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This came up is one of my early edits, when I knew less than I do now about Wikipedia. For ease of finding a name, even when the correct spelling is not certain, it is common practice to sort them all as if they were Mac. As described above this can be before the other Ms or after Mab... The Telephone Directory places them all ((including names such as Mace) after Mabbott and sorts all as Mac, but that is hardly a definitive source! I am told that this is documented in a "standard text" for librarians, but have not sourced that. All I have found on-line is Everything - third section; second bullet. Collation indicates that this practice may have fallen out of favour since computerisation. I agree that much of the time it is an unnecessary complication; even in List of Scots there do not appear to be a vast number of Macs and Mcs (m' less common nowadays). However I believe we should have an agreed style. Comments? Finavon 22:16, 11 June 2007 (UTC)
I agree with Stemonitis, and I always index both MacX and McX as Macx. This isn't just a a convention, it's a convention with a reason, because the spellings are not always handled consistently across a family or even for the same person, and there is no guarantee that an entry found somewhere for "John MacCarthy" will not be listed elsewhere as "John McCarthy", or (without capitalisation) as "John Mccarthy" or "John Maccarthy". The consistent approach makes it easier to find articles, and isn't that the whole point of indexing? -- BrownHairedGirl (talk) • ( contribs) 22:23, 7 November 2007 (UTC)
There's been a recent discussion of this and other alphabetisation issues at Wikipedia_talk:Manual_of_Style#Alphabetization, which may be of interest. PamD ( talk) 08:22, 10 February 2008 (UTC)
Does anyone else find it interesting that articles must have reliable sources but Policies and Guidelines are promulgated based solely on the opinions of the editors who voice their opinions, often in the face of reliable sources? It does no good to cite reliable sources, such as the Library of Congress, in these instances. Consensus, defined as those who can defend an opinion longer than those on the other side, will always take precedence over rigor and reliable sources. JimCubb ( talk) 21:35, 16 July 2010 (UTC)
...
Categories using the name of a person hold articles directly related to that person. Remember this when placing the article in larger categories. If the person is a member of a category, put the article about the person in the larger category. If articles directly related to the person are also members of the larger category, put the category with the person's name in the larger category. This often results in the article and category being categorized differently. ...
I have read this through three times, and I am still not clear on the meaning. The word 'larger' has ambiguity. Some examples on what is meant would be good. billinghurst ( talk) 11:38, 24 July 2008 (UTC)
Despite what the main page says:
Wikipedia:Categorization_of_people#By_residence: "The place of birth is rarely notable."
~ender 2007-06-17 17:14:PM MST
This continues from the long discussion above.
current text:
Proposed new text:
- Any comments? Obviously it could be extended to book length, but I think this is clearly more accurate than the current text. Johnbod 18:16, 22 June 2007 (UTC)
- not bad; I thought it was Van Basten under V, so conforming to the capialization rule; but it it seems he may be van Basten under V, so an exception. If so, he should be changed or explained. Like many of these examples, the uses within the WP article are inconsistent, & include plenty of both Van & vans. His official website goes with van, the AC Milan one with Van. Johnbod 17:52, 23 June 2007 (UTC)
- van (or Van) Basten, and Von (or von) Braun dropped as correct capitalisation & sorting unclear. Johnbod 17:13, 1 July 2007 (UTC)
In case people here are interested: Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Biography#Sortkey and birth/death categories standardization project. Carcharoth 14:06, 18 July 2007 (UTC)
There are many categories that inexplicably lump a sporting team's past memebers with its current members. For example see: Category:New York Yankees players, Category:Boca Juniors footballers, and Category:San Antonio Spurs players. Why can't I start creating subcategories for every one of these cats to differentiate current players from players who are no longer on the team? For example, we would have Category:Current New York Yankees players and Current Boca Juniors footballers:, etc.
Granted keeping these categories maintained would take an enormous amount of work at first, but work is what we Wikipedia volunteers are all about, and I would certainly pitch in. And, yes, certain categorizations would become out of date quickly, but I believe editors who were fans of the respective teams would recategorize articles as new players joined and old players left the team. The result would be greatly useful.
I'm 90% sure that people have brought this up before and decided against this idea (if so, please provide a link to the old discussion), but I would like someone to confirm it for me. I have also left an identical note on Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Sports. If I don't hear back from any of you with reasonable objections, I will procede to begin making the subcategories. Thanks, -- The Fat Man Who Never Came Back 17:19, 28 July 2007 (UTC)
To quote:
Category names do not carry disclaimers or modifiers, so the case for the category must be made clear by the article text. The article must state the facts that result in the use of the category tag and these facts must be sourced.
Category tags regarding religious beliefs and sexual preference should not be used unless two criteria are met:
- The subject publicly self-identifies with the belief or preference in question;
- The subject's beliefs or sexual preferences are relevant to the subject's notable activities or public life, according to reliable published sources.
Why shouldn't these criteria apply likewise to biographies of dead people? They seem ideal for both the living and the dead, irrespective of the addition burden of accuracy and verifiability associated with WP:BLP. -- Rrburke( talk) 22:56, 29 August 2007 (UTC)
A question: if something is disputed in an article about a dead person, should we go with consensus regarding the application of category at the bottom (since the choosing of the category itself cannot give both sides of the argument (ie. be wholly NPOV) and must come down on one side)?
Wikipedia:Categorization of people#General considerations has:
For some "sensitive" categories, it is better to think of the category as a set of representative and unquestioned examples, while a list is a better venue for an attempt at completeness.
I bolded one word in that quote. Re. consensus, there is a consensus that categories should not include questionable examples. Sacco and Vanzetti would be an example of a questionable characterisation as murderers. Is JB Adams an unquestionable example of a murderer? I don't think it should be too difficult to form a consensus about that. If there is residual doubt, or if the characteristic is labeled "suspected" (as it is in the first line of the JB Adams article), then don't include in the category. On the other hand, it is possible to include both Adams and S&V in a list, if that list is properly annotated regarding the remaining doubts, and if the list is set up in such a way that doubtful inclusions are allowed (for some lists talk page discussions led to exclusion of doubtful cases too).
Re. your Jesus example, I think there is little or no residual doubt that he was in fact a Roman era Jew. Anyway, consensus seems to be there is no significant residual doubt in that case. Note also the difference in "sensitivity" (as it is called in the Wikipedia:Categorization of people guideline) between a category that indicates place, time and cultural association, as opposed to subcategories of "criminals". There is little residual doubt that Jesus was a convicted criminal (I think even Josephus as an independent source confirms that). But as a highly sensitive categorisation the actual category found at the bottom of the Jesus article is somewhat more convoluted, category:Disputed convictions leading to execution. Both Sacco and Vanzetti are in that category too (by categorisation of redirect pages, which makes that the category doesn't show up on the S&V page itself). -- Francis Schonken ( talk) 13:03, 5 January 2008 (UTC)
(My bolding of words.)"Wikipedia aims to present competing views in proportion to their representation among experts on the subject, or among the concerned parties. This applies not only to article text, but to images, external links, categories, and all other material as well."
(My bolding of words.) Then if the majority consider Adams to be guilty, it should be reflected in the category, should it not? I see few flaws in that logic. Whether the majority actually do consider him guilty can be discussed on the Adams talk page. I'm just attempting to establish the ground rules before doing so. Thoughts? And please, think about the theory before applying it to Adams. Malick78 ( talk) 11:37, 8 January 2008 (UTC)"Wikipedia aims to present competing views in proportion to their representation among experts on the subject, or among the concerned parties. This applies not only to article text, but to images, external links, categories, and all other material as well."
Bruce Willis and John McEnroe were born in American military bases in Germany. Are they German Americans (based on that sole fact)? I notice this Wikipedia:Naming conventions (categories)#Heritage. SamEV ( talk) 17:52, 28 November 2007 (UTC)
The current guideline states that for a religion category to be included for a living person, "The subject's beliefs or sexual preferences are relevant to the subject's notable activities or public life, according to reliable published sources. " We have some disagreement on how this applies to politicians. Does the fact that a person is a politician mean that the religion is automatically "relevant to the subject's notable activities or public life"? In many articles, a religion is listed in a politician infobox (sometimes sourced, most times not), and not mentioned at all in the article. If it is mentioned in the article, it usually just says "Subject attends Church X." I think that this means the religion is not relevant and religious categories should be removed. Others have questioned this interpretation. I'd like more community input on what is meant. Karanacs ( talk) 18:11, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
The literature in question is out of date and out of step with current Wikipedia consensus. Other than religious figures no one else should be categorized according to that 2 point criteria. It needs to be rewritten so that either points mean a person is worthy of categorization by religion.
I do not follow these guidelines, for example in the category English Baptists I will add the category to every English Baptist I come across regardless of whether they are known as "That self-admitted Baptist guy" or as "an international cricketeer".
I am only annoyed because a person (anonymous person) of a certain nationality and a certain faith uses these guidelines to remove as many people (living or not) from the categories from said nation and not of said faith for... well God only knows why, but he feels it is necessary.
Why are sexual preferences and religious beliefs grouped together like this anyway? Why not religion and former occupation or sexual preference and place of birth?
If someone is reading this also feels they need changing then lets get some consensus together and rewrite the guidelines to include some common sense.-- EchetusXe ( talk) 23:51, 20 November 2008 (UTC)
Wikipedia:Categorization_of_people#By_the_person.27s_name suggests this should only be done in certain "very notable" cases, but there isn't any kind of criteria listed. There are now categories for Category:Dick Cheney and even Category:Fred Thompson (with 5 articles). I'm not sure whether that's legitimate or not. - TheMightyQuill ( talk) 22:05, 15 April 2008 (UTC)
I think that categorization is one of the biggest problems the project has, with respect to attempting to adhere to the BLP and NPOV policies. It is far too vulnerable to exploitation by POV warriors, who can Wikilawyer a BLP or other article into a category and demand that it be retained there based on some sort of nominalist argument, which appears to be logically correct but defeats the purpose of core policies. Others have called this a vulnerablity to WP:POINT violations. I think that it is time to reconsider the use of any potentially contentious category. -- Marvin Diode ( talk) 21:16, 13 June 2008 (UTC)
Will Beback's attempt to add "context" is misleading. For the actual "context," see Talk:Neutral point of view#Templates and Categories. -- Marvin Diode ( talk) 00:08, 15 June 2008 (UTC)
I tried to add the cat "Spanish-American" to Antonio Banderas and was told that I could not because he is not a naturalized American citizen though he resides in the US. I understand that the meaning of nationality can be different around the world. But appears to me that in these cats, the nationality part refers to the person being a citizen of that country, no? What is the guideline regarding nationality for these cats? MrBlondNYC ( talk) 08:11, 17 June 2008 (UTC)
I would like to see some guidance on what to do with people where historically there is no agreement on the spelling of a surname.
Thx. -- billinghurst ( talk) 15:17, 24 August 2008 (UTC)
This appears to be contrary to practice. For example, George W. Bush has over 30 categories. The tendency I see is to categorize biographies exhaustively. (Every school they attended, their religion and ethnicity, their ancestry, their professions, everywhere they lived, selected honors and prizes, etc.) Or we see examples of editors agreeing to only list the few most important categories? ·:· Will Beback ·:· 07:14, 30 September 2008 (UTC)
So I'm sorting some people, and the guidelines appear self-contradictory / unclear. So let's try to make them clearer. How about this? Headbomb { ταλκ κοντριβς – WP Physics} 05:30, 4 December 2008 (UTC)
This seems to cover almost everything but arabic names such as Shams al-Dīn Abū Abd Allāh al-Khalīlī (with two al-) or such as Muhammad ibn Jābir al-Harrānī al-Battānī (ibn, al-, al-) or Ahmad ibn Muhammad ibn Kathīr al-Farghānī (ibn, ibn, al-).
Headbomb {
ταλκ
κοντριβς –
WP Physics}
05:35, 4 December 2008 (UTC)
If I can add to the above discussion. I appreciate that the surname is normally sorted by "the first capitalised element". However, this can lead to confusion with French names. Currently, names such as Maurice Le Boucher, Paul Le Flem, Philippe Le Goff, Jean-François Le Sueur etc are all grouped, and they appear before such names as Firmin Lebel, Charles-Édouard Lefebvre, René Leibowitz etc - see Category:French composers. This is ok, except where we have cases such as Maurice Le Roux (appears in the first group) and Maurice Leroux (appears later), who turn out to be the same person. I’ve added a merge template to both articles. Such cases would be more quickly identified if all surnames starting with "Le" or "le" were defaultsorted by removing all the spaces between the component parts of the surname. That is, Le Boucher would be sorted as if it were spelled "Leboucher", and a putative Martin Le Boucher would appear after a Louis Leboucher, as intuition (mine, at least) would indicate. Comments? -- JackofOz ( talk) 00:41, 8 February 2009 (UTC)
On the page for Vernon and Irene Castle there are no birth or death categories given even tho their dates are established. Is this common practice? I see the Laurel and Hardy page does the same but also gives links to separate articles about each comedian (which provide birth and death categories). If there are no pages for the separate members of a duo, and there are no birth/death categories given, how does one solve the problem if separate pages are not there (and possibly not necessary or wanted)?
I have looked at WP:Categorization of people but it wasn't much help. Thanks for any info.-- FeanorStar7 ( talk) 03:13, 16 February 2009 (UTC)
This seems to be discussed above, but is "For a surname which begins with Mc or Mac, the category sort key should always be typed as Mac with the remainder of the name in lowercase" necessary? I mean, I get McD should be Mcd, but why do we have to auto-change from Mc to Mac? Is there something I'm not getting? Wizardman 04:42, 1 March 2009 (UTC)
_________________________________________| |
My interpretation of the rules is that periods/ full stops should be included in sort keys, and that's reflected in an example given on the page: " Robert J. Smith II sorts as [[Category:New Jersey politicians|Smith, Robert J., II]]"
However, it also says "Punctuation, such as apostrophes and colons (but not hyphens) should be removed". If periods/full stops should not be removed, this should be mentioned in that sentence.
What prompted this is that ListasBot is currently removing any periods/full stops it finds in listas parameters. I would like to inform its operator of the correct sorting, but the bot is actually changing things according to the strictest interpretation of the currently listed guidelines. MANdARAX • XAЯAbИAM 01:36, 13 April 2009 (UTC)
Well, there's two people saying "I don't care about this", and two people saying "periods should be left in", so as far as ListasBot's behavior is concerned, I'll assume the consensus here is to leave periods in. (P.S. -- for anyone who's curious, it only took the addition of one extra character in the source code to make this change.) Matt ( talk) 20:13, 17 April 2009 (UTC)
Why do we treat these two names as the same when the legal names have diverged and are no longer synonyms? As of now we force the sort key to always be "Mac", but why? -- Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) ( talk) 02:35, 15 April 2009 (UTC)
There is an approval request at Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/tomerbot for a bot that would categorize people based information in lists and on other Wikis. If people familiar with these policies could comment there, it would be appreciated. – Quadell ( talk) 13:25, 29 April 2009 (UTC)
I thought I saw a FAQ answering this question somewhere, but can't find it. Can someone tell me what the guidelines are regarding putting actors/directors in the category for a book/movie/franchise? I seem to remember that this is frowned upon, since this might lead to cat clutter -- but, then again, if their involvement is key to their career, then it's okay. Or something like that. I'm asking specifically WRT to actors who have appeared in Star Trek -- is it appropriate to include "Star Trek" (or Star Trek actors) as a cat for William Shatner? What about an actor who played a minor character? -- EEMIV ( talk) 13:27, 6 May 2009 (UTC)
Should Saint, St. and St all be listed together (not as in people who are saints, but people like Pam St. Clement)? I see that some St and St. names are sorted under Saint but many are not, and where they aren't, St names are listed first, then hyphenated names such as Kim St-Pierre and then St. names are last. Shouldn't they all be together? AnemoneProjectors ( talk) 23:48, 18 May 2009 (UTC)
I detect a note of Cultural Imperialism in the guideline for DEFAULTSORT. Most people in the world do not have names that fall into the scheme "given-name family-name". Chinese, Koreans and Hungarians, for example, have the scheme "family-name given-name", no comma. Icelanders have the scheme "given-name patronym". Arabs and many others in the Middle East have a scheme that is something like "given name lineage", similar to pre-modern Welsh names, and should be sorted on the given name.
The notion that a name should be sorted as "family-name, given-name" is imposing a specific cultural notion on another culture. Put more simply, it is wrong. When followed it can produce results that are legitimate targets for ridicule. (Until a few months ago all the Ptolemaic kings were sorted by their epithets. Ptolemy I Soter had been sorted for months as "Soter, Ptolemy I".)
Stronger cautions need to be put into the guidelines to warn editors that the mores of their culture or sub-culture are not the laws of the universe and that people can be offended by a misuse of a name. If British Peerage naming customs can be described so that exceptions can be made the other customs should be described so that they are not forced into an alien naming convention.
We've a couple of related nominations, intended to help disentangle the many cross-categorization and category intersections that have arisen recently:
Should the first be successful, we must amend the Wikipedia:Naming conventions (categories) and Wikipedia:Biographies of living persons policies and related guidelines to clarify that "race" is not appropriate for categorization.
The second is somewhat dependent on the first. However, the inclusion of ethnic "origin" and "descent" is already against policy without notability, and these should never have been intermixed with the less contentious (more easily verifiable) nationality categories.
The wording had gradually diverged from Wikipedia:Biographies of living persons main policy. Therefore, combined nearly identical sections into a Wikipedia:Categorization of people/boilerplate fact policy subpage to prevent any drift from policy language, and to ease editing.
For example, should H. H. Asquith be sorted as "Asquith, H. H." or "Asquith, Herbert Henry"? I always thought it should match the article title because that's how it will appear in the category (and presumably the article title will have the most common form of the name). However, I had such an edit reverted recently by a user who disagrees. Is there an existing policy on this? -- Auntof6 ( talk) 00:32, 7 June 2009 (UTC)
Surely this has been discussed and dealt with before but I just can't find where. What is the rule for people whose nationality is uncertain? Can a person only be in one nationality category or is more than one possible? If a person is born in a country but later in life moves to another country does he cease to be in his native country's category? Is it based on what passport they hold? As I say, I'm sure this isn't the first time it's been discussed, so could anyone point me in the right direction?-- Jeff79 ( talk) 12:49, 26 June 2009 (UTC)
In the sort order it would make sense to replace these with 01, 02, 03 etc. Rich Farmbrough, 14:40, 1 August 2009 (UTC).
Had I known this page existed before now, I would have mentioned this matter instead of reverting bot edits with little more than terse, snide comments: Ethiopian names are being butchered due to ignorance. They do not have surnames, but they do have patronymics. I'd like to direct your attention to Wikipedia:Manual of Style (Ethiopia-related articles)#Proper names, which explains the matter further. Thanks, & I hope I can leave off with the terse, snide edit comments on this matter. -- llywrch ( talk) 03:39, 5 October 2009 (UTC)
Sorry if this has been asked before. Simple - Say we have a person from the United States from anytown, anystate. Is it incorrect to add category "anytown, anystate"? Note that the category "People from anytown, anystate" doesn't exist. The person is already in "People from anycounty, anystate".
Also, the person's presence in the location is not significant at all.
Thank You
-- Omarcheeseboro ( talk) 13:22, 4 November 2009 (UTC)
::Thank you Bearcat, but I'm not sure if I explained my question correctly. Perhaps it is best just to give my specific example:
Andrew Maynard (boxer). The subject is from Laurel, Maryland, which is in Prince George's County. His presence in Laurel, Maryland is not significant (he's not a politican, has done nothing specific for the town).
Strike that, edit conflict and you answered it! Thanks again! --
Omarcheeseboro (
talk)
19:14, 4 November 2009 (UTC)
Hi, is it correct to put Friedrich Welwitsch in the category Austrians of Slovene descent? The article says: "It is known that Welwitsch's mother was a German, while the his father's family is probably of Slovene origin. However, this has not been definitely proven.[2] It is disputed whether Welwitsch spoke Slovene.[1]" -- Eleassar my talk 10:52, 7 November 2009 (UTC)
Is it ok to list Anwar al-Awlaki in the category "Islamic terrorism" (note: this is not "Islamic terrorist"), where:
-- Epeefleche ( talk) 19:53, 1 December 2009 (UTC)
Could I ask what people think about the idea of creating and populating this category? - Richard Cavell ( talk) 03:41, 18 December 2009 (UTC)
What is the policy for sorting a building, award, etc., that is named for a person, e.g., Lt. Raymond Enners Award, Adam Jones Federal Building? Should it be sorted by surname (even though the article is not about the person) or should it be sorted by the first name of the article? Eagle4000 ( talk) 21:51, 15 February 2010 (UTC)
This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
Archive 1 | Archive 2 | Archive 3 | Archive 4 | Archive 5 | Archive 6 | → | Archive 10 |
This came up is one of my early edits, when I knew less than I do now about Wikipedia. For ease of finding a name, even when the correct spelling is not certain, it is common practice to sort them all as if they were Mac. As described above this can be before the other Ms or after Mab... The Telephone Directory places them all ((including names such as Mace) after Mabbott and sorts all as Mac, but that is hardly a definitive source! I am told that this is documented in a "standard text" for librarians, but have not sourced that. All I have found on-line is Everything - third section; second bullet. Collation indicates that this practice may have fallen out of favour since computerisation. I agree that much of the time it is an unnecessary complication; even in List of Scots there do not appear to be a vast number of Macs and Mcs (m' less common nowadays). However I believe we should have an agreed style. Comments? Finavon 22:16, 11 June 2007 (UTC)
I agree with Stemonitis, and I always index both MacX and McX as Macx. This isn't just a a convention, it's a convention with a reason, because the spellings are not always handled consistently across a family or even for the same person, and there is no guarantee that an entry found somewhere for "John MacCarthy" will not be listed elsewhere as "John McCarthy", or (without capitalisation) as "John Mccarthy" or "John Maccarthy". The consistent approach makes it easier to find articles, and isn't that the whole point of indexing? -- BrownHairedGirl (talk) • ( contribs) 22:23, 7 November 2007 (UTC)
There's been a recent discussion of this and other alphabetisation issues at Wikipedia_talk:Manual_of_Style#Alphabetization, which may be of interest. PamD ( talk) 08:22, 10 February 2008 (UTC)
Does anyone else find it interesting that articles must have reliable sources but Policies and Guidelines are promulgated based solely on the opinions of the editors who voice their opinions, often in the face of reliable sources? It does no good to cite reliable sources, such as the Library of Congress, in these instances. Consensus, defined as those who can defend an opinion longer than those on the other side, will always take precedence over rigor and reliable sources. JimCubb ( talk) 21:35, 16 July 2010 (UTC)
...
Categories using the name of a person hold articles directly related to that person. Remember this when placing the article in larger categories. If the person is a member of a category, put the article about the person in the larger category. If articles directly related to the person are also members of the larger category, put the category with the person's name in the larger category. This often results in the article and category being categorized differently. ...
I have read this through three times, and I am still not clear on the meaning. The word 'larger' has ambiguity. Some examples on what is meant would be good. billinghurst ( talk) 11:38, 24 July 2008 (UTC)
Despite what the main page says:
Wikipedia:Categorization_of_people#By_residence: "The place of birth is rarely notable."
~ender 2007-06-17 17:14:PM MST
This continues from the long discussion above.
current text:
Proposed new text:
- Any comments? Obviously it could be extended to book length, but I think this is clearly more accurate than the current text. Johnbod 18:16, 22 June 2007 (UTC)
- not bad; I thought it was Van Basten under V, so conforming to the capialization rule; but it it seems he may be van Basten under V, so an exception. If so, he should be changed or explained. Like many of these examples, the uses within the WP article are inconsistent, & include plenty of both Van & vans. His official website goes with van, the AC Milan one with Van. Johnbod 17:52, 23 June 2007 (UTC)
- van (or Van) Basten, and Von (or von) Braun dropped as correct capitalisation & sorting unclear. Johnbod 17:13, 1 July 2007 (UTC)
In case people here are interested: Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Biography#Sortkey and birth/death categories standardization project. Carcharoth 14:06, 18 July 2007 (UTC)
There are many categories that inexplicably lump a sporting team's past memebers with its current members. For example see: Category:New York Yankees players, Category:Boca Juniors footballers, and Category:San Antonio Spurs players. Why can't I start creating subcategories for every one of these cats to differentiate current players from players who are no longer on the team? For example, we would have Category:Current New York Yankees players and Current Boca Juniors footballers:, etc.
Granted keeping these categories maintained would take an enormous amount of work at first, but work is what we Wikipedia volunteers are all about, and I would certainly pitch in. And, yes, certain categorizations would become out of date quickly, but I believe editors who were fans of the respective teams would recategorize articles as new players joined and old players left the team. The result would be greatly useful.
I'm 90% sure that people have brought this up before and decided against this idea (if so, please provide a link to the old discussion), but I would like someone to confirm it for me. I have also left an identical note on Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Sports. If I don't hear back from any of you with reasonable objections, I will procede to begin making the subcategories. Thanks, -- The Fat Man Who Never Came Back 17:19, 28 July 2007 (UTC)
To quote:
Category names do not carry disclaimers or modifiers, so the case for the category must be made clear by the article text. The article must state the facts that result in the use of the category tag and these facts must be sourced.
Category tags regarding religious beliefs and sexual preference should not be used unless two criteria are met:
- The subject publicly self-identifies with the belief or preference in question;
- The subject's beliefs or sexual preferences are relevant to the subject's notable activities or public life, according to reliable published sources.
Why shouldn't these criteria apply likewise to biographies of dead people? They seem ideal for both the living and the dead, irrespective of the addition burden of accuracy and verifiability associated with WP:BLP. -- Rrburke( talk) 22:56, 29 August 2007 (UTC)
A question: if something is disputed in an article about a dead person, should we go with consensus regarding the application of category at the bottom (since the choosing of the category itself cannot give both sides of the argument (ie. be wholly NPOV) and must come down on one side)?
Wikipedia:Categorization of people#General considerations has:
For some "sensitive" categories, it is better to think of the category as a set of representative and unquestioned examples, while a list is a better venue for an attempt at completeness.
I bolded one word in that quote. Re. consensus, there is a consensus that categories should not include questionable examples. Sacco and Vanzetti would be an example of a questionable characterisation as murderers. Is JB Adams an unquestionable example of a murderer? I don't think it should be too difficult to form a consensus about that. If there is residual doubt, or if the characteristic is labeled "suspected" (as it is in the first line of the JB Adams article), then don't include in the category. On the other hand, it is possible to include both Adams and S&V in a list, if that list is properly annotated regarding the remaining doubts, and if the list is set up in such a way that doubtful inclusions are allowed (for some lists talk page discussions led to exclusion of doubtful cases too).
Re. your Jesus example, I think there is little or no residual doubt that he was in fact a Roman era Jew. Anyway, consensus seems to be there is no significant residual doubt in that case. Note also the difference in "sensitivity" (as it is called in the Wikipedia:Categorization of people guideline) between a category that indicates place, time and cultural association, as opposed to subcategories of "criminals". There is little residual doubt that Jesus was a convicted criminal (I think even Josephus as an independent source confirms that). But as a highly sensitive categorisation the actual category found at the bottom of the Jesus article is somewhat more convoluted, category:Disputed convictions leading to execution. Both Sacco and Vanzetti are in that category too (by categorisation of redirect pages, which makes that the category doesn't show up on the S&V page itself). -- Francis Schonken ( talk) 13:03, 5 January 2008 (UTC)
(My bolding of words.)"Wikipedia aims to present competing views in proportion to their representation among experts on the subject, or among the concerned parties. This applies not only to article text, but to images, external links, categories, and all other material as well."
(My bolding of words.) Then if the majority consider Adams to be guilty, it should be reflected in the category, should it not? I see few flaws in that logic. Whether the majority actually do consider him guilty can be discussed on the Adams talk page. I'm just attempting to establish the ground rules before doing so. Thoughts? And please, think about the theory before applying it to Adams. Malick78 ( talk) 11:37, 8 January 2008 (UTC)"Wikipedia aims to present competing views in proportion to their representation among experts on the subject, or among the concerned parties. This applies not only to article text, but to images, external links, categories, and all other material as well."
Bruce Willis and John McEnroe were born in American military bases in Germany. Are they German Americans (based on that sole fact)? I notice this Wikipedia:Naming conventions (categories)#Heritage. SamEV ( talk) 17:52, 28 November 2007 (UTC)
The current guideline states that for a religion category to be included for a living person, "The subject's beliefs or sexual preferences are relevant to the subject's notable activities or public life, according to reliable published sources. " We have some disagreement on how this applies to politicians. Does the fact that a person is a politician mean that the religion is automatically "relevant to the subject's notable activities or public life"? In many articles, a religion is listed in a politician infobox (sometimes sourced, most times not), and not mentioned at all in the article. If it is mentioned in the article, it usually just says "Subject attends Church X." I think that this means the religion is not relevant and religious categories should be removed. Others have questioned this interpretation. I'd like more community input on what is meant. Karanacs ( talk) 18:11, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
The literature in question is out of date and out of step with current Wikipedia consensus. Other than religious figures no one else should be categorized according to that 2 point criteria. It needs to be rewritten so that either points mean a person is worthy of categorization by religion.
I do not follow these guidelines, for example in the category English Baptists I will add the category to every English Baptist I come across regardless of whether they are known as "That self-admitted Baptist guy" or as "an international cricketeer".
I am only annoyed because a person (anonymous person) of a certain nationality and a certain faith uses these guidelines to remove as many people (living or not) from the categories from said nation and not of said faith for... well God only knows why, but he feels it is necessary.
Why are sexual preferences and religious beliefs grouped together like this anyway? Why not religion and former occupation or sexual preference and place of birth?
If someone is reading this also feels they need changing then lets get some consensus together and rewrite the guidelines to include some common sense.-- EchetusXe ( talk) 23:51, 20 November 2008 (UTC)
Wikipedia:Categorization_of_people#By_the_person.27s_name suggests this should only be done in certain "very notable" cases, but there isn't any kind of criteria listed. There are now categories for Category:Dick Cheney and even Category:Fred Thompson (with 5 articles). I'm not sure whether that's legitimate or not. - TheMightyQuill ( talk) 22:05, 15 April 2008 (UTC)
I think that categorization is one of the biggest problems the project has, with respect to attempting to adhere to the BLP and NPOV policies. It is far too vulnerable to exploitation by POV warriors, who can Wikilawyer a BLP or other article into a category and demand that it be retained there based on some sort of nominalist argument, which appears to be logically correct but defeats the purpose of core policies. Others have called this a vulnerablity to WP:POINT violations. I think that it is time to reconsider the use of any potentially contentious category. -- Marvin Diode ( talk) 21:16, 13 June 2008 (UTC)
Will Beback's attempt to add "context" is misleading. For the actual "context," see Talk:Neutral point of view#Templates and Categories. -- Marvin Diode ( talk) 00:08, 15 June 2008 (UTC)
I tried to add the cat "Spanish-American" to Antonio Banderas and was told that I could not because he is not a naturalized American citizen though he resides in the US. I understand that the meaning of nationality can be different around the world. But appears to me that in these cats, the nationality part refers to the person being a citizen of that country, no? What is the guideline regarding nationality for these cats? MrBlondNYC ( talk) 08:11, 17 June 2008 (UTC)
I would like to see some guidance on what to do with people where historically there is no agreement on the spelling of a surname.
Thx. -- billinghurst ( talk) 15:17, 24 August 2008 (UTC)
This appears to be contrary to practice. For example, George W. Bush has over 30 categories. The tendency I see is to categorize biographies exhaustively. (Every school they attended, their religion and ethnicity, their ancestry, their professions, everywhere they lived, selected honors and prizes, etc.) Or we see examples of editors agreeing to only list the few most important categories? ·:· Will Beback ·:· 07:14, 30 September 2008 (UTC)
So I'm sorting some people, and the guidelines appear self-contradictory / unclear. So let's try to make them clearer. How about this? Headbomb { ταλκ κοντριβς – WP Physics} 05:30, 4 December 2008 (UTC)
This seems to cover almost everything but arabic names such as Shams al-Dīn Abū Abd Allāh al-Khalīlī (with two al-) or such as Muhammad ibn Jābir al-Harrānī al-Battānī (ibn, al-, al-) or Ahmad ibn Muhammad ibn Kathīr al-Farghānī (ibn, ibn, al-).
Headbomb {
ταλκ
κοντριβς –
WP Physics}
05:35, 4 December 2008 (UTC)
If I can add to the above discussion. I appreciate that the surname is normally sorted by "the first capitalised element". However, this can lead to confusion with French names. Currently, names such as Maurice Le Boucher, Paul Le Flem, Philippe Le Goff, Jean-François Le Sueur etc are all grouped, and they appear before such names as Firmin Lebel, Charles-Édouard Lefebvre, René Leibowitz etc - see Category:French composers. This is ok, except where we have cases such as Maurice Le Roux (appears in the first group) and Maurice Leroux (appears later), who turn out to be the same person. I’ve added a merge template to both articles. Such cases would be more quickly identified if all surnames starting with "Le" or "le" were defaultsorted by removing all the spaces between the component parts of the surname. That is, Le Boucher would be sorted as if it were spelled "Leboucher", and a putative Martin Le Boucher would appear after a Louis Leboucher, as intuition (mine, at least) would indicate. Comments? -- JackofOz ( talk) 00:41, 8 February 2009 (UTC)
On the page for Vernon and Irene Castle there are no birth or death categories given even tho their dates are established. Is this common practice? I see the Laurel and Hardy page does the same but also gives links to separate articles about each comedian (which provide birth and death categories). If there are no pages for the separate members of a duo, and there are no birth/death categories given, how does one solve the problem if separate pages are not there (and possibly not necessary or wanted)?
I have looked at WP:Categorization of people but it wasn't much help. Thanks for any info.-- FeanorStar7 ( talk) 03:13, 16 February 2009 (UTC)
This seems to be discussed above, but is "For a surname which begins with Mc or Mac, the category sort key should always be typed as Mac with the remainder of the name in lowercase" necessary? I mean, I get McD should be Mcd, but why do we have to auto-change from Mc to Mac? Is there something I'm not getting? Wizardman 04:42, 1 March 2009 (UTC)
_________________________________________| |
My interpretation of the rules is that periods/ full stops should be included in sort keys, and that's reflected in an example given on the page: " Robert J. Smith II sorts as [[Category:New Jersey politicians|Smith, Robert J., II]]"
However, it also says "Punctuation, such as apostrophes and colons (but not hyphens) should be removed". If periods/full stops should not be removed, this should be mentioned in that sentence.
What prompted this is that ListasBot is currently removing any periods/full stops it finds in listas parameters. I would like to inform its operator of the correct sorting, but the bot is actually changing things according to the strictest interpretation of the currently listed guidelines. MANdARAX • XAЯAbИAM 01:36, 13 April 2009 (UTC)
Well, there's two people saying "I don't care about this", and two people saying "periods should be left in", so as far as ListasBot's behavior is concerned, I'll assume the consensus here is to leave periods in. (P.S. -- for anyone who's curious, it only took the addition of one extra character in the source code to make this change.) Matt ( talk) 20:13, 17 April 2009 (UTC)
Why do we treat these two names as the same when the legal names have diverged and are no longer synonyms? As of now we force the sort key to always be "Mac", but why? -- Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) ( talk) 02:35, 15 April 2009 (UTC)
There is an approval request at Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/tomerbot for a bot that would categorize people based information in lists and on other Wikis. If people familiar with these policies could comment there, it would be appreciated. – Quadell ( talk) 13:25, 29 April 2009 (UTC)
I thought I saw a FAQ answering this question somewhere, but can't find it. Can someone tell me what the guidelines are regarding putting actors/directors in the category for a book/movie/franchise? I seem to remember that this is frowned upon, since this might lead to cat clutter -- but, then again, if their involvement is key to their career, then it's okay. Or something like that. I'm asking specifically WRT to actors who have appeared in Star Trek -- is it appropriate to include "Star Trek" (or Star Trek actors) as a cat for William Shatner? What about an actor who played a minor character? -- EEMIV ( talk) 13:27, 6 May 2009 (UTC)
Should Saint, St. and St all be listed together (not as in people who are saints, but people like Pam St. Clement)? I see that some St and St. names are sorted under Saint but many are not, and where they aren't, St names are listed first, then hyphenated names such as Kim St-Pierre and then St. names are last. Shouldn't they all be together? AnemoneProjectors ( talk) 23:48, 18 May 2009 (UTC)
I detect a note of Cultural Imperialism in the guideline for DEFAULTSORT. Most people in the world do not have names that fall into the scheme "given-name family-name". Chinese, Koreans and Hungarians, for example, have the scheme "family-name given-name", no comma. Icelanders have the scheme "given-name patronym". Arabs and many others in the Middle East have a scheme that is something like "given name lineage", similar to pre-modern Welsh names, and should be sorted on the given name.
The notion that a name should be sorted as "family-name, given-name" is imposing a specific cultural notion on another culture. Put more simply, it is wrong. When followed it can produce results that are legitimate targets for ridicule. (Until a few months ago all the Ptolemaic kings were sorted by their epithets. Ptolemy I Soter had been sorted for months as "Soter, Ptolemy I".)
Stronger cautions need to be put into the guidelines to warn editors that the mores of their culture or sub-culture are not the laws of the universe and that people can be offended by a misuse of a name. If British Peerage naming customs can be described so that exceptions can be made the other customs should be described so that they are not forced into an alien naming convention.
We've a couple of related nominations, intended to help disentangle the many cross-categorization and category intersections that have arisen recently:
Should the first be successful, we must amend the Wikipedia:Naming conventions (categories) and Wikipedia:Biographies of living persons policies and related guidelines to clarify that "race" is not appropriate for categorization.
The second is somewhat dependent on the first. However, the inclusion of ethnic "origin" and "descent" is already against policy without notability, and these should never have been intermixed with the less contentious (more easily verifiable) nationality categories.
The wording had gradually diverged from Wikipedia:Biographies of living persons main policy. Therefore, combined nearly identical sections into a Wikipedia:Categorization of people/boilerplate fact policy subpage to prevent any drift from policy language, and to ease editing.
For example, should H. H. Asquith be sorted as "Asquith, H. H." or "Asquith, Herbert Henry"? I always thought it should match the article title because that's how it will appear in the category (and presumably the article title will have the most common form of the name). However, I had such an edit reverted recently by a user who disagrees. Is there an existing policy on this? -- Auntof6 ( talk) 00:32, 7 June 2009 (UTC)
Surely this has been discussed and dealt with before but I just can't find where. What is the rule for people whose nationality is uncertain? Can a person only be in one nationality category or is more than one possible? If a person is born in a country but later in life moves to another country does he cease to be in his native country's category? Is it based on what passport they hold? As I say, I'm sure this isn't the first time it's been discussed, so could anyone point me in the right direction?-- Jeff79 ( talk) 12:49, 26 June 2009 (UTC)
In the sort order it would make sense to replace these with 01, 02, 03 etc. Rich Farmbrough, 14:40, 1 August 2009 (UTC).
Had I known this page existed before now, I would have mentioned this matter instead of reverting bot edits with little more than terse, snide comments: Ethiopian names are being butchered due to ignorance. They do not have surnames, but they do have patronymics. I'd like to direct your attention to Wikipedia:Manual of Style (Ethiopia-related articles)#Proper names, which explains the matter further. Thanks, & I hope I can leave off with the terse, snide edit comments on this matter. -- llywrch ( talk) 03:39, 5 October 2009 (UTC)
Sorry if this has been asked before. Simple - Say we have a person from the United States from anytown, anystate. Is it incorrect to add category "anytown, anystate"? Note that the category "People from anytown, anystate" doesn't exist. The person is already in "People from anycounty, anystate".
Also, the person's presence in the location is not significant at all.
Thank You
-- Omarcheeseboro ( talk) 13:22, 4 November 2009 (UTC)
::Thank you Bearcat, but I'm not sure if I explained my question correctly. Perhaps it is best just to give my specific example:
Andrew Maynard (boxer). The subject is from Laurel, Maryland, which is in Prince George's County. His presence in Laurel, Maryland is not significant (he's not a politican, has done nothing specific for the town).
Strike that, edit conflict and you answered it! Thanks again! --
Omarcheeseboro (
talk)
19:14, 4 November 2009 (UTC)
Hi, is it correct to put Friedrich Welwitsch in the category Austrians of Slovene descent? The article says: "It is known that Welwitsch's mother was a German, while the his father's family is probably of Slovene origin. However, this has not been definitely proven.[2] It is disputed whether Welwitsch spoke Slovene.[1]" -- Eleassar my talk 10:52, 7 November 2009 (UTC)
Is it ok to list Anwar al-Awlaki in the category "Islamic terrorism" (note: this is not "Islamic terrorist"), where:
-- Epeefleche ( talk) 19:53, 1 December 2009 (UTC)
Could I ask what people think about the idea of creating and populating this category? - Richard Cavell ( talk) 03:41, 18 December 2009 (UTC)
What is the policy for sorting a building, award, etc., that is named for a person, e.g., Lt. Raymond Enners Award, Adam Jones Federal Building? Should it be sorted by surname (even though the article is not about the person) or should it be sorted by the first name of the article? Eagle4000 ( talk) 21:51, 15 February 2010 (UTC)