This is an archive of past discussions about Slice of life. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.
I propose that Slice of life story be merged into Slice of life as their usage is exactly the same and having both is unnecessary content forking. Please indicate your Support or Oppose opinion below, and please include your reasoning for your opinion. Please note that this is not a vote, but a discussion. Thank you for your participation. ···日本穣? · Talk to Nihonjoe23:39, 11 April 2009 (UTC)
Oppose. Even just glancing at the intro for Slice of life story confirms that they are very different phenomena. The story article says "It may or may not contain any plot progress and little character development, and often has no exposition, conflict, or denouement, with an open ending. It usually tries to depict the every-day life of ordinary people, sometimes with fantasy or science fiction elements involved.". This is categorically not true for "slice of life" drama. Articles on the theatre are not usually dealt with as part of articles on literature--i.e., Naturalism (literature) and Naturalism (theatre), etc.--and most theatre studies academics would reject the implied methodology. "Slice of life" is a term from the theatre and ought to remain separate. DionysosProteus (talk) 16:36, 12 April 2009 (UTC)
Comment. First, please explain why the statement is not true for a "slice of life" drama. Second, Science fiction has no problems with having both literary and theatrical uses on the same page and thus they are not always seperated. Third, a straw manappeal to authority is not a reason to stop the merge especially when the methodology merging the literary and theatrical pages on all articles that have both would be refuted not the merging of these two articles. AndrewTJ31 (talk) 17:26, 13 April 2009 (UTC)
Not merge for several reasons. The words "exactly the same" are given above twice, but a comparison reveals that, apart from the mention of the French phrase, the two pages are totally different. "Slice of life" has fully referenced research with correct categories. "Slice of life story", as noted, has numerous issues, a request for attention by an expert, no explanation of the anime usage, an original research tag from two years ago and many citation notices. The discussion page notes more than a few contradictions, with several remarks indicating subjective interpretations or errors. As I previously noted, there's a reason that Beat Generation and beatnik have separate pages even though the two topics have an obvious intrinsic connection; if merged, the distinctions would be instantly blurred. What makes "beatnik" stand apart would then become allied with "Beat Generation" in such a way as to generate confusion. Such an alliance was the original problem with the "beatnik" page before it was given extensive revisions. I believe a similar confusion could result here from a merger. Any suggestion for a simple "clean-up" after such a merger will be inadequate, as the original problems of "slice of life story" will not go away. They might even increase. Pepso2 (talk) 16:48, 12 April 2009 (UTC)
Comment. First, sentences 2-4 and 8-9 are a complaint that the merger will bring the problems from Slice of life story to Slice of life and that those problems can't be fixed, this complaint may also violate WP:OWN as this editor has made 10 outmost of the 16 edits and does not want the page to have any problems on it. Second, the merger of two distinct groups of people that are closely related and two near identical (if not completely identical) genres are not the same and thus should not be proposed as a reason not to merge. AndrewTJ31 (talk) 17:26, 13 April 2009 (UTC)
Comment. I make no claim of ownership over this page or any other Wikipedia page I have started or worked on. In truth, I follow the history on some pages very closely to see anything added that improves what I have written. Pepso2 (talk) 14:44, 14 April 2009 (UTC)
Comment. I apologize for my previous comments sounding cold that was not my intent. My comment on ownership was about your complaints about the quality of the article being merged and not the information from it. Slice of life story has problems with it but it also has information that can be useful to this page. AndrewTJ31 (talk) 17:49, 14 April 2009 (UTC)
Comment: The sentence taken from "slice of life story" detailed above isn't true for "slice of life" drama in EVERY respect. Every claim--about plot, character, exposition--does not apply to slice of life drama. Secondly, your suggestion that "science fiction provides an appropriate comparison misses the fact that "science fiction" is not a theatrical genre. Science fiction in the theatre is at best an extremely marginal phenomenon. The comment about "methodology" intended by the last sentence of the comment above is incomprehensible to me. Can you state what you mean more clearly? I was describing the methodology that Theatre Studies adopts to describe these kinds of works. Not sure what you were trying to say there. How exactly is the appeal to authority rendering the opposed view as a straw man? To suggest that we are discussing "two distinct groups of people that are closely related and two near identical (if not completely identical) genres" is patent nonsense. Which people are you talking about? By what stretch of the imagination are they "closely related"? The genres are not at all the same, given the ocean of distance that separates them by virtue of their their plot construction, use of exposition, conflict, resolution, its characterisation modes, use of fantasy and science fiction elements. The concerns about the low quality of the story article are perfectly legitimate, particularly since its "references" appear to rely heavily on anime websites, which as I'm sure you're aware are not reliable sources. DionysosProteus (talk) 17:47, 13 April 2009 (UTC)
I believe "two distinct groups of people" was directed at my comment about the separate pages for "Beat Generation" and "beatnik". The notion that "fantasy and science fiction" is relevant is curious to me. Having lifelong interests in film, theater, naturalistic fiction and science fiction, it never occurred to me that I was reading a "slice of life story" when I was reading science fiction. By its very nature, science fiction cannot be categorized with naturalistic fiction. As I recall, critics debated Algis Budry's more realistic approach with Rogue Moon as a turning point for speculative literature, but "suspension of disbelief" and "slice of life story" are quite different terms. I'm aware that Philip K. Dick was influenced by French naturalism, but even The Man in the High Castle, with its lifelike characters, remains a work of fantasy. I am still hoping to learn why the term "slice of life story" is applied to anime. Pepso2 (talk) 15:40, 14 April 2009 (UTC)
Anime is a medium, so any genre can be and is applied to it. Just as there are slice of life stories in live action theatre as well as in television and in film, there are slice of life stories in anime. Most of them don't make it to the English-speaking world, but some do (such as Yotsuba&! and Maison Ikkoku, though the latter falls more into the romantic comedy genre).
The current description at the top of the Slice of life story page is a bit off and needs to be modified, so using that as a reason for opposing this merger is invalid. "Slice of life" means simply that it's an example of everyday life, and therefore doesn't fall into being an adventure, full of action, suspense, high fantasy, hard science fiction, or any of the other major genres of most fictional events portrayed in any other genre. While it's true there is not always plot or character development, and the stories often contain little to no conflict, these are not always true. Everyday life does have elements that would advance a plot or develop a character, and people do run into conflict as well in everyday life. These two articles can be combined without too much work while still being able to describe some nominally different uses in theatre and elsewhere. ···日本穣? · Talk to Nihonjoe17:38, 14 April 2009 (UTC)
Comment. First, Thank you for responding. Thank you for clearing up what you meant by the quote because it seemed too long for its explanation. The straw man was refuting the idea that pairs of theatre and literary articles should be merged, and not specifically these two articles should be merged (the general not the specific which seems to be what "Articles on the theatre are not usually dealt with as part of articles on literature and most theatre studies academics would reject the implied methodology" would suggest). Also, it might be phrased poorly and that might have caused the confusion. My point on Science fiction was that theatre and literature articles can be combined into one article. Could you elaborate on if you meant in general or specifically this genre. The two groups of people I was talking about were the Beat Generation and Beatniks as they were mentioned as a reason why not to merge in Pepso2's comments. Quality of an article does not weigh in on merging an article should that is what the page's content is for. (This comment was written before Pepso2's and I don't want to edit it.)
One thing that needs to be added to Slice of life before the two articles can be treated as being significantly different is a definition of slice of life in theatre that shows that the two are different when they are compared (ie. this page says "blah" and the other page says "blah" and after reading both a person with no previous understanding of the difference will be able to know why they are different, not this is different from that because...); I believe that you can help greatly in this respect. But as the articles stand I believe they are less to be "use in literature vs. use in theatre" as they are "the creation of the term tranche de vie with its expansion into a variety of its meaning1 vs. the use of the term in literature". I feel that as the articles stand they should be merged, but if the articles are expanded in a way that can highlight their differences I would support them being separate articles, and that they should only borrow parts from each other2.
1The sentence In the 20th century, it expanded to mean "the realistic description or representation of events and situations in everyday life in literature, film, journalism, etc." which remains from the first posted draft of Slice of life suggests that the page will go into further detail on the other uses.
2Firefox spellchecker is strange; when i forgot to put a space between each and other, it though I might have meant to write psychotherapy.
Further discussion here will help to determine what direction the article should move in and even help to expand it. AndrewTJ31 (talk) 17:49, 14 April 2009 (UTC)
You did get rid of some of the wonky statements! But note that three different people on the "sol story" discussion page questioned the article's claim about a lack of plot. Pepso2 (talk) 20:30, 14 April 2009 (UTC)
I think it's not so much that there is a lack of plot as the plot is either less noticeable or the plot moves much more slowly. However, that's not really the point of this discussion, ad that could definitely be addressed once this discussion is completed. You are welcome to modify the example merge page I created if you wish in order to take that into account. ···日本穣? · Talk to Nihonjoe21:47, 14 April 2009 (UTC)
