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User:Abnn/Naming conventions (Palestine-related)

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Consistent Palestinian naming standards

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There have been a number of CfD & stub-deletions of late. See:

I just wrote this to Tewfik in an attempt to solidify a consistent way of handling these things so that any renamings become simply procedural and straightforward:

"Consistent Palestinian naming standards
You, Tewfik, seem to know a lot about naming standards with regards to Palestinian related articles. Maybe we could write this out formally at WP Palestine so that we can avoid problems in the future and ensure that the standards are not shifting aimlessly. I am also concerned about appropriate parent categories so that we tie everything together, it may eventually be impossible to have a single category as the root category, and thus I am thinking that maybe a template that lays out the naming standards can be applied to each of the many base categories thus tieing them together in such a way that it is relatively equivalent in effectiveness to a singular base category. Your thoughts? --Abnn 23:40, 11 May 2007 (UTC)"

Of course, I am asking Tewfik for an initial attempt, but a standard appropriating naming scheme upon which everyone is in agreement is needed so that it can be referenced in future discussions rather than having a disjointed argument every time the issue comes up. --Abnn 23:43, 11 May 2007 (UTC)

First attempt at a standard naming scheme

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The standard, from what I can tell from Tewfik's comment in the CfD is the following:

  1. Category:National symbols of Palestine to Category:National symbols of the Palestinian National Authority
  2. Category:Elections in Palestine to Category:Elections in the Palestinian National Authority
  1. Category:Airlines of Palestine to Category:Airlines in the Palestinian territories
  2. Category:Aviation in Palestine to Category:Aviation in the Palestinian territories
  3. Category:Sport in Palestine to Category:Sport in the Palestinian territories
  • Topics related to one of the two main regional divisions, West Bank and the Gaza Strip, should make use of those restricted regional terms, for example:
  1. Category:Palestinian refugee camps in the Gaza Strip

And I guess I should add one more:

  • Topics related to individual people or products of those people should use the term "Palestinians", for example:
  1. Category:Palestinian politicians
  2. Category:Palestinian musicians

I also now notice that there is no base category Category:Palestinian National Authority, I'll create that now. --Abnn 01:28, 12 May 2007 (UTC)

Sounds broadly sensible to me, though of course there's going to be fuzziness between those classes: do the "national symbols" relate to the PNA, the territories, or to the people? Could be argued to be any of these. The PNA's status as a government-that-isn't-quite, and the lack of correspondance in geographical matters between the first two also complicates matters. Alai 02:11, 12 May 2007 (UTC)

Why is this list completely restricted to the Palestinian National Authority and the West Bank and Gaza?

Where do places like occupied East Jerusalem and the Seam Zone go? (i.e. places that are neither under the control of the PA, nor in Israel whose borders in any case are undefined)

Where do places like Nazareth and Umm al-Fahm go? (i.e. cities with a majority or totally Palestinian population currently located in Israel)

Where do places like Amqa and Al-Zeeb go? (i.e. villages that were depopulated and destroyed during the war of 1948 but tend to be located within what is now claimed by Israel, even though they are no longer physcially present)

Where do articles like Palestine, Canaanites, etc., fit in? (i.e. articles related to Palestinian history?)

Where do articles on Land Day and October 2000 events go? (i.e. political events that involve Palestinian Arab citizens of Israel)

While I appreciate the attempt at categorization, it's very narrow and doesn't deal with almost half of the articles related to Palestine. It needs more work that addresses these complex and important issues. Tiamut 09:03, 12 May 2007 (UTC)

Good points. Is there already an Category:Israeli Arabs category or equivalent? That would cover the East Jerusalem, Nazareth, Umm al-Fahm, Land Day and the October 2000 events and it is a logical category to have. Palestine, Amqa and Al-Zeeb could be covered by Category:Palestinian history or a subcategory of that group. Canaanites? I personally do not know how well established this group is connected to modern day Palestinians, but if there are sufficient references that establish this connection than it could be worked into Category:Palestinian history. Is there a Palestinian history article yet? (I am also thinking that we need a template that explains the category structure and that we place such a template on a lot of the category pages in order to help people navigate through this unique situation with ease.) --Abnn 17:33, 12 May 2007 (UTC)
Tiamut, you also bring up a few more points on the CfD:
"1. Category:National symbols of Palestine to Category:National symbols of the Palestinian National Authority
2. Well over half the Palestinian population does not live in the West Bank and Gaza Strip but that does not mean that they do not have national symbols. Where does the PLO fit it here? It predates the Palestinian Authority and is still operating. Where do other Diaspora groups go?
3. Category:Elections in Palestine to Category:Elections in the Palestinian National Authority
4. What about electoral politics related to Diaspora organization like the PLO or the Hamas-leadership in Syria?
5. Category:Sport in Palestine to Category:Sport in the Palestinian territories
6. What about Palestinian Olympic teams and other Palestinian sports figures who are made up of not just people from the Palestinian territories but from the Diaspora as well?"
For #2, I would argue that we have the Category:Palestinian nationalism that suffices. For #4, I would argue that we have the general Category:Palestinian politics category. If that isn't sufficient we could add both a Category:Palestinian diaspora and a Category:Palestinian diaspora politics category. For #6, I would recommend a category like Category:Palestinian athletes. What do you think? --Abnn 17:40, 12 May 2007 (UTC)
In a related move, I just nominated Category:Israeli Arabs for a speedy renaming to Category:Arab citizens of Israel per Tiamut's concerns on the talk page of that category, which I agree with. --Abnn 19:17, 12 May 2007 (UTC)
Should something also be done about the Israeli people by occupation category? Currently, we have for example Azmi Bishara in Category:Israeli politicians, which is itself inside Category:Jewish politicians. I've raised this point before but forgot about it since I didn't get any response... nadav 19:45, 12 May 2007 (UTC)
Yeah, that seems inaccurate. "Israeli politicians" and "Jewish politicians" should be separate, although I can imagine a "Jewish Israeli politicians" and a "Arab Israeli politicians" category existing at some point. --Abnn 19:54, 12 May 2007 (UTC)
Pretty much all of Abnn's suggestions here make sense, and I've already moved to support at Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Speedy. TewfikTalk 02:38, 13 May 2007 (UTC)
Please see my comments at the category discussion page. I really do not understand the haste to rename these categories. I am asking that we slow down and discuss the complexities and nuances of such a broad sweeping change further. (exception: Arab citizens of Israel should be renamed per Abnn's comments there; i.e. the main page on the subject is titled as such.)Tiamut 10:58, 13 May 2007 (UTC)
My thoughts are that once we nail done a consistent scheme we can rename the categories again, there isn't a major need to halt this one. This isn't necessarily the final renaming, everything on Wikipedia tends to be transient. It would be nice though if Humus sapiens brought up issues dealing with the Palestinian categories on the Palestinian noticeboard first in the future, then we can hammer out the details and consistency issues prior to putting together the CfD. That's probably the lesson here. --Abnn 17:37, 13 May 2007 (UTC)
While everything is transient, there is no need to set bad precedents with a hasty naming scheme that overlooks the nuances and complexities of the geographical and political situation. Further while you may not be familiar with User:Humus Sapiens, I am and I don't think his proposal is made to improve Palestinian categorization systems. He has a strong POV on these issues and even voted for the deletion of the Template:Palestinians, so it's no surprise that he didn't bother informing anyone at wikiproject of his proposal. Tiamut 09:08, 14 May 2007 (UTC)
Tiamut, one thing that I am good at is judging the consequents of the actions of individuals separately that the reputation of those individuals. The fact that Humus sapiens voted to delete the Template:Palestinians is disheartening, but not surprising, as pretending the Palestinians doesn't exist is something very common among certain demographics. This specific category renaming action by itself seems appropriate and I think that if it encourages us to create a template to properly tie together the disparate root categories, than it is a very good thing, thus I support it. One has to be careful of judging people only on their reputation, and it can lead to knee jerk responses that can be self defeating (as it makes one look like one elevates vindictiveness above even judgment), although it is hard in situations like this. --Abnn 15:00, 14 May 2007 (UTC)
My arguments against the renaming are only marginally, if at all, related to my knowledge of Humus sapiens editing techniques and positions, though your advice is duly noted. Tiamut 02:25, 21 May 2007 (UTC)
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