General News for the Duchess of Cambridge 1: November 2010-February 2017

[royalistbert]

It was made very on clear on the wedding day that she will be know by the title of HRH The Duchess of Cambridge. If that is too hard for them why don't they just use Catherine in the articles and use her title for start of sentences.

 

[Broadway Duchess]

I agree. I'm merely pointing out that while it is silly and strange to refer to the Duchess by her full maiden name, "Kate Middleton" sells papers. In that vein (and in light of the fact that there is so much that is offensive about the article), since they've opted to use the name that sells, it falls in line with established journalistic practice.

There wasn't this type of issue with Sophie because a) she was less high-profile, b) the courtship wasn't as public for as long as this one was, and c) outside of the manufactured resemblance to Diana, people weren't as interested. Unfortunately, it's irritating but the fact that there is interest in Catherine seems to help stave off any major republican sentiment, IMO.

 

[Duke of Marmalade]

its not unusual at all to refer to kate as 'kate middleton', even in the british press. you'll find lots or article to this day referring to royal commoner names such as mary donaldson, daniel westling etc. the spanish press will refer to princess letizia 'letizia ortiz' even when she is attending official functions.

 

[HighnessN]

I think the "Kate Middleton" thing has more to do with the fact that her correct title doesn't include her Christian name, she is HRH the Duchess of Cambridge. The incorrect (for divorced royals) use of her title by including her Christian name is too long, especially for headlines " Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge".

The same problem with the Countess of Wessex, the media usually calls her Sophie Wessex (at least they don't use her maiden name".

For ladies that have "princess" in the title e.g crown princess M or Princess of X, they simply call them Princess X eg Princess Mary, Princess Charlene.

I think when William becomes PoW, the media will simply call Catherine "Princess Catherine" like they called Diana "Princess Diana"

 

[royalistbert]

I think new Letters Patent need to be made so that a wife of a Prince can use her first name. It will end a lot of confusion. Then the media can have Princess Kate.

 

[Dman]

The media will end up calling Catherine 'Princess Catherine or Kate' once she's HRH The Princess of Wales and I think the palace will end up saying that's fine to call her that. I think the media should be calling Catherine by her current official title though. Once they start doing that more often, the people will know who they are talking about.

 

[Sun Lion]

While the author did take some digs at the Duchess of Cambridge, referring to her as "Middleton" instead of "Kate Middleton" wasn't likely supposed to be offensive. Granted, it's silly (and misinformed) to refer to her by her maiden name almost three years after her wedding, but if she were still going by "Kate Middleton," using her last name in the context of an article wouldn't be offensive. In fact, it would be clunky to keep writing "Kate Middleton." It's common in journalism. For example, an article about the Prime Minister would likely identify him by name initially and by surname thereafter.

Yes Broadway Duchess, I see your point -and other posters, I know this subject comes up again and again.

When "Kate" is used in an article, I think there is some affection behind that, and I often use C or Catherine for expediency in posts, though "the Duchess" is probably just as easy.

I found it quite jarring Broadway Duchess when, years ago, Mrs Thatcher started being referred to as just "Thatcher".

(And we saw were that lack of civility and respect ended up, with the dreadful behaviour of some in the UK upon her passing.)

Same thing in Oz with our past female PM when reporters went from Julia Gillard to just "Gillard".

(Never was "Ms Gillard" though male PMs and MPs do get "Mr Surname" quite frequently.)

We also had quite a bit of just "Julia, but that was as a diminishing tactic, not out of goodwill or affection.

It would be nice if the media could grasp that the general public doesn't need pandering to at the lowest level of understanding of a subject.

We could probably all follow who the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge are - epecially when there is video footage, or a photo in the paper - with their report.

Cheers All, Sun Lion.

 

[Skippyboo]

I think the worst is where you see something like this - Prince William and Kate Middleton to visit Australia.

It could easily be substituted with the Cambridges or William and Kate. It drives me nuts.

 

[SElizabeth]

Royalistbert:
Would she be brave enough to say it to her face?


Thank you so much, I needed a good laugh today and your comment was just the ticket..........

​

 

[Sun Lion]

I think the worst is where you see something like this - Prince William and Kate Middleton to visit Australia.

It could easily be substituted with the Cambridges or William and Kate. It drives me nuts.

Hi Again Skippyboo,

I've seen someone side-step this issue in the local newspaper with "Prince William and his wife Kate".

"Catherine" still seems to be a no-go area though.

Let alone "Philippa".

(I remember reports Pippa was meant to be up-graded to the complete version of her name as well, being announced around the time of the wedding.)

Sun Lion.

 

[Iluvbertie]

By the time William becomes Prince of Wales she will have been cemented in the public consciousness as Kate Middleton and that is likely not to change - just as nine years on since her wedding Camilla is still frequently referred to as Camilla Parker-Bowles rather than any title.

I like the fact that the British do distinguish between born princesses and those who marry in - so Princess Beatrice is a born princess and in the line of succession in her own right while Princess William is the wife and so isn't in the line of succession personally but by virtue of her marriage only. Old fashioned - maybe - but makes the distinction clear.

I also have no problem with referring to a woman by just her surname as we do with men - our current PM is usually Abbot and his predecessor was Rudd so why not Gillard - why should being a women get her a different title to that of her male counterparts?

 

[Princess of Durham]

Interesting .... so then why Princess Di or Princess Diana rather than Diana Spencer? OR is this just due to the fact that she was the Princess of Wales? One wonders if Camilla would be referred to Camilla Parker Bowles IF she had used her title Princess of Wales .........

 

[cepe]

Interesting .... so then why Princess Di or Princess Diana rather than Diana Spencer? OR is this just due to the fact that she was the Princess of Wales? One wonders if Camilla would be referred to Camilla Parker Bowles IF she had used her title Princess of Wales .........

I can think of 3 reasons.

1stly Catherine was known to the public as "Kate Middleton" for 10 years. Diana was known only a short time pre marriage

2ndly press media was the main source of news in the early '80's. Lady Diana Spencer was known as "Lady Di" which made headlines easier and also "Di" and "Diana". The same applies to Catherine (that's my name - 9 letters, it's long) - Kate is better in headlines.

Princess Diana was not used very often as I remember - more on television or radio (verbal anyway)

3rdly - internet; if you look up Kate Middleton (the name you know really well)
you will find all the Duchess of Cambridge stuff anyway. Internet search engines love consistency. Think of the confusion when Catherine becomes Duchess of Cornwall!

What they have in common now is that when you see Diana or Kate in print, there is a 99% chance it will be these 2.

 

[Ish]

Interesting .... so then why Princess Di or Princess Diana rather than Diana Spencer? OR is this just due to the fact that she was the Princess of Wales? One wonders if Camilla would be referred to Camilla Parker Bowles IF she had used her title Princess of Wales .........

Diana and Charles were first romantically linked in the summer of 1980 and married the next year. The world didn't have time to get used to her as Diana Spencer before she became Princess of Wales (although her title was never Princess Diana).

In contrast, Camilla became infamous as Charles' mistress by the early 1990s, but didn't marry him until 2005. - giving the world roughly 15 years of knowing her as CPB. Catherine was known to the world as Kate Middleton for about 10 years before her marriage, and in a much more technological age.

It's not in the interest of journalists to refer to her exclusively as Catherine or the Duchess of Cambridge because when people are googling her they're looking for Kate Middleton. If you don't have that tagged then you're not getting the readers who are searching for her.

 

[Skippyboo]

For giggles, I did 2 google news searches. One for duchess of Cambridge which brought up news sites like the BBC and Maori king story. The other- Kate Middleton brought up more gossip sites such as Perez Hilton. About 10 stories in, was a daily mirror story about the tour itinerary. It used the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge in the first line and the rest of the story had William and Kate. The headline was Prince William and Kate Middleton's 2014 royal tour Itinerary.

 

[MarNoe]

Wouldn't she become Princess of Wales? Assuming William becomes Prince of Wales.

 

[Cris M]

Wouldn't she become Princess of Wales? Assuming William becomes Prince of Wales.

She'll. In due time, she will be Her Royal Highness The Princess of Wales, but I doubt media will understand such a simple fact. Some jornalists doesn't strike me as particularly intelligent people.

I just hope they will not end up calling her Queen Kate Middleton.

 

[Baroness of Books]

It wouldn't be the first time in history that a queen was known by her maiden name, most famous case in point being Queen Anne Boleyn.

 

[GracieGiraffe]

It wouldn't be the first time in history that a queen was known by her maiden name, most famous case in point being Queen Anne Boleyn.

Um... good point....

I think Ish is right - the media sees the queries people make when searching for Kate, and most likely thing is people search for Kate Middelton

 

[cepe]

Wouldn't she become Princess of Wales? Assuming William becomes Prince of Wales.

Not automatic. First, when Charles becomes King then William becomes Duke of Cornwall - this is automatic. So Catherine will be Duchess of Cornwall first.

It would be up to the King to decide when to make William Prince of Wales.

 

[Cris M]

It wouldn't be the first time in history that a queen was known by her maiden name, most famous case in point being Queen Anne Boleyn.

Yes, but I don't think she was called "Queen Anne Boleyn" when she was alive. The same goes with Mary of Teck.

 

[Baroness of Books]

^^^Most likely not, but Anne is most famously known in history by her maiden name, with her accompanying Boleyn family, than as Anne Tudor. I suppose the same can be said of Jane Seymour, Katherine Howard and Katherine Parr, and wouldn't be surprised if this is the same case with the name Kate Middleton. Time will tell.

 

[Cris M]

^^^Most likely not, but Anne is most famously known in history by her maiden name, with her accompanying Boleyn family, than as Anne Tudor. I suppose the same can be said of Jane Seymour, Katherine Howard and Katherine Parr, and wouldn't be surprised if this is the same case with the name Kate Middleton. Time will tell.

She'll certainly go down in history as Catherine Middleton. I just hope that media will call her Queen Catherine during her husband's reign.

 

[GracieGiraffe]

Well, as long as she keeps her head on her shoulders I suppose it doesn't matter what people call her.

 

[Skippyboo]

I was thinking about the blurb in Richard Palmer's piece about Harry at O2 arena about Kate focusing on young people issues this year.

I went to the Royal Foundation's website. It's 3 main focuses -armed services, young people and conservation. Harry has been the face for helping the armed services and William for conservation. This leaves young people for Kate.

 

[Sun Lion]

Duchess of Cambridge Folowing In Footsteps Of Duchess of York.

That is the Duchess of York better known as Queen Elizabeth, The Queen Mother.

I've just been reading about the visit to the Blue Mountains that the Duke and Duchess are doing when they're in Australia.

Several reports are indicating that apart from meeting people who were involved in last year's bushfires in this area, W and C will get in a bit of sightseeing - maybe Echo Point and the Three Sisters in Katoomba.

I've just seen some footage online of the 1927 Empire Tour undertaken by the then Duke and Duchess of York - the current Queens' parents.

The actual view has not changed - just the lookout - in all these years.

What is striking is the very stylish "flapper" attire of the young Duchess of York, long before she became the Queen Mum.

I had forgotten how as a young women, she too was known for her outfits.

And then Princess Anne when Carnaby St was hip, and later Diana.

(As people have been checking out Catherine's outfit from the presenting of shamrocks, same thing with Anne's attire when she presented leeks in the late '60s - we were so impressed with what she wore.)

The footage of 1927's Blue Mountains visit is "Royal Empire Tour - British Pathe Duke and Duchess of York" if you'd like to see it.

Sun Lion.

 

[Marty91charmed]

https://twitter.com/thesimongregg
Kate was spotted in her range rover

 

[Marty91charmed]

I wonder where Kate has been lately... I guess it's time to increase her agenda, no?

 

[Lumutqueen]

I wonder where Kate has been lately... I guess it's time to increase her agenda, no?

Catherine has probably been at home with her son and husband, the same place her husband has been. William's first engagement since returning from Australia is on Monday.

Frankly I don't expect to see Catherine until the Trooping of Colour.

 

[Tiggersk8]

I wonder where Kate has been lately... I guess it's time to increase her agenda, no?

Oh good grief...Give them some time to recover from the Tour and getting George back into his regular routine. Good thing they've got a dog and not a cat, otherwise they'd be dealing W/whatever "punishment" the cat would be handing out for being left behind. When I returned from my Kidney Transplant, my cat was so happy to see me. That lasted two days. He then proceeded to ignore me for a month!!

They can be rather vindictive when they want to be those four legged furry, purry critters can.

They more than earned some time to unwind, recharge and get George back into the groove of being back home. We've got Garter Day and Trooping the Colour coming up soon. Not to mention Wimbledon and Kate's first year as Patron IIRC. Plus The Commonwealth Games in Glasgow this summer too. I have a feeling we'll be seeing quite a bit of Kate out and about this Summer.

What I really hope for, is for our Cdn Team Members to revive the Tradition of if the Medals are presented by a Female Member of the Royal Family, they're presented w/a rose by our medal winner/s. The last the Games were in Scotland, I clearly remember that happening w/Diana, Anne, The Queen Mum and The Queen during various Medal Ceremonies and thought it was such a lovely thing to do. Here's hoping!!