Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Indigenous peoples of North America

Nomination of List of honorary Native Americans for deletion

A discussion is taking place as to whether the article List of honorary Native Americans is suitable for inclusion in Wikipedia according to Wikipedia's policies and guidelines or whether it should be deleted.

The article will be discussed at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of honorary Native Americans until a consensus is reached, and anyone is welcome to contribute to the discussion. The nomination will explain the policies and guidelines which are of concern. The discussion focuses on high-quality evidence and our policies and guidelines.

Users may edit the article during the discussion, including to improve the article to address concerns raised in the discussion. However, do not remove the article-for-deletion notice from the top of the article.

New Article Spelling

I'd like to see a stub article about this:

Wonchala - A Lakota idea that: We're thrown into a world of forces that we can't control, of powers that are much greater than us, and that we have this awareness that we're just small little humans beings, with so little influence on what's going on around us — when we start from there we then realise the it's up to us to make meaning and purpose out of this crazy world, to make something happen and create a story that is heroic, and takes the chaos into which we're throne and turns it into something beautiful, something that reduces suffering, something that crates pattern and order, something that we're proud to be apart of.

I think the spelling of "Wonchala" needs correcting? I tried searching online for the right spelling, though couldn't find anything. Does anyone know what the correct spelling is?

Tribal Leader Page for Saracen

working on this page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Ogahpah/subpage which hopefully will became a page on a historic tribal leader named Saracen.

If anyone is willing, please give a look over and provide any comments or help you can, so that it can be submitted and approved.

Thank you very much.

Ogahpah (talk) 14:17, 24 September 2018 (UTC)

Citations needed

See [1].Citation bombing but most are legitimate. He put one fact tag on clearly sourced material and reverted sourced material with sn edit summary about edits being unverifiable although the sources were obviously verifiable. Doug Weller talk 06:04, 7 October 2018 (UTC)

Terminology

It would be awesome if this project could provide a guideline or recommendation as to terms, both general ("Native American" or "American Indian") and specific ("Blackfeet", not "Blackfoot"). Presumably it could be supported by citations and quotations. Hyacinth (talk) 19:00, 13 October 2018 (UTC)

Usage is generational and regional. When possible, we state the person's Nation. When talking in more general terms, we use what is in the sources. Older Natives and those from the Plains tend to say "Indian." Younger folks and those from the PNW and East Coast tend to say, "Native." Younger than that often prefer, "Indigenous," but Indigenous is a worldwide term and not specific to one continent. Many people don't like terms that include "American." There is no universal consensus, but this is not a reason to change established usage unless there is consensus. Recent attempts, including the IP edits, were not improvements and tended to break links and just create unnecessary work for those of us who maintain these articles. Reverting established usage of "Native American" to "American Indian" (As Hyacinth has been doing) is generally perceived as regressive, rather than an improvement. As to members of the Blackfoot Confederacy, et al, again, stick with Nation and WP:RS sources, which for Indigenous topics are primarily those from community leaders within the culture. These guidelines, and this chart from the Native American Journalists Association may help. - CorbieV ^☊ ☼ 21:45, 13 October 2018 (UTC)

P.S. As Wikipedians, our job is not to set policy on terminology. We can only document what is in the sources. - CorbieV ^☊ ☼ 22:16, 13 October 2018 (UTC)

I believe the term Indian or American Indian is fine when the sentence is a quote from the past like from Fredrick Douglas or whoever vs. using the term passively because again yes I strongly agree that it is generational, but the younger you go the more the term Indian or American Indian is seen as a form of racism or disrespect no different than more African Americans would be insulted if they were called Negro. Also to that the term "native", "Native American", and "Indigenous" seems to really be accepted on an individual level just like some are okay with the interchange of Black or African American. You will find some that either term is fine, others prefer black while other prefer African American. Indigenous usually from my experience is used to describe all of the New World, but seems to be way more commonly used in Canada when they prefer that over First Nations.Mcelite (talk) 22:04, 13 October 2018 (UTC)

I'd agree with CorbieV on this. Wikipedia is primarily descriptive rather than prescriptive. That is, it summarizes information from reliable sources and doesn't (and shouldn't) attempt to create standardization where there is none among reliable sources used in the citations for articles. This follows the no original research policy. Prescriptive policies would suggest editors dictate and enforce standard based on personal opinion. That would create friction between editors and result in more edit wars. I think the Native American Journalists Assoc. guidelines are good. Cheers, Mark Ironie (talk) 22:39, 13 October 2018 (UTC)

Thanks for weighing in, folks. I'd appreciate more eyes on one of the incidents that set this in motion: Template talk:Native American dances#Why was this moved? Thanks. - CorbieV ^☊ ☼ 19:33, 14 October 2018 (UTC)

I agree that it would be helpful to develop such a guideline. As Wikipedians, it certainly is our job to set guidelines on how terminology is used on Wikipedia. See for example MOS:MORMON and MOS:HAWAII § Hawaiian and Hawaii. Those guidelines should be informed primarily by how terminology is used in reliable sources. The NAJA style guide and other journalistic style guides may be a good starting point. Toohool (talk) 19:39, 30 October 2018 (UTC)

Good idea. I'll get on it. Updating Native American Journalists Association (NAJA) links to archived versions: Reporter's Indigenous Terminology Guide and Evaluating Indigenous Sources. They also have a new AP Style Guide (PDF) that, just reading it now, covers some of the same material, and some new ground, as well. - CorbieV ^☊ ☼ 22:25, 18 December 2018 (UTC)

Talk:Native American use of fire#Article needs to be renamed/moved

Could use some input. Reasons on talk page. Not thrilled with the names I've thought of so far. There's got to be something pithier and more apt. And yes, what was there was pretty dreadful. It still needs more cleanup. Please go for it. - CorbieV ^☊ ☼ 21:01, 9 November 2018 (UTC)

Featured quality source review RFC

Editors in this WikiProject may be interested in the featured quality source review RFC that has been ongoing. It would change the featured article candidate process (FAC) so that source reviews would need to occur prior to any other reviews for FAC. Your comments are appreciated. --IznoRepeat (talk) 21:48, 11 November 2018 (UTC)

Talk:Sterilization of Native American women#Rename / Page Move

Very few articles link to it. I've done some cleanup and want to rename before adding it to templates. Could use some input. Have added First Nations sourcing and brought it into the present. Previous version had past-tensing and title didn't conform with sourcing that this is forced/coerced sterilization that is still going on. If no objections will probably move to Forced sterilization of Indigenous women in North America, just because it's shorter than, "In the United States and Canada". - CorbieV ^☊ ☼ 21:24, 14 November 2018 (UTC)

Show Indians

Needs serious help. Did a bit of cleanup on Wild West shows, but that's not great, either. - CorbieV ^☊ ☼ 23:53, 24 November 2018 (UTC)

Red Haircrow

This article is being considered for deletion due to a potential lack of notability. The individual is a German-born writer who claims to be Chiricahua Apache, Cherokee, and African-American. Most links were recently removed for being self-promotional. Yuchitown (talk) 16:46, 7 December 2018 (UTC)Yuchitown

Newly-created Template:Native American topics sidebar being added to articles

Newly-created and being added to articles: Template:Native American topics sidebar - CorbieV ^☊ ☼ 22:16, 15 December 2018 (UTC)

Nomination of List of Native American women artists for deletion

A discussion is taking place as to whether the article List of Native American women artists is suitable for inclusion in Wikipedia according to Wikipedia's policies and guidelines or whether it should be deleted.

The article will be discussed at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of Native American women artists until a consensus is reached, and anyone, including you, is welcome to contribute to the discussion. The nomination will explain the policies and guidelines which are of concern. The discussion focuses on high-quality evidence and our policies and guidelines.

Users may edit the article during the discussion, including to improve the article to address concerns raised in the discussion. However, do not remove the article-for-deletion notice from the top of the article. Yuchitown (talk) 17:05, 16 December 2018 (UTC)Yuchitown

List of people of self-identified Cherokee ancestry

This is the most insane thing I've seen happen on Wikipedia. A crew of editors concerned about Elizabeth Warren appearing on List of people of self-identified Cherokee ancestry nominated and voted for it to be deleted. None of them had ever contributed to a Native article before and clearly were unfamiliar with Native issues, legal rights, or history. People who actually did edit Native articles voted to keep (not because it's a pleasant subject but because the discussion of non-Native people posing a specifically Cherokees among all the tribes merits discussion and is widely published about. Intead of "no consensus" (which would have been appropriate), some editor who also didn't previously edit Native articles decided to delete.

Conversation here: Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of people of self-identified Cherokee ancestry. Now the editor is purging every name on a list that feeds into the deleted list; I have no idea what the rationale is. Non-Native people pose as Native people (specifically Cherokee) in vast numbers. I cannot comprehend why non-Native people feel so profoundly uncomfortable or threatened even having the subject discussed. Yuchitown (talk) 02:46, 27 December 2018 (UTC)Yuchitown

This was absolutely unbelievable.Indigenous girl (talk) 04:32, 27 December 2018 (UTC)

That's very unfair, the last time I looked at that article majority of it was cited. Yes, it is the most common tribe cited when a person is talking about their ancestry some are telling the truth, others have native blood but are misrepresenting the tribe, and others don't have any blood and talk about their Cherokee princess great great grandma. I'm going to look at the discussion tomorrow.Mcelite (talk) 05:29, 27 December 2018 (UTC)

Multiracial Americans, Passing (racial identity), redface, and Plastic shaman might all be articles to keep tabs on, since there's some obvious brigading going on out there. Yuchitown (talk)Yuchitown

The closing admin, @Scottywong: clearly looked at !votes by uninformed and brigading !voters; Scotty, I don't think your arguments indicate that you looked at the pre-disruption article history, or that you thoroughly read the AfD itself, including the diffs and links.

• 1. Scottywong wrote:

  the list itself is non-notable because that group or set of things hasn't been discussed in sources.

  As we said on talk, in the AfD, and in the summations that the vandals removed - the phenomena of non-Natives claiming to be Cherokee is widespread and well-documented. Scotty took the "delete" brigaders who removed the sources at their word that there weren't sources, after they'd deleted the WP:RS sources documenting all of this. And then apparently didn't bother to check the "keep"s sources and diffs. These include all the sources on Elizabeth Warren, on Cher, and many others on the list, like Jimmie Durham. And the phenomena itself, listed as external links on the article, and in the AfD: Going 'Native': Why Are Americans Hijacking Cherokee Identity? - VOA News and "Why Do So Many Americans Think They Have Cherokee Blood?" - Slate. The Cherokee Syndrome By Mary Annette Pember. Additionally, the list/article itself has been cited and written about in a WP:RS source: A little bit Cherokee? Elizabeth Warren not alone in ancestry claim May 26, 2012 | By Mitchell Landsberg; since you may not click through, I'll tell you now: the article pre-dates Warren's inclusion in the list. It cites others on the list.
• 2. Scottywong wrote:

  The introductory sentence of this article (as well as some of the keep voters here) implies that the article is intended to be a list of people who have falsely claimed Cherokee ancestry. In order to include people in such a list, we'd need sources that prove the falsehood of their claims, and those sources are not likely to exist in the vast majority of (if not all) cases.

  Everyone who is unenrolled was cited before the vandalism. Pre-vandalism version. I specifically note the closing admin namechecked one of the most disruptive editors. All Scotty needs to do is go back to the pre-vandalism version of the list, and read the diffs Marc Ironie provided for the disruptive editing of the very user Scotty namechecks in the closing. - CorbieV ^☊ ☼ 19:43, 28 December 2018 (UTC)

NorthBySouthBaranof is following me around Wiki trying to revert; perhaps in working with these articles, she/he will learn something about Native identity and enrollment. Yuchitown (talk) 20:45, 28 December 2018 (UTC)Yuchitown

There are so many irregularities in the closing and even the cleanup after the closing. Scottywong (talk · contribs) removed about 20 instances of the list appearing on other pages but also mentions of Cherokee and Cherokee descent, even when citations were attached. Then reverted himself on those 20 so a different editor could remove the redlink within the next hour. This AfD and related edits are almost the only thing he's done after 2 months off WP. This appears to be a closing done in collusion with the delete crew, some of which were in obvious collusion. I'm slightly on the fence about whether a list is the best format specifying these people but I'm certain that the AfD and related concurrent edits to the list were coordinated off-wiki. I can't find a WP page on this specifically but it is an abuse of process in my opinion. I'll just end with this Deletion review link. Cheers, Mark Ironie (talk) 21:44, 28 December 2018 (UTC)

I am happy to disabuse you of the notion that anything was "coordinated off-wiki." I have had zero off-wiki communication regarding this matter with anyone. A retraction of this false allegation would be appreciated. NorthBySouthBaranof (talk) 01:37, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

See also WP:HOUNDING - CorbieV ^☊ ☼ 22:16, 28 December 2018 (UTC)

I've decided this AfD is worth getting a deletion review. In preparation, I've left a message on User:Scottywong's talk page here, asking him to review his closing. This is a recommended first step before filing an actual request for review. I also linked/pointed at this discussion. I don't expect a response but, hey, it would be nice having my expectations proved wrong. Cheers, Mark Ironie (talk) 01:14, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

This is the best step. If the page can be restored it can easily be cleaned up by removing anyone that was in the list that doesn't have a citation. To my knowledge that list was created for people that have Cherokee blood, or people that claim it whether they were enrolled or not. (Not everyone that actually is Cherokee by blood can get enrolled) I think that's the best solution so the article doesn't face this kind of deletion again.Mcelite (talk) 02:04, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

Not that everyone that actually is Cherokee by blood can get enrolled. And here you cut to the heart of the issue. Not being enrolled in a tribe is not defining of someone's ancestry or heritage. I shouldn't have to go into the issues of what "blood quantum" can ever even mean, or how tangled the webs of the human family tree get. An article entitled "List of people of Cherokee ancestry" who are verifiably described in reliable sources as being of Cherokee ancestry would not be objectionable (to me, I can't speak for other AfD !voters). That's a different article entirely than the one which was deleted, which contained people who reliable sources described as *not* being of Cherokee ancestry! "Self-described Cherokee ancestry" opens up huge sourcing and verifiability issues, creates an implied doubt in the title even if unwarranted in certain cases and sets the stage for arguments about whose claims are legitimate and whose aren't - which is not what lists are good for. NorthBySouthBaranof (talk) 02:13, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

"Not that everyone that actually is Cherokee by blood can get enrolled." No one disagrees or has disagreed with that statement at any point. Descendants of John Rollin Ridge can't enroll; many descendants of people on the 1835 Henderson Roll and the 1848 Murray Roll can't enroll in the three tribes. However, almost none of these people Wikipedia articles and have made verifiable statements of their heritage. An exception would be Native people enrolled in other tribes who are of Cherokee descent but who do not identify as being Cherokee; they identify with the tribe with which they are enrolled. On a separate tack, we cannot prove on Wikipedia (or anywhere else) that Cher, Wayne Newton, or Elvis Presley have Cherokee descent, but we can prove that they have, at least at some point in their careers, identified as being of Cherokee descent. Yuchitown (talk) 17:07, 29 December 2018 (UTC)Yuchitown

And my point is that the latter is not a notable list; merely self-identifying as something creates a list which is overbroad and unuseful. It lumps together people who verifiably are described in reliable sources as having some Cherokee ancestry with people who verifiably are described in reliable sources as lying about their purported ancestry. We should rely on reliable sources to create a list only of the former. The latter would be a separate list, "List of people who have falsely claimed Cherokee ancestry," or something of the like. NorthBySouthBaranof (talk) 17:37, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

Our argument has consistently been that this phenomenon is notable with a great deal of literature published in the grey area of Cherokee identity. You do not have access to verifiable, published sources to create two lists (unenrolled people with actual Cherokee ancestry and people who claim Cherokee ancestry without having any). Lying is an inaccurate term because people may believe, sincerely if mistakenly, that they are telling the truth. On a parallel discussion, Rachel Dolezel believes with all her heart (as she has published) that she is Black. Yuchitown (talk) 18:37, 29 December 2018 (UTC)Yuchitown

If, as you say, there are not reliable sources sufficient to create these lists, then we simply can't create them and shouldn't have them. Creating an overbroad mish-mash list is not a good solution to not having sufficient sources for two separate lists. We don't list Dolezal in any of our Lists of African Americans because reliable sources don't describe her as African American. NorthBySouthBaranof (talk) 19:35, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

(After edit conflict) And how do you prove that someone has falsely claimed Cherokee ancestry? Short of a confession of lying by the person in question, the best you can say is that the claim is unverified. My grandmother had a 'family history' (two hand-written pages) that indicated that her great-great-great-grandmother was Cherokee. The geneaology enthusiasts in my family have been unable to verify that (although they have verified that a collateral ancestor [putative brother-in-law of that Cherokee woman] did marry a Choctaw). Many families with deep roots in the southeastern US have traditions about Native American ancestors. That such traditions cannot be verified today does not mean that they are not true. Whether people should be claiming such heritage when the ancestor was many generations in the past, is another question. It is comparable to a man I knew who claimed to be a descendant of Thomas Jefferson. So what? I do know that, whether or not I have a distant Cherokee ancestor, it doesn't show in my DNA, and is not part of my identity. - Donald Albury 18:46, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

"And how do you prove that someone has falsely claimed Cherokee ancestry?" IRL it's easy as hell to do, because family stories fall apart so quickly and specifically Cherokee history is so thoroughly documented (a Spanish-American descendant of an Apache would be much more likely and more difficult to research). If you can't identify/name/document the Cherokee ancestor, it is most likely because they are not in fact Cherokee. But this material wouldn't be published because few people are going to openly admit their family stories are wrong or people don't want to publish anything potentially conflicting a claim by a beloved celebrity. Usually the claims get quietly dropped over time. Again, *lying* is seldom an accurate term. Most people are just mistaken or, in the case of Jimmie Durham whose lack of Cherokee ancestry has been proven and published, he is in denial and unlikely to change his views. Like Dolezal, Durham thoroughly believes his own story. Yuchitown (talk) 18:55, 29 December 2018 (UTC)Yuchitown

It's not our job to "prove" anything, merely to report what reliable sources say. If reliable sources generally describe someone's claim as false, we can and should state facts as facts, not opinions. NorthBySouthBaranof (talk) 19:35, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

I would support the article being restored, cleaned, and it being renamed List of people of Cherokee ancestry to avoid anymore controversy. Yuchitown I want you to remember that everyone in the Cherokee nation wasn't documented nor were those that were documented correctly documented. That is why we have issues like the 5 Dollar Indian because you had white people that took advantage of the census process, and had zero native blood. So yes it will be harder to document people with Cherokee ancestry, and documenting was more accurate when they started with tribes like the Navajo because policies "improved" and their history was different. That's why we can't say everyone that can't find a documented ancestor is a liar. Now if they start off with my great great grandma was a Cherokee princess which is an unfortunate thing some white people will say then yes either they're lying about their ancestry, or it's a high probability they are not of Cherokee descent.Mcelite (talk) 21:51, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

NorthBySouthBaranof, the "claim" of Cherokee ancestry is not a self-proving fact. Being Cherokee, both historically and currently, is a matter of sovereign tribal definition. If someone claims to have Cherokee ancestors, then they should be able to name the specific ancestor(s). Constructed identity is not the same as genealogical fact or proof. That is the whole point of the list. In the case of biography of notable people in particular, it seems rare that the official, self-written bio information appended to their work is questioned. Claiming Cherokee ancestry is not some black box, unverifiable or unknowable. It is knowable and verifiable. I've also noted conflation of reliable with verifiable sources on this issue. While the two are usually closely associated, they are not the same thing. This is particularly true of claims of Cherokee identity and heritage when there isn't even a bare minimum of verification, only the bald claim itself. This is not some semantic difference between the two policies but goes to the heart of why they are separate policies. Historical Cherokee genealogy is extremely well-documented, particularly from the Trail of Tears period forward, so claiming Cherokee ancestry is indeed verifiable without violating No Original Research. As to my point above about possible coordination between some of the "delete" editors on the AfD, please note I did not provide specific names. I'm holding onto the evidence for the deletion review. It will be up to the review to determine whether the basis is sound or better suited to a different WP forum/venue for determination. As for your particular bias in the matter, you've spoken of it more than once. It's also abundantly clear that you are engaging in hounding some participants in the AfD as well as re-arguing it on other talk pages such as here. Of course, you're free to do so but the AfD is closed. Cheers, Mark Ironie (talk) 21:56, 29 December 2018 (UTC)