Talk:Philly cheesesteak

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SoP.​—msh210℠ 22:09, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

How so? What did the Philly portion contribute to the meaning? In the US, this is synonymous with cheesesteak, not a sum of parts, and in parts of the US is rarely named any other way. It is a particular kind of sandwich implying particular ingredients, such as onions and bell peppers, that are not implied by the components. Keep. --EncycloPetey 22:32, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

It's a Philadelphia-style cheesesteak. (Admittedly, that's the only style there is (AFAIK), but so what?)​—msh210℠ 22:38, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

I don't think it is all that particular a sandwich except for the mandatory cheese and the steak, but it is a sandwich, possibly served on a plate, not a steak. What are the lexicographic implications of the existence of "vegetarian cheesesteak" (13 @ News), but rarely "vegetarian Philly cheesesteak" (2 @ News}, and hardly ever "Philly vegetarian cheesesteak" (0 @ News)? "Cheesesteak" without "Philly cheesesteak" is mentioned in 4-5 times as many documents at Google news as "Philly cheesesteak". The words "real" and "authentic" precede "Philly cheesesteak" 50% more often than they precede "cheesesteak". This is suggestive evidence that the Philly is an optional term, a product of civic boosterism and attempted product differentiation. DCDuring TALK 23:51, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

Please perform a similar analysis for French fries and fries. Do you reach the same conclusion about the "optional" modifier "French"? --EncycloPetey 03:32, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

I really think you should do some of your own work. I used COCA because it makes it possible to select by PoS (though not always reliably). First "authentic" and "real" don't come up with "French". Without doing any needless research, French fries is a short form for w:French-fried potatoes. The "French" is a differentiator for one type (those deep-fried) from others such as "home", "German", etc. I don't really think it is sufficiently parallel to shed much light on this. Also the absence of promotional and booster motivations make the overall usage situation too different. DCDuring TALK 04:14, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

One of my points is that it's silly to throw a bunch of numbers around in the absence of meaningful comparisons. What about Chicago-style pizza? Do you think that would be a fair comparison? --EncycloPetey 04:29, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

My principal continuing point is that each individual's opinion, no matter what they spend their time and career doing, is one data point. You seem to be complaining that my getting some data about hundreds of usages is worse than having a couple of people's opinions without the benefit of any data other than their own fallible, imperfectly remembered, unexaminable, unsharable experiences. I know that such data as I glean does not settle the matter. It does seem a bit of improvement over the data-free legalistic argumentation that usually accompanies our non-consensus RfD discussions. It seems that we don't even have folks who have the stomach for that kind of thing any more. That it takes time to do even second- and third-rate analysis would seem to mean that we need more folks to do that kind of work. If the existing crew isn't enough, then we need more recruits and we need to get them into the right frame of mind to do it. Perhaps we need to rethink our criteria and get away from modified Pawley lists and get toward Pawley-list-informed analysis protocols for idioms using Google News, Google Books, Google Groups, COCA, and BNC. Maybe we can semi-automate such work. DCDuring TALK 05:14, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

That's 0 for 2. I've asked questions in each of my last posts, both of which you've side-stepped in favor of metaphysics. --EncycloPetey 05:24, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

To try to clarify what I tried to explain above (but did not do well): "New York pizza" arguably is idiomatic (though I'm not sure I'd argue it myself): it refers specifically to large-diameter thin-crust round pizza, not just to any pizza popular in New York. (Or let's say it does, arguendo.) The "New York" part of the phrase adds some meaning to the phrase, and the phrase is not just the sum of its parts. (I reiterate, this is arguable.) However, "Philly cheesesteak" or "Philadelphia cheesesteak" refers to any cheesesteak (AFAICT): all cheesesteaks are Philly cheesesteaks. As such, the phrase "Philly cheesesteak" does not mean "thin-crust, large-diameter cheesesteak" or any such: it means "cheesesteak, like in Philly" only. So it's SoP.​—msh210℠ 15:41, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

Sorry, but I only followed your logical up to the point of your conclusion. You argued that Philly adds nothing at all to the meaning, but then said the combination is sum of parts. Does that mean we need a definition at Philly for "no meaning"? If the combination is exactly synonymous with one of its parts, then the combination cannot logically be a sum of parts. If it were a sum of parts, then the two parts would each contribute to the meaning. A sum of parts would be as in "yellow bus", where the total meaning is the sum of the two parts. --EncycloPetey 20:34, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

Philly cheesesteak means Philly + cheesesteak: a cheesesteak, Philly-style. SoP. (Since every cheesesteak is Philly-style, that's just a cheesesteak.)​—msh210℠ 18:10, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

Weakish delete, the WP link redirects to cheesesteak and the definitions here just seems to say cheesesteak as well, no reason to keep this unless the article is improved in the next few days. Mglovesfun (talk) 12:01, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

Keep Despite msh210's assertion, not every cheesesteak is a Philly cheesesteak. There are variations of the original cheesesteak that are prepared in the same manner but with different ingredients such as chicken cheesesteak or Hawaiian cheesesteak (usually but not always substituting ham), in which cases the term Philly cheesesteak can and does serve as a reference to the original beef cheesesteak. — Carolina wren discussió 03:09, 21 July 2009 (UTC)

Keep A Philly cheesesteak is a type of cheesesteak, but a cheeseteak is not a type of Philly cheeseteak. Once upon a time I worked at a restaurant that served Philly cheesesteaks. I think of cheesesteaks and Philly cheesesteaks as too related but different concepts. I interpret cheesesteak as simply a steak with cheese. A Philly cheesesteak, on the other hand, is specific about the long roll, thinly sliced strips of steak. Besides the Philly Cheesesteak, there are other types of cheesesteaks as well. Thus hypothetically if one ordered a cheesesteak, I would likely try to clarify if they possibly meant a Philly cheesesteak. 118.103.10.2 03:30, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

Kept, consensus. Mglovesfun (talk) 23:26, 26 August 2009 (UTC)