Talk:Dutch people/Archive 11

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Historical Flemings

If all the above is neccesary to merely ´´prove´´ a Dutch ethnic group in the middle ages, it seems to me that the same goes for Flemings. When you, Framm, speak of Flemish and Dutch (ie a split) in the 14th century, then you 'll need to provide sources. Gelijke monniken gelijke kappen is a Dutch proverb, so I'm sure someone from Flanders knows it too.HP1740-B (talk) 10:47, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

Since this article is about Dutch people, evidence has to be provided for the existence of Dutch people as an ethnic group in the middle ages. Whether there was one Flemish group as well, or none, or several groups (Flemish, Brabant, Limburg-Liège, ...) is irrelevant for this article. Anyway, if this is still about the Bruges image, I have provided plenty sources stating that Bruges at the time was a Flemish city (no matter if this is current Flemish or county Flemish). Not asingle source has been provided stating that Bruges wsa a 14th century Dutch city. Fram (talk) 08:16, 14 June 2010 (UTC)

Once again, because you do not learn, you confuse regional identity, political affiliation and modern connotations of the word 'Fleming' with ethnicity.HP1740-B (talk) 14:36, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

Once again you have no arguments and go back to personal attacks? Anyway, I have provided below excerpts from the "History of the Low Countries", indicating very clearly that to discuss the Low Countries in the 14th century as if they are one is ridiculous. 14:51, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

Prove the existence of a Flemish ethnic group in 1300. If you're done with that please prove its existence today.HP1740-B (talk) 17:09, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

"Prove the existence of a Dutch ethnic group in 1300." For today's Flemish, the matter is actually disputed. For the existence of a 14th-century Dutch ethnic group I have not found a single source to date. If you know of any, please show them. Iblardi (talk) 23:19, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

HP1740-B, for the umpteenth time, I have no need to prove a Flemish ethnic group in 1300, and I don't claim that there was one. This article is about the Dutch ethnic group. You are the one claiming that Bruges was a Dutch city in the middle ages, and that the inhabitants of Flanders (either the County or the current geographic region) belonged to the Dutch ethnic group at the time. You have to provide evidence of your claims to include this in this article. As long as you don't do this conclusively, all references to the Flemish, Flemish cities, ... as part of some medieval, pre-Burgundian period Dutch ethnic group should be removed from this article. Fram (talk) 07:04, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

Everything you write needs proof. It's as simple as that.HP1740-B (talk) 15:38, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

"Everything you write needs proof." Very well. The citations on this talk page show that there was no unity in language, mentality and culture, there was no sense of solidarity, political or otherwise, and there did not exist an ethnonym for "Dutch people" before the unification under the Burgundian dukes. This is all sourced. You have not contributed any "proof" that supports your position. Iblardi (talk) 19:37, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

Single issues

Belgian Revolt a traumatizing experience

The article states:

The Belgian Revolt was a traumatizing experience.

Insofar as the Netherlands are concerned, this statement is contradicted by Kossmann: "Uit zo'n rijmsel (sc. some verses cited above) blijkt wat overal in Nederland in de jaren 1830 bleek: de Belgische Afscheiding werd in Nederland niet als een wezenlijk probleem gevoeld." ("Is het Nederlandse volk door de scheiding van 1830 'wakker geschud'?", Politieke theorie en geschiedenis. Verspreide opstellen en voordrachten (1987), 364-372, esp. 370) Iblardi (talk) 20:02, 7 June 2010 (UTC)

I meant those lines more the in sense of that it disrupted political relations between the two countries; which didn't fully normalize untill after WWI, creating a distance between the two. HP1740-B (talk) 09:32, 13 June 2010 (UTC)

Creating a Belgian nation

In Belgium, the process of creating a nation was much slower than in the Netherlands. This was caused by the fact that rather than being a mono-ethnic independent state, like the Dutch Republic, the territories which would become Belgium remained part of large multi-ethnic, empires until the Napoleonic Wars drew to a close.

This unsourced statement seems to be contradicted by Lode Wils, "Verleden en toekomst van een natie", in Vlaanderen, België, Groot-Nederland. Mythe en geschiedenis (1994), p. 456-457: "Het proces van de omvorming van de oude Zuidnederlandse etnie tot een moderne natie was daarmee niet alleen vroeger voltooid, maar ook met een grotere consensus dan in de meeste Europese landen." "De Noordelijke Nederlanden (...) misten tot 1848 en gedeeltelijk nog langer het goed dat een natie volwaardig maakt: de volkssoevereiniteit. België vormde een natie (...) [M]aar het was minder een staat te noemen..." "De omvorming van 'peasants into Belgians' (...) was zeker een van de vroegste op het Europese vasteland." Iblardi (talk) 23:01, 11 June 2010 (UTC)

Could you elaborate on what the author means by "Belgians"?HP1740-B (talk) 09:34, 13 June 2010 (UTC)

He means Belgians, i.e. both French- and Dutch-speaking, whom he says initially formed a nation according to the definition given by American sociologist Karl W. Deutsch (p. 457), with a Flemish sub-nation only appearing after the attainment of independence (p. 458). This Belgian nation, according to him, had developed from an earlier Southern Netherlandic ethnie. Vos 1993 (see further above) also speaks of a Southern Netherlands ethnic community developing during the 17th and 18th centuries (p. 130). Iblardi (talk) 22:05, 13 June 2010 (UTC)

Well then we should mention in the article that a Belgian nation once existed (could you pinpoint the dates mentioned in the text?) which then either disolved or split. The perception of which, I suppose, rests in political preference.HP1740-B (talk) 14:33, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

Great Privilege of 1477

As requested, I will explain why I placed a "fact" tag in the paragraph concerning the Great Privilege of 1477. It says:

In 1477, the year of Charles' sudden death at Nancy, the Low Countries rebeled against their new liege, Mary of Burgundy and presented her with a set of demands. The subsequently issued great privilege met a lot of these demands (which included that Dutch, not French, should be the administrative language and that the states general had the right to hold meetings without the monarch's permission or presence) and despite the fact that the overall tenure of the document (which was declared void by her son, and successor, Philip IV) aimed for more autonomy for the Dutch counties and duchies, the fact that all Dutch fiefs presented their demands together, rather than separately, are evidence that by this time a sense of political unity had clearly emerged.

This is a misrepresentation in the sense that it disregards the fact that it was primarily a collective undertaking of the Burgundian Netherlands. It gives undue weight to the Dutch provinces on behalf of their being Dutch. Clarification:

• The Privilege was granted to all provinces, not just the Dutch but also the French-speaking ones. See WPGN 1, p. 283: "...werd door de Staten-Generaal aan Maria van Bourgondië afgedwongen en beoogde de centralistische politiek van de Bourgondiërs te vervangen door een politiek waarbij de gewestelijke instellingen hun oude macht zouden terugkrijgen." "Op de belangrijkste bijeenkomst van de Staten-Generaal waren, op Luxemburg en Gelre na, alle Bourgondische landen 'van herwaarts over' vertegenwoordigd. (...) Op 11 februari verleende Maria aan de Staten-Generaal het beroemde Groot Privilege..."; G. Nijsten, "Het Groot-Privilege van Maria van Bourgondië (1477)", pp. 38-39: "De vertegenwoordigers van alle territoria hadden hun grieven verzameld en gebundeld."; Gosses/Post, p. 230: "...terwijl Vlaanderen en alle gewesten tezamen op 11 februari 1477 een privilege ontvingen (Groot Privilege) en Holland en Zeeland op 14 maart."
• In fact, some of the Walloon provinces were involved in the negotiations at an earlier date than some of the Dutch-speaking ones. See A.G. Jongkees, "Het groot privilege van Holland en Zeeland (14 maart 1477): "Toen op 3 februari 1477 te Gent de jonge hertogin Maria het woord richtte tot de vergadering van de gezamenlijke Staten harer landen van herwaarts over (van 'Staten-Generaal' sprak men nog niet) waren afgevaardigden van edelen en steden van Holland, Zeeland en (West-)Friesland daar nog niet bij aanwezig. Deze deputatie ... zal ... zeker niet vóór de 21ste zijn aangekomen. Het algemene privilege, dat een weergave was van door de vergaderden schriftelijk ingediende 'pointen ende articlen', was toen reeds verleend." Military affairs, meanwhile, had also been taken care of: "Hierover hadden de anderen, uit Brabant, Vlaanderen, Artesië, Henegouwen en Namen, een plan ontworpen (...), dat ook reeds met hun medewerking rekening hield."
• The Privilege contained a clausule regulating the language of administration; however, rather than that "Dutch, not French, should be the administrative language", this language could be either "Duytsch" or "Walsche". The original text, linked to in a footnote, has: "item, dat onse secretarisse, tot onsen vornoemden Rade behouvende, zullen wesen in alzulken redelike ghetale, als ons ghelieven zal, uut onsen vorscreven landen, conende ten minsten beede de talen, Walsche ende Duytsch"; "item, dat de zaken, die voor onsen voornoemden Grooten Raed ghehandelt zullen werden uut eenighe van de vorsz. landen, zullen werden beleet ende ghedinght tusschen denghonen, dien't ancleeft, in alsulker talen, als men ghemeenlic spreect in de landen, daer de verweerers wonachtich zijn". Now, "Duytsch" also referred to those regions that spoke dialects that we would not, or hardly, now consider to be Dutch, such as Luxemburg and Limburg: "Vlaanderen, Brabant en Henegouwen ... dwongen samen het Groot Privilege af, dat voor de Nederlanden een aantal grieven moest wegnemen..." "Het bepaalde dat de Grote Raad ... zou bestaan uit negen vertegenwoordigers "uut onsen Walsschen landen" met Bourgondië en Picardië inbegrepen, en zestien "uut onsen Duytsschen landen" waaronder Luxemburg, Limburg en Overmaas..." (Lode Wils, Van Clovis tot Di Rupo: de lange weg van de naties in de Lage Landen, p. 50-51). There is no evidence that this stipulation was caused by any form of specifically Dutch proto-nationalism; rather, this was intended to protect the defendant: "In de plaats kwam weer de Grote Raad, opnieuw rondreizend, wel tweetalig, dwz. dat de processen zouden worden gevoerd in de taal van de verweerder, niet in die van de eiser en dat men bij moeilijkheden het Frans zou nemen, waar Parlement en Grote Raad zich vroeger uitsluitend van deze taal bedienden." (WPGS 1, p. 296)
• All of this resulted in the appointment, not of a Dutchman, but of Jean de la Bouverie, who, judging by his name, was apparently a Francophone person who also spoke Dutch; moreover, he was a 'Netherlander': "Hij [het hoofd van de Grote Raad] moest bovendien naast het Latijn en het Frans ook het Diets machtig zijn, met het gevolg dat niet de Bourgondiër Jean Carondelet maar de Brabander Jean de la Bouverie hoofd werd." (p. 293)

From the above, it cannot be argued that "a sense of political unity had clearly emerged" among the Dutch provinces as a distinct group. Iblardi (talk) 00:25, 13 June 2010 (UTC)

Unless of course we all agree to add to the Dutch ethnic group the inhabitants of the Walloon provinces, as well as parts of Northern France (e.g. Artois) and Luxembourg ;-) Arnoutf (talk) 08:43, 13 June 2010 (UTC)

This does raise doubts. Then again; I have begun to have doubt on the importance of 'political unity' as a whole ...HP1740-B (talk) 09:38, 13 June 2010 (UTC)

Nations are often seen as the political manifestation of an ethnic group, so this kind of group solidarity can be telling, had it been there. Iblardi (talk) 23:26, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

The Dutch as a historical ethnic group before the 16th century

I would like to move on with the discussion and try to apply some theoretical framework to the material collected. A good place to start would be Anthony D. Smith's The ethnic origins of nations (1987) (often quoted). The author has given a number of "dimensions of ethnie" by which historical ethnic groups may be recognized:

• 1. A collective name. "This is the identifying mark of an ethnos in the historical record." p. 23: "Are there any unnamed ethnie (...)? I do not know of any." "In general, however, collective names are a sure sign and emblem of ethnic communities, by which they distinguish themselves and summarize their 'essence' to themselves". (p. 22)
• 2. A common myth of descent. "In many ways the sine qua non of ethnicity, ... myths of origin and descent provide the means of collective location in the world and the charter of the community which explains its origins, growth and destiny." (p. 24)
• 3. A shared history. "Ethnie are nothing if not historical communities build up on shared memories." (p. 25) "'History' in this sense must tell a story, it must please and satisfy as narrative, it must be all of a piece, like the Homeric epics and Ossian. It must also educate. The heroes and heroines whose deeds it unfolds must embody the virtues held precious by the community and conform to its stereotypes - the Indian holy man, the Turkish warrior, the Jewish sage." (p. 26)
• 4. A distinctive shared culture. "Over and above myths of descent and common memories, ethnie are differentiated by one or more elements of 'culture' which both help to bind members together and to separate them from outsiders." (p. 26) "The most common shared and distinctive traits are those of language and religion; but customs, institutions, laws, folklore, architecture, dress, food, music and the arts, even colour and physique, may augment the differences or take their place." "...language, long held to be the main, if not the sole, differentiating mark of ethnicity, is often irrelevant or divisive for the sense of ethnic community. The difference in speech between the Gaelic-speaking Highlands and the Lallans-speaking Lowlands did not impair the sense of Scottish identity, and English-speaking Welsh in South Wales may feel just as ethnically Welsh as their Welsh-speaking compatriots in northern Wales." (p. 27)
• 5. An association with a specific territory. "Ethnie always possess ties to a particular locus or territory, which they call their 'own'." (p. 28)
• 6. A sense of solidarity. "It is also a community with a definite sense of identity and solidarity which often finds institutional and philanthropic expression." (p. 29)

Of Smith's definition, I find lacking for the Netherlands in late medieval times: 1. a collective name (cf. Huizinga 2007 [1948-1953] ["'Netherlanders' was common neither among foreigners nor among the inhabitants themselves"], LexMa ["Der Begriff der N. ist in ma. hist. Quellen unbekannt."]); 2. a common myth of descent (simply not mentioned for the Netherlands at large; the Batavian Myth may qualify for 16th-17th ct. Holland [cf. De Vos 1995, "how ethnic identity is fabricated"]); 3. a shared history (cf. Gosses/Post 1959 ["It is not entirely reasonable in view of the political relationships of the 13th century" etc.], Kooij 1987 [for Groningen "incorporation into some sort of German confederacy was much more probable"]; in subjective sense later Flanders [Conscience, "Lion of Flanders", 19th ct.] may qualify, but none found for the 16th-ct. Netherlands); 4. a distinctive shared culture (cf. for the Netherlands in general LexMa ["not yet found a strong cultural identity"]; for Groningen, Drenthe, Overijssel and Gelderland in particular, cf. Huizinga 2007 [1948-1953] ["the (later) political alignment furthered the mutual ethnographic and cultural assimilation"], WPGN 1977 [Dutch-German linguistic border], Feenstra 2007 & 2008 [the east slowly penetrated by the culture of Holland, "mentally not yet a province"]); 5. a sense of solidarity (Blockmans 2006 [no collective "Netherlandic" identity in 1400]; also see the comments on the Great Privilege above). [The proper citations and bibliography are given at the RfC-section.]

My conclusion can be none other than that if we apply Smith's definition of a historical ethnic group, the existence of a Dutch ethnicity before the 16th century is not, in all reasonability, supported by the evidence of the sources collected above, and that Dutch ethnogenesis therefore must be placed at a later date. Note that all of this does not preclude the existence of regional cultures, or of a degree of linguistic conscience of Dutch/German vs. French speakers.

If anyone thinks that this conclusion is for some reason invalid, please let me know and explain why. Iblardi (talk) 21:48, 14 June 2010 (UTC)

Certainly for the period before 1400, I think your conclusion is correct. Instead of one group, you had basically three, one centered around Flanders, one around Holland, and one on Limburg (Loon, Liège), with Brabant as a kind of intermediate. Flanders was much more French oriented (political, but also linguistic, literary), while Limburg was much more German-oriented (with e.g. people like Henrik van Veldeken). A sense of being simultaneously related to each other and separate of others (France, Germany) seems only to have emerged with the Burgundian unification of the region, and has probably lasted only about 100 to 150 years, until the separation of the Dutch Republic. The "History of the Low Countries"[1] is a good source for this, with reminders that e.g. Flanders was a bilingual region for much of the time, and Limburg would be considered trilingual in todays time (Dutch, German and French, without an actual distinction between Dutch and German in reality though). Like it says on page 31: "All the major powers of the Low countries had fought together at Bouvines, but it would be a mistake to interpret this as growing regional unity; each ruler had chosen to fight for his own reasons, and drifted apart after Bouvines." And page 32: "If any regional unity or cohesiveness existed in the thirteenth-century Low Countries, it was because of a coincidence of divergent interests, riven together by geographical conditions, particularly the tangle of rivers and the proximity of the sea." Later on, page 82, we have "The Low Countries of the lmate fourteenth century hardly constituted a unified whole, and only the most prescient seer could have predicted the subsequent political events which welded the region together." And page 83: "Contemporary historians, however, discount the notion that there was any collective "Netherlandic" identity in 1400." By the mid-15th century however, (page 114): "The core regions of the Low Countries, however, had reached such a level of political integration that they desired to maintain their mutual ties". So by then a political unity of sorts was achieved. Page 119: "Only in the mid sixteenth century did people attempt to give a name to these so-called Seventeen Provinces: Nederland or Nederlanden in Dutch and Pais Bas in French, or Belgique(s) from the Latin." Fram (talk) 07:27, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

The article, by using the 'ethnic framework' already adresses this problem. Quite nicely I think, so in my opinion this information can be easily intergrated into the existing structure. HP1740-B (talk) 14:29, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

That is part of the problem. The way the model is used in the article does not seem to correspond with its intended use. Cf. Jasna Čapo Žmegač, Strangers either way: the lives of Croatian refugees in their new home, 123-124: "The migrants' constitution as a subnational community is the result of their social differentiation and boundary making vis-a-vis other social groups..." "Ethnic incorporation is most frequently initiated by intellectuals whereby ethnic communities become participants in economic competition in modern societies. Don Handelman analyzed ethnicity in terms of a four-fold continuum of organizational incorporation: it starts as an ethnic category, develops into an ethnic network, an ethnic association, and culminates as an ethnic community. The ethnic category merely labels members of a community - the name identifies them and establishes a boundary toward other social groups. (...) The activities of the migrant association will be analyzed precisely from the viewpoint of those different forms of ethnic incorporation."; Thomas H. Erikson, "Economies of ethnicity", in: James G. Carrier (ed.), A handbook of economic anthropology, 353-369, esp. 354: "It may be useful to distinguish between four degrees of ethnic incorporation. Following Handelman (1977), ethnic categories exist whenever people conventionally distinguish one another on the basis of imputed cultural or 'racial' characteristics. Ethnic networks exist whenever certain coveted resources flow between members of the ethnic category, but not outside its boundaries. Ethnic associations exist whenever the ethnic category is formally or informally organised and has a recognised leadership. Finally, ethnic communities are territorially based and thus offer their members a wide array of resources, ranging from jobs and housing to ontological security."; same author, Ethnicity and nationalism, 41-42: "The least incorporated kind of ethnic collectivity is the ethnic category, which provides its members little in terms of tangible valuables. (...) In Mauritius, the Creoles ay be said to be an ethnic category. They consider themselves, and are considered by others, as culturally distinctive." "In Mauritius, the Franco-Mauritians may be said to constitute an ethnic network. As they are a small numerical minority in a parliamentary democracy, they lack shared political organisation and do not function as a visible interest group, but there remains a strong sense of solidarity and cultural uniqueness. There are strong moral obligations for Franco-Mauritians to support each other on an individual basis." (My bolding.)

In other words, the fourfold division seems mostly (exclusively?) to be applied to modern multi-ethnic states, especially dealing with immigrant communities, and concerns itself primarily with the distribution of economical resources between members of a pre-existing ethnic group. Now how can this be reconciled with the content of the article? Notice that even the lowest level of incorporation, the "ethnic category", already assumes a common culture and a common name. It has been shown that this not the case for the "proto-Dutch" inhabitants of the Low Countries in the early Middle Ages. Yet the article describes them as an "ethnic category". It seems to me that, on second thought, Handelman's categorization is not useful for our purpose. Iblardi (talk) 16:24, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

This only proves the concept can also be applied to immigrants ... As to the last section; I've already told you that, that is a matter of interpretation.HP1740-B (talk) 17:12, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

It's not that easy. Let's analyse the passage concerned:

The first stage of Dutch ethnogenesis falls within the frame of an ethnic category. This essentially means that though certain characteristics of the Dutch ethnic group start to appear, the people displaying these traits did not have any, or a very limited, awareness of belonging to this specific group.[36][37]

The cited source (Anthony Smith) has: "Ethnic categories are populations distinguished by outsiders as possessing the attributes of a common name or emblem, a shared cultural element (usually language or religion), and a link with a particular territory." (Ethnic communities, according to the same source, actually possess an awareness of their being a unique group and additionally have a myth of common ancestry, shared historical traditions, and a sense of group solidarity.) Strictly following Smith's description, this means that there supposedly was a time, during the early Middle Ages (i.e., when the ethnic category supposedly existed), when the Dutch formed a population "distinguished by outsiders as possessing the attributes of a common name or emblem, a shared cultural element (usually language or religion), and a link with a particular territory" without actually displaying any sense of ethnic group solidarity. It is reasonable to ask, then, what this "common name or emblem" might be for the Dutch group. A common name is not reported, as is shown by the quotation from LexMa; "Netherlands" in its broader sense was lacking until approximately the middle of the 16th century (and even then it included the Walloons), whereas "Duytsch" of course does not just pertain to the Dutch, but also to the Germans. Also, no "common emblem" of any kind has hitherto been found in the sources for the early medieval Germanic-speaking inhabitants of the Low Countries. As a "shared cultural element", religion will not do, since Christianity was the universal religion of Western Europe, with no special status for the Low Countries. Language might be a factor, as we read that dialects spoken in the Low Countries started to develop a number of shared characteristics around the 8th century (Het Nederlands vroeger en nu). However, there is no evidence that the Dutch, as a group, were "distinguished by outsiders" as having a language of their own which made them recognizable as a distinct group (our 'category'). For the Dutch as a group, in this period, there is no (reported) shared name or emblem and there are no (reported) specific cultural traits: therefore, there can be no Dutch ethnic category. (A much stronger case could be made for the Frisians, by the way, but they are not the subject of this article.) Iblardi (talk) 23:11, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

We need to be very careful with jumping to conclusions. If only because there is very little evidence, not for 'my' position, but for any position in the Early Middle Ages about anything. Have we looked at ecological similarities? Architecture? Trade routes? Literature? Furthermore, we are as much outsiders as anyone living at the time. If archeologists can establish different cultures based on a few pottery fragments, why should it be impossible to do so with the Dutch/proto-Dutch/proto-proto-Dutch or whatever you want to call them. I think the social situation of the early Middle ages should be mentioned though, it helps give a picture of how people lived at the time and explains why people wouldn' t have identified based on a common/extremely similar language or religion.HP1740-B (talk) 08:59, 18 June 2010 (UTC)

Wrong. We don't have to look at anything you suggest, we have to report, to condense and summarize what the reliable sources have to say. What you are suggesting is original research, which is a violation of one of the basic policies of Wikipedia. Fram (talk) 09:20, 18 June 2010 (UTC)

I'm not suggesting anyhing of the kind ... that's just your prejudiced mind at work I suppose.HP1740-B (talk) 09:53, 18 June 2010 (UTC)

"Have we looked at ecological similarities? [Architecture?] Trade routes? [Literature?]" People have, and instead of unity, the conlusions seem to point to greater-than-average ethnic, cultural and ecological diversity for such a relatively small region: Van Bavel, Manors and Markets: Economy and Society in the Low Countries 500-1600 (2010), p. 31: "All in all, the Low Countries contained many different peoples, tribes, and cultures within a small area." "This diversity was perhaps greater than elsewhere in Europe." "Unfortunately, hardly any research has been done on the effects of the cultural, political, and ethnic diversity on later developments. It would be very interesting to know more about what remained of it after inclusion in the Frankish empire. Did these elements merge or retain much of their diversity?"; p. 407: "The enormous density of various geographical-pedological landscapes in the Low Countries, the result of the special genesis of this area, led to a high density of different economic regions. Associated with this, and even increased by the ethnic diversity, each of these regions acquired its specific socio-institutional characteristics with the occupation in the early or high Middle Ages." - Edit: bracketed "Architecture?" and "Literature?" in HP1740-B's quotation to make clear the exact relevancy of the material. Iblardi (talk) 10:05, 18 June 2010 (UTC)

Now that's an interesting book, I don't see much about architecture and literature straight away, though you make it seem it does, but I'm going to read into it straight away. Looks like an ideal source for this period of history.HP1740-B (talk) 10:25, 18 June 2010 (UTC)

OK. Iblardi (talk) 10:35, 18 June 2010 (UTC)

HP1740-B, please stop with the snide remarks. Whather I am prejudiced or not is not really relevant: a source is provided, and to contradict it, you ask "have we looked at ..."? If wewould be looking at architecture, ecology, ..., we would be presenting original research. Even if we would be looking at sources about the architecture in the Netherlands and Flanders, and then making conclusions from that about the ethnicity of the people, we would be creating a synthesis, which again is not allowed (WP:SYNTH). Fram (talk) 10:20, 18 June 2010 (UTC)

Fram, please stop at putting words in my mouth. When I say 'we' ought to look at architecture/economy/etc. I mean (of course) we should look at sources that elaborate on these subjects. Stop thinking about me, and go and look for the sources needed to back up your statements instead.HP1740-B (talk) 10:25, 18 June 2010 (UTC)

I didn't put any words in your mouth, your wording was (again) very unclear. As for your other statement: if you would be so kind as to state what statements of me need sources to be eventually included in this article, I'll try to provide them. If you are still asking for sources about e.g. the fact that Bruges in the 14th century was not a Dutch city (Dutch-speaking, yes, but not a Dutch city) according to any source, then you can wait a lot longer, as you are the one who has to provide sources to back up your inclusion of picturesand claims in the article. I don't have to prove a negative, you have to prove the positive. Fram (talk) 11:22, 18 June 2010 (UTC)

Let's bring in another citation. WPGN 1, chapter "De Middeleeuwen", p. 244, on culture (my bolding): "Daarom was het centrum bij uitstek de Rijn-Maasvallei, waar een opmerkelijke cultuur ontstond in de post-Karolingische tijd die tot in de vroege 13de eeuw bleef bloeien. Nijvel en Keulen, Nijmegen en Verdun waren de steden die dit gebied omzoomden (...) Vooral Luik was hier het centrum, helemaal nog gericht op en geïnspireerd door het Duitse Rijk." "Later en verschillend van inspiratie kwam Vlaanderen tot bloei, geschraagd door de vroege macht van het graafschap en door stimulerende invloed vanuit Frankrijk." "Tot de twee genoemde zones, Rijn-Maas en Vlaanderen, bleef zonder veel overdrijving de cultuur der Nederlanden beperkt tot in de 13de eeuw."; p. 246: "De twee zones die we hebben onderscheiden vormden natuurlijk maar delen van de grotere culturele en politieke complexen: het Maasland van Duitsland, Vlaanderen van Frankrijk."; p. 249, on literature: "De vraag of Hendrik van Veldeke nu behoort tot de Nederlandse of de Duitse literatuur is onzes inziens irrelevant, aangezien de tijdgenoot zelf nog geen onderscheid schijnt te hebben gemaakt tussen datgene wat we met moderne begrippen Oostnederlandse en Westduitse dialecten zouden noemen." Iblardi (talk) 12:17, 18 June 2010 (UTC)

Let me recapitulate though. The problem is not so much with the contention that the late medieval Low Countries, or at least significant regions within it, were developing a number of characteristics that by and large distinguished them from surrounding countries. The high degree of urbanization, for instance, is there, and all of the social, economical and cultural developments associated with it. The crux lies in the question whether these characteristics should be described as those of a single ethno-linguistic group rather than as those of a region which was inhabited by speakers of Dutch (or Flemish, Hollandic, Brabantine, Low German) and French. Iblardi (talk) 16:21, 20 June 2010 (UTC)

Proposed solution

The confusion lies in the fact that English only has one word ("Dutch") for what has in Dutch basically two words: "Nederlanders" (the dominant ethnic group of the Netherlands) and "Dietsers" (a loose group including the Dutch-speaking peoples from Flanders, Holland, Brabant, Limburg and Gelderland - until WO II this term was indeed actively used without it having the current negative connotation). Before the existence of the Netherlands, Nederlanders did not exist, but Dietsers did. The solution to your problem is easy: Make an article called "Diets people" (using the old neutral meaning of Diets) which treats all Dutch-speaking peoples in the Low Countries until their gradual separation into two seperate ethnic groups. Let the article "Dutch people" start with the de facto creation of the Dutch state in 1581, which gradually led to the formation of the Dutch identity. Without the creation of this state, there wouldn't have been "Nederlanders". Both articles will of course overlap each other during a few centuries. A similar situation exists by the way for the "Flemish": there's only one term, but it can mean two different but related things: the people from the County of Flanders (contemporary West-Vlaanderen, Oost-Vlaanderen, Zeeuws-Vlaanderen and Frans-Vlaanderen) and the inhabitants of the Flemish region (W-Vla, O-Vla AND Vlaams-Brabant, Antwerpen and Limburg; BUT NOT Fra-Vla and Zeeuws-Vla). ScalaDiSeta (talk) 12:01, 20 June 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for your suggestion, but I think that this doesn't really solve the problem. For instance, one question that has to be answered is what united speakers of 'Dietsch' with those who spoke 'Duutsch' (today's eastern Dutch) and didn't unite them with many others who spoke 'Duutsch' (today's Low German) or those who spoke 'Deutsch'. Also, I did not find any instances of the use of "Diets people" in the English language so far, or "Dietsers" - the latter name seems to be quite heavily politicized too, judging by the instances that come up in Dutch on Google ("trouwe, ware Dietsers", "onze eigenheid als Vlamingen en Dietsers", "radicale Dietsers", "alle Vlamingen opleiden tot volwaardige Dietsers" etc.) I would be happy if you could point me to some though. Iblardi (talk) 16:26, 20 June 2010 (UTC)

Related ethno-linguistic groups

Should not Germans be included in this section as wel. For example the Low Saxon dialect spoken in the north east don’t stop at the border. Neither do the other border dialects. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.87.73.104 (talk) 14:48, 25 July 2010 (UTC)

So, the Dutch are "related to English" people, yet not the rest of the British. I don't see how that works, but okay. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 124.185.162.213 (talk) 07:25, 24 November 2010 (UTC)

It's quite simple, really. Of the four home countries of the United Kingdom, England is the closest to the Netherlands, so it makes sense that genes would be transmitted back and fourth between the Netherlands and England to a greater and more direct extent than between Netherlands and Wales, Scotland, or Northern Ireland (or even the Republic of Ireland, for that matter). Some historical proof of this is the large influx of continental Germanic tribes into England during the Dark Ages, including the Saxons and the Frisians who also settled in the Netherlands. Linguistically, of all continental languages, English is most closely related to Frisian, a minority language of the Netherlands, and it is closely related to general Dutch as well. It's true that the English people maintain a lot of ancestry from population that lived there before the Germanic invasions, as well, but even further back, there is historical documentation that the Belgae, a Celtic people who inhabited the Low Countries (hence Belgium), moved across the English Channel and settled as far west as Winchester (which is incidentally the earliest capital of a unified kingdom of England). All in all, the ethnic composition of the English and the Dutch both have a heavy mix of Germanic and Celtic elements, in addition to the genes of the earliest post-Ice Age settlers of Europe whose languages and identities have been lost in prehistory. --98.114.176.218 (talk) 03:26, 24 November 2011 (UTC)

Well, I'm Dutch, so il try to explain. The most people in the Netherlands use engels, in case of Brits. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 213.10.75.131 (talk) 10:50, 16 August 2011 (UTC)

Red Haired Barbarians?

Typing "red haired barbarians" into search redirects you to "Dutch People".... 11:15, 18 September 2010 (UTC)

No longer so Arnoutf (talk) 11:41, 18 September 2010 (UTC)

It still happens. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.212.41.73 (talk) 10:54, 25 November 2010 (UTC)

Shouldn't it be Scottish people? Mannafredo (talk) 10:56, 25 November 2010 (UTC)

I resent that. Boney-ersed ginger frae Paisley (talk) 10:59, 25 November 2010 (UTC)

The Picture

the picture there is damn ugly, it makes my eyes sore. —Preceding unsigned comment added by =92.46.177.236 (talk) 09:49, 27 August 2010 (UTC)

I agree. It looks like a false-colour copy of copy of a copy of a scan of a cheap jigsaw lid. Mannafredo (talk) 11:11, 25 November 2010 (UTC)

Ok the picture is not perfect, any better ideas. A collage may be possible but earlier discussion demanded it should be very noticable Dutch people, should not have a bias towards any era or popular field, and should exclude non Dutch or people before the Netherlands were formed. This has resulted in an endless debate and the rather neutral picture was the only compromise. Please read through the archives before setting up an adhoc collage. (I can tell already that the currently proposed collage is horribly biased: Out of 24 images: 2 before the Dutch were recognised (AdrianIV and Erasmus), 3 football player, +2 other sports people bringing the contemporar sportspeople to over 20% of all. Additionally 2 movie stars, a director, a producer, a reporter, 2 musicians and a model bringing the bottom 2 rows (a full third of all) to contemporary pop culture. And with that only 1 scientist or 2 if you count Ockels) 1 politician, 1 inventor/industrialist (and a minor 1 at that). Not a single writer.) Arnoutf (talk) 09:26, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

PS I do not object to a collage in itself. However it should be (a) non biased (or at least as little as possible) in choice of pictures (b) the collage is logically ordered on topic (e.g. order on data of birth, or ordered on type of impact) (c) have only images of sufficient qiality to clearly recognise the depicted person (without need for caption for those familiar with the topic) (d) have all images of the same size and shape. The recent suggestion fails (in a big time) on all these 4 counts and is therefore in my view not an improvement, not even over the admittedly low quality streetview. Arnoutf (talk) 12:40, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

We typically use collage images on all of the "X people" articles. I looked into this because of the silliness with the socking/image replacement of a clearly inferior picture–that's unrelated to this question of course–but looking at the history, I wonder why any "street view" image should be used over a collage.

The last time this debate was mentioned before this was in March of 2010. In that discussion Arnoutf refers back to prior "heated" discussions. The last time I found one of those was April 2008, and there it seemed to be one editor loudly opposing a collage, but not a lot of consensus to remove it. However for whatever reason, it looks like that status quo has continued without much resolution. Given the time since there's been a real discussion of the issue, and the particularized complaints raised back then, it's not enough to just refer to those past debates now, 3 years later, when there's only sporadic concern.

I don't know enough about the nuance of your neutrality argument or about who to include. My general impression is this is a dime holding up a dollar: arguing over minutiae. The other people articles don't have this issue (at least most don't) and many arguably come from more contentious histories. Why is it such an issue here?

A "street view" image doesn't make a lot of sense given the subject matter is the people. It's of course telling that overwhelmingly other "peoples" articles are collages.

There are a few collage options that have been made in the past. Here are just the ones I've found on my preliminary look through the history:

• this one which is good, but I guess you have some complaints.
• this one seems to have popped up recently, and the source of some edit warring
• [2]
• [3]

Those are just the ones I've found. I'm new to this talk page, and I realize that Arnoutf has been claiming there was consensus to exclude a collage for a long time. I simply don't see that. I think there's an impasse here that it's time be broken. Shadowjams (talk) 17:52, 24 December 2011 (UTC)

Can we please try to engage in a fair discussion without statment like "clearly inferior" and " one which is good"

Of the four proposed collages I prefer the last, the 2nd and 3rd are ok, but have only few people on.

The first one (labelled as good) is awful in my opinion, for two reasons. Bias and graphical issues.

The bias is as I explained above incredibly to 2nd half 20-21 st century (14 out 24). Sport (5/24), popular culture (8/24 excluding sports - including sport is would be 13/24). This gives no representative image of the Dutch.

The grpahical issues are even worse. The collage is not at all nicely outlined, some rows are much wider than others, some picture are incredibly narrow, worst of all several people are hardly recognisable from their image: The face of van Basten is too small to allow easy recognition; the image of Krajicek similarly show a small picture of his face, and on top of that several other people.

As said before, I would be happy with a collage, but not with one that is compiled as haphazardly, biased and plain ugly is this one. Arnoutf (talk) 18:08, 24 December 2011 (UTC)

Re "clearly inferior" you need to reread what I wrote in the first sentence (I'm talking about my edit here and the previous semi-protection due to claims of socking on the page; none of this is directed or has to do with you or the current picture we're talking about). I'm fine with any of the collages. I don't have much opinion about which one's the most representative. I think the term "bias" carries a bit more weight than intended; perhaps, unrepresentative. And you're right, the graphical issues are bad with the one, but that could be fixed. Shadowjams (talk) 18:49, 24 December 2011 (UTC)

[4] contains a large collage originally made by me (with my old account) but which was deleted because the copyright for it wasn't ok. Now a different person uploaded it. And other images were added. Anyway I made the original collage deliberately with just ethnically dutch people (including for example Dutch Americans). Dutch people who had a different ancestry were avoided. But as always this caused a controversy. If we're going for a collage again let's come to a consensus first about what persons to include. Dutch people, or ethnically Dutch people? I feel that every ethnic group should deserve it's own page on wiki and that's why I limited it to just ethnicy. But others immediately argued that people of different descent should not be excluded. I however feel that just describing people with a different ancestry as Dutch is sometimes close to assimilation. Like for example Dutch Jews. Should we add Spinoza to the collage or exclude him because he was Dutch-Jewish? Someone could argue that Spinoza should be added, because otherwise this would be racist. On the other hand describing him or other Dutch-Jews as just 'Dutch' could be seen of oppression, why deny people a Jewish identity or background? The same discussion can be held over the Princes of Orange who were Dutch, but of (royal) German descent. If everyone voices his opinion I could go with the consensus and try to create a good looking collage. Machinarium (talk) 00:20, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

I don't have strong opinions but I don't think it should include Dutch-Americans... I think it would have a nice cross section of living notable Dutch people and some historical figures. I saw in the archives this Spinoza thing kept being brought up... I don't see why Dutch-Jewish wouldn't apply just as much, but if it's so controversial, shouldn't be hard to find a replacement. Just take cues from other articles (that have been doing this for years). Shouldn't be too controversial. Shadowjams (talk) 08:31, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

Current picture is typical Hollandic, not Dutch. It is also very stereotypical! Please change it for a good collage or something like all other people's pages. — Preceding unsigned comment added by J187B (talk • contribs) 21:09, 20 January 2012 (UTC)

Flemings

I've tried to 'clear up' the description of the relation between Flemings and Dutchmen in this article. I think it's great fun ... but also incredibly complicated and could sure use some help.

For example; both Dutch and Flemings don't see each other as a different people, but they don't see themselves as identical either. If you try, academically, to make a case for them being separate ... you'll find its impossible given the language, religion and culture yet that all seems irrelevant as despite all that ... there is generally no shared identity and yet, in some way, there is. A Fleming/Dutchman in the Netherlands/Flanders isn't a "foreigner" in the same way that a German or Frenchman would be.

It's a paradox which seems nigh impossible to explain. It's the concept of 'Flemings' that's the 'problem', which is a national rather than ethnic construct as opposed to 'Dutch' which can be both... which kind of makes you feel you're comparing apples and pears. There has to be a way to explain how the idea of a 'Flemish identity' fits a Dutch ethnic category ... Any thoughts? G.Burggraaf (talk) 02:30, 26 December 2010 (UTC)

That wasn't all you did though, you also eliminated the list that was referenced on diaspora and the whole section on South America. You also eliminated the section on Frisians completely. I see the Fleming people as the same ethnically as the Dutch, but I admit they are more like a subculture in their relationship to each other. Outback the koala (talk) 04:48, 26 December 2010 (UTC)

I also may have reverted some of your edits that I agree with, sorry about that. Outback the koala (talk) 04:49, 26 December 2010 (UTC)

First of all thanks for your reaction. As you don't disagree with me on the 'Flemish'-issue. I'll let that rest, though I'd still like others to help me on the wording/thought process because as I said ... I find it very hard to write down the actual relations in simple concrete language.

About the things I deleted. In the list at the top of the article a lot of references were to other Wikipedia-articles and something called the 'Joshua-project', which seems to be some kind of missionary group trying to spread bibles in native languages in mostly 3rd world countries. I don't think either of those makes a reliable source and so I removed them.

About South America. The entire article (which, I must say, is very good when compared to most articles on ethnic groups of this category) when concerning the 'diaspora' talks about large groups of anonymous Dutch people, which to this day can be distinguished. Perhaps not as 100% Dutch, but still, distinguishable in more than just their surname.

The South American text however talks about a pirate, 'a few dozen Dutch families', a man called 'Hageman Egbert' who arrived with his wife and children and then goes on about how the Dutch nominally controlled a piece of Brazil for about 30 years. When I looked up some of the references, I found myself on the 'Dutch Chilean'-article where I, fair enough, saw a number of Dutch surnames, but also a sentence saying that the highest concentration of Dutch Chileans is found in 'Puerto Varas', which I found out in its article, is known for its 'German traditions' and 'kuchen'.

I guess what I'm trying to say is, that I don't believe the information and even if I did, the numbers are really too small to be mentioned in an article like this. Perhaps a sort of list-article should be created in which all the Dutch-X's are listed?

About the Frisians. I think I was too quick there, and a portion of the information there should be stored elsewhere in this article (I'll do that right away) but a section about 'related groups' is really not in place here. Again, thanks for your reply! G.Burggraaf (talk) 13:23, 26 December 2010 (UTC)

Hey Burggraaf, sorry for not replying sooner. Ok, I agree with you, the stuff relating to the Joshua-project should probably go since its fairly unrelated anyway. As for the South America references I guess those are also quite minor, but I don't think we should delete it outright. I understand that its a little suspicious sounding, but I believe it; why don't we just shorten it down a lot then(I'll do that right now). A list article is a good idea, but I don't think there enough info to justify a whole other page right now. Thanks for coming back and discussing! Outback the koala (talk) 21:55, 30 December 2010 (UTC)

I looked over your edits and see you've already done that. I am concerned about loosing that data about the diaspora from the infobox. Joshua project or not those are significant numbers and for say Chile, which has it's own page, we should really include that, it not a top # of dutch countries list there... Outback the koala (talk) 22:00, 30 December 2010 (UTC)

If the source is unreliable, the numbers are too.G.Burggraaf (talk) 18:12, 8 January 2011 (UTC)

G.Burggraaf, you cite Pan and Pfeil to support the claim that "within the field of ethnography it is generally agreed that the Dutch-speaking populations of the Netherlands and Belgium form a single (though internally diverse) group, with a shared language, religion, generally similar or identical customs and with no clearly separate ancestral origin or origin myth." You cite this to page 20 of their book, but that page is just a list of different linguistic groups in Europe, and doesn't make any claims about what is "generally agreed" upon 'within the field of ethnography", nor does it support the rest of your statement apart from the linguistic part (which isn't disputed). Could you provde some page numbers and quotes that lead you to use this source as support for this statement? Fram (talk) 13:31, 12 January 2011 (UTC)

Hello Fram, why did you add a source on the "United Netherlands" (which I would think concerns the cultural and linguistic differences between the French and Dutch rather than the 'Dutch' & 'Flemings' - which did not exist then), aside from religion? Also why did you change the picture? Greetings, G.Burggraaf (talk) 12:12, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

South Africa

We need to try and figure out how many people in SA have Dutch ancestry. Let's see what we have to work with: 4.6 million whites, and 4.4 million coloureds. Well we know that Anglo-Africans are out of the white equation, that gives 2.64 mil + 4.4 million coloureds. The majority of Coloureds have Dutch ancestry and due to intermarriage rates this is likely to be quite high. As for the white percentage, a third in 1904 were of mostly Dutch ancestry, however of course intermarriage rates are not at all barriers and so this number should have decreased and partial Dutch ancestry should have increased across all whites. Any comments? Bezuidenhout (talk) 06:47, 23 May 2011 (UTC)

This is WP:OR, we need a reliable source indicating a figure, or we should leave it out. ²Fram (talk) 09:18, 23 May 2011 (UTC)

Well you can get all that data just from Demographics of South Africa, and the respective links there? Further information at articles such as White South Africans, Afrikaners, Coloureds, Basters (namibia), White Africans of European Ancestry etc. :) Bezuidenhout (talk) 20:33, 23 May 2011 (UTC)

And where is the number of people with Dutch ancestry reported? And this of course ignores the basic discussion of whether someone who has one Dutch predecessor somewhere in his family tree should be counted as a Dutch person. Where does this stop? We are all Kenyans or Tanzanians by this reasoning, and why adding this to everyone's background may stop a lot of racism and get people to think about any supposed purity of race, it isn't really what is normally expected when people are labelled as belonging to a group. Anyway, we need a reliable source for any figures, not a link to anpther Wikipedia article with some vague indications. Fram (talk) 07:16, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

This whole we-are-all-Kenya thing is different, that was very far back, with this South Africa thing, that's only really 300 years, mostly less than that. There are still Americans that classify themselves as English-ancestry even though their ancestors came in the 17th century! Most South Africans will know if they have SOME Dutch heritage simply by their surnames? Most coloureds also have Dutch surnames. I am not saying have a reference to a wikipedia article, just have a check through some of those articles and THERE you will find the respective references and links to good and reliable websites! One study said "Professor Heese suggested a genetic mix for the average Afrikaner to be: 35.5% Dutch, 34.4% German, 13.9% French, 7.2% African/Asian/Khoi, 2.6% British, 2.6% Other European, and 3.5% undetermined[5]. Here's another study that says the Dutch have contributed 30% to the Afrikaner's heritage. Once again if we take 30%[6] of the Afrikaners thats around 1 million people. However, intermarriage rates are so common, most people have somewhere along the line a Dutch relative. I have Dutch, French, German, Austrian and Portuguese, and I'm only one person! But I think for now there is a Guarenteed 1 million in SA, but I am sure if I nosey around Google some more I can find more hits. Likewise, this means that out of the 64,000 Afrikaners in Namibia, if 30% of them "are of Dutch ancestry", then that means 21,000 "dutch ancestries" in Namibia. Once again I will try and find sources for this. :) Bezuidenhout (talk) 08:01, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

If Afrikaners have on average 30% dutch ancestry that means almost all of them have some dutch ancestry, not 30% of them. An exact number is of course impossible, because you'd have to explore every single persons family tree. Machinarium (talk) 14:44, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

I know that, I have made that point many times above, and finally someone recognises it. But what I am saying is that at least we have a "minimum" ancestry of around 1 million, of which we can build up apon. The same goes for Americans, many of which no longer delcare Dutch ancestry and prefer "American-ancestry", but we can still get a figure for Dutch ancestries there. Bezuidenhout (talk) 16:03, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

We should not build anything as that is original research WP:OR. We should sources that clearly and straigthforwardly identify these people as Dutch, or at least Dutch ancestry. Arnoutf (talk) 18:53, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

Where are the figures for the other countries' Dutch ancestry figures? Bezuidenhout (talk) 19:46, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

By the way the american figure is probably taken from "average" ancestry anyway. An american of German heritage isn't repelled by an American of Scottish ancestry just from where their ancestors came from. I'm sure there is PLENTY of intermarriage between Americans to the extent of similarly the majority of Americans have some German. I gave you two sources which both state similar figures, I want to start elaborating on that and still don't understand why it's so difficult to digest that there are possibly over 6 million South Africans of Dutch ancestry. this isn't a source, but a general discussion I have found IF anyone actually would like to help me find a proper figure. I'm sorry I'm getting really edgy but this is getting frustrating because it's so obvious in modern-day SA society, yet I could go trolling and find plenty of "no citations" and just remove them, instead of just putting a "citation needed" template. Sorry for the rant, Thanks Bezuidenhout (talk) 19:55, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

I dont mind at all about anything but reliable sourcing. There are 2 issues involved here that require such reliable sourcing (a) How distant Dutch ancestry is still enough to be listed as Dutch (b) What are the numbers for those with Dutch ancestry.

Indeed this should go for all countries, not only SA, but also US etc. I agree that me too could remove all the badly sourced stuff (which I did not do but according to WP:OR would absolutely support) Arnoutf (talk) 20:18, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

Well the first answer should be quite easy and the extend should be if they have a blood relative, who was a self-proclaimed Dutchman/Dutchwoman when they immigrated to South Africa (regardless of their departure point). Since europeans have only lived in South Africa since the late 17th century it is actually reasonably quite nearby for when we county Dutch ancestries. As for the second answer, I think thats the horrible one :/, thanks for your time Arnoutf :) Bezuidenhout (talk) 20:28, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

I have to agree with Arnoutf that it's not proper to call them Dutch (or German). They are Afrikaners, with Dutch ancestry. That's something different than Dutch. I think its safe to save to list and explain how they are Afrikaners with a lot of Dutch ancestry. And perhaps we can find some sources about the ancestry of coloured people. (My guess is that they simply mixed with Afrikaners, so their Dutch ancestry is less). Machinarium (talk) 23:17, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

Indeed, having one or two Dutch ancestors from e.g. around 1800 is not sufficient to declare that someone belongs to the Dutch people. We need reliable sources stating that they are still part of the Dutch people somehow, not just that they have 1/32nd Dutch ancestry. Fram (talk) 06:43, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

In the infoboks there is the blue and green writing, I am talking about the green writing "ancestries", not people who delcare themselves dutch, but declare themselves having Dutch ancestry. I can bet you that white south africans who are sure they have Dutch ancestry will declare and be proud of it, albeit when asked their current ethnic group they will state "Afrikaans" (not Afrikaner). Once again we can say the same for Canadian or American Dutch who have been there for over 300 years as well, but many still "claim" Dutch anestry by personal opinion, rather than true family history. Coloured people could possibly be as Dutch as Afrikaners because Coloureds dont have so much German or French influence, so although they were only half as much European ancestry, that European was a greater Dutch percentage. Once again many of you probably need a soruce for this though. In responce to Fram, I am not calling them "Dutch", no way! I am just saying that they have had Dutch ancestries (the green writing), I agree that 1/32 is NOT Dutch ancestry in my opinion unless you believe in the one-drop rule, but like I said intermarriage rates are virtually almost always the case so the ancestries are so spread that small fractions like 1/32 is uncommon. Bezuidenhout (talk) 07:24, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

The green text is "Total population including ancestral diaspora": people who have some minor, very remote Dutch ancestry are not part of the total population of Dutch people by any reasonable standards, not matter how proud they may be to have Dutch ancestry. Among the White Afrikaners, there may be more of a feeling of being Dutch, and their ancestry will probably be more fuly Dutch as well. The situation for the Coloureds is quite different though (generally speaking, there are of course numerous exceptions in both groups). Fram (talk) 07:44, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

Yes, but people in America that "claim" Dutch ancestry may only be 0.5% Dutch just because they remembered one Dutch relative from the 17th century? But down to their personal opinion they declare themselves "American of Dutch Ancestry". Once again I will repeat that Afrikaners have mostly Dutch ancestry. Bezuidenhout (talk) 08:07, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

I've removed the figures for Americans and Canadians from the infobox, as they were unsourced as well. I personally don't agree that ancestry-figures should be included, I think we could have two figures, people who are Dutch-born (i.e. first generation migrants) and people who still self-identify as Dutch, or are identified by their national government or some reliable source as Dutch (not simply as having some Dutch ancestry, but as being ethnically Dutch). This may mean that different criteria are used for different countries, but we don't have a sngle clear criterion for ethnicity anyway. But the bottomline is that any figure that gets included has to be directly sourced to a reliable source, without any further research or interpretation by us. Fram (talk) 08:27, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

Ok that seems fair, but I want to hear what others have to say first :) Bezuidenhout (talk) 08:29, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

I'm against removing the 'reported ancestry'. It was very informative, and quite clearly only states ancestry and not necessarily identity. When I go to an article like Irish People they also list Irish descendants in the USA, same goes for Scottish people. They don't differentiate between ancestry and ethnicy/identity though, it looked better here. I believe the sources are somewhere down in this article. Machinarium (talk) 11:51, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

The US figures are here[7] and here for Canada[8]. Machinarium (talk) 12:10, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

One reason to have everything sourced: we had some 8 million Americans with Dutch ancestry, even though the US census only has 5 million people with Dutch ancestry, or a difference of 3 million people[9]! Fram (talk) 12:13, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

Indeed, no idea where the 8 million figure comes from. Machinarium (talk) 12:21, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

Ok, so I'm confused now, I gave you a figure of 35% of Afrikaners are of average Dutch ancestry, but you said that this is too little. Then you say that if one has only distant relatives then it's too much. So I am going to add 35% of Afrikaners (35% of 2.7m) to the infobox. Bezuidenhout (talk) 12:28, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

...with a good source, I presume? Otherwise it will just get removed again... Fram (talk) 12:33, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

That's just a made up minimum figure tho. I think the best thing to do is list the total of Afrikaners (like 3600000) and say that the ancestry is "up to 3600000"), which is what the sources say. Machinarium (talk) 12:34, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

OK, good thinking but what about the Coloureds? I will look for a link asap. Bezuidenhout (talk) 12:41, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

I'd say ignore them until figures are available. Machinarium (talk) 12:42, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

I found another more recent source in Kenan Malik's Strange Fruit: Why both sides are wrong in the race debate (2008):

"The Afrikaner population of South Africa, which is today about 2.5 million strong, is mainly descended from one boatload of Dutch immigrants who landed in 1652. Although there was later immigration, the influence of the early colonists is shown by the fact that almost one million living Afrikaners bear the names of just twenty original settlers. That ship of 1652 contained one man who carried the gene for Huntingdon’s disease. As a result, Huntingdon’s is far more common among Afrikaners than within the Dutch population.

The combination of founder effect and genetic drift may have helped create genetic differences between the major races. All the people in the world today are descended from small bands of Africans who moved out of that continent some 60,000 years ago. These first groups of migrants were very small; perhaps just a few hundred people. Each group would have had a genetic profile slightly different to that of the African population from which they originated, just as the original Afrikaner migrants had a slightly different genetic profile to that of the Dutch population as a whole. Some genes would have been more common than in the mother population, others less so. Along the way, as they journeyed out of Africa, these small bands of original explorers would have picked up new mutations and, thanks to genetic drift, the genetic profiles of the new and the old populations would have continued to move apart." Machinarium (talk) 13:02, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

Collage

Why isn't there a collage with famous Dutch people like other articles have? Mythic Writerlord (talk) 15:27, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

Read up about 3 sections. It's hopefully in the works. Shadowjams (talk) 08:28, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

It took me some time but I finished creating a collage. I've added some of the most presitgious Dutch people through history. Not by ethnicy but by citizenship. I've ordered them by year of death, except for one whose still alive. I guess many would like to add their favourite contemporary pop star, model, politician and sportsman, so I prefered selecting historical people. And I chose cruyff as the only person living because I guess we can all agree he's the most famous sportsman. I've selected (and colorrfixed)what I believe are the best portraits/photos. I'm not satisfied with the photos of Jacobs and Wilhelmina, but don't have alternatives (yet). Tell me what you think. Machinarium (talk) 13:10, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

1st row: Erasmus • William of Orange • Johan van Oldenbarnevelt • Maurice of Nassau • Piet Heyn
2nd row: Hugo Grotius • Frederick Henry of Orange • Jan Leeghwater • Rembrandt • Michiel de Ruyter
3rd row: Johan de Witt • Baruch Spinoza • Christiaan Huygens • William III of Orange • Antonie van Leeuwenhoek
4th row: Belle van Zuylen • Thorbecke • Multatuli • Vincent van Gogh • Johannes van der Waals
5th row • Hendrik Lorentz • Aletta Jacobs • Wilhelmina • Willem Drees • Johan Cruyff

I think it's a good collage, but maybe some more living people should be included. As for Jacobs and Spinoza, as important as they may have been in Dutch history, they are not any more ethnically Dutch then Ali B. Mythic Writerlord (talk) 13:32, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

That's why I said I didn't define them Dutch by ethnicy ;). I'm personally against more living people. Usually they don't have good photos available, and everyone has his own contemporary idol, so it would be hard to agree on someone. The collage for Italians has only one living person as well (I think). We would also have to throw persons out because otherwise the collage would get too big. Machinarium (talk) 13:38, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

I think it looks great. Maybe a few more days for anybody that has any tweaks or objections, then you could implement it? If there are objections changing 5x5 to 4x4 might fit better, but not a big deal either way. Shadowjams (talk) 01:58, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

Thank you. The collage of Germans also has 5x5, I think provides more opportunity. Machinarium (talk) 11:50, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

I like it, although we may want to reduce a bit on some of the 80 yrs war people, to allow for some more recent people. We now have William of Orange, Maurice and Frederick Henry; the first three stadholders in charge of the armies of the republic. That may be overdoing it. We also have Michiel de Ruyter and Piet Heyn, which may overdo the navy heroes a bit.

Removing Fred. Henry and Piet Heijn would leave some space to fill out the gap between Drees and Cruijff. I think in particular 20th century Dutch culture is a bit underrepresented. We could consider Annie M.G. Schmidt, Hella Haasse, Harry Mulisch, Gerard Reve or Willem Frederik Hermans as I guess there is more or less general agreement these are the big 5 authors of post WWII Dutch literature. Visual arts may include Piet Mondriaan, Gerrit Rietveld, Willem de Kooning (although often considered American). Arnoutf (talk) 10:23, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

Thank you for your input Arnoutf. It's hard to not overrepresent people from the 80 years war / golden century, that's when the Dutch republic was a world superpower, and had huge amount of prestigious people with international importance and fame. Maurice and Frederik Hendrik were the most important military leaders during the 80 years war (I guess?), and William the Silent is hard to remove for obvious reasons (father of the nation). That's why I included all three. I also don't think two navy captains is too many, due to the importance of the Dutch navy throughout history (just like two painters isn't too many). I would agree that people from the second half of the 20th century are underrepresented, not the early 20th century though. But that's not the only period that's underrepresented, let's have a look:

16th century (1st half): 1 / 16th century (2nd half): 1
17th century (1st half): 6 / 17th century (2nd half): 5
18th century (1st half): 2 / 18th century (2nd half): 0
19th century (1st half): 1 / 19th century (2nd half): 3
20th century (1st half): 3 / 20th century (2nd half): 2

This is the people listed by their year of death rather than birth, which I think better reflects their active years. As you can see the period of 1750-1850 is more underrepresented than 1950-2000. I personally prefer picking people by prestige rather then in which century they lived or died, or what position they held. As for the people you proposed. Some would be hard to add because they don't have a good photo available (or none at all). Anyway the writers may have been famous in the Netherlands, but not internationally. And it's a matter of taste as well. I was never a fan of Harry Mullisch, others are. Just like I never liked Piet Mondriaan's work, but others do. That's the difficulty in selecting someone whose work is quite recent.
Two alternative options we could consider are: throwing Cruyff out and replace him with a historic figure. Then we won't have the problem of selecting a living person. Or changing the collage into a 5x6 collage so there's five more empty spots (and setting it at 350px perhaps), but that would make the collage bigger than any other. Machinarium (talk) 11:50, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

True the writers are more of a national thing, that has to do with the language barrier I guess. Personally I would rather add Haasse or Hermans than Mulisch or Reve myself (indeed taste). Haasse has the added benefit of writing from a Dutch-Indies youth. An alternative once mentioned before has been Anne Frank, who is a bit problematic, as she was born in Germany and migrated to the Netherlands in the 1930's. She did write her famous Diary in Dutch.

The problem with the Dutch period of 1750-1850 is that the Neterlands had become one of the backwaters of Europe (Heinrich Heine famously remarked he would migrate to the Netherlands in case world came to an end, as everything happens 50 years later there....), so I am not surprised at all few remarkable people could be found for the 1750-1850 time slot (I still recall the struggle to find a readable book from that period for my high school reading list....).

I am aware we cannot do without William the Silent, and we need at least one of the great generals (not sure about both but could not chose between the two).

Still the Golden Age of the Republic (17th century) has 11 faces, with the 20th century when the Netherlands became somewhat more relevant at a global level once more, only 5 (2x science, 2x politics, 1x royalty); so I would like to include something from the arts (in the broadest sense).

We might also consider one of the great Dutch entrepreneurs such as Frits Philips, Freddy Heineken or Albert Heijn (born 1927) here?

I do not care about removing Cruyff as his fame in the Netherlands is based on a good football career, but nothing much since (besides creating a mess whenever he involves himself with things). There have been much more interesting sportspeople in the Netherlands in my view including those outside football such as: Fanny Blankers-Koen, Anton Geesink, Ard Schenk, Jan Janssen/Joop Zoetemelk. Arnoutf (talk) 12:33, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

If we consider writers, I would vote for Anne Frank. Of the writers (and martyrs) she has most international fame. It would also add someone WWII related other than Wilhelmina. But a problem is she was formally stateless. I think she identified herself as Dutch (not sure), we could argue in favour of that. The entrepreneurs you proposed don't really thrill me, they were just business men. They don't seem to have portraits available either.

As for 1750-1850. I don't know enough about the Dutch colonial past, but Hendrik Merkus de Kock seems like an interesting person and was from this period in time. Perhaps Jan van Swieten or Karel van der Heijden are more symbolic of the Dutch Indies wars. They were not from 1750-1850 which might be a problem in only selecting De Kock. I also have no idea if De Kock is controversial.

I would argue that if we're going for sports people Cruyff should be on top of the list. And I'm pretty objective here as a supporter of Feyenoord ;). Cruyff usually appears in the top three football players, ever. World Soccer (magazine) lists him third, the IFFHS 2nd. And football is the world's most popular sport. His career goes further than just a football player. He was a very succesful coach too (and does humanitarian work for his foundation). The current mess within Ajax shouldn't be relevant (I would argue it wasn't his fault though). The other sports people don't seem to appear as high on international lists, and add to that that a sport like iceskating or cycling is much less popular, and has had less competition. If we're going to remove Cruyff, I would argue against replacing him with another sports person. Machinarium (talk) 13:41, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

Agree on WWII, but again the Dutch were hardly heroic in that war. [I am not sure whether Wilhelmina was stateless, as any decision about Wilhelmina's status post May 1940 cannot have been made by a legal installed Dutch government. In any case, if Wilhelmina was stateless, chances are Anne Frank (as a migrated German Jew) would be made stateless as well by some decision. In summary, I would leave up Wilhelmina. Alternative WWII people might be Karel Doorman who bravely (and not very wisely) took on the Japanese battle fleet with some minor cruisers, and was killed in action. Otherwise chances are we might end up with Prince Bernhard who is also royalty. Or people from the resistance (although across the board Dutch resistance was rather limited) Hannie Schaft might do, or Erik Hazelhoff Roelfzema.

Regarding colonial past, again, the great age of the Dutch colonial enterprise was in the 1700th rather than 18th/19th century, the Governors of the Dutch indies tended to be of limited relevance, and colonial crimes against humanity were abundant, so I would be careful with these guys. More relevant might be Rutger Jan Schimmelpenninck who is interesting in his own right as one of the leaders of the ill fated Batavian Republic. Otherwise we just may have to accept there was little of interest going on in the 1750-1850 period.

The industrialists are indeed not very interesting people, although they all were very succesful captains of industry who made their family business multinationals. Also their photos are lacking indeed.

I don't mind with Cruyff who is indeed one of the best football players ever - and helped Feyenoord become champion in his last year ;-) Football is indeed more popular than Judo, Cycling, athletics or speedskating - of whom I listed some all time top ranking people ;-). His other performance is somewhat more mediocre though, as he has been a reasonably succesful coach (but compare with Hiddink), has done some good charity (Cruyff foundation/university). However in both those capacities, and now in the Ajax mess he has also shown that he has no idea about his personal limitations. But that is besides the point anyway. If we need a Dutch sportsperson, Cruyff seems a logical choice. Arnoutf (talk) 16:23, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

It's hard to judge an entire nation during WWII, comments like 'the Dutch were hardly heroic during the war' are typically Dutch. No offense there. There were many heroes in the Netherlands, both during the German invasion and during the German occupation. And don't forget that the Dutch suffered a huge amount of casualties (up to 300,000 deaths). Sure there were collaborators, many of them (just like in every other occupied state). But that doesn't make the martyrs any less heroic, and shouldn't be a reason to exclude them from a collage.

Anne Frank never held Dutch citizenship I think, unlike Wilhelmina. That's the only obstacle (I would love to add her). I remember she appeared in a collage of Germans as well once. The Dutch government tried to naturalize her posthumous, but that wasn't possible. As for the governors in the indies, not every governor was as bad a man as Jan Pieterszoon Coen, from a purely military perspective they might have been heroic, but I know too little about them. How about a Dutch Patriot? I read how they played an important part in the French revolution, but admittedly I know too little about the 1750-1850 period. We could indeed just drop this period in time.

Anyway if we think about adding someone, we also have to think about removing someone. Perhaps Leeghwater? He was from the 17th century too. Or Cruyff simply to exclude living people and avoid the debates surrounding them. Machinarium (talk) 18:31, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

So why is this collage already in use on the Dutch wikipedia about Dutch people (Nederlanders), but not here? It's not a big deal on the Dutch wiki, but it is here? I don't get it.. J187B (talk) 01:05, 11 February 2012 (UTC)

The Dutch version was recently created. It has many famous Dutch people, who are not generally known outside of the Netherlands. Part of the discussion here is to what extend the shown people should be internationally known. Arnoutf (talk) 10:54, 12 February 2012 (UTC)

Added the collage for now. Suggestions on changing it are always welcome. Machinarium (talk) 13:16, 13 February 2012 (UTC)

Height

Shouldn't there be something about height in this article. See http://www.usatoday.com/news/offbeat/2006-09-16-dutch-tall_x.htm WikiParker (talk) 12:06, 10 April 2012 (UTC)

Figures South Africa

It says there's 7,000,000 people in South Africa 'Based on adding together Afrikaner and Coloured populations.' I'm not sure if that's true. I mean most Afrikaner's have some Dutch ancestry, but not necessarily all (or only very little). For the Coloured people this figure could be even lower. Machinarium (talk) 23:57, 3 July 2013 (UTC)

demonym needs expansion

The demonym Dutch needs expansion when used as a noun referring to an individual person. What would a male from the Netherlands be called properly? "Dutchman" has mildly pejorative connotations in English that make it seem unsuitable, but what alternatives are there? For a female it's even more problematic, since "Dutchwoman" doesn't even seem like a real word.

There must be widely accepted English terms for individual males and females from the Netherlands, but I obviously don't know what they are. Someone who does know should add them to this article for ignoramuses like me who want to refer to individuals from the Netherlands without offending anyone but don't know how.

Maybe not. Now that I think of it, English lacks such terms for lots of nationalities—maybe even most. I don't know what an individual German, Danish, Spanish, Russian, Greek, Italian, etc, male or female would be called either. "Englishman/Englishwoman" and "Frenchman/Frenchwoman" are the only ones I can think of that are available, and I'm not sure I've actually ever seen "Frenchwoman". What a strangely, selectively deficient language we speak (but I love it anyway).

But we do have gender-neutral terms for most of those nationalities, which serve the purpose I'm concerned about now. In referring to an individual, can say "a German", "a Spaniard, "a Russian", "a Greek", "a Dane", "an American", "a Norwegian", etc—but not "a Dutch".

If anyone does know of a more graceful and economical way to say "a man [or even just a person] from the Netherlands", please share it with the rest of us—and this article seems to be the logical place to do it. I guess in a pinch I could use "a Nederlander", but that word hasn't really been assimilated into English as far as I know. "A Netherlander", maybe? That sounds stilted, but maybe it will do. ("A person from the Netherlands" is starting to sound not so bad after all.)--Jim10701 (talk) 00:39, 6 December 2012 (UTC)

historians use two words, as this recent example shows: "In [colonial] New York City, only one Dutch woman in six married a man who wasn't Dutch. Dutch men almost never married non—Dutch women; those in Flatbush, for example, were known to range as far as the Dutch villages of New Jersey..." Edwin G. Burrows; Mike Wallace (1998). Gotham:A History of New York City to 1898. Oxford UP. p. 89. Rjensen (talk) 03:17, 6 December 2012 (UTC)

Thanks. That's a great example, and it seems to work well in most cases. What about a statement like, "The director is an American who was born in Alaska", if I'm talking about a Dutch person instead? "The director is a Dutch who was born in Holland" doesn't work, but "The director is a Dutch man who was born in Holland" is over-precise, forcing me to identify the sex of the director when for whatever reason reason I may not want to.

The director is Dutch. Ironic that (in Dutch), one would say: ik ben engelsman [not] ik ben een englesman; i am Englishman, [not] i am one Englishman. I agree, no-one says 'a Dutch.' It is correct but obscure to say 'a Hollander', (although Holland is only one province of The Netherlands. I'd suggest using the form: 'The director is Dutch, she/he...' — Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.40.116.29 (talk) 07:22, 21 December 2014 (UTC)

As in the examples I gave earlier, I could say "The director is a Russian who was born in Siberia", "a Dane who was born in Jutland", "a Greek who was born in", etc—intentionally not disclosing the director's sex. Is there any way to refer to a Dutch person in that intentionally ambiguous way? I could say, "The director is a Dutch person who was born in Holland", but forcing "person" in there makes it more cumbersome and even coy, drawing attention to the fact that I'm withholding information about the person's sex when I may not want to draw attention to the fact that I'm doing it.

There may be no way to say in English what I'm trying to say in the ambiguous, minimalist way I'm trying to say it, when the person I'm talking about is from the Netherlands and a very few other countries... like France and Ireland ("a Dutch", "a French", "an Irish" don't work the way "a Swede" and "an Albanian" do). This is probably just an inescapable peculiarity of the language that doesn't have the simple solution I'm looking for.

I guess being able to talk about a person of any nationality without identifying the person's gender is a luxury some other languages don't allow—where even words like Dutch, American, Finn, etc, would be either masculine or feminine, but not gender-neutral as they and practically all similar words are in English.--Jim10701 (talk) 18:13, 6 December 2012 (UTC)

try: "The director, born in Holland, is Dutch." English is very flexible in syntax. Rjensen (talk) 05:40, 7 December 2012 (UTC)

Actually, English syntax is not very flexible; nonetheless, the solution given by Rjensen would work, at least in some situations. I'm not sure how "The Dutch director, born in Amsterdam, worked for a number of difficult producers . . . " would be reworked—or if such would in fact ever need to be reworked. Similarly, other demonyms that must include the person's sex, at least when used in the predicate, probably could be re-worked into sentences with active verbs, leaving a more active sentence without sexist language. 108.246.205.134 (talk) 07:21, 3 February 2013 (UTC)

Etymology of autonym and exonym

1. Didn't the Dutch (and the Flemish) also call themselves—besides using the words nederlands and diets—Duytschers or Nederduytschers until the 19th century which would correspond to the fact that the English language didn't differentiate between Dutch and German at that time, and to the fact that in High (or standard) German, the Dutch were also called Niederdeutsche?

2. It should also be mentioned that the Americans preserved the ancient meaning of Dutch for both modern Dutchmen and modern Germans until the late 19th century. During the Civil War and the anti-German campaigns by the Nativists, the "damn Germans" were occasionally still referred to as "damn Dutch". It might also be interesting why the old meaning of Dutch comprising the two peoples existed for so long in the U.S. and why it finally stopped nonetheless. -- Orthographicus (talk) 20:21, 3 December 2013 (UTC)

I am not sure about the first one. Diets and Duytsch are practically the same word before standardized spelling was introduced, so I don't think that adds much. Nationalism as we know it became only important in the 19th century so it stands to reason that only at that time these things were formalised.

If you think such of American use of terms is worth to mention and is more than trivia, we would need a reference; and a reason why it is relevant in the article at this level. Arnoutf (talk) 20:39, 3 December 2013 (UTC)

I haven't come across Nederduytschers; can you give a source. The neder/nieder refers to the lowland ('low country') situation of the kingdom. Duits/Deutsch are essentially the same word [for German(s)]. Pennsylvania Dutch is a corruption of Deutsch (German settlers). The dutch themselves, when speaking in their own language, don't refer to themselves as 'Dutch'; they would say Nederlander(s). — Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.40.116.29 (talk) 07:34, 21 December 2014 (UTC)

The gallery of personalities from the infobox

I invite everybody to post their opinions at Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Ethnic_groups#The_necessity_of_galleries_of_personalities_in_the_infoboxes Hahun (talk) 11:36, 26 November 2015 (UTC)

RfC can be found here Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Ethnic groups#Proposal for the deletion of all the galleries of personalities from the articles about ethnic groups. Gerard von Hebel (talk) 02:09, 1 December 2015 (UTC)

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Why the name change ?

I'm not native in English (nor Dutch), but have elsewhere (= not in Wikipedia) once read that the peoples which were well-known to the English got "people-names" (the Scots, the Irish but also the French, the Spanyards, the Italians, the Germans, the Dutch. And later also the Americans etc). Isn't this a kind of British-English culture and tradition which perhaps easily has been lost a bit due to the name change ? On the other hand Americans might perhaps seee things from a different perspective, but this article is European and shold hence be written in British-English style - and perhaps perspective as well ? I'm mainly asking why the name was changed, and asking those who have better knowledge regarding this matter. Boeing720 (talk) 00:45, 16 January 2016 (UTC)

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