Category talk:Wikipedia categories named after people

Restarting discussion on new name

Following on from the discussion at "Categories for deletion" (see here), it looks like we need a consensus on what the new name should be. Here is a list of the options that were mentioned in the discussion (please add more or any I missed). Carcharoth 14:23, 7 May 2006 (UTC)

• Categories by person (current name)
• People who have their own categories
• Person categories
• People with categories
• Topical people
• Portal-like categories concerning people
• Categories about people
• People as categories
• Categories named after people
• Personal categories

Scrub that! I just found a debate here that agreed to rename the category... Carcharoth 21:35, 7 May 2006 (UTC)

What about "Eponymous categories"?—Markles 11:31, 27 May 2006 (UTC)

Sub-categories

Just noting the existence of the discussion at Wikipedia:Categories for deletion/Log/2006 July 12#Categories named after people subcategories, in case anybody should need to refer to it in future. --Paul A 08:31, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

P.S. Does anyone have strong opinions on the appropriateness or otherwise of a Category:Categories named after fictional people? --Paul A 08:32, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

Category:Categories named after fictional characters might be better. The word "characters" would reinforce the fictional aspect and provide a place for fictional dogs, horses, alien and fantastic beings, etc.

Then again, maybe Category:Categories named after fictional people should be a subcat for both Category:Categories named after people and Category:Categories named after fictional characters. But I have little experience in articles or categories about fiction. Maurreen 13:02, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

Another alternative, of course, would be to specify that this category is only for non-fictional people, and give the fictional character categories the boot. I have a feeling that this might be the best course in the long run. --Paul A 17:46, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

Proposing additional sub-categories (new in 2007)

There are several people meeting each of the following criteria, so would additional sub-categories be useful?

• Categories named after makers of films & TV programmes
• Categories named after businesspeople
• Categories named after military leaders
• Categories named after royalty (note 1)
• Categories named after political activists (note 1)

Note 1. Are these people Politicians? Would it be useful to rename the Politicians category (to er... what?) so as to include them? - Fayenatic london (talk) 14:48, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

Should these categories be placed in other categories?

Earlier today, I was populating Category:Categories named after musicians, and I noticed that many of the categories I added included the same categories that their main article already includes. For example, Category:Steely Dan contained all the same categories as the Steely Dan article. I replaced the categories with the appopriate Category:Categories named after musicians which seemed sufficient, but they were re-added. This will cause Steely Dan to appear in each of those categories twice. I also noticed that the number and specificity/generality of chosen categories was extremely random. The categories randomly contained anywhere from one to 42 categories! (Category:Michael Jackson). And some included very general categories such as Category:Singers while others included extremely specific categories such as Category:American dance/club music artists. In almost ever case, these cats were already present in the article. In my opinion, these categories should NOT contain the same cats as the article. With most, especially the musician ones that I have been categorizing, I think Category:Categories named after musicians would be sufficient.

Also, when these categories are included in other categories, they get mixed up with the actual subcategories. For example, the musician categories that were present in Category:American musical groups were mixed with important subcategories such as Category:American musical groups by genre and Category:American musical groups by state. This would make it difficult for a user browsing categories. Also, it does not seem as if it would be a NPOV if certain categories are present at the top as subcategories while others are present below as articles (and while even others are present above and below as both subcategories and articles). We should decide which other cats (if any) should be included because inclusion is currently extremely random, inconsistent, and confusing. --musicpvm 18:38, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

Eponymous categories should only linked into the Categories named after ... hierarchy, anything else is confusing. Can we get that added to the guidelines? --JeffW 19:18, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

Agreed, it should be added. This also seems to be one of the reasons these categories were originally created. --musicpvm 19:56, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

I agree in general, but I think that there are exceptions. It depends upon what is in the eponymous category. An example of this is Category:Presidents of the United States. I think it makes sense to have all the eponymous categories. I'm not sure we are ready for a hard and fast rule. -- Samuel Wantman 20:06, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

This is a confusing area and if we continue to have no positive guidance I'm afraid people are going to continue to be haphazard. That said, perhaps the guidance could be something along the lines that each hierarchy needs to have either (1) only the articles appear in the hierarchy (and the only way to get to the cats is to go through the articles or one of the "Categories named after ..." cats) or (2) both the cats and the articles are in the hierarchy but the articles should only be at the bottom (so that the only category that the article belongs to is the eponymous cat). And it should never be the case that the article and the eponymous category are both included in the same parent category. --JeffW 22:06, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

I think we should at least add a general guideline stating something like "In most cases, eponymous categories should only be included in Category:Categories named after people or a subcategory". If there are certain exceptions to this, they can be explained in the specific subcategory. For example, the exception for U.S. Presidents could be explained in Category:Categories named after politicians. But I do think a general guideline is necessary as users will continue to clutter these cats with every cat from the article; several of my edits from earlier have already been reverted. --musicpvm 23:48, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

I'm not sure I understand. If what you guys are saying is, for example, the Category:Elvis Presley could only go in the Category:Categories named after musicians, I think that's a bad idea. It would not needlessly prevent things from being in other apprpriate categories.

As an aside, Steely Dan is not a person. Maurreen 03:26, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

Why do you think it is a bad idea? It is redundant and confusing for both the article and its eponymous category to be placed into the same cats. Also, I have added musical groups to Category:Categories named after musicians as musicians and musical groups should not be treated differently. Steely Dan may not be one person, but they are people. Category:Musical groups is a subcategory of Category:People, so this would not be improper categorization. A Category:Categories named after musical groups could be created, but I don't think its necessary at the moment. --musicpvm 04:11, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

1. For example, the Elvis Presley article would go in Category:Elvis Presley. That category would be expected to be in Category:American musicians and Category:Rock musicians. Why should the category be treated differently just because it's about a person? Multiple categories at allowed, if not encouraged, for everything else.
2. I disagree with your conclusion about Steely Dan. It's not important to me, but it would be more clear to change Category:Categories named after musicians to Category:Categories named after musicians and musical groups. Maurreen 06:13, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

I'll try to explain the problem in a different way. There are in essence, two different types of categories. There are the "all x are y" categories where all the articles (x) are of the y type. So all the bridges found in Category:Suspension bridges are suspension bridges. There is also the "all x are related to y" categories. Where all the articles (x) are not of the y type, but they mention y, or are somehow related to y. An example of this is Category:George W. Bush. Eponymous people categories are the second type. Personally, I believe very few of these categories are even needed. Often they are populated by people who click on "what links here" and add nothing more. However, it is hard to get these deleted at CfD, and recently their number seems to be increasing rapidly. So what do we do with all these categories, especially as their number is increasing? There is no need to put them in the same categories that the eponymous articles are in. I most cases the categories have very little to do with the parent categories. For example, none of the articles in Category:George W. Bush have anything to do with many of the parent categories of George W. Bush. For example, The Pet Goat found in the Bush category, has nothing to do with Category:Methodist Americans. I could see putting these eponymous categories in parents when a good number of the articles relate to the parent, but this seems to be the rare exception. So the rule should be "Eponymous categories should rarely be put in anything besides Category:Categories named after people or a subcategory".

I also notice that some article/category pairs are still categorized the old way (like Elvis Presley) and the new way, like George W. Bush. -- Samuel Wantman 07:23, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

Thanks, your explanation is some help. I agree that the lack of clarity between the two types of categories can be less than ideal.

But I'm fuzzy about why you guys think these categories should be treated differently from others. Is your point that "the categories have very little to do with the parent categories"?

If so, maybe that can lead to a compromise, not banning other categories, but limiting them to the most appropriate, the one(s) most identified with the person.

Category:George W. Bush should be in Category:Presidents of the United States, but it doesn't need to be in Category:Methodist Americans. Category:Elvis Presley should be in Category:American rock musicians but not in Category:Twins.

Also, I think, for instance Category:Categories named after musicians should also be a member of Category:Musicians. Maurreen 07:52, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

I think we are in agreement. I also had the thought that Category:Categories named after musicians should be in Category:Musicians. This would also be a rationale for removing all the individual eponymous categories from Category:Musicians. -- Samuel Wantman 08:06, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

I'd say the rule should be, "Eponymous categories should never be put in anything besides Category:Categories named after people or a subcategory". By the way, I see that this category is no longer a member of Category:People, but its subcats are (indirectly) members of Category:People. That's an inconsistency. Mirror Vax 08:08, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

The point of categories is navigation, to find related articles. People are less likely to find them if they are only here.

For the sake of curiousity, are any of you thinking these categories are populated more sloppily than others? I have no idea.

Thanks, Samuel Wantman. -- Maurreen 08:14, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

You're welcome! I agree that the point of these is for navigation and that is the reason why I want these eponymous categories removed from most categories. I find it very distracting to have just a few of these eponymous categories cluttering up the subcategory listings, and I don't think people are looking for the eponymous categories almost all of the time, they are looking for the article. When people look at the article, they'd probably be more interested in seeing the eponymous category. I do think that many of these eponymous categories are created without much thought of the larger categorization scheme. They are often popular people, TV shows, Musicals, etc... Often they are created with just a handful of articles as members and are not useful or needed. I often try nominating the worst of them at CfD. -- Samuel Wantman 08:36, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

I am understanding better now. But the sloppiness might be a losing battle. Maurreen 08:44, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

I tend to take the longer view. When I started talking about eponymous categories a year and a half ago the norm was to put the article only in the eponymous category and do all the categorization on the eponymous category. This made no sense to me then, and after many months of discussion I was able to get a consensus at Wikipedia talk:Categorization to change the guidelines. I feel much less alone now then I did when I started talking about this. Also, I actually like alot of the sloppiness of categorization. My main criteria for evaluating categorization is "would users expect to find this article in the category if they were browsing, and is it helpful for it to be in the category". This leads to including many things that would not make it into a formal taxonomy, and for more interesting categories. -- Samuel Wantman 09:16, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

Recategorisation

I would like to adjust the categorisation of this category to make it a subcat of category:People, which is a more comprehensive treatment of the subject area. Please can you indicate any objections, thanks. I'll try to remember to re-visit in a few days. Thanks, Ian Cairns 18:59, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

I've given up waiting. I'll add the categ rather than replace the categ. Ian Cairns 20:13, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

Oops. I missed this. I disagree, so I changed it back. Many of the subcategories contain articles about things that aren't people, so lumping the whole structure under the People category is not appropriate. Carcharoth 18:19, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

I think it could still be an appropriate subcategory of Category:People, since it contains categories which are about people, just as Category:People contains articles which are about people. In that sense, it is something of a thematic branch. --Eliyak T·C 18:40, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

But you can deal with this simply by having links back and forth in the category blurbs at the top. A "see also" link, if you like. Categorisation is not the only way to interlink related topics. Carcharoth 23:30, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

Again, Category:Categories named after people has been wrongly placed in Category:People. The articles on people should be placed in Category:People, but the categories named after people shouldn't be, because they include more than just people (they include books, pets, buildings, and so on). Categorising categories is different from categorising articles. When we categorise a category that has a name similar to that of an article, we shouldnt' categorise the category as if it were the article, but we should think about what is inside the category, and categorise the category on that basis, not on the basis of the 'name' of the category. For that reason, I'm removing this category from Category:People. Readers who want to reach Category:People can do so from the link provided at the top of the category. People to want to get to this category from Category:People, can use the link at the top there. Carcharoth 22:27, 20 August 2007 (UTC)