Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Ryūkyū proper


 * 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 no consensus. Sr13 (T|C) 06:38, 21 April 2007 (UTC)

Ryūkyū proper

 * – (View AfD) (View log)

Wikipedia does not allow new terms to be defined. "Ryukyu Proper" / "Ryūkyū Proper" appears to be a term invented on Wikipedia. I requested for references in the article and in the talk page on February but no sources turned up. (references: WP:OR, WP:NEO) —Tokek 12:17, 13 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Oppose The long debate last fall about Ryūkyū vs. Ryukyu ended with the following conclusion: the Japanese term Ryūkyū Shotō (琉球諸島; literally Ryūkyū Islands) is geographically different than English "Ryukyu Islands". (That is why it lost the crucial macrons which should be there.) Most research about the Ryūkyūs is naturally in Japanese. When I want to talk about Ryūkyū Shotō in English, the English article Ryukyu Islands is absolutely useless. As they are geographically different, they need separate articles. Notice how Ryukyu Islands includes a link to ja:南西諸島 (Nansei Shotō) while Ryūkyū proper links to ja:琉球諸島 (Ryūkyū Shotō). Perhaps the article name is poorly chosen (I did not create the page). I think it should be interpreted as "Ryūkyū (proper)", as opposed to "Ryukyu". Even better would be "Ryūkyū Islands" to supplement the existing "Ryukyu Islands". Either way, there is a need for the article. I oppose deletion, but would consider a rename. Bendono 14:31, 13 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Yes, there was a long and unrelated debate about when the macroned version should be used and when it shouldn't, and I agree with your assessment on how that debate turned out. However, that was never a central issue to this AFD proposal. It is still unlikely that the term could be proven to be not a neologism, therefore the AFD proposal. Because Wikipedia is against neologisms, something needs to be done regardless. In case you missed it, here's a relevant comment I made earlier at Talk:Ryūkyū proper:
 * ''If it's worth having an article of its own, I think either Ryūkyū Shotō or Geography of Okinawa Prefecture works. If it's not worth an independent article, I think it could redirect to Okinawa Prefecture. —Tokek 00:04, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Some more comments:
 * A problem: if "ryukyu proper" is not a real term, it cannot be properly defined, since there is no proper definition. (note: this is not circular reasoning).
 * Content is mostly a copy of a subsection of the Ryukyu Islands article, hence nothing will be lost if this article was deleted.
 * If the article was supposed to be about "Ryūkyū Shotō", though, really, why not title the article as such in the first place? (Currently, a move to Ryūkyū Shotō requires admin intervention.) I also suggested as a possible candidate "Geography of Okinawa Prefecture" because by definition the territory of Okinawa Prefecture consists of Ryūkyū Shotō and vice versa, although moving it to a "Geography of" article would change the nuance slightly.
 * I posted requests at Ryūkyū proper, Talk:Ryūkyū proper, Talk:Ryukyu Islands for sources that could disprove my assumption that this term is a neologism, in February. (I forgot to mention earlier that I posted a request at Talk:Ryukyu Islands, too.) It innately has problems by virtue of being a neologism, for one thing. On top of that there are far more straightforward alternatives.
 * —Tokek 04:41, 14 April 2007 (UTC)


 * "Ryūkyū Islands" is not a neologism. Here are some in print English references:
 * Temporal and spatial variation in the culture history of the Ryūkyū Islands, Richard J Pearson
 * Ryūkyū Islands (under United States administrations) : standard list of post offices, Melvin H Schoberlin
 * Catalog of the Ryūkyū research collection. A special collection of books, articles and manuscripts in relevant languages dealing with the Ryūkyū Islands, as of May 1, 1964, Douglas Gilbert Haring
 * Scientific investigations in the Ryūkyū Islands (SIRI) report, by National Research Council (U.S.). Pacific Science Board
 * China's quasi-war with Japan : the dispute over the Ryūkyū (Liu-ch'iu) Islands, 1871-1881, Pak-Wah Leung
 * Japan country map. area maps, Japan 1:2,000,000, Kansai district 1:200,000, Kantō area 1:750,000, Ryūkyū Islands 1:4,000,000 : city plans, central Tokyo 1:17,500, central Osaka 1:15,000, central Kyoto 1:15,000, Periplus Editions.
 * Handbook and specialized catalogue of the postal issues of the Ryūkyū (Liu Chʻiu) Islands (issued under United States administrations), William C Lassister
 * Specialized catalogue of the postal issues of the Ryūkyū (Liu Chʻiu) islands (issued under United States administrations), by Arthur Lee-Francis Askins
 * etc. etc... Bendono 04:51, 14 April 2007 (UTC)
 * You just stated: "Ryūkyū Islands is not a neologism", but I am proposing "Ryūkyū proper" for deletion based on the claim that "Ryūkyū proper" is neologism. Please read more carefully what you are responding to. —Tokek 05:30, 14 April 2007 (UTC)


 * I have. As I said, I oppose deletion, but am open to renaming. If it makes you happy, I suppose we could delete Ryūkyū proper and then change Ryūkyū Islands from a redirect to a full article. There is a need for the article, however it is titled. Either way, it is the same in the end. Bendono 05:44, 14 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Wouldn't creating a full article at Ryūkyū Shotō avoid the confusion and controversy that would arise from creating a full article at Ryūkyū Islands? —Tokek 05:57, 14 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Two problems with that:
 * Ryūkyū Shotō is Japanese for English "Ryūkyū Islands". It is desirable to use English when possible on English Wikipedia.
 * As the resources above demonstrate, there is established usage for "Ryūkyū Islands" in real, published English (i.e., non-neologism). Bendono 06:37, 14 April 2007 (UTC)
 * I agree that "Ryūkyū Islands" has been used in published English works. However, I'm concerned whether the definition of "Ryūkyū Islands" has always been the same as the definition of "Ryūkyū Shotō". By the way, for those who are confused, the terms "Ryukyu Islands", "Ryūkyū Shotō", "Ryūkyū Rettō" etc. are explained at Ryukyu Islands. —Tokek 07:13, 14 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Japan-related deletions.   -- Kusunose 00:54, 14 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Strong Keep -- The page (I'm tagging with stub, as is in need of work) is usful to make the distinction between the English usage (geographic chain of islands) and the Japanese usages (Northern and southern parts are awkward to transliterate into English, and that is complicated by the Different Political entities within Japan. As is, both as well as Okinawa need refactored, overhauled and integrated, but each has the place and prominence deserving their own pages. // Fra nkB 20:57, 14 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Comment The term "Ryūkyū proper" is not used in Japanese or English, so it would be unclear what usages we would want to distinguish under such an article title. Ryukyu Islands explains the differences between most Ryukyu related geographical names already, but if we want to create another article that does this again, it might as well be under a non-neologism title. (The situation with existing terms is already complicated enough.) The "Ryūkyū proper" article basically consists entirely of snippets from Ryukyu Islands. Unfortunately the article  does not have a definition for "Ryūkyū proper" to work with in the first place.—Tokek 15:54, 15 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep, Close, and Move the discussion to WP:RM to settle the correct name. Neier 05:34, 15 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Comment Actually, I think a delete is more appropriate than a rename in this case. I first assumed that "Ryukyu proper" meant "Ryūkyū Shotō", however, it is not clear if everyone, including the Wikipedia contributor who presumably first coined it, agrees with this definition. If we were going to rename it, we would first have to figure out what "Ryukyu proper" is supposed to mean. The term appears to be a neologism mainly invented for and used at Ryukyu Islands and Talk:Ryukyu Islands. When a poorly understood neologism such as this is used for an article title, the problem is deeper than a simple case of bad article title. At the heart of the problem is that this article is based on a neologism. —Tokek 18:16, 15 April 2007 (UTC)
 * It's not based on a neologism; but, the neologism was applied to a real-world concept (what Japan calls their islands). I've tried to follow the previous discussion, and this discussion; this is my understanding: This article is about what Japan calls the Ryūkyū Shotō, which (although translated, means Ryūkyū Islands) is more limited from what is commonly called the Ryukyu Islands in English (called Nansei Shotō in Japanese).  I think a move to Ryūkyū Shotō is acceptable, regardless of Wikipedia's "Use English" rules.  This is a good case for "break all rules"; and, each page would of course need a DAB tag at the top to point to the other.  The opening of the article can be cleaned up: The Ryūkyū Shotō (琉球諸島) is the main, southern group of islands in what is commonly called the Ryukyu Islands in English, or Nansei Islands (南西諸島 Nansei-shotō; "southwest islands") in Japanese.  But, it also looks like certain groups within that chain have been shuffled in this article.  For example, Miyako-jima should be a part of the Sakishima Shotō (ja:先島諸島), according to ja: wikipedia.  I don't think that deleting this article and starting over would leave us in any better position than we are already.  What exists can be renamed, to get rid of the neologism, and cleaned up (to either a) better match the grouping in Japanese, or b) explain the differences between the English grouping and the Japanese). Neier 23:34, 15 April 2007 (UTC)
 * You said: "It's not based on a neologism;": The same thing could be said for many neologism terms consisting of two words. For example, I don't know what "banana rhinoceros" means but it is based on non-neologisms ("banana" and "rhinoceros" are each real words). Someone else also said "Ryūkyū Islands" (the macronned version) is not a neologism.  For the sake of argument: sure! But what does "Ryukyu proper" mean? The article existed since January 2006 and described "Amami Islands" as being part of  "Ryukyu proper" (even though Amami Islands is not part of Ryūkyū Shotō). (The source of "Amami Islands" being classified under "Ryukyu proper" can be explained by an earlier revision of Ryukyu Islands - omitting details for now.) In Feb 2007, I removed Amami Islands from the "proper" article based on the assumption that the article was supposed to be talking about Ryūkyū Shotō. But then I realized this term seems to be made up, hence the addition of the unreferenced tag. Confusion over definition wouldn't be a big issue if a real term was used for the article title. Hence the policy against neologisms is very apt in this case. Although, I agree if this article was used as the base for a new Ryūkyū Shotō article and people wanted that ( I think it's somewhat unusual for content of an article put up for AFD to be recycled like that but nevertheless... ) sure, that can definitely work. The article so far includes:
 * Two, three sentences for introductory terminology explanation.
 * Images from the Ryukyu Islands article.
 * A verbatim copy of a section of a revision of Ryukyu Islands for the list of islands.
 * In my opinion, duplication of parts from the Ryukyu Islands article is not very valuable content for now. —Tokek
 * What I meant was that the concept that there is a group of islands which are a subset of what is called Ryukyu Islands in English (and, which are called Ryūkyū Shotō in Japanese) is not a neologism. Bananas and rhinos notwithstanding, the name "Ryukyu proper" is a neologism; but, the group of islands is not.  We can discuss what to call them in English, but, their existence (and the island grouping hierarchy in Japanese) seems to be well-defined, without resorting to making up names. Neier 06:15, 16 April 2007 (UTC)


 * For the sake of reference, I compiled a usage history for the term "Ryukyu proper":
 * "Ryukyu proper" was invented by Node ue on 03:24, 25 March 2005
 * On August 2005, I made some edits to the terms and grouping of islands. Here, I made an assumption that "Ryukyu proper" = "Ryūkyū Shotō".
 * On 23:55, 23 October 2005, Node ue makes this statement in the edit history: "There is no such thing as "satsunan" or "sakishima"; these terms were invented by the Japanese government in an attempt to create false divisions where none exist"
 * On 15 December 2006, a short exchange of comments on Talk:Ryukyu Islands mention Ryukyu proper: . Mention of "Ryukyu proper" on the talk page was actually shorter and less frequent than I thought.
 * On 10 January 2006, Ryukyu proper is created mostly from copy-and-paste from Ryukyu Islands.
 * I reverted the Ocober 2005 edit mentioned above on 8 July 2006 and added an explanative text: "This list is based on present day Japanese geographic names." The reason why I chose Japanese geographic names is because it is recent, official, detailed, easily referenced, and unambiguously defined classification of island subgroupings, making it virtually the only practical choice available, etc.
 * Also on the same day, I removed mention of "Ryukyu proper" from the article.
 * On February 2007, As I've previously mentioned, citation for the term "Ryukyu proper" was requested on three different pages. No sources showed up.
 * —Tokek 13:05, 18 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Move without redirect to something like Geography of Okinawa Prefecture, or Merge without redirect to Ryukyu Islands. The whole thing is settled by the above comment: The term was invented on Wikipedia. This is not a vote, and the above discussion points to not keeping it where it is. --GunnarRene 19:50, 18 April 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.