Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of Orthodox parishes in Alaska


 * 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. The main ground proposed for deletion here is notability. Notability is the standard which topics must meet to justify standalone articles; the non-notability of items in a list is not a relevant standard according to which to judge the list itself. Nor is merging and deleting an acceptable outcome. Skomorokh, barbarian   00:13, 19 November 2009 (UTC)

List of Orthodox parishes in Alaska

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These fail WP:NOTDIR. The majority of churches in these lists are in no way notable, and for the few that are, we have relevant categories (Category:Churches in Washington, D.C., Category:Eastern Orthodox churches in California, etc.) and even dedicated articles such as Orthodox Church in Hawaii. Biruitorul Talk 15:15, 3 November 2009 (UTC)

I am also nominating the following related pages:

 Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks,  Pmlineditor      ∞    17:03, 10 November 2009 (UTC)
 * Keep First, because that the individual churches may not be individually notable does not mean that they are inappropriate content for at least a list entry.  Second, categories and lists are complementary, and there is no reason not to have both. Lists have the particular advantage of providing some information about the material in which they appear, thus facilitating identification and browsing.  Browsing is a key function of an encyclopedia. As a general rule, for almost all topics with individual elements, if there is a category, there should be a list. Incidentally,  i suspect that most of the ones in Alaska would turn out to be historically notable if properly investigated, for either the parish as such or the building.  DGG ( talk ) 03:53, 4 November 2009 (UTC)
 * All right, let's pick through this. For convenience, let's assume the only notable entries are cathedrals and churches that already have articles. We get 0 of 7 notable entries for Arkansas and Hawaii, 4 of 31 for the DC area, 10 of 157 for California, and 8 (5 cathedrals and 3 parishes with articles) for Alaska. Now, even if a few more of these were notable (and remember, WP:BURDEN requires proof of notability at hand, not hypotheses of what would turn up "if properly investigated"), we'd still be left with five lists of largely non-notable entities, of directory material. As for your boilerplate argument on the function of an encyclopedia, there's a flaw. Lists by definition present notable subjects, not ones that "may not be individually notable". See WP:LIST: "An Index of articles page presents an alphabetical list of articles related to the subject of the index... Lists contain internally linked terms". I could support a List of Eastern Orthodox churches in the United States, with state-by-state lists of actually notable ones (ie, ones with articles), but this is a step too far. - Biruitorul Talk 07:30, 4 November 2009 (UTC)
 * Delete parishcruft. These are NN congregations - what's next List of fast food eateries in YOURSTATE or List of ATMs in Manhattan.... Carlossuarez46 (talk) 03:22, 6 November 2009 (UTC)
 * Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so consensus may be reached.


 * Keep. Orthodox parishes in Alaska are likely to have a lot of history, since Alaska was once a Russian possession and the Russian Orthodox Church was then Russia's established church. Some of the parishes were established under Russian rule, so they have been around a long time. The absence of an article is not a proof of non-notablity; it simply means that nobody has gotten around to writing an article on the topic yet. -- Eastmain (talk) 19:09, 10 November 2009 (UTC)
 * WP:BURDEN requires positive proof of notability, not speculation. I also note you say nothing about the Arkansas, California, Hawaii and DC lists. - Biruitorul Talk 19:13, 12 November 2009 (UTC)
 * I agree with Eastmain on this. Hundreds of years of history there. I also have nothing to say about the other states. Don't bundle nominations. Abductive  (reasoning) 05:05, 18 November 2009 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Hawaii-related deletion discussions.


 * Delete the one for Hawaii, after merging into the Orthodox Church in Hawaii article. It already has a list, so just merge that section. Note the link in the Orthodox Church in Hawaii is not even working! I might have time to work on this tomorrow. The most historic is probably the one associated with Kauai due to Russian Fort Elizabeth. W Nowicki (talk) 03:23, 13 November 2009 (UTC)
 * I fixed some broken links in Orthodox Church in Hawaii and merged the lists, so the List of Orthodox parishes in Hawaii should be deleted now. Then you can decide on the others. Thanks. W Nowicki (talk) 19:41, 13 November 2009 (UTC)


 * Delete Merge any good information into existing "Orthodox Church in..." articles. --SquidSK (1MC•log) 21:16, 17 November 2009 (UTC)
 * Keep. List can be used as an incubator for notable material yet to be published, as noted above. -- Pink Bull  17:35, 18 November 2009 (UTC)
 * Keep List of Orthodox parishes in Alaska per Eastman, et al, as historically interesting. The others don't seem to be notable. Bearian (talk) 19:34, 18 November 2009 (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.