Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Linda Hulin


 * 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. Joyous! | Talk 15:28, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

Linda Hulin

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No evidence for notability and she doesn't satisfy WP:NACADEMIC. The only criteria that she might satisfy is 8 ("chief editor of a major, well-established academic journal in their subject area") but I'd say that the Palestine Exploration Quarterly is not a major journal. Gaia Octavia Agrippa Talk 14:50, 30 November 2016 (UTC)


 * Please keep in mind that Wikipedia is very poor on women academics, especially non-US academics, as British roles are frequently misunderstood in comparison to American terminology, so it would be great to avoid being overly hard-line. Here's the key points for meeting PROF, any on their own may be sufficient:
 * I disagree that Palestine Exploration Quarterly is not major or established. In fact it has a publication history starting in 1865, making it extremely well established, and with 3 publications a year is more regular than most other academic journals. I suggest checking the description and archives at http://www.pef.org.uk/quarterly/.
 * She is a "Supernumerary Fellow" of Harris Manchester College, and any fellow of an Oxford College normally meets PROF, there is no exception for supernumeraries.
 * As the Director of the Western Marmarica Coastal Survey in Libya (which appears to have been running for the last 6 years), she can be presumed to be holding a significant research position.
 * Lastly this deletion was raised 4 hours after creation, it's still a stub and that's a good thing. Rather than rushing improvement, it would be nice to have questioned notability on the article talk page as a bit more ad hoc searching over a few days may find evidence of committee membership, prizes, etc, for example though I noticed http://www.torch.ox.ac.uk/inhabit, I have yet to look at it properly for including her co-organizer role in the article. --Fæ (talk) 15:14, 30 November 2016 (UTC)


 * I am all for increasing the number of biographical articles about women (this has in fact been my focus these past few months). However, that does not mean creating articles for individuals who might only be considered notable at a great stretch. I am my self British, so I understand the complicated system we have. To reply to each of your points:
 * The Palestine Exploration Quarterly is very old. That wasn't why I questioned it. The requirements are that a journal is "major, well-established". Why its long-levity may make it "well-established", it isn't a major journal. Something like Antiquity would be a major journal. There are many small academic journals around but most are not what could be described as "major".
 * I disagree that all fellows of Oxbridge colleges satisfy PROF. Notability through academic rank requires the person to have "held a named chair appointment or distinguished professor ... or an equivalent". An Oxbridge fellowship is not equivalent to a professorship; they include everything from final year doctorate student up to the top academis in their field. The rank notability comes from their university appointments (reader and above). Regardless, she is a supernumerary fellow (an extra fellow). A quick glance through HMC's supernumerary fellows shows that this is a category to reward individuals. For example, they include the PA to the principal (she surely doesn't satisfy PROF?), Zouhair Khaliq (a businessman), and Will Gompertz (a journalist). At university level she is a "Research Officer"; this is not a title I am familiar with but the research track equivalent to reader/professor is a senior research fellow, which she is not.
 * Looking at all the research projects undertaken with the school of archaeology, it is clear that they are fancy tiles for the research of individual academics or collaborations. So the "Western Marmarica Coastal Survey" is just another way of saying "Linda Hulin is carrying out a survey of the Western Marmarica coast". As for the TORCH network, it appears to simply be a grouping of academics with similar interests that runs the occasional seminar.
 * I put it up for deletion because I know it attracts more people than a simple comment on a talk page. Having read it and looked the individual up, I couldn't find anything that made her notable, hence the nomination for selection. The problem is, I can only really judge her notability by what is in her article, if I had found something to add I would have. I want more biographies of women, but they need to be notable nonetheless and she isn't. Gaia Octavia Agrippa Talk 16:00, 30 November 2016 (UTC)


 * We can make it pretty easy by agreeing on what "major journal" means. I assert that Palestine Exploration Quarterly is a major journal, being a choice established channel for academic papers on Levant history and archaeology. Hulin is therefore notable by being its Editor (per the Executive listing for the journal). What can you link to as being an existing consensus on how to measure "major", rather than it being subjective? Thanks --Fæ (talk) 16:10, 30 November 2016 (UTC)
 * BTW http://www.tandfonline.com/action/journalInformation?show=editorialBoard&journalCode=ypeq20 shows that Professor Philip Davies is the assistant editor. By a weird co-incidence I happen to know Philip as we were doing masters degrees together at Sheffield, but I don't think that's a conflict of interest. Anyway, Hulin having Davies as her assistant editor, an extremely well established Professor in this field, seems a bit odd if this were not a major journal. --Fæ (talk) 16:29, 30 November 2016 (UTC)


 * I agree that that is the sticking point. My first reaction is that it is not a major journal. It isn't insignificant, but to me it is more a minor than major one. Hopefully someone else will weight in or point out a non-subject measurement. A quick google of "major archaeology journals" has brought up this website. Palestine Exploration Quarterly is not mentioned in its top 50 archaeology journals. Gaia Octavia Agrippa Talk 16:31, 30 November 2016 (UTC)
 * The Google test was discounted years ago ;-) As a balance http://www.ancientneareast.net/journals/ is a useful list for Ancient Near East focused journals. --Fæ (talk) 16:46, 30 November 2016 (UTC)
 * The problem is that yours is just a list of journals. The is now weighting to it, unlike the one I found. Ultimately this comes down to weather or not Palestine Exploration Quarterly is a "major journal". I say it isn't (and I defending my nomination) and you say it is (and you are defending your article). Hopefully someone else can come shine some light on the subject. I'm going to ask some wikiprojects to get some relevant advice. Gaia Octavia Agrippa Talk 22:37, 30 November 2016 (UTC)


 * I asked at the help desk, and they say that its a "low impact" journal and therefore wouldn't be considered major. One even used the same site that I did above (it measures how the average amount of citations a journal gets to measure its "impact" on the wider subject). Like I said above; I want more biographies of women, but only if they are notable. Gaia Octavia Agrippa Talk 01:48, 1 December 2016 (UTC)
 * In the interest of balance, you also asked at WikiProject Archaeology and WikiProject Palestine and got the opposite answer. The help desk based their on answer on PEQ's (supposedly) impact factor, but it's well known that impact factors are far less reliable and fair less useful in the humanities than in physical science (due to significantly less complete journal and citation indexes, lower citation rates overall, and the greater importance of monographs – all of which would affect PEQ). Note that the site they linked Scimago) only uses data from the last eight years and between 1972–1974 – a tiny fraction of PEQ's publication history.
 * For my part I don't interpret WP:PROF's reference to "major well-established" journals as only including very high impact journals, rather it's excluding bogus vanity presses, very new periodicals, student-run journals, etc. In that sense PEQ definitely qualifies. Joe Roe (talk) 12:19, 4 December 2016 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Authors-related deletion discussions. Coolabahapple (talk) 03:55, 4 December 2016 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Academics and educators-related deletion discussions. Coolabahapple (talk) 03:55, 4 December 2016 (UTC)


 * Delete. Off to a good start but too little impact so far WP:Too soon. Xxanthippe (talk) 04:04, 4 December 2016 (UTC).
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Archaeology-related deletion discussions. Joe Roe (talk) 11:57, 4 December 2016 (UTC)


 * Weak keep Editing the oldest and most prestigious journal in Near Eastern archaeology meets WP:PROF in my book, but I agree from most other regards it seems a little WP:TOOSOON. Erring towards keep because I do think she technically meets the SNG, this article helps to counter systemic bias, and we at least have enough sources for a solid stub. Joe Roe (talk) 12:22, 4 December 2016 (UTC)
 * Comment. I note Hulin does not appear to be a university lecturer but a member of the research staff; see School of Archaeology Research Staff, which lists her as a "Research Officer" vs School of Archaeology Academic Staff, which does not list her. The Faculty of Oriental Studies calls her "Research Assistant to the Director". According to Google Scholar her highest citations are 37, 24, 10 ; I'm not sufficiently familiar with the area to put these into appropriate context, but they don't seem to me to represent a substantially cited body of work. So we seem to be resting on the editorship alone for meeting WP:PROF. Espresso Addict (talk) 18:01, 5 December 2016 (UTC)
 * Yes, that seems right. Note that Hulin is the Editor for PEQ, this is not a case of a board of editors. I agree with the previous comments, my feedback from a historian in this area was amazement that the PEQ might not be recognized by Wikipedia as a major journal for the field. I guess the issue is the unlikelihood of a single reliable way of determining "major", so it's an unpredictable test for encyclopaedic notability. --Fæ (talk) 10:28, 7 December 2016 (UTC)
 * Magdalen lists her as a lecturer. It seems Oxford could do to update their various websites, but I can't see a reason why the college would list her at a higher rank than she has, so I assume it's a recent promotion rather than a mistake. Joe Roe (talk) 13:02, 7 December 2016 (UTC)
 * Joe Roe, more confusing Oxford terminology! The college lecturers aren't senior. and they aren't equivalent to lecturers at other British universities. They are there to supplement the teaching of undergrads, especially in topics not covered by the tutors/fellows of a college. If you look here, you'll see that the pay is very low compared to what a lecturer receives at other universities (in the region of £30/40,000). This gives details of university level teaching posts though it isn't thorough on college positions and doesn't mention research-only ones. Gaia Octavia Agrippa Talk 15:43, 7 December 2016 (UTC)
 * UK titles are so confusing. Yes, her post is very junior. I was a lecturer at the University of Birmingham and that was a tenured position, presumably something like the Associate Professorships at Oxford. There was a great fuss at Oxford and Cambridge over such titles which led to the creation of many more Professorships and the Associate Professorship grade at those Universities, as none of us liked having to explain to academics from other countries what our titles really meant. I have to admit I was a wee bit jealous that my American academic friends were called Professor and I wasn't. Doug Weller  talk 17:27, 7 December 2016 (UTC)
 * Oh, they do have to everything differently, don't they? It sounds on a par with a Teaching Fellow elsewhere, then? But thanks for the correction, it does seem to drop Hulin below the threshold of notability in everything except the editorship of PEQ. Joe Roe (talk) 18:34, 7 December 2016 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Women-related deletion discussions. Espresso Addict (talk) 18:13, 5 December 2016 (UTC)


 * In the light of Fæ's note about the expert perception of PEQs standing, I'm prepared to go with keep'. (I think, however, this is the first time I've encountered an academic who crossed the notability threshold for being an editor-in-chief without passing any other criteria.) Espresso Addict (talk) 00:32, 8 December 2016 (UTC)
 * I do point out that WP:Prof is a guideline, not a policy, and so does not have to be followed rigorously. I have noted that some journals are appointing more junior people as editors in chief. This has happened in the legal area. What these editors lack in achievement they may make up for in youthful vigor. It may be time to review WP:Prof. Xxanthippe (talk).


 * Weak keep - I'm going to stub the article. There appears to be enough here, from a purely academic standpoint. Here's a little bit more biographical info from her early years.[]  Also pinging  - his talk page says he has a special interest in and insight with higher education and research.Timtempleton (talk) 01:51, 8 December 2016 (UTC)
 * Keep. Notable on the basis of the editorship: As Fae says, Palestine Exploration Quarterly  is the most important journal in its specialized field. But I am a little puzzled, as are Xxanthippe and Espresso Addict, for she does seem considerably junior for that position.  It's possible that the position may be closer to Managing Editor, who does the work, while Davies does the traditional editor in chief  role of recruiting the best authors.   DGG ( talk ) 04:47, 8 December 2016 (UTC)
 * I wondered that, but she wrote the editorial in the latest issue, which suggests an editor-in-chief role. Espresso Addict (talk) 04:59, 8 December 2016 (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.