Feminist SF Wiki talk:Categorization/Defaults - Revision history

Lquilter: sort

2009-03-09T16:39:47Z

sort

← Older revision		Revision as of 09:39, 9 March 2009
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	I tend to want messier information, so while I see the value in structuring Categories, I still long for free tagging. I think we should have categories explicitly spelled out, named, because then the information is more portable to other areas. More categories is fine and I'm also okay with redundant categories. I'm facing the same issues as I try to outline a women writers wiki and whether I want to say "latin american writers" and then "uruguayan writers." I had started without identifying gender (i.e. assuming the default is that all people are women...) But now I think I might id people as women (as most if not all will be) in case I ever want to move the information somewhere else. If you have the tag or category, you can change it later. But adding it back in is laborious. So I'd say don't delete gender tags!--[[User:Liz Henry\|Liz Henry]] 17:29, 24 March 2007 (PDT)		I tend to want messier information, so while I see the value in structuring Categories, I still long for free tagging. I think we should have categories explicitly spelled out, named, because then the information is more portable to other areas. More categories is fine and I'm also okay with redundant categories. I'm facing the same issues as I try to outline a women writers wiki and whether I want to say "latin american writers" and then "uruguayan writers." I had started without identifying gender (i.e. assuming the default is that all people are women...) But now I think I might id people as women (as most if not all will be) in case I ever want to move the information somewhere else. If you have the tag or category, you can change it later. But adding it back in is laborious. So I'd say don't delete gender tags!--[[User:Liz Henry\|Liz Henry]] 17:29, 24 March 2007 (PDT)


			[[category:FSFwiki admin index\|{{PAGENAME}}]]

Contributor: Reply

2007-03-26T17:52:31Z

← Older revision		Revision as of 10:52, 26 March 2007
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	::: Quick response - Actually I did have [[:Category:Male x]] but started deleting all the gender categories and tags, and got thru male first ... then decided would be better to have discussion on the whole issue. So there is definitely no consistency in categorizing right now, but the gender thing is ''not'' because the default is male ... More on other stuff later after I've had more time to process. --[[User:Lquilter\|LQ]] 19:14, 23 March 2007 (PDT)		::: Quick response - Actually I did have [[:Category:Male x]] but started deleting all the gender categories and tags, and got thru male first ... then decided would be better to have discussion on the whole issue. So there is definitely no consistency in categorizing right now, but the gender thing is ''not'' because the default is male ... More on other stuff later after I've had more time to process. --[[User:Lquilter\|LQ]] 19:14, 23 March 2007 (PDT)

			:: Aha! Things become clearer. Slow thoughful responses are fine by me. :-) New issue: I tend to stick to wikipedia style indentation on talk pages, i.e. if I start as two indents then I remain at two indents as the conversation progresses, or would you prefer to read ever increasing diagonal indents because there are fewer people here so we won't reach the right hand margin too quickly? [[User:Contributor\|Contributor]] 10:52, 26 March 2007 (PDT)

	I tend to want messier information, so while I see the value in structuring Categories, I still long for free tagging. I think we should have categories explicitly spelled out, named, because then the information is more portable to other areas. More categories is fine and I'm also okay with redundant categories. I'm facing the same issues as I try to outline a women writers wiki and whether I want to say "latin american writers" and then "uruguayan writers." I had started without identifying gender (i.e. assuming the default is that all people are women...) But now I think I might id people as women (as most if not all will be) in case I ever want to move the information somewhere else. If you have the tag or category, you can change it later. But adding it back in is laborious. So I'd say don't delete gender tags!--[[User:Liz Henry\|Liz Henry]] 17:29, 24 March 2007 (PDT)		I tend to want messier information, so while I see the value in structuring Categories, I still long for free tagging. I think we should have categories explicitly spelled out, named, because then the information is more portable to other areas. More categories is fine and I'm also okay with redundant categories. I'm facing the same issues as I try to outline a women writers wiki and whether I want to say "latin american writers" and then "uruguayan writers." I had started without identifying gender (i.e. assuming the default is that all people are women...) But now I think I might id people as women (as most if not all will be) in case I ever want to move the information somewhere else. If you have the tag or category, you can change it later. But adding it back in is laborious. So I'd say don't delete gender tags!--[[User:Liz Henry\|Liz Henry]] 17:29, 24 March 2007 (PDT)

Liz Henry at 00:29, 25 March 2007

2007-03-25T00:29:09Z

← Older revision		Revision as of 17:29, 24 March 2007
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	::: Quick response - Actually I did have [[:Category:Male x]] but started deleting all the gender categories and tags, and got thru male first ... then decided would be better to have discussion on the whole issue. So there is definitely no consistency in categorizing right now, but the gender thing is ''not'' because the default is male ... More on other stuff later after I've had more time to process. --[[User:Lquilter\|LQ]] 19:14, 23 March 2007 (PDT)		::: Quick response - Actually I did have [[:Category:Male x]] but started deleting all the gender categories and tags, and got thru male first ... then decided would be better to have discussion on the whole issue. So there is definitely no consistency in categorizing right now, but the gender thing is ''not'' because the default is male ... More on other stuff later after I've had more time to process. --[[User:Lquilter\|LQ]] 19:14, 23 March 2007 (PDT)

	I tend to want messier information, so while I see the value in structuring Categories, I still long for free tagging. I think we should have categories explicitly spelled out, named, because then the information is more portable to other areas. More categories is fine and I'm also okay with redundant categories. I'm facing the same issues as I try to outline a women writers wiki and whether I want to say "latin american writers" and then "uruguayan writers." I had started without identifying gender (i.e. assuming the default is that all people are women...) But now I think I might id people as women (as most if not all will be) in case I ever want to move the information somewhere else. If you have the tag or category, you can change it later. But adding it back in is laborious. So I'd say don't delete gender tags!		I tend to want messier information, so while I see the value in structuring Categories, I still long for free tagging. I think we should have categories explicitly spelled out, named, because then the information is more portable to other areas. More categories is fine and I'm also okay with redundant categories. I'm facing the same issues as I try to outline a women writers wiki and whether I want to say "latin american writers" and then "uruguayan writers." I had started without identifying gender (i.e. assuming the default is that all people are women...) But now I think I might id people as women (as most if not all will be) in case I ever want to move the information somewhere else. If you have the tag or category, you can change it later. But adding it back in is laborious. So I'd say don't delete gender tags!--[[User:Liz Henry\|Liz Henry]] 17:29, 24 March 2007 (PDT)

Liz Henry at 00:28, 25 March 2007

2007-03-25T00:28:49Z

← Older revision		Revision as of 17:28, 24 March 2007
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	::: Quick response - Actually I did have [[:Category:Male x]] but started deleting all the gender categories and tags, and got thru male first ... then decided would be better to have discussion on the whole issue. So there is definitely no consistency in categorizing right now, but the gender thing is ''not'' because the default is male ... More on other stuff later after I've had more time to process. --[[User:Lquilter\|LQ]] 19:14, 23 March 2007 (PDT)		::: Quick response - Actually I did have [[:Category:Male x]] but started deleting all the gender categories and tags, and got thru male first ... then decided would be better to have discussion on the whole issue. So there is definitely no consistency in categorizing right now, but the gender thing is ''not'' because the default is male ... More on other stuff later after I've had more time to process. --[[User:Lquilter\|LQ]] 19:14, 23 March 2007 (PDT)

			I tend to want messier information, so while I see the value in structuring Categories, I still long for free tagging. I think we should have categories explicitly spelled out, named, because then the information is more portable to other areas. More categories is fine and I'm also okay with redundant categories. I'm facing the same issues as I try to outline a women writers wiki and whether I want to say "latin american writers" and then "uruguayan writers." I had started without identifying gender (i.e. assuming the default is that all people are women...) But now I think I might id people as women (as most if not all will be) in case I ever want to move the information somewhere else. If you have the tag or category, you can change it later. But adding it back in is laborious. So I'd say don't delete gender tags!

Lquilter: more

2007-03-24T02:14:28Z

← Older revision		Revision as of 19:14, 23 March 2007
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	:: From a purely personal point of view I have problems with lists because I'm dyslexic and trying to read long lists in some formats makes me feel literally dizzy and nauseated so I have an inbuilt bias against lists and in favour of categories (other dyslexics will have different experiences). [[User:Contributor\|Contributor]] 14:16, 23 March 2007 (PDT)		:: From a purely personal point of view I have problems with lists because I'm dyslexic and trying to read long lists in some formats makes me feel literally dizzy and nauseated so I have an inbuilt bias against lists and in favour of categories (other dyslexics will have different experiences). [[User:Contributor\|Contributor]] 14:16, 23 March 2007 (PDT)

			::: Quick response - Actually I did have [[:Category:Male x]] but started deleting all the gender categories and tags, and got thru male first ... then decided would be better to have discussion on the whole issue. So there is definitely no consistency in categorizing right now, but the gender thing is ''not'' because the default is male ... More on other stuff later after I've had more time to process. --[[User:Lquilter\|LQ]] 19:14, 23 March 2007 (PDT)

Contributor: Added comma for sense

2007-03-23T21:18:10Z

Added comma for sense

← Older revision		Revision as of 14:18, 23 March 2007
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	: On the ethnic and other identity issues -- lists are really better indexes than categories for this kind of thing, because you can reference, cite, explain, and do subheads and sorting as appropriate. (Lists let you handle grey areas better too.) And it avoids the potential for ghettoizing, which categories can create; even if there's a policy to redundantly categorize ("writers" and "african american writers") people will inadvertently just diffuse people and not redundantly categorize). And finally, to the extent that "categories" function as "labels", it may be offensive to label people as their identities -- lists can make it clearer that these are aspects or features of someone, and because it doesn't create a visual tag or label at the bottom of the page like a category does, it avoids that offensive tagging/labeling issue. --[[User:Lquilter\|LQ]] 08:04, 22 March 2007 (PDT)		: On the ethnic and other identity issues -- lists are really better indexes than categories for this kind of thing, because you can reference, cite, explain, and do subheads and sorting as appropriate. (Lists let you handle grey areas better too.) And it avoids the potential for ghettoizing, which categories can create; even if there's a policy to redundantly categorize ("writers" and "african american writers") people will inadvertently just diffuse people and not redundantly categorize). And finally, to the extent that "categories" function as "labels", it may be offensive to label people as their identities -- lists can make it clearer that these are aspects or features of someone, and because it doesn't create a visual tag or label at the bottom of the page like a category does, it avoids that offensive tagging/labeling issue. --[[User:Lquilter\|LQ]] 08:04, 22 March 2007 (PDT)

	:: I understand what you're saying about the potential subtleties of lists but any list/categorisation which defines any group of people can subsequently be used for either positive or negative discrimination and, to be blunt, this wiki has already jumped the shark on this issue because there is a Category:Female writers but no Category:Male writers which implies that even feminists writing a feminist wiki think male is the default and female is a subcategory. I notice these things :-). I practice situation ethics so I can only take responsibility for my own actions and those actions which I therefore exemplify for other people to follow so... onwards to a specific situation... I preferred to name Malorie Blackman's ethnic identity in the categories rather than in her biography because she has expressed complex opinions on how she believes her ethnic identity effects her writing (and her writing is the part of her I'm primarily interested in) and I didn't want to overtly label her. I've since changed my mind about this and have altered her Wikipedia article to quote one of her own statements about herself as a "black woman writer". I tend to use the descriptive words which people use about themselves. In Blackman's case she says "black British" or "Black British" which, in Britain has been the preferred self-identification for most Britons of Afro-Carribean or African origin for at least 30 years. It's an uncontroversial self-description even though it technically excludes black people born in Northern Ireland ::shrugs::. But perhaps (per the discussion above) I should have categorised her as Category:Black British people and hoped for new wikisoftware :-). I have to trust that other editors exhibit similar good faith in categorising people. [[User:Contributor\|Contributor]] 14:16, 23 March 2007 (PDT)		:: I understand what you're saying about the potential subtleties of lists but any list/categorisation which defines any group of people can subsequently be used for either positive or negative discrimination and, to be blunt, this wiki has already jumped the shark on this issue because there is a Category:Female writers but no Category:Male writers which implies that even feminists writing a feminist wiki think male is the default and female is a subcategory. I notice these things :-). I practice situation ethics so I can only take responsibility for my own actions and those actions which I therefore exemplify for other people to follow so... onwards to a specific situation... I preferred to name Malorie Blackman's ethnic identity in the categories rather than in her biography because she has expressed complex opinions on how she believes her ethnic identity effects her writing (and her writing is the part of her I'm primarily interested in) and I didn't want to overtly label her. I've since changed my mind about this and have altered her Wikipedia article to quote one of her own statements about herself as a "black woman writer". I tend to use the descriptive words which people use about themselves. In Blackman's case she says "black British" or "Black British" which, in Britain, has been the preferred self-identification for most Britons of Afro-Carribean or African origin for at least 30 years. It's an uncontroversial self-description even though it technically excludes black people born in Northern Ireland ::shrugs::. But perhaps (per the discussion above) I should have categorised her as Category:Black British people and hoped for new wikisoftware :-). I have to trust that other editors exhibit similar good faith in categorising people. [[User:Contributor\|Contributor]] 14:16, 23 March 2007 (PDT)

	:: From a purely personal point of view I have problems with lists because I'm dyslexic and trying to read long lists in some formats makes me feel literally dizzy and nauseated so I have an inbuilt bias against lists and in favour of categories (other dyslexics will have different experiences). [[User:Contributor\|Contributor]] 14:16, 23 March 2007 (PDT)		:: From a purely personal point of view I have problems with lists because I'm dyslexic and trying to read long lists in some formats makes me feel literally dizzy and nauseated so I have an inbuilt bias against lists and in favour of categories (other dyslexics will have different experiences). [[User:Contributor\|Contributor]] 14:16, 23 March 2007 (PDT)

Contributor: Added my overlong replies

2007-03-23T21:16:35Z

Added my overlong replies

← Older revision		Revision as of 14:16, 23 March 2007
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	:Lastly, I note a problem with Category:Fantasy which contains no subcategories (such as Category:Works of fantasy etc) and is therefore either in need of discussion, subcategories or eventual deletion. [[User:Contributor\|Contributor]] 18:12, 21 March 2007 (PDT)		:Lastly, I note a problem with Category:Fantasy which contains no subcategories (such as Category:Works of fantasy etc) and is therefore either in need of discussion, subcategories or eventual deletion. [[User:Contributor\|Contributor]] 18:12, 21 March 2007 (PDT)

	:: I had been actually trying to ''not'' diffuse the basic categories -- [[:Category:Writers]] is a good example. I think that the mediawiki software at some point will include a combination feature, so you can find the intersection of categories; for instance, Writers and Directors; or Writers and 1958 births; or Writers and African-American people. Then, we wouldn't need combination categories (like "Indian writers"). And [[:Category:Writers]] is a comprehensive index of everyone, which can be usefully combined with whatever other categories there are.		:: I had been actually trying to ''not'' diffuse the basic categories -- [[:Category:Writers]] is a good example. I think that the mediawiki software at some point will include a combination feature, so you can find the intersection of categories; for instance, Writers and Directors; or Writers and 1958 births; or Writers and African-American people. Then, we wouldn't need combination categories (like "Indian writers"). And [[:Category:Writers]] is a comprehensive index of everyone, which can be usefully combined with whatever other categories there are. --[[User:Lquilter\|LQ]] 07:53, 22 March 2007 (PDT)

			: I know nothing about the software but that would be a useful development, yes. Are there Category:People, Category:People by ethnicity, and Category:People by nationality? I'll have to go and look. [[User:Contributor\|Contributor]] 14:16, 23 March 2007 (PDT)

	:: But that's only for what I call "intersection categories" -- i.e., "writers of X nationality" or "writesr of X gender" or "writers of x ethnicity". It doesn't address the question of how specific we ought to be in terms of what ''kind'' of writer they are. What their genres (fantasy, SF, magical realism) and audiences (YA, lesbian, etc.) and formats (novelists, short story writers, essayists) and/or subject-areas (literary criticism, cultural studies, women's history) are. Which of these categories would be useful? And are there any "basic-level" categories, so that someone would get that category in addition to any other relevant categories? I'm particularly interested in the distinction between fiction writers and other kinds of writers (journalists, literary critics, etc.), and SF writers and other kinds of fiction writers. Should we have either "fiction writers" or "SF writers"? Or, since those are the majority categories, should we have their complementary categories, and what would those be called? --[[User:Lquilter\|LQ]] 07:53, 22 March 2007 (PDT)		:: But that's only for what I call "intersection categories" -- i.e., "writers of X nationality" or "writesr of X gender" or "writers of x ethnicity". It doesn't address the question of how specific we ought to be in terms of what ''kind'' of writer they are. What their genres (fantasy, SF, magical realism) and audiences (YA, lesbian, etc.) and formats (novelists, short story writers, essayists) and/or subject-areas (literary criticism, cultural studies, women's history) are. Which of these categories would be useful? And are there any "basic-level" categories, so that someone would get that category in addition to any other relevant categories? I'm particularly interested in the distinction between fiction writers and other kinds of writers (journalists, literary critics, etc.), and SF writers and other kinds of fiction writers. Should we have either "fiction writers" or "SF writers"? Or, since those are the majority categories, should we have their complementary categories, and what would those be called? --[[User:Lquilter\|LQ]] 07:53, 22 March 2007 (PDT)

			: I can't remember this site's suggested definition of SF (spec fic or sci fic?). As long as the categories are reasonably intuitive and reasonably webbed together as sub categories then I'm all for throwing categories at articles and seeing what sticks (within reason). I don't know the limitations of the categorisation software though. I have a problem with the idea of a "lesbian audience" or work supposedly aimed at any group (because we all know adults read YA) unless that "aiming" is evident in the writing (as it supposedly is with YA) or the writer has specified their intended audience (which most writers are too canny to do for marketing reasons). Which is why I put the "lesbian-centric" comment on Category:Lesbian fiction when I created it, so it would be inclusive for fiction about/by/for lesbians without having to determine precisely which of those reasons is cause for an article's inclusion in the category (yes, there is method in my madness...). [[User:Contributor\|Contributor]] 14:16, 23 March 2007 (PDT)

	: On the ethnic and other identity issues -- lists are really better indexes than categories for this kind of thing, because you can reference, cite, explain, and do subheads and sorting as appropriate. (Lists let you handle grey areas better too.) And it avoids the potential for ghettoizing, which categories can create; even if there's a policy to redundantly categorize ("writers" and "african american writers") people will inadvertently just diffuse people and not redundantly categorize). And finally, to the extent that "categories" function as "labels", it may be offensive to label people as their identities -- lists can make it clearer that these are aspects or features of someone, and because it doesn't create a visual tag or label at the bottom of the page like a category does, it avoids that offensive tagging/labeling issue. --[[User:Lquilter\|LQ]] 08:04, 22 March 2007 (PDT)		: On the ethnic and other identity issues -- lists are really better indexes than categories for this kind of thing, because you can reference, cite, explain, and do subheads and sorting as appropriate. (Lists let you handle grey areas better too.) And it avoids the potential for ghettoizing, which categories can create; even if there's a policy to redundantly categorize ("writers" and "african american writers") people will inadvertently just diffuse people and not redundantly categorize). And finally, to the extent that "categories" function as "labels", it may be offensive to label people as their identities -- lists can make it clearer that these are aspects or features of someone, and because it doesn't create a visual tag or label at the bottom of the page like a category does, it avoids that offensive tagging/labeling issue. --[[User:Lquilter\|LQ]] 08:04, 22 March 2007 (PDT)

			:: I understand what you're saying about the potential subtleties of lists but any list/categorisation which defines any group of people can subsequently be used for either positive or negative discrimination and, to be blunt, this wiki has already jumped the shark on this issue because there is a Category:Female writers but no Category:Male writers which implies that even feminists writing a feminist wiki think male is the default and female is a subcategory. I notice these things :-). I practice situation ethics so I can only take responsibility for my own actions and those actions which I therefore exemplify for other people to follow so... onwards to a specific situation... I preferred to name Malorie Blackman's ethnic identity in the categories rather than in her biography because she has expressed complex opinions on how she believes her ethnic identity effects her writing (and her writing is the part of her I'm primarily interested in) and I didn't want to overtly label her. I've since changed my mind about this and have altered her Wikipedia article to quote one of her own statements about herself as a "black woman writer". I tend to use the descriptive words which people use about themselves. In Blackman's case she says "black British" or "Black British" which, in Britain has been the preferred self-identification for most Britons of Afro-Carribean or African origin for at least 30 years. It's an uncontroversial self-description even though it technically excludes black people born in Northern Ireland ::shrugs::. But perhaps (per the discussion above) I should have categorised her as Category:Black British people and hoped for new wikisoftware :-). I have to trust that other editors exhibit similar good faith in categorising people. [[User:Contributor\|Contributor]] 14:16, 23 March 2007 (PDT)

			:: From a purely personal point of view I have problems with lists because I'm dyslexic and trying to read long lists in some formats makes me feel literally dizzy and nauseated so I have an inbuilt bias against lists and in favour of categories (other dyslexics will have different experiences). [[User:Contributor\|Contributor]] 14:16, 23 March 2007 (PDT)

Lquilter: grey areas

2007-03-22T15:05:41Z

grey areas

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	:: But that's only for what I call "intersection categories" -- i.e., "writers of X nationality" or "writesr of X gender" or "writers of x ethnicity". It doesn't address the question of how specific we ought to be in terms of what ''kind'' of writer they are. What their genres (fantasy, SF, magical realism) and audiences (YA, lesbian, etc.) and formats (novelists, short story writers, essayists) and/or subject-areas (literary criticism, cultural studies, women's history) are. Which of these categories would be useful? And are there any "basic-level" categories, so that someone would get that category in addition to any other relevant categories? I'm particularly interested in the distinction between fiction writers and other kinds of writers (journalists, literary critics, etc.), and SF writers and other kinds of fiction writers. Should we have either "fiction writers" or "SF writers"? Or, since those are the majority categories, should we have their complementary categories, and what would those be called? --[[User:Lquilter\|LQ]] 07:53, 22 March 2007 (PDT)		:: But that's only for what I call "intersection categories" -- i.e., "writers of X nationality" or "writesr of X gender" or "writers of x ethnicity". It doesn't address the question of how specific we ought to be in terms of what ''kind'' of writer they are. What their genres (fantasy, SF, magical realism) and audiences (YA, lesbian, etc.) and formats (novelists, short story writers, essayists) and/or subject-areas (literary criticism, cultural studies, women's history) are. Which of these categories would be useful? And are there any "basic-level" categories, so that someone would get that category in addition to any other relevant categories? I'm particularly interested in the distinction between fiction writers and other kinds of writers (journalists, literary critics, etc.), and SF writers and other kinds of fiction writers. Should we have either "fiction writers" or "SF writers"? Or, since those are the majority categories, should we have their complementary categories, and what would those be called? --[[User:Lquilter\|LQ]] 07:53, 22 March 2007 (PDT)

	: On the ethnic and other identity issues -- lists are really better indexes than categories for this kind of thing, because you can reference, cite, explain, and do subheads and sorting as appropriate. And it avoids the potential for ghettoizing, which categories can create; even if there's a policy to redundantly categorize ("writers" and "african american writers") people will inadvertently just diffuse people and not redundantly categorize). And finally, to the extent that "categories" function as "labels", it may be offensive to label people as their identities -- lists can make it clearer that these are aspects or features of someone, and because it doesn't create a visual tag or label at the bottom of the page like a category does, it avoids that offensive tagging/labeling issue. --[[User:Lquilter\|LQ]] 08:04, 22 March 2007 (PDT)		: On the ethnic and other identity issues -- lists are really better indexes than categories for this kind of thing, because you can reference, cite, explain, and do subheads and sorting as appropriate. (Lists let you handle grey areas better too.) And it avoids the potential for ghettoizing, which categories can create; even if there's a policy to redundantly categorize ("writers" and "african american writers") people will inadvertently just diffuse people and not redundantly categorize). And finally, to the extent that "categories" function as "labels", it may be offensive to label people as their identities -- lists can make it clearer that these are aspects or features of someone, and because it doesn't create a visual tag or label at the bottom of the page like a category does, it avoids that offensive tagging/labeling issue. --[[User:Lquilter\|LQ]] 08:04, 22 March 2007 (PDT)

Lquilter: lists versus categories

2007-03-22T15:04:16Z

lists versus categories

← Older revision		Revision as of 08:04, 22 March 2007
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	:: But that's only for what I call "intersection categories" -- i.e., "writers of X nationality" or "writesr of X gender" or "writers of x ethnicity". It doesn't address the question of how specific we ought to be in terms of what ''kind'' of writer they are. What their genres (fantasy, SF, magical realism) and audiences (YA, lesbian, etc.) and formats (novelists, short story writers, essayists) and/or subject-areas (literary criticism, cultural studies, women's history) are. Which of these categories would be useful? And are there any "basic-level" categories, so that someone would get that category in addition to any other relevant categories? I'm particularly interested in the distinction between fiction writers and other kinds of writers (journalists, literary critics, etc.), and SF writers and other kinds of fiction writers. Should we have either "fiction writers" or "SF writers"? Or, since those are the majority categories, should we have their complementary categories, and what would those be called? --[[User:Lquilter\|LQ]] 07:53, 22 March 2007 (PDT)		:: But that's only for what I call "intersection categories" -- i.e., "writers of X nationality" or "writesr of X gender" or "writers of x ethnicity". It doesn't address the question of how specific we ought to be in terms of what ''kind'' of writer they are. What their genres (fantasy, SF, magical realism) and audiences (YA, lesbian, etc.) and formats (novelists, short story writers, essayists) and/or subject-areas (literary criticism, cultural studies, women's history) are. Which of these categories would be useful? And are there any "basic-level" categories, so that someone would get that category in addition to any other relevant categories? I'm particularly interested in the distinction between fiction writers and other kinds of writers (journalists, literary critics, etc.), and SF writers and other kinds of fiction writers. Should we have either "fiction writers" or "SF writers"? Or, since those are the majority categories, should we have their complementary categories, and what would those be called? --[[User:Lquilter\|LQ]] 07:53, 22 March 2007 (PDT)

			: On the ethnic and other identity issues -- lists are really better indexes than categories for this kind of thing, because you can reference, cite, explain, and do subheads and sorting as appropriate. And it avoids the potential for ghettoizing, which categories can create; even if there's a policy to redundantly categorize ("writers" and "african american writers") people will inadvertently just diffuse people and not redundantly categorize). And finally, to the extent that "categories" function as "labels", it may be offensive to label people as their identities -- lists can make it clearer that these are aspects or features of someone, and because it doesn't create a visual tag or label at the bottom of the page like a category does, it avoids that offensive tagging/labeling issue. --[[User:Lquilter\|LQ]] 08:04, 22 March 2007 (PDT)

Lquilter: resp

2007-03-22T14:53:57Z

resp

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	:I've depopulated Category:Canadian Writers in favour of Category:Canadian writers but I haven't (and won't) create the new category. I've depopulated Category:Indian Writers in favour of Category:Indian writers but I haven't (and won't) create the new category. The two old categories, Category:Canadian Writers and Category:Indian Writers are definitely deletable though. [[User:Contributor\|Contributor]] 18:09, 21 March 2007 (PDT)		:I've depopulated Category:Canadian Writers in favour of Category:Canadian writers but I haven't (and won't) create the new category. I've depopulated Category:Indian Writers in favour of Category:Indian writers but I haven't (and won't) create the new category. The two old categories, Category:Canadian Writers and Category:Indian Writers are definitely deletable though. [[User:Contributor\|Contributor]] 18:09, 21 March 2007 (PDT)
	:Lastly, I note a problem with Category:Fantasy which contains no subcategories (such as Category:Works of fantasy etc) and is therefore either in need of discussion, subcategories or eventual deletion. [[User:Contributor\|Contributor]] 18:12, 21 March 2007 (PDT)		:Lastly, I note a problem with Category:Fantasy which contains no subcategories (such as Category:Works of fantasy etc) and is therefore either in need of discussion, subcategories or eventual deletion. [[User:Contributor\|Contributor]] 18:12, 21 March 2007 (PDT)

			:: I had been actually trying to ''not'' diffuse the basic categories -- [[:Category:Writers]] is a good example. I think that the mediawiki software at some point will include a combination feature, so you can find the intersection of categories; for instance, Writers and Directors; or Writers and 1958 births; or Writers and African-American people. Then, we wouldn't need combination categories (like "Indian writers"). And [[:Category:Writers]] is a comprehensive index of everyone, which can be usefully combined with whatever other categories there are.

			:: But that's only for what I call "intersection categories" -- i.e., "writers of X nationality" or "writesr of X gender" or "writers of x ethnicity". It doesn't address the question of how specific we ought to be in terms of what ''kind'' of writer they are. What their genres (fantasy, SF, magical realism) and audiences (YA, lesbian, etc.) and formats (novelists, short story writers, essayists) and/or subject-areas (literary criticism, cultural studies, women's history) are. Which of these categories would be useful? And are there any "basic-level" categories, so that someone would get that category in addition to any other relevant categories? I'm particularly interested in the distinction between fiction writers and other kinds of writers (journalists, literary critics, etc.), and SF writers and other kinds of fiction writers. Should we have either "fiction writers" or "SF writers"? Or, since those are the majority categories, should we have their complementary categories, and what would those be called? --[[User:Lquilter\|LQ]] 07:53, 22 March 2007 (PDT)

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	::: Quick response - Actually I did have [[:Category:Male x]] but started deleting all the gender categories and tags, and got thru male first ... then decided would be better to have discussion on the whole issue. So there is definitely no consistency in categorizing right now, but the gender thing is ''not'' because the default is male ... More on other stuff later after I've had more time to process. --[[User:Lquilter\|LQ]] 19:14, 23 March 2007 (PDT)		::: Quick response - Actually I did have [[:Category:Male x]] but started deleting all the gender categories and tags, and got thru male first ... then decided would be better to have discussion on the whole issue. So there is definitely no consistency in categorizing right now, but the gender thing is ''not'' because the default is male ... More on other stuff later after I've had more time to process. --[[User:Lquilter\|LQ]] 19:14, 23 March 2007 (PDT)

			:: Aha! Things become clearer. Slow thoughful responses are fine by me. :-) New issue: I tend to stick to wikipedia style indentation on talk pages, i.e. if I start as two indents then I remain at two indents as the conversation progresses, or would you prefer to read ever increasing diagonal indents because there are fewer people here so we won't reach the right hand margin too quickly? [[User:Contributor\|Contributor]] 10:52, 26 March 2007 (PDT)

	I tend to want messier information, so while I see the value in structuring Categories, I still long for free tagging. I think we should have categories explicitly spelled out, named, because then the information is more portable to other areas. More categories is fine and I'm also okay with redundant categories. I'm facing the same issues as I try to outline a women writers wiki and whether I want to say "latin american writers" and then "uruguayan writers." I had started without identifying gender (i.e. assuming the default is that all people are women...) But now I think I might id people as women (as most if not all will be) in case I ever want to move the information somewhere else. If you have the tag or category, you can change it later. But adding it back in is laborious. So I'd say don't delete gender tags!--[[User:Liz Henry\|Liz Henry]] 17:29, 24 March 2007 (PDT)		I tend to want messier information, so while I see the value in structuring Categories, I still long for free tagging. I think we should have categories explicitly spelled out, named, because then the information is more portable to other areas. More categories is fine and I'm also okay with redundant categories. I'm facing the same issues as I try to outline a women writers wiki and whether I want to say "latin american writers" and then "uruguayan writers." I had started without identifying gender (i.e. assuming the default is that all people are women...) But now I think I might id people as women (as most if not all will be) in case I ever want to move the information somewhere else. If you have the tag or category, you can change it later. But adding it back in is laborious. So I'd say don't delete gender tags!--[[User:Liz Henry\|Liz Henry]] 17:29, 24 March 2007 (PDT)

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	: On the ethnic and other identity issues -- lists are really better indexes than categories for this kind of thing, because you can reference, cite, explain, and do subheads and sorting as appropriate. (Lists let you handle grey areas better too.) And it avoids the potential for ghettoizing, which categories can create; even if there's a policy to redundantly categorize ("writers" and "african american writers") people will inadvertently just diffuse people and not redundantly categorize). And finally, to the extent that "categories" function as "labels", it may be offensive to label people as their identities -- lists can make it clearer that these are aspects or features of someone, and because it doesn't create a visual tag or label at the bottom of the page like a category does, it avoids that offensive tagging/labeling issue. --[[User:Lquilter\|LQ]] 08:04, 22 March 2007 (PDT)		: On the ethnic and other identity issues -- lists are really better indexes than categories for this kind of thing, because you can reference, cite, explain, and do subheads and sorting as appropriate. (Lists let you handle grey areas better too.) And it avoids the potential for ghettoizing, which categories can create; even if there's a policy to redundantly categorize ("writers" and "african american writers") people will inadvertently just diffuse people and not redundantly categorize). And finally, to the extent that "categories" function as "labels", it may be offensive to label people as their identities -- lists can make it clearer that these are aspects or features of someone, and because it doesn't create a visual tag or label at the bottom of the page like a category does, it avoids that offensive tagging/labeling issue. --[[User:Lquilter\|LQ]] 08:04, 22 March 2007 (PDT)

	:: I understand what you're saying about the potential subtleties of lists but any list/categorisation which defines any group of people can subsequently be used for either positive or negative discrimination and, to be blunt, this wiki has already jumped the shark on this issue because there is a Category:Female writers but no Category:Male writers which implies that even feminists writing a feminist wiki think male is the default and female is a subcategory. I notice these things :-). I practice situation ethics so I can only take responsibility for my own actions and those actions which I therefore exemplify for other people to follow so... onwards to a specific situation... I preferred to name Malorie Blackman's ethnic identity in the categories rather than in her biography because she has expressed complex opinions on how she believes her ethnic identity effects her writing (and her writing is the part of her I'm primarily interested in) and I didn't want to overtly label her. I've since changed my mind about this and have altered her Wikipedia article to quote one of her own statements about herself as a "black woman writer". I tend to use the descriptive words which people use about themselves. In Blackman's case she says "black British" or "Black British" which, in Britain has been the preferred self-identification for most Britons of Afro-Carribean or African origin for at least 30 years. It's an uncontroversial self-description even though it technically excludes black people born in Northern Ireland ::shrugs::. But perhaps (per the discussion above) I should have categorised her as Category:Black British people and hoped for new wikisoftware :-). I have to trust that other editors exhibit similar good faith in categorising people. [[User:Contributor\|Contributor]] 14:16, 23 March 2007 (PDT)		:: I understand what you're saying about the potential subtleties of lists but any list/categorisation which defines any group of people can subsequently be used for either positive or negative discrimination and, to be blunt, this wiki has already jumped the shark on this issue because there is a Category:Female writers but no Category:Male writers which implies that even feminists writing a feminist wiki think male is the default and female is a subcategory. I notice these things :-). I practice situation ethics so I can only take responsibility for my own actions and those actions which I therefore exemplify for other people to follow so... onwards to a specific situation... I preferred to name Malorie Blackman's ethnic identity in the categories rather than in her biography because she has expressed complex opinions on how she believes her ethnic identity effects her writing (and her writing is the part of her I'm primarily interested in) and I didn't want to overtly label her. I've since changed my mind about this and have altered her Wikipedia article to quote one of her own statements about herself as a "black woman writer". I tend to use the descriptive words which people use about themselves. In Blackman's case she says "black British" or "Black British" which, in Britain, has been the preferred self-identification for most Britons of Afro-Carribean or African origin for at least 30 years. It's an uncontroversial self-description even though it technically excludes black people born in Northern Ireland ::shrugs::. But perhaps (per the discussion above) I should have categorised her as Category:Black British people and hoped for new wikisoftware :-). I have to trust that other editors exhibit similar good faith in categorising people. [[User:Contributor\|Contributor]] 14:16, 23 March 2007 (PDT)

	:: From a purely personal point of view I have problems with lists because I'm dyslexic and trying to read long lists in some formats makes me feel literally dizzy and nauseated so I have an inbuilt bias against lists and in favour of categories (other dyslexics will have different experiences). [[User:Contributor\|Contributor]] 14:16, 23 March 2007 (PDT)		:: From a purely personal point of view I have problems with lists because I'm dyslexic and trying to read long lists in some formats makes me feel literally dizzy and nauseated so I have an inbuilt bias against lists and in favour of categories (other dyslexics will have different experiences). [[User:Contributor\|Contributor]] 14:16, 23 March 2007 (PDT)

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	:Lastly, I note a problem with Category:Fantasy which contains no subcategories (such as Category:Works of fantasy etc) and is therefore either in need of discussion, subcategories or eventual deletion. [[User:Contributor\|Contributor]] 18:12, 21 March 2007 (PDT)		:Lastly, I note a problem with Category:Fantasy which contains no subcategories (such as Category:Works of fantasy etc) and is therefore either in need of discussion, subcategories or eventual deletion. [[User:Contributor\|Contributor]] 18:12, 21 March 2007 (PDT)

	:: I had been actually trying to ''not'' diffuse the basic categories -- [[:Category:Writers]] is a good example. I think that the mediawiki software at some point will include a combination feature, so you can find the intersection of categories; for instance, Writers and Directors; or Writers and 1958 births; or Writers and African-American people. Then, we wouldn't need combination categories (like "Indian writers"). And [[:Category:Writers]] is a comprehensive index of everyone, which can be usefully combined with whatever other categories there are.		:: I had been actually trying to ''not'' diffuse the basic categories -- [[:Category:Writers]] is a good example. I think that the mediawiki software at some point will include a combination feature, so you can find the intersection of categories; for instance, Writers and Directors; or Writers and 1958 births; or Writers and African-American people. Then, we wouldn't need combination categories (like "Indian writers"). And [[:Category:Writers]] is a comprehensive index of everyone, which can be usefully combined with whatever other categories there are. --[[User:Lquilter\|LQ]] 07:53, 22 March 2007 (PDT)

			: I know nothing about the software but that would be a useful development, yes. Are there Category:People, Category:People by ethnicity, and Category:People by nationality? I'll have to go and look. [[User:Contributor\|Contributor]] 14:16, 23 March 2007 (PDT)

	:: But that's only for what I call "intersection categories" -- i.e., "writers of X nationality" or "writesr of X gender" or "writers of x ethnicity". It doesn't address the question of how specific we ought to be in terms of what ''kind'' of writer they are. What their genres (fantasy, SF, magical realism) and audiences (YA, lesbian, etc.) and formats (novelists, short story writers, essayists) and/or subject-areas (literary criticism, cultural studies, women's history) are. Which of these categories would be useful? And are there any "basic-level" categories, so that someone would get that category in addition to any other relevant categories? I'm particularly interested in the distinction between fiction writers and other kinds of writers (journalists, literary critics, etc.), and SF writers and other kinds of fiction writers. Should we have either "fiction writers" or "SF writers"? Or, since those are the majority categories, should we have their complementary categories, and what would those be called? --[[User:Lquilter\|LQ]] 07:53, 22 March 2007 (PDT)		:: But that's only for what I call "intersection categories" -- i.e., "writers of X nationality" or "writesr of X gender" or "writers of x ethnicity". It doesn't address the question of how specific we ought to be in terms of what ''kind'' of writer they are. What their genres (fantasy, SF, magical realism) and audiences (YA, lesbian, etc.) and formats (novelists, short story writers, essayists) and/or subject-areas (literary criticism, cultural studies, women's history) are. Which of these categories would be useful? And are there any "basic-level" categories, so that someone would get that category in addition to any other relevant categories? I'm particularly interested in the distinction between fiction writers and other kinds of writers (journalists, literary critics, etc.), and SF writers and other kinds of fiction writers. Should we have either "fiction writers" or "SF writers"? Or, since those are the majority categories, should we have their complementary categories, and what would those be called? --[[User:Lquilter\|LQ]] 07:53, 22 March 2007 (PDT)

			: I can't remember this site's suggested definition of SF (spec fic or sci fic?). As long as the categories are reasonably intuitive and reasonably webbed together as sub categories then I'm all for throwing categories at articles and seeing what sticks (within reason). I don't know the limitations of the categorisation software though. I have a problem with the idea of a "lesbian audience" or work supposedly aimed at any group (because we all know adults read YA) unless that "aiming" is evident in the writing (as it supposedly is with YA) or the writer has specified their intended audience (which most writers are too canny to do for marketing reasons). Which is why I put the "lesbian-centric" comment on Category:Lesbian fiction when I created it, so it would be inclusive for fiction about/by/for lesbians without having to determine precisely which of those reasons is cause for an article's inclusion in the category (yes, there is method in my madness...). [[User:Contributor\|Contributor]] 14:16, 23 March 2007 (PDT)

	: On the ethnic and other identity issues -- lists are really better indexes than categories for this kind of thing, because you can reference, cite, explain, and do subheads and sorting as appropriate. (Lists let you handle grey areas better too.) And it avoids the potential for ghettoizing, which categories can create; even if there's a policy to redundantly categorize ("writers" and "african american writers") people will inadvertently just diffuse people and not redundantly categorize). And finally, to the extent that "categories" function as "labels", it may be offensive to label people as their identities -- lists can make it clearer that these are aspects or features of someone, and because it doesn't create a visual tag or label at the bottom of the page like a category does, it avoids that offensive tagging/labeling issue. --[[User:Lquilter\|LQ]] 08:04, 22 March 2007 (PDT)		: On the ethnic and other identity issues -- lists are really better indexes than categories for this kind of thing, because you can reference, cite, explain, and do subheads and sorting as appropriate. (Lists let you handle grey areas better too.) And it avoids the potential for ghettoizing, which categories can create; even if there's a policy to redundantly categorize ("writers" and "african american writers") people will inadvertently just diffuse people and not redundantly categorize). And finally, to the extent that "categories" function as "labels", it may be offensive to label people as their identities -- lists can make it clearer that these are aspects or features of someone, and because it doesn't create a visual tag or label at the bottom of the page like a category does, it avoids that offensive tagging/labeling issue. --[[User:Lquilter\|LQ]] 08:04, 22 March 2007 (PDT)

			:: I understand what you're saying about the potential subtleties of lists but any list/categorisation which defines any group of people can subsequently be used for either positive or negative discrimination and, to be blunt, this wiki has already jumped the shark on this issue because there is a Category:Female writers but no Category:Male writers which implies that even feminists writing a feminist wiki think male is the default and female is a subcategory. I notice these things :-). I practice situation ethics so I can only take responsibility for my own actions and those actions which I therefore exemplify for other people to follow so... onwards to a specific situation... I preferred to name Malorie Blackman's ethnic identity in the categories rather than in her biography because she has expressed complex opinions on how she believes her ethnic identity effects her writing (and her writing is the part of her I'm primarily interested in) and I didn't want to overtly label her. I've since changed my mind about this and have altered her Wikipedia article to quote one of her own statements about herself as a "black woman writer". I tend to use the descriptive words which people use about themselves. In Blackman's case she says "black British" or "Black British" which, in Britain has been the preferred self-identification for most Britons of Afro-Carribean or African origin for at least 30 years. It's an uncontroversial self-description even though it technically excludes black people born in Northern Ireland ::shrugs::. But perhaps (per the discussion above) I should have categorised her as Category:Black British people and hoped for new wikisoftware :-). I have to trust that other editors exhibit similar good faith in categorising people. [[User:Contributor\|Contributor]] 14:16, 23 March 2007 (PDT)

			:: From a purely personal point of view I have problems with lists because I'm dyslexic and trying to read long lists in some formats makes me feel literally dizzy and nauseated so I have an inbuilt bias against lists and in favour of categories (other dyslexics will have different experiences). [[User:Contributor\|Contributor]] 14:16, 23 March 2007 (PDT)