Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Brown Canadians


 * 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 delete. Consensus that this term lacks a guideline or policy based reason to exist and satisfies at least one deletion reason. Barkeep49 (talk) 03:24, 18 May 2020 (UTC)

Brown Canadians

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"Brown" is not a racial or ethnic group as this article suggests. South Asians and Middle Easterners/North Africans are not related. Not to mention that Middle Easterners/North Africans tend to have lighter skin. There is no scientific basis for the creation of this article and the term is not recognised by the Canadian census. We already have articles about South Asian Canadians and Middle Eastern Canadians. To merge information from both articles into this article as if they are a united racial group is incorrect and misleading. A source on the page explicitly states that Latin Americans are generally considered to be more "brown" than Middle Easterners, yet there appears to be no information on Canadians with Latin heritage. Some of the information included in this article should be transferred to the Brown (racial classification) Brown identity article. Sapah3 (talk) 01:23, 3 May 2020 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of People-related deletion discussions. Sapah3 (talk) 01:23, 3 May 2020 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Canada-related deletion discussions.  CAPTAIN RAJU (T) 02:09, 3 May 2020 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Ethnic groups-related deletion discussions.  CAPTAIN RAJU (T) 02:09, 3 May 2020 (UTC)
 * Comment from nominator: Following further comments published by other users, I have amended my proposal and propose the deletion of the article and the moving of any valuable information to the newly created "Brown identity" article where discussion on other "brown" groups can also be included such as Latin Americans, Pacific Islanders and Southeast Asians (especially Filipinos and other Austronesian-speakers who have a history of using the term). (Sapah3 (talk) 01:36, 4 May 2020 (UTC))


 * Keep the article doesn't need a scientific basis because race isn't a science, the article seems to be about the experience of brown people in canada (which can be different then that of a unique immigrant group from one country or origin). additionally, the article provides good references to the experiences of some canadains who identify as 'brown' (last paragraph book or article "being brown". Epluribusunumyall (talk) 12:30, 3 May 2020 (UTC)
 * The article has been set up in the nature of an ethnic group (e.g. South Asian Canadians) with the use of an infobox, total number of people among other things. The article suggests "brown Canadians" are a united ethnic group who come from the same cultural and ethnic origin and that is not the case. South Asians and Middle Easterners/North Africans are genetically and culturally quite different from each other, I hope you are aware of that. Not to mention the fact that the article makes no mention of other "brown" groups such as Latin Americans despite the fact that there is an entry in the article that says "brown" in Canada tends to refer mostly to South Asians and Latin Americans with Middle Easterners often being marginalised within the definition of "brown". Parts of the article include information that make no mention of "brown" (e.g. "19th century" section). The rest of the article is merely a collection of sources that use the word "brown" that have been placed into this article as if they refer to an ethnic group under the misnomer "Brown Canadians". That's why I believe whatever useful information from the page should be transferred to the Brown (racial classification) article in a new section that talks about "brown identification" rather than keeping an article that is misleading. (Sapah3 (talk) 13:14, 3 May 2020 (UTC))


 * The debate here seems to be whether or not "Brown Canadians" are considered to be a unique identity or ethnic group. However the issue here shouldn't whether or not "Brown Canadians" are a separate ethnic group; that's subjective and open to debate. The issue here is whether or not "Brown Canadians" is a commonly used term worthy of an encyclopedia article. The notability of the subject doesn't necessarily mean that anyone here endorses that Brown Canadians are a separate & distinct ethnic group to the detriment of South Asians or Indians just like how our article on Indigenous peoples in Canada doesn't mean that we endorse the idea that "Native Canadians" are a separate identity over Inuit or First Nations. I personally do not believe Asian Canadians is a unified ethnic group, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't have an article on the topic especially considering that the term is widely used and discussed. First of all, we need to reflect the terminology that reliable secondary sources use even if we perceive that terminology to be incorrect, which is why the article on Latino Americans is called that instead of Latinx Americans. Secondly, it's appropriate to have articles on ideas or terms if they're notable, regardless of whether or not the ideas or terms are "correct". For example, we have an article on Color terminology for race even though it's universally agreed upon that "yellow people" is both an offensive term and not a cohesive ethnic group. For this reason I disagree with the nominator on their rationale for deletion, as it's based around their own opinions on race/ethnicity and not the notability of the term at hand or whether it's used in reliable sources.
 * However, while I do disagree with the nominator's reasoning, I don't believe the article should be kept in its current state. "Brown Canadians" are not described as an ethnic group by reliable sources. Many of the sources use "brown" as an adjective in conjunction with "black" to make a blanket statement covering all visible minorities in Canada. Almost none of the sources in the article describe "Brown Canadians" to be a distinct ethnic group instead of just using the term as an adjective for skin colour. Additionally, the Canadian census does not consider "Brown Canadians" to be an ethnic group either, so the entire "demography" section is original research created by adding separate ethnic group totals together. While some authors do advocate a "brown identity", that appears to be in reference to their skin colour and not their ethnic group. Many of the sources that cover the identity in detail though in the "academic research" are university theses and not actual academic papers. Naming the article "Brown Canadians" is misleading as it implies that "Brown Canadians" is common terminology in the sense of being an ethnic group like "Black Canadians", and not just an adjective which some people identify with. For this reason I support merging the article to brown identity or moving to brown identity in Canada. Additionally the article should be rewritten to follow Canadian English if it is kept. Chess (talk) (please use&#32; on reply) 19:18, 3 May 2020 (UTC)


 * Keep or move (per above): I agree with the nominator that this page is incorrectly presenting "Brown Canadians" as if it's a united demographic, but that can be solved by tidying up the article: removing the infobox and demographics sections (which are bordering on WP:OR regardless) and the WP:SYNTHy stuff in the prose. But the concept and discussion of "Brown Canadians" is well-sourced as used in both the news media and academia. — Kawnhr (talk) 19:45, 3 May 2020 (UTC)


 * Delete Preposterous article where the editors have come up with their own original research, where there is no academic source of Arabic-speaking referring to themselves as "Brown". Absolutely ridiculous POV and OR. George Al-Shami (talk) 06:48, 5 May 2020 (UTC)


 * Delete:"Brown Canadian" is too broad of a term to warrant an article about people with "brown" skin in Canada. Not all South Asians, Middle Easterners and North Africans have brown skin. Many South Asians actually have lighter skin. For example, Samragyee RL Shah's mother may be perceived as "brown" because of her typical South Asian features, I'm sure nobody is going to call Samragyee RL Shah, a Nepali actress, "brown" because she has more East Asian-type features which many Nepalis have. I know that the infobox has been deleted but I'm just going to say that using the total amount of South Asians to come up with an obviously incorrect number of "brown Canadians" is incorrect, not everybody included in that number has "brown" skin. I know that somebody has made changes to the page bur this also applies to Middle Easterners/West Asians. Most Middle Easterners have light skin and in the US and across Latin America, Middle Easterners are classified as "white", pass as white and receive benefits for looking "white" in countries like Brazil. I've heard of many stories of "white" Middle Eastern people in North America (US and Canada) who don't experience the type of discrimination that other ethnic minorities face simply because they are "white passing". Rami Malek, is North African yet he can pass as "white" so can Mohamed Hadid, nobody is going to think anything of them based on appearance alone. The total number of Middle Eastern and North African included in that article is incorrect because not everybody has brown skin or even identifies as "brown". Sharing a similar skin tone does not mean your experiences are the same because they're not, none of these groups are related to each other. We all know that a brown-skinned Nepali woman or a brown skinned Mexican woman is not going to face the same type of experience that an olive-skinned Syrian woman wearing a hijab would experience. Please delete it. Not that my opinion matters but the whole concept of "brown" is so far fetched to me because where I live no one uses that term. It's a quintessentially North American thing and it's weird in my opinion because "brown" can mean so many things. I don't understand when people who don't even have brown skin use it to refer to people with darker skin, like why are you using that term when all dark skinned people aren't the same? It makes no sense. (2001:8003:4E46:D000:F159:66DB:3606:FBCF (talk) 05:31, 8 May 2020 (UTC))

Delete WP:SYNTH, WP:OR; many of the studies cited do not use the term brown Canadians, but specific ethnic groups; those that do say Canadians with brown skin. Zoozaz1 (talk) 19:26, 9 May 2020 (UTC)  Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.

Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks,  Sandstein   07:42, 10 May 2020 (UTC)


 * Delete "Brown Canadians" in all the sources I looked at seems to be given in opposition to "white Canadians" i.e "is the treatment of someone the same if they are white too if they are brown?" This article also spends a lot of time talking about Malawi Canadians for some reason despite there not being any evidence at all of even a small community in Canada (and going by the article they would be Black Canadians not brown?) The evidence of anyone identifying under this term is one book by a non-notable author, and I would be willing to bet s/he would identify as an Indian Canadian before identifying as a "brown" Canadian. This article appears to be a history of racism in Canada, which does have a place on Wikipedia, but not under an ethnic group that exists solely in the authors head. AlessandroTiandelli333 (talk) 11:56, 10 May 2020 (UTC)


 * Delete. While as a Canadian I can certainly attest that "brown" has been getting some use here in recent years as a self-descriptor for people with darker skin tones, it's not a unified group that's been collectively analyzed for brownness per se: it simply encompasses everybody with a skin tone in the brown family, regardless of whether their brown skin tone comes from African, Middle Eastern, South Asian or even Latino roots — and, as the article briefly explains, there have also been some less successful attempts to rope indigenous Canadians into the label too. So there's nothing that can really be said about this without synthesizing: this isn't an article about a defined or unified group, it's an article about a word that's still highly subjective as to who it even does or doesn't apply to. Bearcat (talk) 21:34, 14 May 2020 (UTC)


 * Delete. WP:SYNTH to create a unified ethnic group that doesn't exist, not enough reliable sources talk directly about the subject.  Mohamed  Talk 21:38, 15 May 2020 (UTC)  — Preceding unsigned comment added by Memelord0 (talk • contribs)


 * Delete. This is a made-up identity, as most probably a racist one. Nobody self-identifies as a Brown Canadian, and probably nobody would use this term either to describe any person or group. As explained above by other editors, this article goes against a set of Wikipedia policies, such as WP:OR, WP:SYNTH, WP:COATRACK, WP:LABEL or WP:POINT. Place Clichy (talk) 23:31, 15 May 2020 (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.