Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Andrew May (historian)


 * The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review).  No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was keep. (non-admin closure) — Ⓜ️hawk10 (talk) 06:18, 11 June 2022 (UTC)

Andrew May (historian)

 * – ( View AfD View log | edits since nomination)

Happy to be proved wrong here, but I'm not managing to see how this person is notable by our standards. According to Scopus, he has an h-index of 4; GScholar search results suggest that it is closer to 6 or 7. He seems to get a number of mentions on JSTOR, but no in-depth coverage that I can see. Note: I've searched for him as "Andrew Brown-May", as there are several other academics called "Andrew May". Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 09:06, 3 June 2022 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the deletion sorting lists for the following topics: Academics and educators and Australia. Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 09:06, 3 June 2022 (UTC)
 * Delete Fails WP:NACADEMIC as far as I can see. Best Alexandermcnabb (talk) 10:11, 3 June 2022 (UTC)
 * Sorry, new here. Just realized I should have replied to this comment rather than below. You might not have gotten a notification. Please see my points below starting with "(I'm new here)". Notamitchell (talk) 00:07, 5 June 2022 (UTC)
 * Delete does not as of yet meet our inclusion criteria for academics.John Pack Lambert (talk) 16:30, 3 June 2022 (UTC)
 * Sorry, new here. Just realized I should have replied to this comment rather than below. You might not have gotten a notification. Please see my points below starting with "(I'm new here)". Notamitchell (talk) 00:07, 5 June 2022 (UTC)


 * (I'm new here)
 * He is also sometimes "Andy" and has changed his name. So I don't think citations are going to be a reliable metric here. (Side note: I don't think many historians of Australia have a high index. There simply aren't many of them in a small country to be citing each other. Instead, the public is the main consumer of academic books. For that matter, how could historians of any small country meet this bar? I digress.)
 * My reading of the criteria WP:NACADEMIC ("Academics meeting any one of the following conditions...".) is that the subject only needs to meet one of the criteria, not all. Therefore the h-index point is moot if any one of these is true:
 * "1. The person's research has had a significant impact in their scholarly discipline, broadly construed, as demonstrated by independent reliable sources."
 * Would the history podcast tick this box? It was number one in a few categories consistently when new episodes are released. I can chase citations for this if it is considered a sufficient condition.
 * "3. The person has been an elected member of a highly selective and prestigious scholarly society or association (e.g., a National Academy of Sciences or the Royal Society) or a fellow of a major scholarly society which reserves fellow status as a highly selective honor (e.g., Fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers)."
 * Is the fellowship of the Academy of the Social Sciences in Australia not sufficient here? It seems to be the notability basis of other historians of Australia.
 * "6. The person has held a highest-level elected or appointed administrative post at a major academic institution or major academic society."
 * Head of History at Australia's #1 or #2 university is not sufficient? This seems to have been deleted from the article.
 * "7. The person has had a substantial impact outside academia in their academic capacity."
 * Is it sufficient to prove the impact the books? (Again, h-index not relevant for history books that the public reads) Notamitchell (talk) 00:43, 4 June 2022 (UTC)
 * Hi . The two fellowships certainly count. The thing that would be most helpful is book reviews from newspapers, magazines and academic journals, which would contribute to meeting WP:AUTHOR; I've quickly searched JSTOR but newspaper reviews would be very useful. Espresso Addict (talk) 00:58, 4 June 2022 (UTC)


 * Keep. Appears to publish as Andrew May, Andrew J. May and Andrew Brown-May, unless the article is conflating two scholars. He is an elected fellow of two separate bodies, which would probably meet WP:PROF. There are several book reviews just on JSTOR, probably enough to meet WP:AUTHOR: Missionaries, Indigenous Peoples and Cultural Exchange ,,; The Encyclopedia of Melbourne ; Welsh Missionaries and British Imperialism . Espresso Addict (talk) 00:49, 4 June 2022 (UTC)
 * I'd also note that the article was hacked down before nominating, which does not help one to understand the potential areas of notability. Espresso Addict (talk) 00:55, 4 June 2022 (UTC)
 * I'm going to have to disagree with you on that, . In my opinion the removal of sources that don't mention the topic at all, the removal of unreferenced personal detail per WP:BLP, the removal of unsourced content, the removal of some extremely minor awards and the addition of one (albeit absolutely non-independent) source all help to determine whether or not there's any real substance in the page and any real grounds for having it. But as I said above, happy to be proved wrong here.
 * A question for : do you have some connection to this person? Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 21:13, 4 June 2022 (UTC)
 * I'm mindful of putting personal information on the internet (e.g. something like "we had the same supervisor but at different times in different departments at the same large institution where I no longer work because of a scandal involving a spatula and ..."). The Wikipedia Article Wizard and all the orientation went into this and related questions. I'm confident that I'm within all those guidelines/policy/etc, which I think is the spirit of your question.
 * On sources, I'm confident I can find publicly available links for the issues you raise. I've got a lot of information that's behind paywalls/logins and the alternative public ones I found aren't good enough. That's just time and effort on my part. I'd rather not go to this effort if the article is still going to be rejected. Or to put it another way, if you can expand "happy to be proved wrong here" to "if can prove you are right here, here or even here, I'm wrong"... then I can get to work on those points. For example, "if you can prove the two fellowships, I am wrong".
 * Getting a bit sidetracked from the topic of notability, so feel free to not engage with this. But a newcomer's perspective might be helpful. I found the deletions ("hack down") in conflict with my experience of wikipedia to date. Whenever there are problems on a wikipedia article I have always seen [citation needed] or [who?] and so on added to the end of a sentence. Or one of those "This section sucks because" boxes. Apologies for not knowing the names of these. The "hack down" deletions almost made me give up on wikipedia editing. I don't think adding [citation needed] and equivalents would have had the same effect on me, as that is quite literally constructive feedback rather than destructive feedback. Again, feel free to ignore this as it is off topic of notability criteria. Notamitchell (talk) 00:05, 5 June 2022 (UTC)
 * Paywalled or book sources are fine; many editors here are academics &/or librarians and can access them to check. Espresso Addict (talk) 00:26, 5 June 2022 (UTC)
 * No objection to removing unsourced personal information that doesn't contribute to notability; however, when bringing an article to AfD, I think it's best to leave everything else in situ, even if the sources aren't 100% reliable, so that AfD participants don't have to poke around in the history to see what was originally written. Often when a semi-reliable source states something, a reliable source can be found to state the same thing. Espresso Addict (talk) 00:21, 5 June 2022 (UTC)


 * Keep. The removal of unsourced family connections was appropriate. The removal of major career milestones was not. Regardless, he appears to pass WP:PROF (FASSA) and WP:AUTHOR (multiple reviews for Welsh Missionaries and The Encyclopedia of Melbourne). —David Eppstein (talk) 23:57, 4 June 2022 (UTC)
 * Keep notable Melburnian academic JarrahTree 05:19, 6 June 2022 (UTC)
 * Keep per David Eppstein. Deus et lex (talk) 23:03, 10 June 2022 (UTC)
 * Keep per David Eppstein. Cabrils (talk) 23:59, 10 June 2022 (UTC)


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