Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Japanese historical people in popular culture


 * 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. Nakon 01:03, 1 March 2015 (UTC)

Japanese historical people in popular culture

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This looks like someone's collection of "movie references to historical figures". I am placing this under WP:FANCRUFT, WP:NOTDIR, and WP:OR. If the culture is notable enough, then it should be included in the articles. Knowledgekid87 (talk) 22:48, 21 February 2015 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Anime and manga-related deletion discussions. Knowledgekid87 (talk) 22:54, 21 February 2015 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Japan-related deletion discussions. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 22:54, 21 February 2015 (UTC)


 * Delete I think the nom hits it on the head. Many of the people listed are notable in their own right, but this list consists of unsourced trivia consisting of appearances and not encyclopaedic information. Any information that can be sourced would be better served on the existing articles to place it in the proper context. SephyTheThird (talk) 23:19, 21 February 2015 (UTC)
 * Keep – I agree that the content is unsourced trivia. But the fact is that this stuff is often added to the "In popular culture" sections of main articles. This article was created by the late Dg2, as a destination for trivia in articles like Oda Nobunaga and Takeda Shingen. That material has since been moved to People of the Sengoku period in popular culture, although editors keep adding more to the main articles. They are also adding trivia to articles like Himiko. I think this article should be kept as a move destination for trivia (mainly games) in main articles about figures from Japanese history. I am definitely opposed to moving it back into the main articles. As to how much of it can be sourced, none of it. But that's not going to stop editors from adding it again. If we have this article, at least it can be kept out of the main articles. – Margin1522 (talk) 01:52, 22 February 2015 (UTC)
 * The obvious counter is that if it's not wanted in the main articles, why should it be wanted in an article with obvious issues that you agree exist. Keeping it simply to keep the information out of other articles doesn't sounds like a good reason to keep it and actually says to me that we should delete the article because it's a dumping ground of unwanted information. Some of the information is relevant to those articles, the issue is largely about presentation and sourcing. I would argue that historical figures being the subject of contemporary media to be of encyclopaedic interest on those articles, If anything it serves to illustrate why those figures are still of note in a modern context. Perhaps the issue is having people familiar with both the actual person as well as the fictional versions of them, but that's an issue for those pages and not the existence of this page. I would also strongly disagree that "none of it" can be sourced, much of it can't but certainly there is information that can. SephyTheThird (talk) 03:50, 22 February 2015 (UTC)
 * It sounds like you are saying that this article is a triva dumping ground for all of the stuff that editors don't want to appear in articles. The notable information that appears in popular can be sourced and including it in the articles can help give them GA status as outside third party information. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 04:23, 22 February 2015 (UTC)
 * Comment – Sorry, I don't want to be dismissive of manga or gaming culture, but for example this, from the Himiko article: "A clone of Himiko is a character in the manga series Afterschool Charisma, where she follows in her progenitor's footsteps as a shaman by leading a cult that worships the spirit of Dolly the clone sheep." That's actually typical. Himiko is popular as an empress about whom so little is known that popular authors can give free rein to their imagination. I suppose this could be sourced, but only if we were willing to settle for manga itself. Per WP:"In popular culture" content, I think this entire list of manga and game stuff should be spun off into a separate article, like this one. I'm not saying that it's not encyclopedic, only that it doesn't improve the main article, which should be about the historical person. – Margin1522 (talk) 06:47, 22 February 2015 (UTC)
 * I disagree when you say articles should be just about the historical person, it is always good to include a legacy like section with in popular culture if it be by notable books or whatnot. Notability is the key word here, if editors want to build a trivial list of who's who that appears where then there is wikia for that. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 22:10, 22 February 2015 (UTC)


 * Keep (OK, I am an inclusionist, but not a keepist) Perhaps the title should be changed to "List of...", and the entries should be trimmed. I see the "trivia" problem with the content, but sometimes lists are really useful sources of overview information, which cannot easily be obtained by searching individual articles. So deleting it does not seem constructive to me. Imaginatorium (talk) 04:45, 22 February 2015 (UTC)
 * Comment. From the nomination: This looks like someone's collection of "movie references to historical figures". It doesn't look to me like that. Where are the (non-animation) movie portrayals (let alone "references")? Are movies no longer regarded as popular culture? As a ferinstance, Utamaro and His Five Women purports to be about (and doesn't just refer to) Utamaro. No mention of it, or anything like it. What do I misunderstand? -- Hoary (talk) 06:22, 22 February 2015 (UTC)
 * Surely, this ("serious"!) film is not in the list, because of the "fancruft" tendency. But I think the answer to this problem is not to (try to) remove anything with a whiff of fancruft, but rather to fill out the list with good stuff like Mizoguchi's film. Imaginatorium (talk) 07:07, 22 February 2015 (UTC)
 * In principle, yes. But then this would be enormous. Still, I suppose that it could thereupon spin off sub-articles. -- Hoary (talk) 09:55, 22 February 2015 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Popular culture-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 01:14, 23 February 2015 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Lists-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 01:14, 23 February 2015 (UTC)
 * Delete as non-notable indiscriminate info (the only inclusion criteria is a self-evident primary source), whether as a list or article (as a list it would likely fail WP:LISTN). There are also subjectivity issues involved in what equals historic.  Every culture has historical figures, real or fictional, that re-occur in various media (think Abraham Lincoln, Blackbeard, Johnny Appleseed, Moses...). There is no indication that historical Japanese figures being referenced in modern culture is by itself a notable entity per WP:GNG, it just happens. If there are no significant reliable sources that discuss what it means to have Minamoto no Yoshitsune in a video game, then this is fancruft and/or WP:OR. --Animalparty-- (talk) 02:00, 23 February 2015 (UTC)


 * But... jeez some editors put an awful lot of work into this. In fact that guy who started it is dead. You hate to toss all that away. Especially if, per Margin1522, it's just gonna get created again... I don't know if there's any force on earth that can stop people from writing about Japanese cartoons, so maybe per Margin1522 we should channel it into this article... Herostratus (talk) 14:30, 25 February 2015 (UTC) And the person who made the article, Fg2, was a Ph.D. and was fluent in Japanese and English and looks to have been a pretty smart cookie and well-regarded generally. I'm not really inclined to second-guess him that much. Keep. Herostratus (talk) 14:58, 25 February 2015 (UTC)
 * My condolences to the author but as it stands you have not provided reasoning that trumps the policy concerns raised. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 19:19, 25 February 2015 (UTC)
 * Delete I agree with Knowledgekid that this article is essentially a dumping ground for unwanted pop culture trivia. This is sadly not a coherent article about Japanese historical people in pop culture, and there is no way to write a generalized article about all the different Japanese people spanning the length of Japanese history (unlike Joan of Arc in popular culture). As such, it cannot be more than a list, and most of it is unsourced anyways so why not just nuke it. About the "people will just add it back" point, we have a similar problem for articles about the Three Kingdoms period of China; how we deal with it is to try and keep the sourced and significant pop culture information in the main article and present it in prose form while removing the rest. The solution is maintenance, not trying to sweep it under the carpet creating a giant unwanted mothball. _dk (talk) 23:52, 25 February 2015 (UTC)


 * Delete. This is clearly an indiscriminate list, as the definition of "historical" is entirely subjective. Popular culture references or appearances can easily be added to the relevant biography articles, but there is no need to make an infinitely long list here. --DAJF (talk) 06:17, 26 February 2015 (UTC)


 * Delete per  – Philosopher Let us reason together. 02:43, 27 February 2015 (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.