Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Journal of Vaishnava Studies (2nd nomination)


 * 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. wangi (talk) 03:05, 7 January 2019 (UTC)

Journal of Vaishnava Studies
AfDs for this article: 
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Non-notable journal. Not indexed in any selective databases, no independent sources. Links to it appear to be dead, seems to have disappeared without leaving much (if any) trace. "Sources" put forward to the previous AfD years ago are not convincing either. Does not meet WP:NJournals or WP:GNG. Randykitty (talk) 10:48, 24 December 2018 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Hinduism-related deletion discussions. Happy holidays~! Baby miss  fortune 11:25, 24 December 2018 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Literature-related deletion discussions. Happy holidays~! Baby miss  fortune 11:26, 24 December 2018 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Academic journals-related deletion discussions. Randykitty (talk) 11:39, 24 December 2018 (UTC)


 * Wikipedia's page on Vaishnavism cites estimates that there are somewhere between 200 million and 641 million adherents to Vaishnaivsm. With such a huge number of adherents, there are remarkably few journals dedicated to its study. As cited in the previous deletion discussion, there do seem to be a number of leading scholars who have published in its pages. After 8 or 9 more years the total of such scholars has surely risen (and could be checked if relevant). While much of the effort for maintaining this journal does seem to have been done by a single individual (Rosen), this journal is clearly in a different category from modern-day predatory journals and spam journals that try to create an appearance of being a respectable journal, even as sincere editorial effort is minimal or non-existent. My sense it that for the topic of Vaishnava studies this journal has indeed been influential even if the citation counts are not comparable to areas of more active scholarship (relevant to criterion 1), and -- with the amount of scholarship so small as it is - it has been historically important (relevant to criterion 3), and it has indeed been cited in various reliable sources (relevant to criterion 2).


 * But a big problem is that there does seem to be a total absence of known secondary sources that assert and document these things. And furthermore, it seems that the journal's publisher's website has evaporated, as RK stated. However, the journal does seem to be continuing to publish issues, even without a website (possession of a website is not a requirement for Wikipedia article). For example, as of today, the Columbia University Library (LINKED) lists the following issues in the reading room: v. 27, no. 1 (2018 Fall); v. 26, no. 2 (2018 Spring); v. 26, no. 1 (2017 Fall); v. 25, no. 2 (2017 Spring); v. 25, no. 1 (2016 Fall). But without having identified secondary sources (online or offline) that document these things, and could be used to expand the article, it's hard to see how the journal can be affirmed as meeting the notability guideline at the present time.


 * I suspect that eventually sufficient secondary sources will be generated or identified. But perhaps that may be awhile, unless someone who knows about offline literature can step into the breach with relevant and verifiable offline reliable source citations that bridge the gap. If we can't identify such online or offline sources now, which seems likely, what do we do? Can the existing article be moved into some sort of limbo, where it is officially deleted, but its bare-bones draft text and discussion remains? --Presearch (talk) 17:24, 24 December 2018 (UTC)


 * Keep I think Wikipedia should go easy on serious/non-predatory academic journals (even if obscure ones). It is real, it is published in and cited by genuine academics, there is no evidence that it is academically deficient (lacking in peer review, promoting fringe theories, etc.) Given all that, I don't think the paucity of secondary sources should result in deletion (which I don't think actually are non-existent – Google Books finds many refs, most of which are just journal cites, but some appear to be secondary discussions, but they are not free preview, so I can't determine how extensive they are.) SJK (talk) 03:09, 27 December 2018 (UTC)
 * Addendum: contrary to nom, it does meet WP:NJOURNALS, in particular "Criterion 2: The journal is frequently cited by other reliable sources". Searching Google Books, JSTOR, etc, shows quite a few cites from RS on this topic. SJK (talk) 03:18, 27 December 2018 (UTC)
 * Comment Any journal (even scam predatory ones, which this isn't) will get a smattering of citations, that's nothing exceptional. If they really get cited frequently, they are picked up by citation indexes like Scopus or the Social Sciences Citation Index. In this case, the journal is not even in the ATLA Religion Database. As for going easy on academic journals, but not predatory ones, that puts us in the undesirable position that editors here will have to decide which journal is "decent" and which one is "predatory". Better to stick to the WP principle that we let the sources decide. So if there are no sources, there won't be an article. --Randykitty (talk) 10:00, 27 December 2018 (UTC)


 * Delete Agree with noiminator. BlueD954 (talk) 05:04, 27 December 2018 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of India-related deletion discussions. SJK (talk) 07:09, 27 December 2018 (UTC)


 * Notifying participants in previous AFD:, , , , , , , , , , SJK (talk) 07:16, 27 December 2018 (UTC)
 * Query, is it a predatory journal? Is it peer-reviewed? Abductive  (reasoning) 16:48, 27 December 2018 (UTC)
 * Comment There are no sources that say that it is predatory. There are no sources that say it is. The one source that we have (in Wire) treats it as a respectable journal. Also, I don't think that it is OA (and AFAIK, nobody has yet found a way to be predatory with a subscription business model). So it most likely is not predatory. I don't know whether it is peer-reviewed, not even if the journal claims peer-review, as I cannot find a homepage for the journal. --Randykitty (talk) 16:53, 27 December 2018 (UTC)
 * Actually, it does claim to be peer reviewed, according to this archived issue. The website of the international Krishna Society still lists it here, but if you click the link, it goes to an expired domain. In any case, whether predatory or not, or whether peer-reviewed or not, has no direct bearing on notability... --Randykitty (talk) 18:25, 27 December 2018 (UTC)
 * If it was predatory, it could be notable for that. The fact that is disappeared is interesting. Are abstracts still available somewhere? Abductive  (reasoning) 20:38, 27 December 2018 (UTC)
 * Yes, we often get more and better sources if a journal screws up than when they do a good job, unfortunately. Perhaps abstracts are still available somewhere, but I haven't found them. There may be printed issues in some libraries. --Randykitty (talk) 21:49, 27 December 2018 (UTC)


 * Comment Regarding libraries, the Columbia University library webpage (linked above and here) claims to have a seemingly complete collection up through Fall 2018. The WorldCat page linked from the current version of the article (and here) claims it exists in 50 libraries (and my impression is that WorldCat is not yet good at covering libraries in India, so there may be more). I think the answer is that almost certainly there are printed issues in many libraries. On another note, since there seems to be a Fall 2018 issue in the libraries, the absence of an online journal homepage seems likely to be transitory. Do we know how long the journal has been without a homepage? My guess would be that it may have been a few weeks, but maybe not all year, but I'm just guessing (based on how long it can take busy people to arrange for a new web home if one disappears). What role is there for patience about such fluctuations by we Wikipedia editors? --Presearch (talk) 00:15, 28 December 2018 (UTC)
 * I dont know how long it has been out, but the domain name is for sale, so they haven't even renewed their domain name registration... --Randykitty (talk) 10:09, 28 December 2018 (UTC)
 * WorldCat reporting 50 libraries holding it (with the decent possibility that Indian libraries, poorly indexed by WorldCat, may hold additional copies) supports my contention that it meets NJournals C2, via remark 2.c. This also supports the contention that it is non-predatory and of serious academic quality, since it seems unlikely that a predatory journal (or a low quality journal) would be so popular with libraries, including the libraries of prestigious institutions such as Columbia University (and also, per WorldCat, among others, Stanford, UC Berkeley, University of Chicago, Cornell, UPenn, Harvard, Brown, Yale, Oxford, Cambridge, and ANU.) Prestigious institutions like that don't subscribe to or keeping holdings of junk and predatory journals. SJK (talk) 09:06, 28 December 2018 (UTC)
 * Nobody says that it's a fake predatory journal. However, we regularly delete journals for not meeting WP:NJournals (and forget about meeting WP:GNG in that case). I don't see why this journal should be an exception. We have barely enough info to verify that the journal exists. --Randykitty (talk) 10:09, 28 December 2018 (UTC)
 * But, arguably, it does meet NJournals C2 via remark 2.c, as evidenced by WorldCat. And WorldCat verifies the existence of the journal (surely it is a reliable source as to the holdings of libraries), so WP:V is clearly (and not "barely") met that the journal exists. SJK (talk) 10:17, 28 December 2018 (UTC)


 * Comment I found a journal article reviewing one of its issues, and have added that as a cite to the article. Surely that adds to the case for its notability. SJK (talk) 11:13, 28 December 2018 (UTC)
 * And a noted American scholar of Hinduism (Francis X. Clooney) has positive things to say about the article as well, which I've also quoted. That is evidence it meets NJournals criteria 1. SJK (talk) 11:22, 28 December 2018 (UTC)

 Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.

Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Jovanmilic97 (talk) 09:59, 31 December 2018 (UTC)
 * Frankly, I don't think that 50 libraries is such a big deal. Really notable journals are held by hundreds of libraries the world over. In addition, WorldCat is notoriously unreliable. Just one example: the Eberhard Karls University is listed as having it, but if you click that link to see their holdings, you get "not found"... And as far as Clooney goes, that's an in-passing mention in a complete listing of journals in the field and most certainly hardly (or even not at all) contribute to notability, let alone that this alone would be enough to meet NJournals#1. The journal article reviewing an issue is a good one, but to meet GNG we need multiple sources, just one won't do it. --Randykitty (talk) 11:03, 31 December 2018 (UTC)


 * Keep This is by European-US standards very much of a niche publication, and we would therefore expect only certain extremely comprehensive libraries to hold it; it seems from WorldCat that most of them do. As mentioned, there is no practical way of evaluating its holdings in libraries in its cultural area., a problem with all Indian periodicals. Scopus and ISI make no attempt to cover fields like this in that geographic area.  I think journals like this should be an exception to the usual rules, for the sake of assistance to the users in finding information.  It's not actually even IAR, because an exception such as this is necessary to avoid WP:Cultural bias, which though not a formal principle, is a general practice here.  And at least there's another way to avoid deletion, which is to merge with the article on the religious sect.  I'd accept that as a general way of handling this sort of problem.  DGG ( talk ) 17:38, 31 December 2018 (UTC)
 * I strongly disagree with this. 1/ Simply using the keyword "Hindu" shows two jounals included in both Scopus and ISI ([Clarivate http://mjl.clarivate.com/cgi-bin/jrnlst/jlresults.cgi?PC=MASTER&Word=*hindu]). There's probably more, but it shows that they DO include journals in this field, just not THIS particular journal. 2/ There is NO cultural bias here. Bias is if there were sources on 10 India-related subjects and on 10 European/North American subjects and we would only create articles on the latter. Or, if we would require more sourcs for India-related subjects. Neither is the case here, we should require THE SAME sourcing, regardless of the topic. WorldCat is unreliable (as you basically say yourself above) and, in any case, number of library holdings at best indicates that there may be notability but that is all. --Randykitty (talk) 09:50, 4 January 2019 (UTC)


 * Keep. Journals, and publications in general, are notoriously difficult to find reliable sources. This is for the simple reason that other publications are reluctant to talk about their rivals, and those that aren't rivals aren't independent.  So it came as a surprise to me, especially after DGG's comment, that I found some sources relatively quickly;
 * "Book Review: Journal of Vaishnava Studies" in Journal of Hindu-Christian Studies
 * The above author has also posted (possibly the same review) in Academia.edu. Ok, that's an academic social network, but Jon Paul Sydnor is previously published in the field so is RS per WP:SPS
 * Interview: Journal of Vaishnava Studies editor Steven J. Rosen in Vrindavan in Vrindavan Today
 * SpinningSpark 01:46, 1 January 2019 (UTC)
 * Comment So we have 1 review (good source in reputable journal) and 1 interview with the editor. In bios we don't take interviews as indicating notability so why would we do things differently here? --Randykitty (talk) 09:55, 4 January 2019 (UTC)
 * , no opinions on the merits of this AfD but you really think that Vrindavan Today is such a high-quality RS; wherein an interview of the journal-editor is sufficient to impart notability to the journal? &#x222F; WBG converse 11:16, 4 January 2019 (UTC)


 * Keep as per Spnning Spark, DGG, SJK. --Presearch (talk) 07:01, 4 January 2019 (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.