Talk:Joan of Arc/Archive 9

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Infobox

74.76.152.162 03:27, 30 August 2007 (UTC)Was she even a subject of the Kingdom of France then? This should be clarified. The article on the Barrois Mouvant leaves this open.

what's up with "Jehanne" in the infobox? If no-one explains this within the week, I will change it to "Jeanne d'Arc". Jake the Editor Man 17:03, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

No-one's said, it's changing.

In the news

I heard that they have some results from those DNA tests they started doing about a year ago on what had been said to be Joan of Arc's relics. Any news?  — AnnaKucsma   (Talk to me!) 16:30, 5 April 2007 (UTC)

Yes, it was just added here. Quite interesting, not entirely unexpected I think. Angus McLellan (Talk) 17:41, 5 April 2007 (UTC)

Not unexpected at all. Her ashes were thrown into the river — specifically to preclude the presence of any relics, as I recall.  — AnnaKucsma   (Talk to me!) 17:59, 5 April 2007 (UTC)

The preliminary report had already been footnoted, so there isn't particularly much new here except for the identification of the remains as those of an Egyptian mummy. It may be undue weight to devote so much space to the current news. Suggest updating the existing footnote with the new information and moving the description of the purported remains' origin to Joan of Arc facts and trivia. Durova^Charge! 04:27, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

Dangit, that old article version would have been perfect but a deletionist stripped a lot of content and converted the remainder into Alternative historical interpretations of Joan of Arc. Seems like any mention of trivia in a title is the kiss of death. Vandal-fighting takes too much of my time these days - good luck with this. Durova^Charge! 04:31, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

Death Legend

This section of the article seems really out of place. It doesn't state its sources, and seems to be OR. --PureRED - Kyle Floyd 02:03, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Agreed, the historical sources stated her final words was "jesus" repeatedly 6 times. She never said "thank you" Phu2734 04:20, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

I agree, and I've removed that section. ElinorD (talk) 04:46, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Archive 8

Whoa, Archive 8 starts December 21, 2007?! That can't be right! For one thing, it would mean it starts eight months or so from now. And for another, it would mean the archive ran backwards to the beginning of April.  — AnnaKucsma   (Talk to me!) 20:53, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Merging from Name of Joan of Arc

I think the article Name of Joan of Arc is unnecessary. The creator of the page said he modeled it after the Canada's name article. I think the latter is significant enough to remain an article, but Joan of Arc's name article is only a paragraph long and should be incorporated into the Joan of Arc article. --Valley2city^₪‽ 04:53, 29 April 2007 (UTC)

For a while we had a subordinate article called Joan of Arc facts and trivia that discussed surrounding and subordiante issues that would have been tangential to the main page but that could have borne relevance to some readers as background research. Apparently that name was a mistake because an editor objected to the word trivia in any title and gutted about half its content (for instance, we lost the part where two men actually fought a duel over her honor more than four centuries after she died and another part about a comet that was named after her). The name article got spun off from that page at around that time. Ideally I'd like to see that page restored. Durova^Charge! 05:27, 2 May 2007 (UTC)

I'm not actually sure if this is the proper place to "vote" on whether the pages should be merged. But if it is, I say merge. The page is about two paragraphs, almost the size of a biography stub. It would be much better served as a section in the Joan of Arc article proper. Drewcifer3000 08:22, 15 May 2007 (UTC)

Well, as the editor who raised this page to featured article status, I consider that particular matter rather digressive and better suited for a subordinate article. Does a general reader who comes to Wikipedia for an introduction to Joan of Arc really need two paragraphs about her name? I think not: they want to know who she was, how she was important, and why she remains famous six centuries later. Durova^Charge! 20:27, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

• No - bad idea 63.215.28.17 19:05, 21 May 2007 (UTC)gpscholar

• • well it seems obvious that a short article on the provenance of her name should be part of the main 'joan of Arc' page. but surely any editor would simply just Do that...why ask us? personally i feel that dissecting and then deleting the 'Joan of arc facts and trivia' page is in fact a much bigger issue...what happened to all the info?? why werent we asked about THAT before it happened? was a vote taken then? -- dont get me wrong i think that AGAIN a 'trivia' section of the main page called 'joan of arc' would be better & less confusing than two seerate pages...but lets not get too prescious here, deleting articles just because yuo dont like the term 'Trivia' seems quite snobby & self defeating - especially for an 'encyclopedia'!! 66.249.73.154

• In my opinion it is a good idea to merge. The article about her name is a very interesting one, yet would be much more useful incorporated into the main Joan of Arc article. When people are looking for information about Jean, they do not expect info about her name being on a separate page. Sapphire1000 , 23:25, 12 June 2007

• merge - it would clearly be impracticable to aim for a single article on Canada, but it is hard to see any need to separate the question of Joan's name from the main article on her Xn4 01:21, 21 June 2007 (UTC)

I've removed the template without merging. As the editor who raised this article to FA I don't see any way to incorporate that information without making the main article digressive. Nobody else has attempted this in two months. I agree the subordinate article is hacked up and terrible, but that's not a reason to spoil the main article. The material remains where it is in case anyone want to actually try the proposal. Durova^Charge! 14:51, 1 July 2007 (UTC)

Shakespeare?

What work did Shakepeare create about Joan of Arc please? I am unfamiliar with this. It seems unlikely as he was very much on England's side in the 100 years war. SmokeyTheCat 11:29, 23 May 2007 (UTC) If no-one produces one in a week or I will delete the reference to Shakespeare as I think that is a mistake. SmokeyTheCat 16:04, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

She appears in Henry VI, Part 1. The Legend of Julie Egbert 15:15, 3 June 2007 (UTC)

The Joan of Arc Namey thing should definenetly be moved no doubt about it I speaking as a priest definently think it should be merged

Execution

Excuse me, but if a sexual assault in prison is not a rape, what is? Bcameron54 11:14, 16 April 2006 (UTC)

   I agree. The distinction between sexual assault and rape seemed unnecessary and contrived. I took the liberty of removing the offending line. Cwiki 12:22, 16 April 2006 (UTC)

to you guys who like to change it back to whatever: the issue is not whether she was raped in prison, it is what you are going to call it. alleged attempted rape by an allegedly english possibly lord? please. Bcameron54 21:22, 16 April 2006 (UTC)

Birthdate

I have no idea how often this comes up, but Nursenut added "January 6" as Joan's date of birth (over these two edits). As far as I'm concerned — and I think there was a fairly extensive discussion of this in Pernoud and Clin's Joan of Arc: Her Story as well — this date is purely legendary. Joan of Arc, who would certainly have been an authority on the subject, never connected her birthday to the Feast of the Epiphany: As someone living in the Middle Ages, and who (at the very least) claimed a mission from God, this isn't really a likely date.

So, my question is, do we simply remove the date outright? Add an explanation to the infobox, along with the date? Or just a question mark? Or something else?  — AnnaKucsma   (Talk to me!) 01:19, 1 June 2007 (UTC)

She only could estimate her age. She didn't know her own date of birth. The January 6th is based on 1 source. I think it should be removed. Phu2734 15:50, 1 June 2007 (UTC)

The information is already footnoted. What I've always done is remove it. It's fairly common for popular readership works to repeat that date uncritically, so this crops up periodically. Durova^Charge! 21:35, 1 July 2007 (UTC)

Joan, Oh Joan

She is so cool. And i think the information you show on this site is really good, well done to the guys and girls who do it!

can you tell me what other female's to look up, i find it so interesting.

Try Kathleen Hanna, Allison Wolfe, Nancy Pelosi and Martha Stewart. - Throw 20:11, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

Redirect question

Why does John Dark redirect here? He's an (admittedly obscure) renaissance composer. If Joan is also known by this name, is it significant enough to require him to need a (composer) appendix? Lethe 23:33, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

No good reason that I can think of. If you've got sources go ahead and create an article.

He's also a British film producer. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.106.248.202 (talk) 01:13, 30 December 2007 (UTC)

name, also psychology

I would like to bring up two omissions in the article. First, her real name was Jeanne Darc -- the French mistook this for Jeanne d'Arc and the mistake has been carried into other languages such as English. Brecht corrected this in his play. There is no such place as Arc!

Secondly, there is how Joan fit into the political propaganda of the time. Both the English and French were looking for "miracles" that would prove that their respective kings were chosen by God. For the English, the lopsided victory at Agincourt was a pro-English miracle, reflected in Shakespeare's Henry V. The French needed a miracle of their own, and found it in the victories of a "mere" peasant girl. To refute this the English had to blame Joan's victories on the Devil -- hence the accusations of witchcraft. It all sounds silly now but had a powerful propaganda effect in its time. Shakespeare was still parroting the "witch" accusation two centuries after Joan's time.

Incidentally, the Joan of Arc display at Madame Tussaud's in London claims that some of the judges tried to mitigate the sentence by ordering the executioner to secretly stab Joan to death, then burn the corpse (this sort of thing was not unusual in an age of savage executions). The plan failed. Any citations on that beyond Madame Tussaud's? CharlesTheBold 02:20, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Charles, see Name of Joan of Arc. The full explanation is too digressive to include in the main article. For the second point, what source other than Shakespeare do you have for that? We can't accept a fictional account as a historical source. And you might ask the Tussaud staff what their source is. At any rate, the original sources include eyewitness testimony that she not only burned to death, but the English prevented any of the usual methods for making the death more humane. The most common of these was for sympathizers to bring bundles of sticks so that the condemned would die of smoke inhalation before being touched by the flames. I know of no surviving record that states any of her judges tried to implement the plan the Tussaud museum describes. Durova^Charge! 12:49, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

"Janne Da Arc" redirection

Anyone searching for "Janne Da Arc" is obviously looking for the Japanese rock band, not Jeanne D'arc/Joan of Arc. The band was named after a character from a Japanese comic called Devilman, not after the historical figure. Janne Da Arc is not an alternate spelling for Joan of Arc, anyway.

Pernoud's credentials

Since Durova has drawn me back into this article (life managed to get in the way before, and I ended up forgetting about it), I'll start back where I left off. Durova has frequently cited an "academic concensus" that Joan had no gender identity and sexuality issues, but never referenced it. The most common defenses against the charges were to mention Pernoud and Clin. These were presented as figures of eminent authority, "historians", compared to people who weren't "historians" like Feinberg and Crane (a professor of English who I mistakenly identified as a professor of History with the exact same name). In particular, the focus was on Pernoud. I pointed out that Pernoud only has a BA and an honorary doctorate, so that's hardly strong ground to defend a position from. The response to that issue was:

"I'm not sure where Rei gets her information about Pernoud's education, but the degrees Rei names are peculiar to North America."

From here:

"Regine Pernoud is French and was born June 17, 1909,the only daughter of Louis and Nelly Pernoud. She received her BA from Notre Dame at Marseilles in 1926, and in 1928 studied to become an archivist. In 1928 she won the Femina Prize and in 1946 received the Office of the Legion of Honor. In 1979 she received an honorary doctorate from the College Anna-Maria of Worcaster."

I'm not saying that Pernoud isn't a good reference. In fact, she's a great reference. However, comparisons to Pernoud involving academic credentials really don't stand. Even Feinberg has an honorary doctorate. As far as I am aware, Colombia University's Dr. Crane's doctorate is real (I could verify if needed).

Once again, I repeat my request for evidence of an academic concensus. This article does not mention the topic, yet the topic certainly meets Wikipedia:Notability's guidelines. That doesn't mean that the discussion should specifically go in this article, just that it should be covered by Wikipedia (this article being a possibility, or an article linked from here; the latter case might be less controversial). -- Rei 03:30, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

The way to establish that JoA had gender/sexuality issues is by citing reliable sources that say she did, not by attacking the credentials of other scholars who say she don't. Considering the contemporary focus on gender and sexuality in all areas of the humanities and social sciences, it shouldn't be difficult to come up with multiple citations if this is an often-discussed topic. --Akhilleus (talk) 03:36, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

That is correct, and I did. For starters, I previously listed Feinberg and Crane. Durova rejected including them in the article because she considered their credentials as not standing up to Pernoud's. -- Rei 16:15, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

Rei, a recent administrators' noticeboard thread confirmed that you canvassed an off-Wikipedia site in an attempt to garner support at a different POV dispute. You are rather lucky no administrator has blocked you for that behavior. Your participation at this article delayed progress for six weeks. Now you attempt to reverse the burden of evidence at a history article for a POV which you would defend with an English literature professor and a transgender activist. In the past you named (but never cited) a playwright and a novelist. None of these people are historians. I see no new evidence at this thread.

In the time since we interacted last I raised this article to featured status, became sysopped, and cowrote the disruptive editing guideline. I will recuse myself from the use of administrative tools regarding you, but if you persist in disruptive behavior I can and will bring it to the attention of uninvolved parties for impartial evaluation and action. Durova^Charge! 04:09, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

Oh, great -- the lies now spread to here. You can read it for yourself. Someone came to me offsite, wanting to make changes to the article, changes that I had already made previously, and I told them that I would back them up, but not without more support because I didn't want an edit war. Apparently, one of the editors on the article in question was spying on me daily, and made charges of meatpuppetry. This is what I get for answering a person who came to me. I never contacted anyone, neither before or after this, asking them to support my side. Quite to the contrary, I was the one who let the other side have their way and brought it to dispute resolution. The noticeboard didn't "confirm" anything; my cyberstalker simply posted it there, and you used it as a chance to attack me.

Congratulations on your promotion and on the article. This is, however, not relevant to questions related to whether Crane and Feinberg should be cited. Nor is your comment in line with the guidelines that you edited. I'm not sure why you even raised the issue if not to try and intimidate me. Or perhaps you believe that this is a perfect article and it can no longer be improved?

Attacking the messenger is not responsible debate. Let's keep this respectful and address the issues. Where is your cite for an academic consensus, and how can you claim justification to exclude Feinberg and Crane over credentials given Pernoud's? -- Rei 16:15, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

I should add that there's no shame in not having a cite for there being an academic consensus. However, without that, the views of other authors are certainly fair game, and if WP:Notability is met, then guidelines say that it should be covered *somewhere* on Wikipedia. -- Rei 23:17, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

I've never objected to the basic idea of mentioning that within the article. Based upon the evidence I've seen it qualifies as a fringe POV of rather long pedigree so per WP:NPOV#Undue weight could either be overlooked entirely or get a brief one sentence mention. If you locate a historian who espouses it then that it would merit a little more space. Per WP:V burden of evidence rests with you to demonstrate the legitimacy of the claim. If you choose to cite original source material, please use the same translation quoted through the rest of the article. The last time you participated at this page produced a lot of tedious labor re-researching and re-citing for consistency. I'll open a content RFC, and perhaps a user conduct RFC, if problems resume. Durova^Charge! 20:23, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

If it's fringe, you have a cite for an academic concensus, right? The cite I started asking you for in 2005 which you still haven't provided?

Re: The burden lies with with me: Exactly, which is why I have a peer-reviewed publication by Crane (Crane, Susan. "Clothing and Gender Definition: Joan of Arc." Journal of Medieval and Early Modern Studies 28 (1996) 297-320; also, there's her book, "The Performance of Self: Ritual, Clothing, and Identity During the Hundred Years War."; here's the sort of stuff she teaches at Columbia, so Columbia University, an Ivy League university, clearly views her as credentialed on this subject as well). The ball is back in your court. I don't think that there's anyone from the RFC who would disagree that this is a legitimate cite, and I would be surprised if you would. Barring evidence of an academic concensus (which would make this fringe research), the reference should not be denied inclusion unless there is no WP:Notability. Seeing as Joan's sexuality and gender identity have been being published about for much of a century, it certainly meets notability guidelines. I would also argue for a cite from Feinberg, and probably a few others, but let's take things one at a time -- Crane first.

Thank you for going ahead and issuing the RFC; that will probably save us a lot of needless conflict. -- Rei 17:20, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

Rei, there's no need to explain to me what Columbia University is: I earned my history degree there. A professor of English literature publishing outside her field does not equal a historian. If you can find a single historian in support of your POV, then it becomes reasonable to give it more than one sentence as a minority view. Per WP:V, you ought to be able to find one. The corpus of scholarship on Joan of Arc is enormous. Durova^Charge! 23:16, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

That's good to hear. Now, we're comparing a professor of English with a Ph.D, with a specialization in English and French medieval literature and culture, who has been published in a modern scholarly journal on the subject (Joan of Arc and medieval history in general), who has published books on the subject (same), and who Columbia university apparently feels is qualified to teach on the subject (same), with Pernoud, who had only an undergraduate degree and an honorary doctorate. There's absolutely no grounds to declare Pernoud so much more eminently qualified that her views must be treated as absolute truth and those of Crane ignored. When was Pernoud published in the Journal of Medieval and Early Modern studies? Judging by scholarly credentials, Crane clearly comes out ahead. You can declare Pernoud a "historian" and declare Crane just an "English professor" and call Pernoud "a historian" all you want, but the credentials stand for themselves.

Let's cite WP:V while we're at it for emphasis:

In general, the most reliable sources are peer-reviewed journals and books published in university presses; university-level textbooks; magazines, journals, and books published by respected publishing houses; and mainstream newspapers. As a rule of thumb, the greater the degree of scrutiny involved in checking facts, analyzing legal issues, and scrutinizing the evidence and arguments of a particular work, the more reliable it is.

With Crane, we have a peer-reviewed journal *and* books published in university presses that are used as university-level textbooks, plus the support of a prestigious university. You simply can't get more WP:V than that. In fact, if I really wanted to drive the point home, I could cite, "Questionable sources are those with a poor reputation for fact-checking or with no editorial oversight. Questionable sources should only be used in articles about themselves.", and then ask you what level of fact-checking Pernoud's book publishers (like Harcort Press, Palgrave Macmillan, and so on) are famous for, and how that compares to the level of fact-checking in a peer-reviewed journal. -- Rei 20:34, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

Oh, and I would once again remind you that Wikipedia's standards are WP:Verifiability and WP:Notability, not whatever one might be convinced "truth" is. -- Rei 21:06, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

She's been dead for 550 years ago, why are you worried about Joan of Arc's sexuality? Let the woman rest in peace. From all the articles, books I've read(in English and French), no one has said Joan had a sexuality problem. The people who wrote about her that probably claim she had a trans gender crisis etc, never had real experience of medieval culture or was in that era.

P.S Durova did a excellent job with this article on Joan! Probably best article than any other on wiki. Well put together. Tom 144.137.107.28

People have been publishing about her sexuality since Sacville-West in the 1930s. It is certainly notable, whether or not you personally have read about it. In fact, Wikipedia seems to think enough of the notability of that one book alone that it has its own article. As Sacville-West's book is rather dated, and does contain some inaccuracies, I'd prefer to focus on more modern scholarship.

By the way, I agree with you that most of Durova's work on this article has been good. Had I more issues of contention with Durova than this one issue, I would have raised them  ;) However, there is no such thing as the "perfect article". I would be WP:Bold and simply edit, but I know that this is an issue of contention, so it is best resolved in talk. -- Rei 20:09, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

I like her novels, particularly All Passion Spent, but Mrs Nicolson wasn't a historian. Beaune's biography - Colette is a historian - has an aside on was-Joan-anorexic?, but at two or three lines in nearly 400 pages, even to mention that would be to give it too much space in an article of this size. When the subject is Joan of Arc, we have to ask ourselves what must be included and drop most everything else. Is her sexuality a must-include? Well, it's a good subject for a publish-or-perish academic, or for Vita, but probably not for us as we cannot possible do the topic justice without giving it undue weight. Angus McLellan (Talk) 20:36, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

Who is talking about Mrs. Nicolson?

I would not argue for including an aside that takes up three pages. Since that's not at all what we're talking about here, it's a non-sequiteur. We're talking about a subject that has been repeatedly published about over the last century. Heck, if you extend the topic to her cross-dressing, its meaning been debated since while she was still alive.

Continuing publishing on a particular topic is considered grounds for WP:Notability. However, if you want to discount that grounds, what metric would you propose -- a "popularity of the topic" metric? While google searches aren't references, they can give you an idea of how widely this issue is discussed on the web. Compare to anorexia. So, if I were to present either the metric of publishing in a scholarly journal, or the metric of widespread discussion on the internet, it comes out as notable in either measure. Do you have another metric to judge how notable the issue is that you would care to raise? -- Rei 20:43, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

Let's spend just a few minutes of searching and see who's talking about Joan's sexuality these days.

*The St. Joan Center[1]. Being a "traditional" interpretation site, it denies any link to sexuality, but has one of their questions as, "Why do some historians spend so much time on the subject of Joan wearing man's clothing?", indicating that it's a common question that they get.

*The Gay, Lesbian, Transgender, and Queer encyclopedia[2]

The Wikipedia page on "Saint Joan of Arc"[3]

Womenshistory.about.com has a mere paragraph directing people with questions to the St. Joan Center, and the sexuality issue is raised.[4]

Carolyn Gage's one-woman lesbian show, "The Second Coming of Joan of Arc"[5]

Leslie Feinberg's "Transgender Warriors: Making History from Joan of Arc to Dennis Rodman"[6] (21 reviews, 83 used & new; compare to, say, the first hit for Pernoud on Amazon: Joan of Arc: Her Story -- 80 used & new, 29 reviews) (if you know of a better way to assess sales, let me know)

Joan Roughgarden's "Evolution's Rainbow: Diversity, Gender, and Sexuality in Nature and People", from University of California Press[7]

I can keep going and get you thousands if you'd like. This is most certainly an issue of WP:Notability. -- Rei 21:02, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

What will really impress me is your finding a biography of Joan, written by a historian, and preferably a medievalist, which treats the subject. What you've got now is the equivalent of semioticists writing about quantum chromodynamics: interesting, but is it really relevant and what does it all mean? Angus McLellan (Talk) 21:06, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

P.S. I take an equally narrow view on other content here. I don't think that the modern medical stuff on visions should be included either. A discussion of Joan's visions in the context of C15th views would be relevant, and the same would be true of transvestism and sexuality. Angus McLellan (Talk) 21:13, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

You're changing the topic; the discussion here was WP:Notability. Do you accept WP:Notability? If you want to go back to WP:Verifiability, we can. See the credentials discussion above and compare Crane's credentials for writing about the subject, and the level of review of her research, with that of Pernoud. Her work has passed peer review, she's written books on the subject published by university presses, an Ivy League school feels she's qualified to teach about the subject, and she has a Ph.D. Pernoud's books are not peer-reviewed, and the author with nothing more than an undergraduate degree and an honorary doctorate. Argue for the latter's works as meeting WP:V better than the former's works, by the guidelines in WP:V. -- Rei 21:11, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

"A discussion of Joan's visions in the context of C15th views would be relevant": Depending on what you mean by that, the cite from Crane may be exactly what you're looking for. She argues that given the social context, Joan's crossdressing can't be looked at only a military choice or social necessity. If you want other studies of medieval crossdressing, I could cite Marjorie Garber, Vern Bullough, or Valerie Hotchkiss. I really don't think that we need to dwell long on the subject, though. -- Rei 22:02, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

I believe the article should present Joan not as 19th century flag-waving French patriots imagined her, or 16th century mysogenist Englishmen, or the many in the 20th century who appropriate her for their own ends, but in a way that makes her, and her circumstances, understandable to our readers. What Charles VII believed about visions is important, modern medical views can stay in medical articles where they belong. What Joan's colleagues or her judges believed about transvestism would be relevant, today's beliefs belong somewhere else.

By treating Joan's dress as anything more than just a mention in passing, and another black mark at her trial, we necessarily have to explain what people then believed about gender, feminity, virginity, transvestism, etc. This is not simply done, and it would take a considerable amount of space to do it justice. The objective is to present a neutral article. If, by dealing with these things, we have to exclude other, perhaps more important material, we will certainly end up with an unbalanced, non-neutral article that devotes too much space to particular topics, because it will not stop with dress. Someone from the dreaded military history project would no doubt be along the next minute to insist on adding umpteen paragraphs on the minutiae of Joan's military experiences. This is already a long article. Making it significantly longer would be a Bad Thing.

So, yes, there are things that could be added, but not easily, and not without considerable thought. I would suggest creating a forked article in a sandbox in your user space, or writing the extra sections the same way, so that they can be discussed. Everything on Wikipedia is a work in progress, and even featured articles can be improved. All the same, it's much easier to discuss changes when we can see them. Angus McLellan (Talk) 22:39, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

I agree with everything you just wrote. After all, WP:Notability says that notable things should be included in Wikipedia, but specifically notes that it doesn't say where they should be included.

My only concern is topic length, which I think might be too long for this (already large) article but too short for an independent article. Although, come to think of it given that the social context will need to be addressed (which could mean citing some Garber, Bullough, and Hotchkiss), that would extend the length. I'll try it out as a separate article in my sandbox (probably this weekend, when I have more time), and then seek some feedback from you and anyone else who feels like it (don't want any POV issues, after all -- and as we know this can be a hot-button issue, so things need to go by the book). Such an article could be wikilinked from the clothing section of this article so that anyone who comes here after reading Feinberg, Roughgarden, Crane, or any other works that raise sexuality and gender identity issues have a branch-off point. The article could possibly take some of the clothing section's content, ultimately reducing the article's length by a paragraph or a few.

Thanks for your input! -- Rei 02:33, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

Update: I spent several hours at the library this weekend gathering sources and starting on the first draft of the article offline. I should have it up in my sandbox in a day or two. Contrary to my initial concerns, there will be no issues with it coming up short lengthwise; if anything, just the opposite. The amount of content needed (and vast quantity of papers and books on the subject**) to present a brief backgrounder on the situation with Joan's crossdressing, then a historical background and social context for crossdressing and sexuality in Joan's time, then viewpoints of her crossdressing from her lifetime and shortly thereafter, and then modern scholarship, means that there's no risk of the article being merely a stub.

A lot of the historical background and social context that I ran into which I hadn't heard of before is pretty fascinating, especially the long list of "holy tranvestites" ranging all the way back from Joan's time to the apocryphal but widely popular St. Thecla, a purported follower of Paul himself. Interesting how well accepted many women who attempted to fully pass as men were, but how shunned women who mixed gender presentation -- adopting aspects of male garb but not attempting to hide their femininity, like the fictional Wife of Bath -- were, and why Joan's accusers were careful to phrase their accusations against her not as simply the fact that she cross-dressed, but that she cross-dressed in all aspects of male dress save for hiding her femininity, thus setting her apart from the holy transvestite motif and attempting to preempt claims that she met Aquinas's guidelines. Also, Judith Bennett's book on singlewomen in both the middle ages and the early modern age provided a lot of great information on female sexuality at the time (and, of course, church views/actions related to it). You can always find out new stuff on a topic even if you've read a lot about it before  :) I think that, with some review and editing, we'll end up with a great contribution to Wikipedia that will hopefully be as free from POV as possible, given the hot-button topic.

** I've probably already cited at least 15 WP:V sources, and it's just a tiny fraction of what's out there. This issue seems to have spawned endless debate. Which is great  :) -- Rei 15:44, 24 September 2007 (UTC)

It's pretty late, but I've got the first draft up here. Please see the talk page first. Thanks to anyone who can provide feedback! -- Rei 07:12, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

Happy ending for Joan of Arc, she was saved by the English?

Can someone explain this article to me about a book? Because I find it hilarious! link: http://www.smh.com.au/news/world/happy-ending-for-joan-of-arc-she-was-saved-by-133-the-english/2007/09/23/1190486137759.html —Preceding unsigned comment added by 121.216.102.244 (talk) 16:15, 24 September 2007 (UTC)

A very old fringe theory, warmed over. Durova^Charge! 17:37, 24 September 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, none of those theories are particularly new. -- Rei 19:51, 24 September 2007 (UTC)

Joan of Arc was a man?

the main page for this article has this link below. I think it's a silly suggestion and I think it should be removed.

http://www.globalspot.com/know/joanarc.shtml —Preceding unsigned comment added by 121.218.74.88 (talk) 11:05, 3 November 2007 (UTC)

Agreed. Old fringe theory, warmed over. Durova^Charge! 15:50, 3 November 2007 (UTC)

wikipedia this main page: The French king at the time of Joan's death, Charles VI, suffered bouts of insanity and was often unable to rule.

Joan didn't die during the time of Charles VI, typo or mistake? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 124.179.82.122 (talk) 13:19, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

Vandalism. Durova^Charge! 06:56, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

Another one:

By the beginning of 1484, nearly all of northern France and some parts of the southwest were under foreign control. CookCityPenn 14:14, 1 December 2007 (UTC)

Someone vandalized the date. I'll fix that. Durova^Charge! 18:54, 1 December 2007 (UTC)

Semiprotection

I think in my opinion, this popular article should be locked from editing and vandalizing sentences. CookCityPenn 13:47, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

Good idea. It's a frequent target while school's in session. I've put some semiprotection onto the article for a while. Cheers, Durova^Charge! 16:19, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

Good Information

My name is Tom and i have contributed some articles & some messages. Soon I would be handing in a Joan of Arc Essay. Thanks for this info.

Tom (Scrth)

tom 23:26, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

-I'll be handing in in a Joan of Arc Essay as well. This is a fairly big artical, and it helped a whole lot! I made one tiny correction, that I thought was more of a mix up in numbers than anything, but that's all. Anyway, thanks to all who made this artical! Cyclone~Fox^RenaTalk —Preceding comment was added at 04:32, 30 November 2007 (UTC)

witchcraft theory

many protesstant christians say that Joan of Arc's visions were demonic shouldn't this be listed under the section about her visions since it includes the theories of them being a divine revelation as stated by the catholic church who declares her a saint and the theory that she had mental delusions such as schizophrenia i am adding that theory under the vision section of this article unless some one posts a response to this and tells me why i shouldn't —Preceding unsigned comment added by Charlieh7337 (talk • contribs) 01:19, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

No I don't think so, and what you said is just 'theories' without any good sources for backup. I'm sorry but this article itself is well done, I don't see the point of adding anything else that is just plain silly. Pretty much everything is said about her visions. Kellz88 (talk) 15:17, 3 January 2008 (UTC)