Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Margit Warburg


 * 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. (non-admin closure) Natg 19 (talk) 19:49, 6 February 2015 (UTC)

Margit Warburg

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Does not meet WP:SCHOLAR. Journal, book, and web searches did not find anything other than expected trivial mentions. No in-depth coverage of the article subject or her works, and does not meet any of the other criteria at WP:NACADEMICS. Tgeairn (talk) 19:56, 30 January 2015 (UTC)
 * Keep. The subject is a well-known academic with much available material to flesh out the article if an editor so chooses. The nominator seems to not have bothered to verify that sources covering this person per WP:BEFORE (which enjoins the taking of reasonable efforts be made to locate sources). Unfortunately, the tag-to-Afd process is being abused by some, whether out of ignorance or intent, resulting in the loss of notable articles. There are short/stub articles covering equally notable subjects out there that are only sporadically watched (there is only so much watchlist traffic that can be monitored) and that are equally vulnerable to over-hasty nominations. &bull; Astynax talk 20:09, 30 January 2015 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Academics and educators-related deletion discussions.  Everymorning   talk  20:22, 30 January 2015 (UTC)
 * Astynax, would you mind linking to some of the reliable sources covering this person you mentioned above? I looked and couldn't really find any reliable sources except books or papers she has written/her faculty page/other primary sources like that. Everymorning   talk  20:24, 30 January 2015 (UTC)
 * Click the "news" link above for a few. There are certainly more, as google news and jstor don't represent anything like complete coverage. For her most recent work, visit her current faculty page. &bull; Astynax talk 20:37, 30 January 2015 (UTC)


 * Keep. Renowned and wellknown scholar who publishes in reputable journals and is editor for reputable publishers: Brill, Routledge, Aarhus University Press. Theobald Tiger (talk) 20:33, 30 January 2015 (UTC)
 * None of those meet WP:ACADEMIC, except possible "renowned" - but we have no independent reliable sources for that. --Tgeairn (talk) 20:46, 30 January 2015 (UTC)
 * As I had already indicated to you before you proposed this, the article already includes an independent news article that should be more than sufficient to establish notability. &bull; Astynax talk 20:58, 30 January 2015 (UTC)
 * An single half-column lightweight article in the church & faith section of a limited distribution online religious newspaper that has no critical analysis of her work or works does not confer notability. Again, please see WP:ACADEMIC for a list of what would qualify - including the detailed notes at the bottom of that page. --Tgeairn (talk) 21:12, 30 January 2015 (UTC)


 * Keep. Per previous comments. Sufficient evidence to establish that she's a distinguished academic; extensive reference in other works to hers is evident at GScholar and GBooks. --Arxiloxos (talk) 22:59, 30 January 2015 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Denmark-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 14:57, 31 January 2015 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Social science-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 14:57, 31 January 2015 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Religion-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 14:57, 31 January 2015 (UTC)


 * Keep - with 2810 Gbook hits you thought it would be easy to add some references before sending it to AfD. Or just notice to start with that she is Professor of Sociology of Religion at the University of Copenhagen and thus meets WP:NACADEMICS No. 6 5. Weird nomination. -- Sam Sing! 15:19, 31 January 2015 (UTC)
 * Regarding NACADEMICS criteria 6. The person has held a highest-level elected or appointed academic post at a major academic institution or major academic society.
 * "Criterion 6 may be satisfied, for example, if the person has held the post of President or Chancellor (or Vice-Chancellor in countries where this is the top academic post) of a significant accredited college or university, director of a highly regarded notable academic independent research institute or center (which is not a part of a university), president of a notable national or international scholarly society, etc. Lesser administrative posts (Provost, Dean, Department Chair, etc.) are generally not sufficient to qualify under Criterion 6 alone, although exceptions are possible on a case-by-case basis (e.g., being a Provost of a major university may sometimes qualify). Heads of institutes and centers devoted to promoting pseudo-science and marginal or fringe theories are generally not covered by Criterion 6; their heads may still be notable under other criteria of this guideline or under the general WP:BIO or WP:N guidelines."
 * Being Professor of Sociology of Religion at the University of Copenhagen does not meet that criteria at all. --Tgeairn (talk) 18:22, 31 January 2015 (UTC)
 * That is criterion 5, not 6, which quite frankly should be a very obvious but here overlooked typo. -- Sam Sing! 22:50, 31 January 2015 (UTC)
 * Her staff page at University of Copenhagen lists her as a professor in the Department of Cross-Cultural and Regional Studies. The sociology department does not even list her at all.  In no way does that meet criteria 5 (The person holds or has held a named chair appointment or "Distinguished Professor" appointment at a major institution of higher education and research). Please research your statements before just throwing accusations around. --Tgeairn (talk) 23:07, 31 January 2015 (UTC)
 * Research is indeed good both before and during an AfD discussion. Nom now makes the observation that "The sociology department does not even list her at all", presumes that her professorship does not qualify, and in two "updates to match sources" and  removes the string "Professor of Sociology of Religion".
 * While Warburg has been teaching in several departments the last 35 years, the sociology department is not one of them. But that does not change the mere fact that she is Professor of Sociology of Religion. A simple distinction between where and what that the sources are clear about.
 * I have corrected the mistake and added further references to the article in . -- Sam Sing! 06:58, 1 February 2015 (UTC)
 * Thank you for the additions. We have differing understandings of notability, and NACADEMICS in particular.  I do not appreciate your assertion that you have corrected my mistake - as an illustration, at least two of the sources you added contradict your "correction". These two books both list Warburg as being a "...professor in [the] sociology of religion."  Note the "in", not "of", which distinguishes a title from a type.  Before you call that splitting hairs, note that the second source lists a number of academics and uses the phrase "Professor of Sociology" for some (Nason-Clark and Richardson, for example) and "Professor in Sociology" for Warburg in the same listing.
 * Many of the other publications added simply contain passing mention and/or are novelty presses. Do we really want to delve into what the print run size was for the 20 page pamphlet The Circle, the Brotherhood, and the Ecclesiastical Body?
 * I am unlikely to sway your opinion on PROF, and I remain unswayed as well. I am hopeful that the community will review this thoroughly as this discussion proceeds. --Tgeairn (talk) 17:35, 1 February 2015 (UTC)


 * I am not swayed by what to the best of my experience is a misreading of WP:PROF due to an inability to read and understand the sources. I can see you have repeated something similar in Articles for deletion/Saul V. Levine. You are, as far as I'm concerned, very welcome to bring more eyes to either deletion discussion, but so far you stand alone with your interpretation.
 * "Professor of" is predominantly used, but the preposition has no relevance here: you somehow drew "the sociology department" into the equation although it's irrelevant, and then boldly deleted the string "Professor of Sociology of Religion" in the article. To call it a mistake was mildly put, it's a blunder of dimensions. And it was corrected. -- Sam Sing! 20:30, 1 February 2015 (UTC)


 * Weak keep. She has a high profile in Danish-language sources that discuss Danish identity and its relationship to religion, her work is much cited, and she has had an important career at a major university. While her field may not have great prominence in some countries, it does in hers, and the newspaper that has written most about her (including the profile article), Kristeligt Dagblad, plays a larger role in the Danish media than its name, "Christian Daily", might suggest, and I found and added to the article another article from the same publication that cites her work at length. I also added a reference to a one-hour lecture she gave on Danish Radio; being invited to give such a talk indicates her prominence there. She isn't all over the news, but I believe she clears the bar as an influential academic in her field. It should be noted that the evidence is likely to be pretty much all in Danish, complicating search for some (Google may not even show you foreign-language results), but that national notability is perfectly acceptable. Yngvadottir (talk) 21:02, 31 January 2015 (UTC)
 * 'Keep news coverage is quite sufficient for WP:GNG, and in addition, she, like most academics, is notable for her academic work under WP:PROF. The importance of her work is show, as usual for her field, by her books. Brill is the most important European publisher for the academic study of religion at the highest level. The  real WP:PROF  test is almost always being an expert in their field--the named chair is an easy way to show it in some cases without even having to look at the publications. But a full professor at a research university is almost always notable even without it I would personally say always notable, but there have been about 1 exception a year here exceptions in fields like education where WPedians don't take the subject seriously. And there has sometimes been a argument for someone who studies an unpopular or controversial field, or is highly notable in their subject but a crank elsewhere--the 1 or 2 articles a year declined on that basis are in my opinion always errors and simply show our prejudice, and for some reason it tends to happen with scholars of religion, especially the less established religions--this seems to be  a field that often attracts prejudice, even at WP.  (The one point where Tgearn is right is that highest position means President of a university or the equivalent, and is an alternate for those people who are appointed to such posts on political or other grounds, but are not notable as scholars--they;re notable as executives. This does;t apply here one direction or another.)  When someone challenges an established informal guideline to see if it really holds, that's fine-- I do that myself once in a while to see if consensus might be changing. But when they discover they are still against consensus and keep challenging it at repeated afds on the same still-rejected basis, that's another matter. DGG ( talk ) 05:38, 4 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.