Talk:Marra people

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This page is problematic. I have worked with Marra people for many years and the tone is borderline offensive and the source material outdated and incorrect. From the start, it is wrong and offensive to refer to Marra people in the past tense - "The Marra were an indigenous Australian people..."

I will delete content that I know to be inappropriate and incorrect and urge the main contribute to rewrite. It appears as though the main contributor has written numerous other pages on Australian Indigenous "tribes" (the term 'tribe' is itself outdated in the Australian context... 'language group' or 'nation' is now preferred) - I would recommend serious reconsiderations of those other pages. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Wamut (talk • contribs) 06:29, 14 May 2018 (UTC)

I changed 'were' to 'are'. The rest of your objections are WP:OR, which all editors are bound to observe. I.e. whatever personal knowledge you have, professional or otherwise, cannot be introduced unless you have a reliable, preferably academic, source that documents the facts asserted. If you prefer 'nation' find a source describing the Marra as a contemporary aboriginal nation; if you prefer 'language' group, idem, though the problem there is that given there are only a handful of people speaking Marra (as opposed to a considerable number of people of Marra descent now speaking other languages), and that usage would damage people who identify themselves as Marra. Explaining yourself on a talk page is not enough. What you do here is question sourced material, by citing other sources which challenge or contradict it, so that one can consensually modify the text to harmonize the new data with that existing. For example, the marriage rules are historic here, and form part of the documentary record for that group. If things change, find a source to cite the changes.etc. Nishidani (talk) 07:35, 14 May 2018 (UTC)

See Page 2-3 here: https://www.ipswich.qld.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0008/10043/appropriate_indigenous_terminoloy.pdf regarding avoiding the use of tribe and instead using preferred terms such as 'language group' or 'nation'. I did cite two sources more recent than most you had cited (Heath 1981 and Dickson 2015). I find it very regrettable that someone is able to create a page full of inaccurate and outdated information and then put the onus back onto others to fix the errors. The original page is your work. I suggest you go back, read more contemporary material, and edit your page so that it is informative and inoffensive. Wamut (talk) 07:49, 14 May 2018 (UTC)

Re: language - the information in that section is just plain wrong. All you need to do is read the Wikipedia page on "Marra language" for better and more up-to-date information and references. Please revise.

Re: Social Organisation, the groupings that Radcliffe-Brown described in 1930 are wrong. Heath 1981 describes four semi-moieties and no moieties and gives a much better overview of social organisation. Similar descriptions are found in Dickson 2015.

Re: Country, there are basic spelling errors ('neighbouring', 'east'). Mangarrayi country does not border Marra country and this can be seen on any modern map of Aboriginal nations. The poor research gone into this page are your problems, not mine. Wamut (talk) 08:02, 14 May 2018 (UTC)

• If 'tribe' is the problem, it is easily fixed by asking an editor like Jarrah to change the title from Marra tribe to Marra people. The former was chosen simply because I found if I wrote Marra, that this redirected out of Australia.

NSH001, with his habitual promptness and technical savviness, just fixed this. resolved.Nishidani (talk) 12:03, 14 May 2018 (UTC)

• 'Inaccurate and outdated information'. I go strictly by sources, and the page is about the Marra, as an historical people, and their contemporary descendants. So one cannot speak of outdated information, since the sources I listed came from the bibliographical list appended to Tindale's entry on the Marra/Mara. I try as far as possible to garner all historical references to each people and take the trouble to find links that might enable the readership to follow up by reading each article, to harvest material I have not, so far, the time to fully transfer to the page. Whether the information is 'accurate' (for what period?) or not is beside the point. If it is reliably sourced we usually add it per policy. What one does technically in such cases of suspected inaccuracy is to paraphrase the ostensibly inaccurate or outdated information, attributing it to the source author, and then adding a new source that challenges the earlier version. One does this by always sourcing the new source to the precise page, preferably accompanying it, if you can't link it so others can verify it, by a citation of the content.
• 'Language group'/'nation' both have problems, and Marra people resolves them.
• The onus to fix errors is on all editors. There is no case where I have refused to alter the text of several hundred articles where an error is detected and the page notified.
• The Marra language page, like many aboriginal linguistic pages on wikipedia, had an error which, unknown to me as I provisionally drew on it, led me to make an incorrect entry. All you needed to do was to say, it's not a Macro-Gunwinyguan language, but one of three of the Marran languages. I've now checked and have two sources to state that. This too has been rapidly fixed. Problem resolved. As occasionally occurs, I broke my own rule here in rushing: the rule is, never rely on Wikipedia pages for information you might like to add to some other page.Nishidani (talk) 11:09, 14 May 2018 (UTC)

Neighbours

The Yanyuwa, we state rightly, now lie to the east, on the coast, of the Marra people's domains. In Dickson 2015 p.41, prior to the Yanyuwa the people indigenous to that area may have been the now extinct Wilangarra. Are these what Tindale described as t the Wilingura, whom he states were still around in his time?Nishidani (talk) 14:49, 14 May 2018 (UTC)

Yes, I think it's safe to say 'Wilangarra' and 'Wilingura' refer to the same group. Also, kudos and thanks to you Nishidani for your work on improving the page in light of my harsh criticism. It is much appreciated and the page looks 1,000 times better. Thank you! Wamut (talk) 00:00, 15 May 2018 (UTC)

Much appreciated. I generally thrive on criticism, so I didn't take that disagreement the wrong way, because it was based on an impression, fair in its own terms, of a rough sketch that, as a stub, naturally left much to be desired for any passing reader or someone with real field experience in the subject matter. I think we've set up around 650 articles and are close to a complete overview, if skeletal, of the several hundred peoples who constitute or formed at the time of white imperial colonization, the fabric of Australian indigenous societies. From the outset, given I can only spend two years of my time on this, I chose the option of (a) making all articles conform to an aesthetically pleasing aspect, internally coherent in format and (b) a bibliographical survey of what the reader can consult by clicking on the items listed, to pursue coverage and fleshen out the bare bones that I provided.(c) though I have copies of nearly all the sources downloaded, and have read them, I haven't had time to eviscerate them all, one by one, to make them more comprehensive, though on occasion, I've stopped the haste and settled down to write up a complete story as at, to name one, Gadubanud. When I look at, say, Baada I think-'5 hours and that could be tripled in content,'since the mythology alluded to in the sources is very rich, but do that for each article and I'd never finish this before I cark it. (d) Your intervention was timely because, by protesting that I simply had not done the detailed homework that, like other pages, requires, you provoked me to show how quickly -if there is some stimulating outside input-the flaws on any one article can be addressed and corrected, and meat added to the sparse diet of facts the readers are presented with all too often. I hate redlinks, and did the Maria Island stub, and must now finish the outline with some material on Marra legends concerning its sheoak and mythological creatures. Best regards.Nishidani (talk) 08:28, 15 May 2018 (UTC)

Warndarrang similarity in patrimoieties

Patrilineal semi-moiety (father)	marries psm (mother)	Offspring
(A) Murrungun ( muruŋun )	(B) Wurtal (wuḍal)	Murrungun
Wurtal (wuḍal)	Murrungun ( muruŋun )	Wurtal
(C) Kuyal (guyal )	(D) Mampali (mambali)	Kuyal
Mampali (mambali)	Kuyal (guyal	Mampali

A child of a Murrungun/Wurtal (A/B) marriage must marry someone who belongs either to the Kuyal or Mampali semimoieties (C/D), and likewise, the latter must marry someone from the Murrungun/Wurtal semimoieties. Is this a correct reformulation of Heath's model of teh related Warndarrang marriage rules?Nishidani (talk) 13:11, 15 May 2018 (UTC)