MoS (both english and spanish) suggest to avoid gender splitting for text economy and a clear, precise and concise text. I disagree with all of Oupals arguments as:

(1) the official term for a municipal head of government is intendente and intendenta: false, the official term is intendente, as stated by provincial constitutions.

(2) using only the masculine term intendente when referring generally or to a female official is inconsistent with both standard Argentine usage and current legal/administrative language: false because intendente is used for both, also false as legal language only uses "intendente" (per constitutions and provincial laws), and also false and unsourced that is inconsistent use as female mayors are called indistinctly with both words, and is natural and correct to use intendente for female mayors.

(3) using generic misses the accurate regional context: unsourced, and at most, that context responds to other recent social or linguistic movements or idiologies and not about the core of the article.

Therefore, I do not agree such style discrepancy is needed or useful at all. The existence of female variants does not mean we need to gender split each such word. pmt7ar ^(talk) 01:06, 13 September 2026 (UTC)

​Thanks for sharing your thoughts. I’d like to address a few points regarding the current text and usage:

• Established consensus: The note explaining the usage of intendente and intendenta for municipal heads of government in Argentina was added in September 2023 and has remained a stable, undisputed part of the article for three years. Per Wikipedia guidelines, long-standing content should not be removed without first establishing a new consensus here on the talk page.
• Institutional and common usage: Intendenta is the standard, well-documented term used across official government communications, municipal websites, and major news outlets in Argentina when referring to a female head of local government.
• RAE dictionary validation: The Real Academia Española (RAE) explicitly acknowledges intendenta as the standard feminine form, noting its specific usage in countries like Argentina.
• Regional variation: Documenting intendenta is not an arbitrary "gender split," but an accurate reflection of standard Argentine Spanish grammar. Regional variation is normal across the Spanish-speaking world—while some regions might favor masculine forms as defaults, Argentina consistently uses gendered titles (intendenta, abogada, doctora) in both legal and everyday contexts.
• Wikipedia precedent for context-dependent titles: Adapting terminology on Wikipedia based on context or the gender of the subject has clear precedents across the site. For example, the title and subject of the UK national anthem article adapt between God Save the King and God Save the Queen depending on whether the reigning monarch is male or female.

Describing regional and context-specific usage accurately is essential for maintaining a neutral and comprehensive encyclopedia. I welcome thoughts from other editors to help confirm consensus on keeping this long-standing usage intact. --Oupals (talk) 01:29, 14 September 2026 (UTC)

Thanks for your comments. Its weird, because your arguments are actually my same arguments; however it seems you to want to maintain the split for some kind of political issue or particularity of Argentina only, while I sustain this is only a style issue.

Having an undisputed edit is not the same as consensus. With that reasoning, it's just a matter of luck if there is a willing editor to dispute it or not. Maybe you leave the community tomorrow and my edit becomes consensus? It doesn't work like that. There was no inclusion of the split word for over 10 years, so... the consensus to keep articles free of gender splitting is objectively greater.

The office name, in Argentina, is worded "intendente", as it is written by law. In spanish language, female intendentes might be called "intendentas" too, and it is valid language, although discouraged by RAE and ASALE when referring to the office itself. Therefore it is normal there to be official and unofficial communications using both variants when talking about the person, but it is not common at all to refer to the office by the female variant.

Unless there is anything particularly special about female intendentes specifically in Argentina, then splitting the word by gender is... exactly that: gender splitting; which should be avoided anytime is possible.

>>There are official communications and same "common usage" of intendenta in Chile, Paraguay and Uruguay.

Why are we not splitting the term on those too? Maybe if you do it will be more evident that the split word is not core of this article and that it is just that, a (bad) styling decision that is actually discouraged by MoS.

There is plenty of examples on english Wikipedia of offices of spanish-speaking countries, which do not even mention the female version of the word, not even when a female politician was in office. Like here, here, here, or here (there are others that do, like this, but are about a single office, and not a list of multiple offices where only one is split). 
The linguistic splitting of words by gender is not relevant to this article, therefore should be avoided. I dont understand a reason to be inconsistent in a single subsection, I would rather either remove all splitting or instead split them on all subsections equally (which should be eventually removed for unnecessary gender splitting) pmt7ar ^(talk) 15:44, 21 September 2026 (UTC)

Thanks for the response. However, there are a few fundamental misunderstandings here regarding English Wikipedia policy and the distinction between style preferences and accurate real-world terminology:

1. WP:MOS vs. Descriptive Terminology: The guidance against arbitrary gender-splitting applies to artificial prose construction (such as writing "intendente/a" or "he/she" in standard narrative sentences). It does **not** prohibit documenting official, widely used titles. In Argentina, *intendenta* is not an informal slang term; it is the standard, official designation used in government acts, legal documents, and mainstream reliable sources when a woman holds the office.

2. RAE Prescriptivism vs. Wikipedia Policy: English Wikipedia relies on descriptive usage documented by reliable sources ([WP:V](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Verifiability)), not prescriptive recommendations from external bodies like the RAE. Real-world usage in Argentina overwhelming reflects *intendenta* for female mayors/heads of local government. Refusing to document the standard term based on prescriptive preferences violates [WP:NPOV](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Neutral_point_of_view).

3. Consensus and "10 Years of Inaction": Per [WP:NOCONSENSUS](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Consensus#Consensus_can_change), the absence of a dispute over a specific wording over time does not constitute a permanent, binding policy decision—especially on niche sub-sections. Consensus can change, and edits should reflect accurate sources rather than historical inertia.

4. Consistency across countries: Local terminology varies across the Spanish-speaking world. Where *intendenta* is the documented standard term for female officeholders in Argentina, we reflect that local usage rather than forcing a artificial uniformity across all entries.

Including intendenta is simply an accurate representation of standard, documented local terminology, not a style breach.Oupals (talk) 03:32, 22 September 2026 (UTC)