Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Laura Nader


 * 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. --Core desat  05:08, 26 January 2007 (UTC)

Laura Nader

 * - (View AfD) (View log)

nn biography; no indication that it meets WP:BIO. Only "notable" as being Ralph Nader's sister. Being related to a notable person does not impart notability in and by itself. Agent 86 19:13, 20 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep Give me a break, it only mentions she's his sister, it doesn't claim she's notable because of that. She's not.  Did you even try to look her up, or did you just assume that the reason the article was written was because she's Ralph Nadar's sister?  The article asserts notability, no indication by nominator of how it fails to meet WP:BIO, Nadar is the subject of articles, not just the author, so it does meet WP:BIO.  Being related to another notable person does not impart non-notability in and by itself.  KP Botany 20:24, 20 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Weak keep, assertion of importance ("Nader edited and published essays from these conferences as well as authoring several books on the anthropology of law, establishing herself as an influential figure in the development of the field.") is unreferenced, and the bio is partly copyvio. Seems like she would pass WP:PROF. --Dhartung | Talk 20:42, 20 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Comment It's also poorly written, but none of that is what it was nominate for. Needs serious work. KP Botany 01:30, 21 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep per Dhartung. Agree with KP Botany, this was a spurious nomination. — coe l acan t a lk  — 19:33, 21 January 2007 (UTC)
 * I don't mind people opposing the nomination, that's why it's a discussion. What I won't accept is the failure to assume good faith that the nomination is made in good faith. To me, take away the fact this person is Ralph Nader's sister, you're left with very little to distinguish this person from any other non-notable prof. If you disagree, that's fine, but leave the subtle personal attacks out of it. Agent 86 19:45, 21 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Actually, that could just be taken away. Nadar is a very well known academic--that she has a crummy Wikipedia article is a lapse that should be corrected.  People write articles about her, as I said before, the record is not just what she wrote.  She is an important and well known academic.  KP Botany 04:21, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Well, none of that is apparent in the article. I never have any problems with people properly sourcing an article and editing it during an AfD to provide encyclopedic content. However, as the article stands, there is no indication that she is "important" (by whose standard?) or "a very well known academic" and, as I said, very little to distinguish this person from any other academic. Agent 86 04:37, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Comment My bad, it seems academics write articles about unimportant topics, and I had made the mistake of assuming that if she was important enough to be the topic of articles, in addition to writing her own, that this was some assertion of notability. All those books, all those seminars and articles about her, all those invitations to speak, to travel the world addressing people, all about her, all her writing, and the only thing that matters is she is Ralph's brother, so she can't be looked at in her own right.  Interesting enough, Wikipedia doesn't have an article about their older brother John, who is also an anthropology professor.  Why not?  He's not notable?  Or he's Ralph's brother?   Again, no amount of evidence will be sufficient to show she is notable, so the article might as well be deleted.  KP Botany 22:05, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
 * I don't know why you need to be so sarcastic. If you can re-write the article so that it meets the content policies and guidelines, then please do. I have always been willing to reconsider an article if it is rewritten so as to contain encyclopedic content. That otherwise non-encyclopedic entries are rewritten so as to meet the standards set in the policies and guidelines is sometimes a wonderful outcome of an AfD nom (even though that goal should never be the reason to nominate an article for AfD). If this topic is as encyclopedic as you contend, your energy might better be spent revising the article so that it is meets the content policies rather than getting angry at me for nominating the article. Agent 86 22:50, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
 * But that's not why you nominated, you nominated it because you contend she's not notable, because she's Ralph Nader's sister, not that the article needs rewritten. And, the fact that she meets some of the criteria for notable, namely there are non-trivial articles about her,  did not change your nomination, in fact, you simply reiterated that there is no indication she's notable--apparently her credentials don't count for notability.  She is a major mid to late 20th century academic.  So what if her brother is more famous than she is?  If the article is crummy, tag it crummy, not deletion.  And, since all I can offer are her credentials, and they don't meet your standards for notability, there's no benefit to my revising the article to simply include the credentials you already reject wholely.   Nader's notable.  In this case a google check would have confirmed that quite readily, and no time would have been spent discussing it, but all time could have been spent correcting the article in any way necessary. KP Botany 00:23, 23 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep per Dhartung. Agree with KP Botany. --Kevin Murray 20:04, 21 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Academics and educators-related deletions.  -- Pete.Hurd 02:17, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Comment Some awards she has won: Morgan Spanish Prize from Wells College, the Wells College Alumnae Award, and the Radcliffe College Alumnae Award. In 1995 the Law and Society Association awarded her the Kalven Prize for distinguished research on law and society. Also someone wrote a brief bio. I'm not sure how prestigious these awards are. If someone can find her CV it'll clarify issues about if she passes WP:BIO due to recognition of her publications (awards) or not. --Quirex 19:59, 23 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep Laura Nader is definitely notable on her own, without her brother, her notability does not come so much from celebrity (not a household name) but she is very important in the field of anthropology, and perhaps the foremost scholar of the Anthropology of Law (from the special edition of the American Anthropologist she edited on this topic in the 60s to her book The Life of the Law)--she has put forth theories such as the User Theory of Law, and written extensively about the role of "harmony ideology" (the ideas harmony is necessarily good and conflict/complaining/dissent are dysfunctional and bad) and its spread & role as a mechanism to silence and to colonize and its relationship to arbitration and Alternative Dispute Resolution started at the Pound Conference in the 60s by the chief justice of the Supreme Court . Also, a couple examples of her frequently cited anthropological work relate to the anthropology of science (the book Naked Science) and her work about the behavior, roles and responsibilities of anthropologists (the most well-known example, and probably best-known thing she's written, "Up the Anthropologist!", which was extremely controversial in anthropology at the time it was published & helped start some important changes in the way anthropologists do anthropology, telling anthropologists that they needed to not just study "down" (study the relatively powerless), but also to study "up" (study the relatively powerful, the corporations, the insurance industry, the pharmaceutical industry, the list goes on and on)). And the list of Laura Nader's very important contributions to anthropology also goes on and on, she's contributed to many areas of anthropology, from her work on energy, to children, to her important formulation of controlling processes and ideas about cultural control (her Mintz lecture published in Current Anthropology, called "Controlling Processes: Tracing the Dynamic Components of Power" among other articles) are just a few examples. Her scholarship is also marked by its being always relevant and comparatively accessible in a time when anthropologists (especially academic ones) are increasingly writing in elitist and jargon-filled terms that hides whatever real relevance their work may have to the everyday lives of real people. I have an encyclopedia of anthropology from decades ago that already had an entry about her. I know a good amount about her work but nothing about Wikipedia content policies or anything like that otherwise I'd try and help fix it up a little. I know it's not well written and doesn't describe Laura Nader's work very well but I thought the idea of Wikipedia had to do with overtime people contribute things they know and it's all a work in progress though some things progress slower than others. (By the way, I thought her older brother's name was Shafeek, and I think he studied anthropology but I didn't know he was a prof, though I know he died some time ago, I think I read somewhere that he gave up on trying to go to law school to work and help pay for Ralph to go.) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 169.237.76.117 (talk • contribs) 04:38, 25 January 2007
 * Strong Keep. I've added her long list of published books to the article, but there are many audio and video publications as well, not to mention many journal articles that have been cited by other academics. While I have faith in the nom., I also hope that recent improvements to the article mean this can become an uncontested WP:SNOWBALL.  Agent 86, do you have any further concerns about the notability of the subject or with how the article covers the subject? John Vandenberg 05:57, 25 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Comment The article is much improved. Despite what might be insinuated by others above:
 * 1) My objection was not based on who her relatives are, but as the article stood previously the only distinguishing factor was the familial relationship (which doesn't necessarily mean a lot outside the US). Absent that, there was nothing in the article to show how she was different than any other prof at any other school any other place. Most profs will publish, and one would expect that most profs works will be cited in other academic texts or journals, so the lack of any other factors seemed telling at the time.
 * 2) The decision or final approval isn't mine - that's why I brought it to AfD, so everyone could have some input. As with most any AfD discussion, I'm willing to abide by with whatever consensus achieves. Agent 86 07:16, 25 January 2007 (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.