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I have noticed that on Stack Exchange sites, "week reputation" is referring to the reputation gained from Sunday to Saturday (in fact, my today's reputation is different from my week's reputation, and today is Monday).

I remember I asked to my friend, who is American, what she would consider the first day of the week, and she replied saying it is Monday.

Which word (or words) can I use instead of "the first day of the week?"

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    I'm surprised that someone from the US identified Monday as the first day of the week. I'm Canadian, and other than Quebec, we use Sunday as the first day of the week, both in law and on calendars. Quebec, to the best of my knowledge, uses Monday in line with, again to the best of my knowledge, France and possibly other European countries. I have many dealings with US and have never come across anything to suggest that they use anything other than Sunday for the first day of the week.
    – Ron Porter
    Mar 14, 2011 at 15:23
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    @Ron Porter: I'm from the US, and I am also surprised. Our calendars always start with Sunday.
    – Kosmonaut
    Mar 14, 2011 at 15:40
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    I was tripped up by this in grade school once: the teacher asked us to spell the name of the fourth day of the week. So I wrote "Thursday", and was marked wrong. I had no idea why, and complained. The teacher's explanation was full of irrelevancies like "the fourth letter of the alphabet is D, not F" -- she thought I was counting "fourth" wrong. Eventually she thought to ask what I considered the first day of the week, and I told her it was Monday, obviously. It took me years to wrap my head around the concept of Sunday as the start of anything.
    – JPmiaou
    Mar 14, 2011 at 18:24
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    When you recite the days of the week, you go Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, ... just as when you recite the months you go January, February, March, ... Clearly Monday is the first day in that sequence. Additionally, Sunday has always been held to be the 7th day of the week in Christian countries, being the “Lord’s day”, corresponding to and contrasting with the Jewish Sabbath (which is actually Saturday)
    – tchrist ♦
    Jul 29, 2012 at 0:13
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    And, by his comment, tchrist seems to show that he is not American ... strange.
    – GEdgar
    Jul 29, 2012 at 2:02

3 Answers 3

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It depends on what you mean by "week" in this case.

In America, Sunday is considered the first day of the week, and Monday is considered the first day of the work week.

Note that SE sites end their week at the end of Saturday, GMT. This makes Sunday the first day of the SE week.

If you want to be safe you could just say "the start of the week," but you would still have to define what you meant by "week": the start of which week?

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  • Saying that the first day of the week is Sunday gives a sense to the meaning of weekend, which is defined as the period of time from Friday evening through Saturday evening. From the dialog with my friend, I understood she was saying that in any cases the first day of the week is Monday, in the same way Monday is considered the first day of the week in Italy (the work week is then considered the period between Monday and Friday—both days included). The Italian weekend should probably be the period of time between Saturday evening through Sunday evening.
    – apaderno
    Mar 14, 2011 at 14:10
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    @kiamlaluno: I disagree that "weekend" means "Friday evening to Saturday evening". The weekend is Saturday and Sunday. This has never bothered me because I always felt that a week should have TWO ends.
    – Mr. Shiny and New 安宇
    Mar 15, 2011 at 13:38
  • @Mr. Shiny and New: The definition I gave for weekend is the one I found on the NOAD (third edition): "the period from Friday evening through Sunday evening, especially regarded as a time for leisure." Uhmmm… I wrote Saturday instead of Sunday, in my previous comment.
    – apaderno
    Mar 15, 2011 at 13:42
  • @kiamlaluno: Ok, that revised definition is better ;)
    – Mr. Shiny and New 安宇
    Mar 15, 2011 at 14:43
  • Compare these two pages: timeanddate.com/calendar/?year=2012&country=5 timeanddate.com/calendar
    – GEdgar
    Jul 29, 2012 at 2:10
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Rather than an alternative phrase, make it explicit:

... weekly, starting each Monday ...

or

... every week (Sunday through Saturday) ...

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The ISO-8601 standard defines Monday as day 1 of the week.

So say "day 1 of the week".

Or "day 1 of the working week" if you want to ensure an American hears "Monday".

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    I'm pretty sure that most people aren't familiar with, or don't care about, ISO-8601, so I wouldn't rely on this approach except for fore-warned audiences.
    – Mr. Shiny and New 安宇
    Mar 15, 2011 at 13:34
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    The ISO week numbering system doesn't correspond with the way weeks are measured in the United States. And, in any event, whether or not Monday is day 1, Sunday can still be day zero. So just making Monday day 1 doesn't mean it's the first day of the week. (Just like 1:00 isn't the first hour of the day, 12:00 is.)
    – David Schwartz
    Jul 29, 2012 at 11:40

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