Category talk:Kurdistan

Criteria of inclusion
What should be included in this category? Only things that have been officially regonized as Kurdistan (if any)? Or should it contain every place that is claimed to be Kurdistan? And is this category only a geographical category, or also a cultural, and should it as such include also kurdish writers and airliners? Before entering this discussion, please note WP:CIVIL and WP:NPA. Please try to make a discussion based on arguments and not on ad hominem attacks. Thank you. Bryan 13:40, 1 February 2007 (UTC)


 * I would say we should opt as broad as for instance Category:Netherlands or Category:Turkey, or indeed regions not recognised as states such as Category:Taiwan. This means basically everything related to the region. And sure, like with these examples there should be worked on creating a number of sub-categories covering a variety of fields (history, culture, infrastructure etc.). Bertilvidet 13:45, 1 February 2007 (UTC)
 * I disagree. Taiwan (Republic of China) has defined borders and claims to be a country. Most countries consider it a defacto country (aka they do not see it as a country and a part of Peoples Republic of China. On the other hand Kurdistan is not a country and does not claim to be a country so it isn't even a defacto country. Kurdistan also does not have defined borders unlike Taiwan (Republic of China). What is Kurdistan supposed to be? A demographic region (as implied from Kurdistan although not sourced), A geographic region (several sources say this without giving borders), A political entity like taiwan (As implied by the comments above still not sourced)? The only workable political borders we have is those of Iraqi Kurdistan recognized under the Iraqi federal body. -- Cat out 14:03, 1 February 2007 (UTC)
 * Perhaps something like Category:Europe, as Europe doesn't have any strictly geographically defined borders. - Francis Tyers · 08:42, 2 February 2007 (UTC)
 * Geographic it is then. Cities should not be tagged with it. See York; not only is it not in a Europe category, it being in Europe is mentioned on 7th section. Also it is important to note Europe is a continent and much much notable than any other geographic sub division. -- Cat out 09:28, 2 February 2007 (UTC)
 * It was only a suggestion. It is worth noting that Europe is a continent, and thus the next subdivision down is "country", Kurdistan is a region and thus the next subdivision down is "city" or subregion. Perhaps we could have Category:Northern Kurdistan, Category:Southern Kurdistan etc. ? - Francis Tyers · 09:41, 2 February 2007 (UTC)
 * There are several problems with that logic. Firstly Kurdistan is controversial, that should be kept in mind.
 * Secondly cities in England are not tagged under Northern Europe or any other 'geographic' division whatsoever with the exception of political borders. York is under an "England" sub-category which in turn is under United Kingdom / England parent categories. Which is parented by "Cities by Country" if you navigate the parental categories. Alternatively you can end up in "Geography by Country" category. York is inside Europe no doubt and that is mentioned in the article in some 7th section indirectly.
 * Where a city is is better expressed with a map than categories or even words. People are free to consider that location Kurdistan, Europe, Asia, or whatever they please. Also, you are welcome to start a List of major cities in Kurdistan if you like. That way conflicting sources on what falls inside and outside Kurdistan can be better expressed in a table for example.
 * -- Cat out 10:00, 2 February 2007 (UTC)
 * I'd appreciate a response. -- Cat out 16:16, 2 February 2007 (UTC)
 * I think we need to try and sub-cat it. I've made a start as you can see. - Francis Tyers · 16:57, 2 February 2007 (UTC)
 * I notcied. I am wondering what is the Category:Europe subcat equivalent of Category:Current governments in Kurdistan or Category:Airlines of Kurdistan. How can there be Airlines in geographic regions? What is the point of Category:Airlines of Kurdistan? -- Cat out 17:08, 2 February 2007 (UTC)
 * I didn't say that it fast and tight had to have the same scheme as Europe, I was just mentioning a category which similarly didn't have any fixed political borders. - Francis Tyers · 17:28, 2 February 2007 (UTC)
 * Wait. So Kurdistan is a geographic region yet you are treating it against the convention we have with geographic categories... For instance why can't Kurdistan airlines be tagged simply with Category:Airlines of Iraq following our categorization conventions? See Delta Air Lines -- Cat out 17:46, 2 February 2007 (UTC)
 * Its a geographic, ethnic, and cultural (and possibly some other -ic or -urals). We don't particularly have a convention for these so lets go with what works. We could make it Category:Airlines of Iraqi Kurdistan, in fact thats probably better. - Francis Tyers · 18:01, 2 February 2007 (UTC)
 * Why not include everything which a source of some reliability has alluded to being Kurdistan-related/Kurdistanic or Kurdish, or something like that? Thulium 18:39, 2 February 2007 (UTC)
 * How about just mentioning it in the article if it is really relevant and not reinventing the wheel. -- Cat out 20:12, 2 February 2007 (UTC)
 * Francis, I am having difficulty following your logic. We already have a convention that is applied to every article on wikipedia. What I am proposing is just that. Follow the standard.
 * Airliners are always categorized based on what country they originate from. Even United States airliners are all tossed under one single category. All Airlines that operate inside Iraqi Kurdistan (political entity) are Iraqi airlines since Iraqi Kurdistan claims to be a part of Iraq.
 * Cities are always categorized based on political entity (defacto or not). Kurdistan is not a political entity, it is in your words merely a geographic, ethnic, and cultural place.
 * So what is not working?
 * -- Cat out 20:12, 2 February 2007 (UTC)

Categories
Per the discussion on the mailing list, here's a check-list of sub-categories for Kurdistan-related topics:


 * Category:Cities in Kurdistan
 * Category:Communications in Kurdistan
 * Category:Economy of Kurdistan
 * Category:Education in Kurdistan
 * Category:Environment of Kurdistan
 * Category:Geography of Kurdistan
 * Category:Government of Kurdistan
 * Category:Health in Kurdistan
 * Category:History of Kurdistan
 * Category:Images of Kurdistan
 * Category:Kurdistan stubs
 * Category:Kurdistan-related lists
 * Category:Kurdistani culture
 * Category:Kurdistani law
 * Category:Kurdistani media
 * Category:Kurdistani people
 * Category:Kurdistani portals
 * Category:Kurdistani society
 * Category:Military of Kurdistan
 * Category:Organizations based in Kurdistan
 * Category:Politics of Kurdistan
 * Category:Provinces and territories of Kurdistan
 * Category:Religion in Kurdistan
 * Category:Science and technology in Kurdistan
 * Category:Sport in Kurdistan
 * Category:Tourism in Kurdistan
 * Category:Transportation in Kurdistan

-- More cheese, Gromit? 22:59, 2 February 2007 (UTC)
 * Thats treating Kurdistan like a country not a geographic region. -- Cat out 08:22, 3 February 2007 (UTC)

To start with, Category:Geography of Kurdistan and Category:History of Kurdistan should be uncontroversial. - Francis Tyers · 14:41, 3 February 2007 (UTC)
 * I am not certain of that. Category:Geography of Kurdistan still is in the Category:Geography by country format. Lake Michigan only has the following cats: "Great Lakes | Lakes of Illinois | Lakes of Indiana | Lakes of Michigan | Lakes of Wisconsin", mostly based on states. Undefined borders of Kurdistan is again problematic.
 * Category:History of Kurdistan (arguably controversial) feels redundant when we have Category:History of the Kurds (inarguably uncontroversial).
 * -- Cat out 12:41, 4 February 2007 (UTC)

This a good list to start with! --Diyarbakir 12:39, 4 February 2007 (UTC)
 * I do not think so. It does not follow wikipedias categorization scheme. -- Cat out 12:41, 4 February 2007 (UTC)

Whilst I'm not actually taking this case up for mediation as per the requets on the MedCab, perhaps this comment might help your decision. If you look at Category:Scandinavia, which bears similarities in its lack of a singular country and other entities (as discussed above), you will see that a standard is the same as for a country. For example, "Scandinavian Designs" is an article in the category as are the article pages of the countries in Scandinavia. As Kurdistan bears a resemblance in terms of its structure in both categorization and political/geographic/demographic layout to Scandinavia, perhaps you should follow that model? If you still need a mediator later on or feel you are getting nowhere, I'll be happy to help. Leave me a note on my talk page. Jem 19:06, 5 February 2007 (UTC)
 * The mediation case has started. -- Cat out 12:07, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

Kurdish inhabiter region vs Kurdistan
"Kurdish inhabiter region" does not mean the same thing as "Kurdistan" -- Cat chi? 21:13, 19 April 2007 (UTC)

Scope of Kurdistan categorization
If there is a verifiable and reliable source disputing this or any of the following assessments, I'd be happy to take it.
 * As per: WP:V "The obligation to provide a reliable source lies with the editors wishing to include the material, not with those seeking to remove it." Kurdistan does not claim to be a country nor does anyone (including Kurdish people themselves) claim Kurdistan to be a country. So I do believe declaring Kurdistan not to be a country in any sense is anything controversial. There are people who wish for an independent Kurdistan, fortunately/unfortunately Kurdistan currently lacks the basic merits even for a defacto country. This may change in the future and we can categorize accordingly. But right now there is no grounds to make such a claim and it would be WP:OR and would also violate WP:NOT.
 * Kurdistan lacks defined borders. Google image search spits out some examples of inconsistent maps. Even among neutral sources such as dictionaries there is a serious disagreement among the basic area of Kurdistan. Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1) defines it as "a mountain and plateau region in SE Turkey, NW Iran, and N Iraq: inhabited largely by Kurds" while American Heritage Dictionary defines it as "An extensive plateau region of southwest Asia. Since the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire after World War I, it has been divided among southeast Turkey, northeast Iraq, and northwest Iran, with smaller sections in Syria and Armenia." on the other hand WordNet defines it as "an extensive geographical region in the Middle East to the south of the Caucasus". Webster says "The borders of Kurdistan are hard to define, as none of the states in question acknowledge Kurdistan as a demographical or geographical region."
 * As per: WP:CAT #8 states that "Categories appear without annotations, so be careful of NPOV when creating or filling categories. Unless it is self-evident and uncontroversial that something belongs in a category, it should not be put into a category." "Kurdistan" is a controversial term as per examples: (incident #1 (Pentagon apology), (Rumsfeld considers it unfortunate)) (incident #2 (Amsterdam University apology) - (turkish)). Putting a "Kurdistan" category on random cities, provinces, lakes, rivers, mountains, and etc appears as an endorsement of Kurdistan's borders and also implies Kurdistan a country status.
 * Ignoring the guideline all together (and treating Kurdistan as a geographic region) cities are almost never categorized by geographic regions. Geographic regions are hard to define and often overlap each other. York is not categorized as being a part of Europe but a part of United Kingdom. Political borders are comparatively very easy to define and do not easily change. Practically every city article on Wikipedia is categorized by political borders (country/state/province/etc). I oppose any kind of "geographic" categorization of cities as per the rationale behind WP:OC and WP:DNWAUC (an essay of mine).

-- Cat chi? 00:00, 15 May 2007 (UTC)