Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2023 January 3

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January 3

Category:Lists of statues of presidents of the United States

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's
talk page or in a deletion review
). No further edits should be made to this section.
The result of the discussion was: rename Timrollpickering (talk) 19:07, 10 January 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Nominator's rationale: Per parent article, List of sculptures of presidents of the United States. All statues are sculptures, but not all sculptures are statues. ---Another Believer (Talk) 16:05, 3 January 2023 (UTC)[reply]
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's
talk page or in a deletion review
). No further edits should be made to this section.

Category:Films set in farms

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's
talk page or in a deletion review
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The result of the discussion was: Rename Timrollpickering (talk) 19:07, 10 January 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Nominator's rationale: The clear common usage is on a farm, not in a farm. -- Necrothesp (talk) 10:53, 3 January 2023 (UTC)[reply]
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's
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Academics in Europe

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's
talk page or in a deletion review
). No further edits should be made to this section.
The result of the discussion was: Option 1 (Academic staff). There was weak consensus for academic staff over academic personnel.
(non-admin closure) Qwerfjkltalk 20:02, 11 January 2023 (UTC)[reply
]
The amended list of renames as implemented is at Wikipedia talk:Categories for discussion/Log/2023 January 3. – Fayenatic London 09:02, 12 January 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Procedural nomination for renaming categories previously discussed at Wikipedia:Categories_for_discussion/Log/2022_October_3#Academic_personnel_in_Europe, for all categories of academics in Europe excluding UK and Ireland.
I found consensus in favour of "academics" rather than "faculty" or "academic personnel", and closed that discussion as use names beginning "Academics of", e.g. Category:Academics of Aleksandër Moisiu University, inserting "the" in specified cases e.g. Category:Academics of the University of Paris.
Following that close I implemented renaming of countries beginning with A, but suspended implementation as the CFD close was taken to review at Wikipedia:Move review/Log/2022 October. That review partially endorsed the close and called for a further discussion to choose between Option 1 – Academics of Foo University, following the accepted format for UK and Ireland; or Option 2 – Foo University academics.
Examples for Option 1 – Academics of Foo University
Examples for Option 2 – Foo University academics
The full list of nominated categories (showing option 1) is at Wikipedia talk:Categories for discussion/Log/2022 October 3. This now includes relisting those for Finland, as the result of Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2022 July 30#Faculty by university or college in Finland was overturned by the subsequent CFD & this was upheld by the Move review. – Fayenatic London 13:38, 26 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Note: It should be taken as read that Alumni categories will be nominated to match in due course. – Fayenatic London 16:29, 26 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
If it's helpful for those outside the US, at many US institutions "academic" used as an adjective when referring to jobs often refers to people who work in specific units i.e., in "academic affairs" as opposed to "student affairs," auxiliary operations. But within those units that are classified as "academic affairs" there are many people who work in jobs that are common outside of academia e.g., human resources, information technology, physical plant maintenance. For a more concrete example, my current position is in a unit that reports to my university's provost so I work in academic affairs and many people would classify me as "academic staff" although I am not a faculty member.
My sense is that there may not be a good set of universally understood labels that work for all subjects and all readers. If that is the case, it seems best to use labels that are reasonable and then clearly explain the membership of the category to help readers and editors understand what we mean with the chosen label. If we can do that then "Academics of __" seems like a reasonable label for us to use. ElKevbo (talk) 20:56, 29 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
I came across https://www.lawinsider.com/dictionary/academic-staff which seems to be useful for an overview of formal English usage. It's apparent from there that US usage is distinct from the rest of the world, and there's examples there from Australia, India, UK, Zimbabwe, Jamaica, Kenya, Ethiopia, Canada, South Africa, Malaysia, Ireland and elsewhere. Hopefully, this is also a relevant indication of common, vernacular usage. Let's assume that it is and think about the worst case - is the proportion of readers of these categories who are only familiar with the US usage and unfamiliar with non-US usage so large that it's a violation of
WP:PLA? Would the average reader be shocked, surprised, or confused by what they read? If we're on the fence about what's "average reader" here, could explanatory notes in category content suffice to make this tolerable? --Joy [shallot] (talk) 10:32, 1 January 2023 (UTC)[reply
]
To me this comment appears to be a combination "lots of people don't follow the American practice of using faculty" (to which I agree) and "therefore it's ok that we use wording that is actively hostile to American readers" (to which I do not). I'm still not seeing any effort at
MOS:COMMONALITY. —David Eppstein (talk) 06:59, 3 January 2023 (UTC)[reply
]
Why would using "academic staff" be actively hostile to American readers? Unfamiliar, possibly confusing if they're part of American academia and used to its terminology, but actively hostile seems like a big stretch. Let's consider what might be common use cases:
a) a reader reads about a European professor, and notices "Academic staff of Lund University" - do they ignore what they read in the article content and assume the person was not a teacher there, which would be astonishing?
b) a reader arrives at Category:ETH Zurich and notices a link to "Academic staff of ETH Zurich" (next to the alumni category) - do they think that there is no category for what they know as 'faculty' and fail to click through, which would mean the category navigation was a failure?
Both of these seem like they're possible, but not very likely for the average reader. Even for readers aware of American academia terminology, it seems a bit odd to assume they can't infer any of this from context. --Joy (talk) 09:44, 3 January 2023 (UTC)[reply]
  • Option 1, because the subjects are academics so that should take primary prominence (i.e. it should come first), whereas the institution they work for is secondary. WaggersTALK 13:40, 30 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
  • Prefer Academic personnel of... as it is the phrasing that seems to clash less with any other meaning, whatever the variety of English. Place Clichy (talk) 22:04, 30 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
  • Prefer Academic staff of... but no objection to "personnel" or option 1 or option 2. When we investigated this some months ago, I checked in a couple of European languages and found that the American usage of "faculty" for personnel was alien to Europe. Peterkingiron (talk) 15:21, 31 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
  • Prefer Academic staff of... (as a US person, where I've been credentialed as visiting academic staff at several universities in the past). Otherwise, Option 1 for preferential voting. No vote for Option 2.
    William Allen Simpson (talk) 06:43, 3 January 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Relisting comment: Currently there seems to be consensus for option 1, insofar that it is something of university, though not necessarily academics. There is consensus for either "Academics of" or "Academic staff of". The argument against academics is that it is ambiguous and UK-centric, meaning scholarly work in America. The argument against academic staff is that staff in America refers to non-professor staff, and therefore academic staff refers to staff working on the academic side of things.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Qwerfjkltalk 09:09, 3 January 2023 (UTC)[reply]

The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's
talk page or in a deletion review
). No further edits should be made to this section.

Category:American sportspeople of European descent

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's
talk page or in a deletion review
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The result of the discussion was: Delete all Timrollpickering (talk) 19:09, 10 January 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Nominator's rationale:
WP:CSD#G4: re-creation of Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2011 February 16#Category:American sportspeople of European descent. Because this is nearly 12 years old, Liz
requested re-listing here.
Nominator's rationale:
WP:CSD#G4
re-creations as above, currently re-nominated for deletion, at which point these should all become empty.
William Allen Simpson (talk) 07:46, 3 January 2023 (UTC)[reply]
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's
talk page or in a deletion review
). No further edits should be made to this section.

Category:Sunni Muslim communities

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's
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The result of the discussion was: Merge Timrollpickering (talk) 19:10, 10 January 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Nominator's rationale: upmerge, redundant category layer with only one subcategory. Most countries do not require a Sunni communities subcategory, in case Sunni are in the majority anyway. Marcocapelle (talk) 07:29, 3 January 2023 (UTC)[reply]
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's
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Category:Box-office bombs

The following is an archived discussion concerning one or more categories. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on an appropriate discussion page (such as the category's
talk page or in a deletion review
). No further edits should be made to this section.
The result of the discussion was: Delete Timrollpickering (talk) 19:11, 10 January 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Nominator's rationale: There are several problems with such a category:
  1. The term is highly subjective and we would end up with endless RFCs about whether this film or that film should be added to the category.
  2. Profit/loss analysis is not widely available for most films. We do have a list of big flops at List of biggest box-office bombs and I think a list is better for this sort of thing where sources can be provided.
  3. Unless it is something like
    WP:CATDEF
    . While Heaven's Gate would undoubtedly qualify for such a category, can the same be said about The Shawshank Redemption or Vertigo ?
These types of list have been routinely deleted in the past:
To my knowledge there has been no fundamental shift of opinion. For example, by the same reasoning, we don't have a "Blockbusters" catgeory for films like Star Wars and Titanic. Betty Logan (talk) 04:38, 3 January 2023 (UTC)[reply]
The above is preserved as an archive of the discussion. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the category's
talk page or in a deletion review
). No further edits should be made to this section.
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