Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Indigenous peoples of North America/Archive 10

Native "gods" categories
There are three categories in the above CfR I'm uncomfortable with entirely: And a couple of also-uncomfortable subcategories: No doubt there's more of the same. "Gods" strikes me as a very bad cultural juxtaposition, like calling a PacNW "Bighouse" a "mosque" or "temple". I'm of a mind they should be deleted entirely, or a more suitable set of names be found. Kumugwe, for example, is an extremely powerful being, but I've never heard of him anywhere else being described as a god. The Transformers (mythology), likewise, or Coyote (spirit), are spirit-beings, and in the case of the Transformers spoken of as "emissaries of the Great Spirit" but I don't think I've ever heard of them as "gods", except in badly-written pastiches or in evangelistic tracts condemning them (the latter are more likely to speak of them as manifestations of the Devil). Thoughts? Oh, also the "Native American" categories included Inuit and Aztec subcats, an example of how badly that term is misapplied (Aztecs had gods, of course).Skookum1 (talk) 16:57, 2 February 2011 (UTC)
 * Category:Native American gods
 * Category:Native American goddesses
 * Category:Native American deities
 * Category:Haida gods
 * Category:Haida goddesses
 * Category:Inuit gods
 * Category:Inuit goddesses
 * Why not consolidate and calling the whole something like "Category:Spiritual beings of the indigenous peoples of North America" and a parallel called "Category:Spiritual beings of the Indigenous Peoples of South America", with the Caribbean and Central America grouped together with North America? A coordination in recat may be necessary by working together with WP:SOUTHAM. Also, why pigeon-hole to a specific group of people? Some spiritual beings are part of several different tribes, often with similar-sounding names, or even if totally different-sounding names, have similar roles in the culture. CJLippert (talk) 16:41, 3 February 2011 (UTC)
 * Good cat-names; maybe it's time for a CfD for these.....certainly fitting and more in line with actual/appropriate usage rather than the outside term "god(desses)"....except maybe in the Aztec and Maya etc cases, but certainly not for "tribal peoples" (an awkward term I know, but you get the drift I mean I hope). SFAIK the NorthAmNative project is supposed to include Mexico and Central America and the Caribbean (if not the Caribbean littoral of South Am...); unless there's a WP:Mesoamerica?  Certainly a working group in WP:ANTHRO I'd think, maybe in WP:MYTH - ?  And yeah, as for beings like Thunderbird and Coyote and others, the stories vary widely across different peoples, eg. Transformers (Sto:lo) vs Transformers (Kwakwaka'wakw) vs Transformers (Okanagan) etc...Thunderbird is very different between the Squamish and the Nuu-chah-nulth and the Kwakwaka'wakw (I think User:OldManRivers held forth on this on Talk:Thunderbird (mythology) before he went back to his war canoe racing (he's now teaching Skwxwu7mesh in North Vancouver and has around 100 students, kickstarted a whole language revival all on his own! - he's both 'Namgis (one of the Kwakwa'kawakw peoples) and Skwxwu7mesh.  Certain items like Kumugwe and Sisiutl also come to mind as having stories that vary widely, though the being is the "same" so again Sisiutl (Skwxwu7mesh) or Sisiutl (Squamish) vs Sisiutl (Snuneymuxw) (this being occurs in other cultures in the region too, but that's the Salish-type form of it, not the Kwakwaka'wakw etc).  D'sonoqua/Dzonokwa, the cannibal giantess of the woods (the standing female figure with arms outstretched and a bloody "O' formed by distended,pursed lips) seems to have a fairly consistent name, but by different spellings etc...these and many more articles need writing, of course....my favourite Kwakwaka'wakw one is "Cannibal-Giant-At-The-North-End-Of-The-World ('Babanuxw'alanux'siwe or something like that in Kwak'wala) who sends the three birds, Long-Beak, Crooked-Beak and Hooked-Beak, to harry mankind - masks of them are some of the best-known potlatch paraphernalia.....so do you want to launch the CfD or should I?  Or should we throw it by WP:SOUTHAM and whichever other WPs might be appropriate first....'too many cooks spoil the broth', though, seems a clear paradigm when launching new projects around the mad, mad world of wikidom....Skookum1 (talk) 06:34, 4 February 2011 (UTC)
 * BTW have you looked at that CfR yet?Skookum1 (talk) 06:40, 4 February 2011 (UTC)
 * There are WP:MESO and WP:CARIB. As you suggest, coordinating CfR with these may be helpful. Where to draw the boundary between WP:IPNA and WP:MESO may be a bit difficult, but should be really easy with WP:CARIB and WP:SOUTHAM. On these other WikiProjects pages, I don't see any subpages that are specific to whole group of indigenous peoples, just only in WP:MESO as WP:AZTEC, which to me is in more in the same lines as WP:IPNA/Nish than WP:IPNA. As you brought this up first, you may want to bring this to them for CfD. CJLippert (talk) 15:36, 4 February 2011 (UTC)
 * There's also WikiProject Central America, which is good for any contemporary info. North America includes Central America and the Caribbean. Slightly off topic, but I wish there were a Wikiproject:Indigenous peoples of the Americas or a Wikiproject:Indigenous peoples of South America, but I don't know enough about the inner workings of WP to create one. -Uyvsdi (talk) 18:41, 4 February 2011 (UTC)Uyvsdi
 * Well, there's almost a case to be made for WP:FOURTHWORLD, which would be for indigenous peoples worldwide, whether Yakuts, Sami or Nagas.....but I'll try and get at the CfD today, or at least will consult the other WPs first....might be just easier to start the CfRs and notify them; I think the suggested wording is about the best we can do; "supernatural beings" is maybe another usage, and less hoity-toity new-age-y sounding maybe. In the PacNorthwest, the Tsimshianic terms for the boss killer whale and boss eagle translate "supernatural killer whale" and "supernatural eagle", i.e. the killer whale of all killer whales, not just any killer whale, the eagle of all eagles, or that's that one translation anyway (Barbeau, who is discredited as a cultural analyst; it's just I was raised with his book Totem Poles so am familiar with his wordings - National Museum of Canada publication, makes me wonder if the pictures in it might actually be PD...maybe I'll get around to asking them....BTW the clans and moities have a similar issue, some are given article-titles in Nisga'a, some in Tlingit, some in Tsimshian; integrated articles covering all already exist, but maybe redirects from each nation-category in the proper language/spelling would be a good idea; I'll come back with examples later, but I think Raven clan will get you to some of them.Skookum1 (talk) 19:26, 5 February 2011 (UTC)
 * Worth discussion for sure, but I am not comfortable with the use of "supernatural" as only some spiritual being are considered "supernatural"... others are considered "natural" beings. CJLippert (talk) 20:09, 6 February 2011 (UTC)
 * Just an aside, while it is tempting to include MesoAmerica and the Caribbean in North America on geographical grounds, culturally the Arawak-speakers and the so-called Caribs of the Antilles were South American. The inhabitants of Cuba and possibly of Hispaniola prior to the arrival of Arawak speakers may have originated in MesoAmerica. Carl Sauer called the Florida Straits "one of the most strongly marked cultural boundaries in the New World", noting that the Straits were also a boundary between agricultural systems, with Florida Indians growing seed crops that originated in Mexico, while the Lucayans (a branch of the Arawak-speaking Tainos) of the Bahamas grew root crops that originated in South America. -- Donald Albury 21:13, 6 February 2011 (UTC)
 * That's why a Wikiproject:Indigenous peoples of the Americas would be really wonderful to have. -Uyvsdi (talk) 22:09, 6 February 2011 (UTC)Uyvsdi
 * Finding editors to work with it is the problem. My interests in indigenous peoples is pretty much confined to Florida and the Bahamas, and I don't want to take on more. -- Donald Albury 23:34, 6 February 2011 (UTC)

I was about to, just now, start the CfR on this particular group of categories, but on looking at the Haida and Inuit ones I'm wondering if rather than renaming them they should just be deleted outright; at least in teh Haida case the mythologies/spiritual beings in question may have cognates in surrounding societies, as discussed above and on the Feb 2 CfD on the "Native American" terminology/mis-use. In "consolidating" these it would seem necessary to delete those categories, and any others like them - except maybe Maya and Aztec etc categories. Input please, before I proceed with placing all the CfR templates and notifying the various affected WPs.Skookum1 (talk) 01:56, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

Wikiproject Indigenous peoples of the Americas
A WP:Wikiproject Indigenous peoples of the Americas has been proposed, see WikiProject Council/Proposals/Indigenous peoples of the Americas. 65.95.14.96 (talk) 07:46, 19 February 2011 (UTC)
 * The rudimentary beginnings of WP:WikiProject Indigenous peoples of the Americas are up. -Uyvsdi (talk) 01:55, 21 February 2011 (UTC)Uyvsdi

Another note on categories
I added some articles to the new categories Category:16th-century Native Americans and Category:17th-century Native Americans. There are several others I could add from Canada, Mexico and the Caribbean, but in Canada the name "First Nations" is used, and it looks like many categories are now being moved to the more inclusive "Indigenous people of North America" rather than "Native American". Perhaps it would be simplest to move to Category:16th century North American Natives? Til Eulenspiegel (talk) 18:48, 20 February 2011 (UTC)
 * Careful with "Natives"... that either sounds like "Savages" if left without qualifiers or additions, or includes anyone born in a certain place. Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 > haneʼ 02:09, 21 February 2011 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure exactly what you mean that it sounds like "savages", which has a far less complimentary definition than "native", but okay then, what about Category:16th century Native North Americans - actually the same as the current title with only the insertion of "North"... ?Til Eulenspiegel (talk) 02:19, 21 February 2011 (UTC)
 * Maybe; but it's probably a case for WP:CfD. The whole point of this is that Canadians are upset about the whole "Native American" term in general, no matter what qualifiers you add. Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 > haneʼ 02:22, 21 February 2011 (UTC)
 * I've got it - Category:16th century Indigenous persons of North America. Maybe that way I could feel comfortable adding articles like Membertou and Donnacona to the category. Til Eulenspiegel (talk) 02:27, 21 February 2011 (UTC)

Featured portal candidate: United States
Portal:United States is a current featured portal candidate. Please feel free to leave comments. -- RichardF (talk) 14:34, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

Adding "Popular pages" to U.S.-related projects
A very interesting tool of the Wikimedia Toolserver is called WikiProject Popular pages lists. These lists are similar to project-related article lists like U. S. article lists used for generating assessment statistics. The Popular pages lists include the rank, total views, average daily views, quality and importance ratings for the listed articles. Here is the full list of projects using popular pages lists. An FAQ also is available at User:Mr.Z-man/Popular pages FAQ.

I recently added links to lists of popular pages as shown below to the U.S. Portal - WikiProjects box and the nominations sections for each of the selected articles boxes.

Portal:United States/Projects/Popular pages

Because this project was not included, I am bringing up the popular pages tool here. This tool makes it very easy to track three of four balancing dimensions when selecting articles for showcasing at a portal - quality, importance and popularity. When tracking the fourth dimension, topic, the related article lists tool (such as for U.S. article lists tool) also might be useful by filtering on categories of interest.

If you do decide to use this tool, feel free to update Portal:United States/Projects/Popular pages as well.

Regards, RichardF (talk) 02:25, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

Proposed deletion of Nyan Wheti


The article Nyan Wheti has been proposed for deletion&#32; because of the following concern:
 * A search for references found only mirrors, fails WP:N and WP:V

While all contributions to Wikipedia are appreciated, content or articles may be deleted for any of several reasons.

You may prevent the proposed deletion by removing the notice, but please explain why in your edit summary or on the article's talk page.

Please consider improving the article to address the issues raised. Removing will stop the proposed deletion process, but other deletion processes exist. The speedy deletion process can result in deletion without discussion, and articles for deletion allows discussion to reach consensus for deletion. JeepdaySock (AKA, Jeepday) 16:12, 25 February 2011 (UTC)


 * It appears Themightyquill and Ponyo took care of the references issue. Thanks! CJLippert (talk) 21:16, 25 February 2011 (UTC)

Prehistory of West Virginia and Protohistory of West Virginia
Cleaning up the articles Prehistory of West Virginia and Protohistory of West Virginia is an epic task, if anyone wants to take a crack at it. Try to find a reference or make a paragraph readable. -Uyvsdi (talk) 19:13, 26 February 2011 (UTC)Uyvsdi
 * Bringing Monetons into line with the rest of the project would be an epic task too. I'd been meaning to get to it one of these days, but it's just too much! Til Eulenspiegel (talk) 03:01, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

Queen Charlotte Islands v. Haida Gwaii - name issue
I'm gonna take this also to WP:TITLE and WP:CANTALK but it's a propos to post this here too. I've been taking a lot of personal heat as an "Anglo-Canadian" (a term I find offensive btw) who won't let go "until it's pried from my cold, dead hands" etc. by ongoing agitators who want Wikipedia to adopt the Haida's preferred name for the islands; which is in common use there, and was made official by the BC govt this last summer as part of a political deal, but isn't official at the Canadian national level, nor in any major source such as the Britannica or National Geographic; the Canadian Encyclopedia has amended its entry, however, and rebranding in media continues apace within British Columbia. I've told the complainers over and over again it has to do with WP:TITLE and WP:COMMONNAME but they're all of a mind that it's some kind of racist conspiracy etc. Paranoia, accusations, hate-mongering and a history of edits and renames to the article of an utterly POV/SOAP nature - including deletions of any mention of either British Columbia or Canada. In my view, using Wikipedia to promote a term is SOAP, and world-wide English usage is what matters; they don't get that, they want Wikipedia to do what THEY want - then accuse me of WP:OWN even though among British Columbians I'm intensely in favour of native culture/land claims etc......ironically their behaviour is similar to that of the various political SPAs who've lately tried to control leadership candidate articles, and another campaign to have the wine industry's geographic definitions be presented as the standard with the wider legitimate usages (of Sonoran Desert re the Okanagan Valley (wine region) article as if they were "minority views". Anyways though certain other editors have weighed in, and there's a closed RM, the complaints and personal/paranoid attacks and insults continue; native sensitivities of course are important, and it's why Kwakwaka'wakw instead of Kwakiutl people or Nuu-chah-nulth instead of Nootka people - both and others like them are standard in BC English now; but a geographic name with historical precedents and a global usage-context is not in the same category; but this is a campaign to "overturn colonialist history" and is inherently POV in nature, and like Salish Sea proponents of the term have repeatedly tried to use Wikipedia to advance/promote it and wipe all mention of the "colonialist name", when not just speaking derisively of it; even before the name-change was made "provincially official". Anyways I'll take this over to WP:TITLE but it seems to me some mediation and/or other input than my own is needed.Skookum1 (talk) 20:25, 4 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Off-topic comment: shouldn't those red-links be redirects? Rmhermen (talk) 20:28, 4 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Perhaps, but there would some that argue that Kwakiutl people should go to Kwaygyulh (or wherever that redirects to); Kwakiutl is a sort of disambig page based on teh misnomer; Nootka people in a technical, specific sense, could go to Mowachaht i.e. the people of Nootka Sound at Yuquot (Friendly Cove), though Nootka as I recall is a disambiguation page and "Nootka people" came to be a widely-used misnomer for all the peoples now known as Nuu-chah-nulth (excepting the Ditidaht, who define themselves separately).Skookum1 (talk) 21:31, 4 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Just to note, Kwagu'ł is where that redirects to (or does now, I just made that redirect) and it's one of several BC ethno articles with special characters in the title, i.e. non-English ones. Some special characters such as the colon in Sto:lo are the norm in BC English now; but the slash-l certainly isn't.  This is a bigger discussion though and relates to my idea of NativeMOS for naming conventions etc. also the tribe/people article-name issue.Skookum1 (talk) 21:35, 4 March 2011 (UTC)

As a non-Canadian, I have a general preference for having these islands be at the name I have heard of before. This is part of being an English wikipedia: communicating with anglophones. This does not have to mean using the name derived from the British Isles; Hawaii is preferable to the Sandwich Islands. Those who wish to change the English language should do so elsewhere and among others. When they succeed, one of the signs will be that these changes are uncontroversial. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 06:58, 7 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Could you explain that at Talk:Queen Charlotte Islands please, so it's not just me relaying that opinion/position (which I already have only to be treated with derision/allegation); there are various sections, the most recent activity is at Talk:Queen Charlotte Islands from Users Harburg and Scales; but read the whole page to get an idea of the animosity over this, and as noted the history of the article includes attempts to do away with the English name entirely, as well as in some edits all mention of British Columbia or Canada (i.e. the name change has always been part of an independence/separation agenda). You'll find, as on semi-official sites like QCInfo.com that Queen Charlotte Islands/Haida Gwaii is a common pairing even in materials produced on the islands (a secondary rebranding "the Misty Isles" you'll also note...isn't that really/originally for the Hebrides or another part of the British Isles btw?).  Also re other official vs. regular usage, the Helvetian Confederation is of course conventionally known as "Switzerland"; I'm sure there's a long list we could compile of such variants between official name/"native name" and most-common-usage.  This is all the more complicated because this is an archipelgao/landform name as well as an incipient-political-unit nameSkookum1 (talk) 07:18, 7 March 2011 (UTC)

Dan George -> Chief Dan George RM
This has been "wrong" for quite a while; see my comments there about it; but like the move by Kwami described above, because the title is what it is, some earnest editor unfamiliar with the subject stripped usages of "Chief Dan George" from the article in a copyedit/rewording effort, and that's just plain wrong; Chief Dan George is invariably referred to that way, and it's the only way he'd be searched for; Dan George, also a modern band chief (a descendant, not sure if he had a hereditary/traditional title also), is not referred to the same way, he'd be "Dan George, chief of the Burrard Band" (political position....more like a mayor).Skookum1 (talk) 21:57, 10 March 2011 (UTC)
 * While the naming convention normally prevents using titles in the names of articles about people, exceptions can be made when well justified. I see no inherent reason why the article name cannot be Chief Dan George, but it will require good documentation on the talk page to prevail against strict application of the naming convention. -- Donald Albury 14:22, 11 March 2011 (UTC)
 * the naming conventions that specifically apply are COMMONNAME and MOSFOLLOW, it's pretty open-and-shut. There are quite a number of "Chief" articles; some because it's fairly obvious that "Garry" and "Blackbird" are going to need disambiguation and adding "(chief)" is pointless if the normal construction is Chief Garry or Chief Blackbird.  Likewise here - how many Dan Georges are there on this planet (and his grandson's actually notable too, though there's no article on him yet).Skookum1 (talk) 19:29, 11 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Dr. Blofeld, in deciding the RM, said this: "Chief" was definitely part of his name" i.e. not so much a title as such, and I'd have to agree. Few band/govt chiefs are referred to this way, it's decidedly an "earned honorific" in the same way as how traditional chiefly names work in the region - they're not strictly hereditary, and function as names rather than as titles.  In this particular case, his fame and popularity meant he'd almost invariably be called by the full term/name; if addressing him in person, it would be "Chief Dan" or maybe "Chief George".  A very personable man....they don't make 'em like that anymore.Skookum1 (talk) 19:51, 11 March 2011 (UTC)

English names vs native names vs native characters
I've just been tidying up a few things on Indigenous peoples of the Pacific Northwest Coast but it's hard because the names/links aren't consistent in any way, and even though some ethno and nearly all government articles have been written someone who'd campaigned similarly on Coast Salish and related pages to use the native orthography has a lot of those here, too; Duwamish people is nearly incomprehensible here (it's one of the linked ones- Dkhw'Duw'Absh - actually piped to Duwamish tribe and though that's a common English usage, not really ethnographically correct). Also some are piped to their govenrment articles, others the ethno-name is a redirect to the government article; some are in English spelling (Comox) some are in modified native spelling, some are in completely "foreign" orthographies, i.e. non-English ones. The utility of such a template using unpronounceables is quite beyond me, I "don't get it". Is there a reason Skagit people should be Sqaĵət here, or Sahewamish be Sʔəhiwʔabš? NB in some cases, such as Skwxu7mesh that spelling - without diacriticals and underlined k's etc - Sḵwxwú7mesh (currently that article's title, though the w's should be superscript, i think, in proper Squamish) - is standard in BC English now, as is Sto:lo - but again not with the diacriticals. WSANEC is the native-correct form for Saanich people, and so on. As with the people/tribe issue, we need some consistency on this, folks, and I'm not sure where to go to clean this one up for now; a lot of those redlinks already have articles but the native-correctifier didn't bother piping them when adding the native spellings, for one thing; others are mistaken as peoples - the Tla-o-qui-aht are actually a modern grouping of various older-era "aht" peoples, and Muchalaht and Mowachaht were two different peoples now under a common band government. Some which once existed are also not here and should be Nahwitti and Pentlatch for example, and Sto:lo could be broken down, certainly, especially re certain groups like the Kwantlen; a fourth-tier sectionizing of templates isn't possible ,apparently....even the Haida aren't historically one people, they were many. This template was worked on by I don't know how many people, all with different agendas; I've fixed a few things but am nonplussed about trying to make changes to it at this point. Discussion needed on the use of native names vs conventional/accepted English ones, and the whole issue of special characters; "Ławit'sis" has a standard English transliteration (Tlowitsis)/ Kwagu'ł does not (Kwagyeulth maybe but it's highly variable). And things which are currently redirecting or piped to government articles....that's got to be considered too, as a whether-or-not...Skookum1 (talk) 02:08, 12 March 2011 (UTC)
 * This may be a bit simplistic, but shouldn't an article written in english use only english characters? The article on Ancient Egypt doesn't use hieroglyphs in the title of the article...
 * The spelling info using native characters should be in the article, not the title, unless the article is written in that language - IanCheesman (talk) 04:04, 12 March 2011 (UTC)
 * totally agreed, but we need a group decision/guideline on this. NB in some cases such as Skwxwu7mesh and Sto:lo the special characters (/7/ and /:/) are part of current English usage in that region (BC), though the extra characters/diacriticals aren't.  Many related categories are similarly "untypable" and need simplifying.Skookum1 (talk) 08:40, 12 March 2011 (UTC)
 * I don't work with, and am not familiar with the entities in question. I do know that even something so simple as accent marks in Spanish names has been controversial, and I remember raging edit wars over whether to use diacritics in the names of eastern European hockey players playing for North American teams. There are conflicting points. We want names for articles that (monolingual) English speakers can recognize and (however imperfectly) pronounce. We want names that are supported in reliable sources, which can be difficult given the frequent differences in orthography and transcription used to describe a language and/or people in English writing, and we want a representation of what the people who are the subject of the article call themselves. And, of course, the name by which a people are commonly known in English sources may have been bestowed by another group, and have various negative connotations. I think the priority should be to make it easy for English speakers to find articles. -- Donald Albury 12:41, 12 March 2011 (UTC)

Category talk:WikiProject Indigenous peoples of North America articles
too many talkpages are in this category; is there a way to botomate a cleanup?Skookum1 (talk) 08:40, 12 March 2011 (UTC)
 * It's okay. They should all be talk pages, as it's the talk page, not the main article, that gets tagged with the WPIPNA template. -Uyvsdi (talk) 06:23, 15 March 2011 (UTC)Uyvsdi
 * Personal talkpages??Skookum1 (talk) 06:05, 16 March 2011 (UTC)
 * such as? Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 > haneʼ 06:17, 16 March 2011 (UTC)

categories
There are quite a lot of people who are categorized as "Native American" who (I think) simply do not belong there. It seems to be rampantly true for individuals in the entertainment-buisness (Bob Barker, for example). I plan on moving them to unless it says they are enrolled members of a tribe/nation. I'll leave this thread open for comments for a few days. Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 > haneʼ 18:06, 20 February 2011 (UTC)
 * That sounds good. People get up in arms when you tell that that Cher or Johnny Cash are not Native, so this is a good compromise that will hopefully minimize future edit-warring. -Uyvsdi (talk) 22:11, 20 February 2011 (UTC)Uyvsdi
 * I'd have to disagree to a certain extent. Not everyone is going to tell the whole world oh by the way I'm registered with my tribe. Nor does that really prove that they are more native than the person that isn't registered with a tribe. A user is on the move removing anyone's categories who seems to not be full blood even people who are half native i.e. Della Reese who may or may not be registred with her tribe. In a way to me honestly it's going back on BS rules about who is and who isn't native. Please correct me if I'm wrong but I don't see why the overwhelming pressure of having Native blood just seems to be the issue. You don't see any other race doing this mess.Mcelite (talk) 05:06, 2 March 2011 (UTC)
 * It's not a matter of blood, it's a legal definition; you can be proud of, say, your German heritage, but that doesn't make you a German citizen. "Native American" involves membership in a polity (as such, it needs to be cited with sources), whereas "Native American descent" can be claimed be anyone. Feel free to open a category "American actors of Native American descent" (this, by the way, already exists for models > ). In fact, if there are enough articles, I might even do that myself. Cheers! Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 > haneʼ 05:13, 2 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Most tribes will tell you if someone is enrolled with them or not. Just talk to the tribal registrar's office of whichever tribe you want to find out about. -Uyvsdi (talk) 05:39, 2 March 2011 (UTC)Uyvsdi
 * Besides being part of a polity, being a tribal member is about being an active part of a community - i.e. participating in dances, ceremonies, community events, maintaining relationships with your relatives and other tribal members, etc. A large number of celebrities who claim some Native descent may or may not have some small amount of Indian blood, but they don't maintain any meaningful relationship with the tribe that they claim descent–which to me is the fundamental difference between being "of descent" or being an actual member of a tribe. -Uyvsdi (talk) 18:29, 2 March 2011 (UTC)Uyvsdi
 * It is true that many ppl who are of native blood have little to no cultural connection partly our society's fault. My main concern was the removal of people from categories when they are of native descent i.e. someone going off of their own personal thoughts as to whether or not someone has Native American heritage (not saying any of the editors here). I was just concerned because it has happened in the past.Mcelite (talk) 04:58, 3 March 2011 (UTC)
 * That's appreciated; I am not done with sorting this out. Rest assured that in the end, nobody will be denied their claim to a heritage or tribal membership. It's just that it takes quite some concentration and time to at least skim every article to see what it actually says. Where you think I've made a mistake, ping me. Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 > haneʼ 08:00, 3 March 2011 (UTC)

Regarding Bob Barker, he is definitely of Sioux ancestry and grew up on the Rosebud Sioux reservation, his mother was one-quarter Sioux, however I'm not certain that she was an enrolled member of the tribe. Barker's half-brother Kent Valandra is possibly enrolled. I don't know what else you need. Anyway, Bob Barker isn't some fly-by-night American Indian "wannabe" - he deserves to be recognized as the real deal. As for astronauts, a distinction was made between "enrolled" John Herrington and "descent" William R. Pogue. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Engines On (talk • contribs) 10:40, 16 March 2011 (UTC)

Feast of the Hunter's Moon
We're missing an article about the Feast of the Hunter's Moon. Currently a dab page resides, linking to the calendrical lunar event, and an album. It would be good to convert the dab page into an article, with a hatnote to the album instead. 65.93.12.101 (talk) 14:23, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

Heads up
User:Kwamikagami has been changing the names of articles about various indigenous groups to add "tribe" on the end, without regard to what entity the article is about. He has done so to several articles on my watchlist about chiefdoms. -- Donald Albury 21:42, 10 March 2011 (UTC)
 * I've referred him here, re discussions about this above, as I changed his Gitga'ata tribe to Gitga'ata people, though as noted there and in the move comments "Git" = "people" and other Tsimshian articles are not (yet) titled that way; did it partly to bypass the redirect created by his move; an issue remains, if the name of the people includes the term "People" is it redundant to use it in English? Anyway, further example of why NativeMOS is needed; I just haven't had time/energy to sandbox a draft.Skookum1 (talk) 21:57, 10 March 2011 (UTC)
 * As the WP naming convention is to use the best-known unique name for the article, I would argue that in most cases where disambiguation is not needed, the bare name of the group is preferable to adding on "people" or "tribe" or whatever. If you wish me to, I can restore Gitga'ata as the article name. -- Donald Albury 23:30, 10 March 2011 (UTC)
 * I think for now that's preferable as none of the other Tsimshian peoples are similarly-titled; it gets further confusing when something like Kitselas is both a people and a place/address but in that case the solution could be Kitselas, British Columbia as the place; Kitselas means, I think, "people of the canyon" (see Kitselas Canyon; Gitanmaax also is the name of a community and IR as well as the name of the people who live there, but the primary meaning is the people. Kitimat is a city name, the native village there is Kitamaat which also is the name of the Haisla people who live there (though that's a Tsimshian name, meaning "people of the snows"....a friend, now in Australia, originally from Holland, spent her first winter there....they had 37 feet of snow....).Skookum1 (talk) 00:05, 11 March 2011 (UTC)
 * See comments on my talkpage in a new exchange with Kwami and major/well-known peoples vs minor ones/subgroups, however.Skookum1 (talk) 00:06, 11 March 2011 (UTC)

I wish the user would move a little slower and, in the case of actively edited articles, propose the move first on the talk page. Obviously groups such as the Peoria or Ottawa need to be disambiguated, but if the tribal name alone has worked fine for years, it's completely unnecessary to tack "people" onto the name. -Uyvsdi (talk) 00:56, 11 March 2011 (UTC)Uyvsdi
 * I advised him on his talk page to propose moves before making them in the future and he replied, "There are too many articles to operate that way effectively." -- Donald Albury 14:14, 11 March 2011 (UTC)
 * That's a pretty unsatisfying response considering how ineffective his moves have been in the first place. I've asked him to revert himself, as his changes were unnecessary (if not detrimental) to nearly every one of the articles that popped up on my watchlist.--Cúchullain t/ c 18:24, 11 March 2011 (UTC)
 * I think its his typical behavior. He's been in editwars with WP:CHINA, is currently in a dash-hyphen debate with several different wikiprojects... 65.93.12.101 (talk) 14:30, 27 March 2011 (UTC)
 * That's what revert is for. If the articles are fine the way they are currently named, then there's no reason to rename them. There's a whole series of user talk page warnings for page moves without census:, etc. Let's start using them. -Uyvsdi (talk) 18:18, 27 March 2011 (UTC)Uyvsdi
 * He's an administrator. Though, people at WP:CHINA think he should be revoked from that; WP:SHIPS right now think it's rather inconsiderate to rename articles while the naming convention itself that he's using is being debated. Kwami pushed through his viewpoint (considering he initiated the several contentious moves and edits, several on edit and move protected pages which required administrator capabilities to change) somehow, against what seems to be community consensus, and consistently&frequently violated WP:INVOLVED. (If you would like a history of this, check his talk page, WP:CHINA's, and various talk pages of Yue Chinese and Cantonese articles (there are some other articles as well besides these two, in this multiyear argument of Kwami vs WPCHINA on Cantonese and what it is) ) 65.93.12.101 (talk) 05:27, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

Peoria War
Advice sought on the article Peoria War - we can't find one. Anybody have any sources? Rmhermen (talk) 19:15, 28 March 2011 (UTC)

Canadian Genocide?
I've been looking for sources so I can made some articles related to the Canadian genocide of First Nations people, but i've found them very few and far between. Specifically, I would like to make an article on the Sexual Sterilization Act of British Columbia, 1933. Other, related laws would also be within such a purview. But i've found literally nothing on Google about the act beyond a mention on this website and in this book (pg 98). And i've also found very little about the Canadian genocide in general online. Can any members of this Wikiproject help in finding some sources on the subject?

Also, i'm having trouble deciphering what articles we already have on the topic. They seem to be all mixed together in the First Nations article. Silver seren C 05:36, 15 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Both those links have to do with Kevin Annett, and I'll avoid saying too much except "histrionic cult", and his followers have wagedd information war, and in zines such as The Tyee and many others. Those are both POV sources from teh same conspiracy theorist, bluntly put.  Look up sites about him, not written by him and his people, and you'll get a very different view.Skookum1 (talk) 06:19, 16 March 2011 (UTC)
 * I expected as much. But, does that mean that the Sexual Sterilization Act of British Columbia, 1933 doesn't exist, that he made it up, including the image in the book? Silver  seren C 05:33, 29 March 2011 (UTC)
 * No, you'll want to consult scholarly works such as The Oxford Handbook of the History of Eugenics (Oxford University Press, 2010) by Alison Bashford and Philippa Levine, which has a chapter on eugenics in Canada (and calls the laws racist but not genocidal), or Restoring the balance: First Nations women, community, and culture (University of Manitoba Press, 2009). Many Wikipedians are unable to identify reliable sources, but books published by university presses are usually the best place to start. We have unreferenced articles on the Sexual Sterilization Act of Alberta and Leilani Muir, but not the British Columbia act. Maybe you'll want to use scholarly works like those listed above to start your article and reference these two articles. —Kevin Myers 07:27, 29 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Agree its generally not refer to as a Genocide in Canada - "Although not without conflict, European/Canadian early interactions with First Nations and Inuit populations were relatively peaceful, compared to the experience of native peoples in the United States. " - if your looking  for sources pls see Bibliography of Canada and Bibliography of Canadian history. were books like *  can be read.Moxy (talk) 12:44, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

Bulk addition of a chapter's worth of material to the Hiawatha article
An anonymous IP editor has added a fairly large verbatim quote from an 1880's local history book (H.P. Smith, History of Cortland County, New York (1885)) regarding the foundation of the Iroquois Confederacy to the Hiawatha article this morning. The material being utilized is apparently the equivalent of five or six pages of text from the publication; an entire chapter by the look of it, added all in one go. Because of the book's age, I doubt there is much of a copyright problem here; however, the bulk addition of so much material from a single source, causes me to be concerned that the proper weighting of the article's content is now negatively effected. The style and tone of the material added is very "19th century" in its perspective on the subject, and although I believe that it was added in good faith by this editor, in my opinion, its presence in this kind of quantity detracts from the article in an overall way. Could I please have some fresh eyes take a look at this and offer their opinions. thanks cheers Deconstructhis (talk) 13:18, 30 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Looking at it, there may be two ways to go about this:
 * Put all of the text found in the Morgan's and Smith's books in Wikisource, and then provide a link from the article to the Wikisource, while the article itself would only have a brief summary.
 * Weave the two sources together in a more systematic way, citing appropriately along the way, and at the same time, remove the quaint language use of that time period. This would drastically shorten the two, as the non-Hiawatha focus could be removed from the text, but this would be still longer than "1." above.
 * So, what do you think? Will either work? Also, looking at the article, I noticed Schoolcraft's work was not even mentioned or cited, so I have provided an external link to it. That should also help in the clean up. CJLippert (talk) 14:18, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

In my opinion, even without this recent addition, the article needs rewritten with modern scholarly sources. Whether you keep it or revert it, almost everything will eventually be tossed out anyway by an editor armed with some modern reliable sources. I think you should remove it, since adding big blocks of text from old books is a poor practice we ought to discourage. Hopefully someone will eventually roll up his or her sleeves and get serious about writing and researching the article. —Kevin Myers 14:22, 30 March 2011 (UTC)


 * Looked into what is out there, and vast majority are children's literature. For Some that aren't, generally, predominately cites Schoolcraft (1856), but then adds additional details Schoolcraft does not provide. Anyways, added a new section with those materials as "Further reading". CJLippert (talk) 15:20, 30 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Sincere apologies for the delay in responding. Although I have no problem whatsoever with CJLippert's suggestion of 'banking' this material in Wikisource (something I've never had much experience with) I tend to share Kevin's perspective on what is to come and how the present material should be handled, even though I sincerely believe it is offered in good faith. I also agree strongly with Kevin's notion that this subject richly deserves better treatment. I'm a little less than enthusiastic about the idea of myself rolling up my own sleeves and taking a go at it, because of my personal situation, but I'd definitely lend a hand if someone else were willing to shoulder it. Thanks to CJLippert for adding that material, it's definitely appreciated. cheers Deconstructhis (talk) 06:15, 5 April 2011 (UTC)

Native American Clown
The Ridiculous article has some stuff on Native American Clown, with some links to related articles. One of these was hard to find. Is there a list of Native American Clown related articles? PPdd (talk) 14:45, 9 April 2011 (UTC)

Young Man Afraid Of His Horses/They Fear Even His Horse
An editor has raised the quest of the title of the page Young Man Afraid Of His Horses, given that it is a significant mistranslation of the name, that should be closer to They Fear Even His Horses. The incorrect translation gets somewhat more Google hits. Additional input would be a good thing at Talk:Young Man Afraid Of His Horses. -- Mwanner | Talk 00:29, 22 April 2011 (UTC)

Popular pages
Hi -- this is just a note that I have filed a request with Mr.Z-bot's owner to add WP:IPNA to the list of WikiProjects Mr.Z-bot creates "Popular pages" lists for. The list would include the 1500-most accessed articles for the month, sortable by views and quality rating. List would be located here when created: WikiProject Indigenous peoples of North America/Popular pages, and updated monthly. Augwp (talk) 19:54, 25 April 2011 (UTC)

How to get an article re-evaluated
Hi. I just made a significant change to an stub article, and I was hoping to have it rescored. Unfortunately, I can't find anything here that tells me how to ask the project to do that. Can anyone help? TheNgeveld  14:35, 1 May 2011 (UTC)


 * This project? You can try leaving a request here, linking to the article. Most projects don't have a formal process for scheduling evaluations, so it will depend on who notices and wants to take it on -- Donald Albury 15:21, 1 May 2011 (UTC).


 * Thanks for the response Mr. Albury. Yes, the article has been previously marked as part of this project (along with a few others).  I'll start a new section with a link.  (The WikiLaw project has a decent way of doing this.  They have a section on a subpage (WikiProject Law/Assessment) where there's a section for people to ask for assessments.).  Thanks again.   TheNgeveld   17:54, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

Request an Assessment
Greetings! Perhaps people would like to use this section to indicate when they have articles they'd like to have assessed. WikiLaw has such a section on a subpage (WikiProject Law/Assessment), which seems to me a pretty good idea. When someone has done an assessment, they archive the entry, although just indicating so with a comment would seem like enough to me. Anyway, I'll start with a request: TheNgeveld   18:00, 1 May 2011 (UTC)


 * 1) I've made a substanative change to the Western Shoshone Claims Distribution Act of 2004 article, and if someone has the time I'd like to know if it's enough to move it from stub to start.  If not, a comment or two on the discussion page there would be appreciated, and I'll try to beef it up some more.  Thanks.  TheNgeveld   18:00, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

Federal Indian Policy and Native American activism
User:Mike Cline created the Outline of United States federal Indian law and policy, an ambitious overview, which you guys might want to look over and add to, especially the biographies section.

In trying to flesh out and differentiate the biographies on that article, I tried to start tackling the two intertwined categories: Category:Native American activists and Category:Native Americans' rights activists. You would be hard-pressed to find anyone listed on Category:Native American activists who doesn't also fight for "Native Americans' rights," so to avoid redundancy and confusion, it seems Category:Native Americans' rights activists should be reserved for non-Native peoples fighting for "Native Americans' rights." Any thoughts on the matter? -Uyvsdi (talk) 17:00, 22 May 2011 (UTC)Uyvsdi
 * Additionally Native American civil rights is a mess, if anyone wants to copy edit a bit. -Uyvsdi (talk) 17:19, 22 May 2011 (UTC)Uyvsdi

Thunderbirds
The usage of is under discussion, see Talk:Thunderbirds (TV series) and WP:Redirects_for_discussion/Log/2011_May_27, for the two discussions underway. As the Thunderbird is an element of Native American culture, I thought I'd let you know. 184.144.166.87 (talk) 06:04, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

Rename discussion
I'm learned to never again post at Requested moves, since all it does is attract editors who have never worked on the page and are completely unfamiliar with the subject matter to the discussion. If any one is interested, I proposed for the second time, renaming the wildly generalized and not-completely-accurate Southeastern tribes to a name more description of the subject matter: Indigenous peoples of the Southeastern Woodlands. -Uyvsdi (talk) 18:49, 12 June 2011 (UTC)Uyvsdi
 * LOL yep - got to be careful when asking for help, because sometimes you get those that have no clue about the subject.Moxy (talk) 18:59, 12 June 2011 (UTC)
 * True. I have no idea why these two editors are involved in the discussion when they've never edited this or any related article, and apparently haven't even read it. It seems like strictly following Wikipedia guidelines and trying to achieve consensus is perhaps not the best practical policy. Unfortunately it's easier to just bully through an undiscussed move :( -Uyvsdi (talk) 19:06, 12 June 2011 (UTC)Uyvsdi

History timelines
I just stumbled upon the following, that could really use general overhauls. etc., etc, etc. etc, etc, etc. They are all in Category:Timelines of North American history -Uyvsdi (talk) 18:58, 17 June 2011 (UTC)Uyvsdi
 * 10th millennium BCE in North American history
 * 9th millennium BCE in North American history
 * 2nd millennium BCE in North American history
 * 1st millennium BCE in North American history
 * 1st millennium in North American history

The red road
This article does not have appropriate sources and appears to be OR. I think it's worth having an article on the subject, but this looks fit for deletion. It really needs substantive work, and this is not one of my areas of knowledge.Parkwells (talk) 17:39, 19 June 2011 (UTC)

Terminology
There doesn't appear to be a definitive terminology discussion anywhere in the archives (if there is and I've just missed it, please let me know) -- are we using "Native American" as the preferred general term, or can we exercise our individual discretion here? I've always preferred "American Indian," and I've heard some tribal elders also expressing that preference. MinervaK (talk) 08:48, 29 June 2011 (UTC)
 * You'll want to search the archives, because there's extensive discussion back and forth on terminology. "Indigenous peoples" is preferred for broad discussions of different peoples. "Native American" and "American Indian" do not describe Inuit, Cup'ik/Yup'ik, Inupiat, Aleutian, or Alutiiq peoples. If you are specifically talking about people south of the Alaska/Canada/Greenland, then either Native American or American Indian should work. My experience has been that "Indian" is an acceptable term in the southwestern and southeastern US and throughout Latin America. -Uyvsdi (talk) 21:09, 29 June 2011 (UTC)Uyvsdi

Pageview stats
After a recent request, I added WikiProject Indigenous peoples of North America to the list of projects to compile monthly pageview stats for. The data is the same used by http://stats.grok.se/en/ but the program is different, and includes the aggregate views from all redirects to each page. The stats are at WikiProject Indigenous peoples of North America/Popular pages.

The page will be updated monthly with new data. The edits aren't marked as bot edits, so they will show up in watchlists. You can view more results, request a new project be added to the list, or request a configuration change for this project using the toolserver tool. If you have any comments or suggestions, please let me know. Thanks! Mr.Z-man 00:32, 1 July 2011 (UTC)


 * GJ - lets add a tab for this so we can watch over the main articles that are seen.Moxy (talk) 00:48, 1 July 2011 (UTC)


 * Thank you for getting that done. -- Donald Albury 11:20, 1 July 2011 (UTC)

American Indian vs. "Native Americans in the United States"
As an American Indian (and frequent Wikipedia contributor) who does not like the term "Native American" to describe us as a group, when did the title "Native Americans in the United States" become the title for this page? Almost any of the six or seven other common phrases would be better than NA. "NA" has the more obvious meaning of anyone born in the United States.

I prefer just the term American Indian; however the following terms would be preferable over "Native Americans in the United States"

American Indians in the United States - Aboriginal Americans in the United States - First Americans in the United States - First People in the United States - First Nations in the United States - Indigenous in the United States - Indigenous Nations in the United States - Native Peoples in the United States - American Tribes in the United States - Native Tribes in the United States - Indigenous Tribes in the United States -

Could we please get some non-European Americans involved in this?

Phil Konstantin (talk) 19:29, 7 July 2011 (UTC)Phil - Enrolled citizen of the Cherokee Nation (Tribal enrollment number C0189288) - Author of "This Date in North American Indian History" - Co-author of "Native American History For Dummies" (Yeah, I don't like the title and we discussed it in the book, but the "Dummies" people decided this without our input) - Contributor to "Treaties With American Indians" - Webmaster for Americanindian.net -


 * I think these designations are based on the official designations used in the U.S. census; for the same reason, Canadian nations are referred to as "First Nations" since that's what's apparently used in Canada. This is not an endorsement, it's an explanation. Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 > haneʼ 19:40, 7 July 2011 (UTC)


 * That is my point exactly. The US Census uses the title "American Indians and Alaska Natives." The do not use the phrase "Native American" anywhere that I know of except to talk about people being born in the US. To be specific here is listing from the US Census website:

"The U.S. Census Bureau today released the Profile of General Population and Housing Characteristics: 2010 for the United States, Arkansas, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Louisiana, Maryland, New Jersey, Oklahoma, Oregon, South Dakota, Texas, Vermont and Virginia. The demographic profiles provide 2010 Census data on age and sex distributions, race, Hispanic or Latino origin, household relationship and type, the group quarters population, and housing occupancy and tenure (whether the housing occupant owns or rents). With the release of data for all the states, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico, profiles are now available for the nation, regions, metropolitan areas, American Indian and Alaska Native areas, and other cross-state geographies." WEBSITE: http://www.census.gov/newsroom/releases/archives/2010_census/cb11-cn144.html

To avoid double posting, discussion continues @ Talk:Native Americans in the United States Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 > haneʼ 20:24, 7 July 2011 (UTC)

Ward Churchill
One user in particular pretty much "owns" the Ward Churchill article. I happened to notice the cats Category:Cherokee people, Category:Indigenous activists, Category:Native American activists, Category:Native American writers, had Category:21st-century Native Americans had been added back to the article, despite being removed in the past. There's innumerable citations throughout the article demonstrating that Churchill cannot prove any Native ancestry. I pulled these cats only to have them immediately added back in. I truly, truly hate edit wars. Would anyone else be willing to occasionally check in on this article? The UKB have in the past spelled out as clearly as possibly that Churchill is not part of their tribe.] -Uyvsdi (talk) 23:31, 16 July 2011 (UTC)Uyvsdi
 * saw it; was on my list already anyways. Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 > haneʼ 03:13, 17 July 2011 (UTC)
 * I also saw it; and took the time to read the sources. re: the article linked above by Uyvsdi
 * In an abrupt change of tone two days later, the United Keetoowah Band of Cherokee Indians removed its critical statement regarding Churchill and replaced it with one that acknowledged his "alleged ancestry" of being Cherokee. "Because Mr. Churchill had genealogical information regarding his alleged ancestry, and his willingness to assist the UKB in promoting the tribe and its causes, he was awarded an 'Associate Membership' as an honor," the tribe's website now said. "However, Mr. Churchill may possess eligibility status for Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma, since he claims 1/16 Cherokee."
 * Do you know what you are reverting? Xenophrenic (talk) 04:08, 17 July 2011 (UTC)
 * That paragraph from Churchill's article that you posted above quotes a different article (Herdy, 25 May 2005) than the one I referenced. That article includes statements like: "'alleged ancestry' of being Cherokee," "may possess eligibility status for Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma," "topping short of endorsing any of Churchill's heritage," "falsely identifying himself to be Indian," and "he does not possess a 'Certificate of Degree of Indian Blood (CDIB),'" which precludes him from enrolling as a full member in any federally recognized tribe. At no point does that article positively state that Churchill is Native American. Wikipedia is limited to what can be verified in reliable, published secondary sources. As per WP:Burden, "[t]he burden of evidence lies with the editor who adds or restores material." So adding back any categories saying Churchill is indigenous, Native American, Muscogee Creek, or Cherokee would require new positive source material confirming these identities. -Uyvsdi (talk) 17:59, 17 July 2011 (UTC)Uyvsdi

NARA uploads
Wikimedia Commons has a ongoing project to upload hundreds of thousands of images from the National Archive. A number of these are historic images of Native Americans and related subjects. I have added catoegories to a few and found several which duplicate images we are already using in articles but many are new and potentially useful. I also found one which appear to be mislabeled: It appears to be a wickiup to me, not a pueblo and certainly does not include 3 Hopi or ladders. Any ideas what tribe this is actually from?

Category:Media from the National Archives and Records Administration needing categories is the category on Commons that these images are going into for sorting. Please feel free to tag a few; More hands make less work! Rmhermen (talk) 23:47, 26 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Minutes later I find:

Which is clearly Native Alaskans or Eskimo/Inuits hunting whales! I think special caution may be required with these images. Rmhermen (talk) 00:01, 27 July 2011 (UTC)


 * Photo on the right above caught my eye as being very similar to the types of houses I've seen associated with the eastern Woodland Algonquins. I couldn't say which Nation, but I doubt it's Hopi! MinervaK (talk) 07:31, 30 July 2011 (UTC)


 * Check out Wigwam MinervaK (talk) 07:49, 30 July 2011 (UTC)

Request for feedback regarding scope of Native American name controversy
I just did a badly-needed major reorganization of the page, and have some general questions about the scope of the article before I dig into the finer editing. If you've got a minute, please head over to the talk page and let me know your thoughts. Thanks MinervaK (talk) 07:24, 30 July 2011 (UTC)

New article Navajo Rangers - Navajo Nation Resource Enforcement?
I read mention of this group in a Hillerman mystery novel, and we don't appear to have anything on them on Wiki aside from a brief mention at Navajo Nation. They appear to be a park-oriented law enforcement organisation, but I'm unclear as to whether they're a branch of the Navajo Nation Resource Enforcement, or whether the term is just a nickname for the NNRE. Anyone have any perspective? MatthewVanitas (talk) 17:15, 11 August 2011 (UTC)


 * I have sorted this under Navajo Nation government since it uses the Navajo Nation seal. Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 > haneʼ 09:54, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

Sioux Reservation
How many km2 were in Great Sioux Reservation in 1868?--Kaiyr (talk) 09:50, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

first nation, metis or inuit
Are there first nation, metis or inuit secessionist movements in Canada?--Kaiyr (talk) 17:08, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

Native American jewelry
Hi, if anyone would care to check in occasionally on the Native American jewelry, an editor has repeatedly inserted her own commercial website, http://americanindianoriginals.com, and another online store, http://nativeamerican-art.com, as references, despite warnings to not use Wikipedia for advertising or promotional purposes. The writing style is verbose and peacocky — I've tried to clean up some and will continue to try to make the article a little more concise and fact-based. There's absolutely no shortage of scholarly material on Native American jewelry. If anyone would care to add sections about other cultural areas besides the southwest, that would be fantastic. -Uyvsdi (talk) 00:16, 5 August 2011 (UTC)Uyvsdi
 * watching. Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 > haneʼ 01:10, 5 August 2011 (UTC)
 * After User:Bonnie.butterfield, owner of the two commercial websites, created this page, there have been a cavalcade of redlinked accounts that have only edited this particular article, User:Mcscribbles, User:Arisuu, User:Baden511, and User:Donblade, or edited a couple other articles in the case of User:Barbarabarrington. I'm not sure how to investigate sockpuppery but I'd wager this is taking place here. -Uyvsdi (talk) 08:06, 17 August 2011 (UTC)Uyvsdi

Categories nominated for decision
I nominated the recently created Category:Native American women in the arts and Category:Native American female painters, due to WP:Overcategorization. There's already the Category:Women painters and Category:American women artists, which is sufficient, and no other ethnicity has been divided like this (ethicitiy+country+occupation+gender). Category:Native American artists is already categorized by country, ethnicity, and occupation. This category has already been subdivided by media, century, and, in some cases, tribes. Personally as a Native American woman in the arts, I find removing women from the main category extremely unhelpful and unnecessary. -Uyvsdi (talk) 08:00, 17 August 2011 (UTC)Uyvsdi

Help with syllabics at Qilaut?
Can someone whose browser displays Inuit syllabics (even if you can't actually read the alphabet) take a quick glance and see if the syllabics I added to Qilaut match those in the reference I linked? My browser won't display them, but I copy-pasted what I believe are the right items from Inuktitut syllabics but I can't tell if they processed right. MatthewVanitas (talk) 17:40, 1 October 2011 (UTC)
 * They match up. CambridgeBayWeather (talk) 22:20, 1 October 2011 (UTC)

WikiProject National Register of Historic Places/Fall 2011 Photo Contest
WP:NRHP is having a Fall Photo Contest running from Oct. 21-Dec. 4, 2011. I'd like to encourage anybody who enjoys photography, and anybody who is interested in historic places to participate as a photographer, a sponsor, or both.

One way that an individual editor or a project can participate is to sponsor their own challenge. For example, somebody here might want to include a challenge such as "A barnstar will be awarded to the photographer who adds the most photos of previously non-illustrated NRHP sites related to Native American history to the NRHP county lists." To sponsor a challenge all you need to do is come up with an idea, post it on the contest page, and do the small bit of work needed to judge the winner(s).

Any and all contributions appreciated.

Smallbones (talk) 15:15, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

Moving frenzy
In my years of editting, I've only gotten so far in understanding Wikipedia protocol, but I know some of you have been around much longer and know what's up. What can be done about the editor that constantly moves indigenous American ethnic group articles without any discussion, doesn't fix double redirects, and tries to turn previously article names into dab pages? I'm sick of following this individual around and cleaning up after them, but I don't know what to do. Any help/advice would be greatly appreciated. -Uyvsdi (talk) 05:49, 18 October 2011 (UTC)Uyvsdi
 * I assume, from looking through your contribution history and his talk page, that you're referring to Kwamikagami. I didn't do a lot of digging, so I'm not sure if your brief conversation with him on Oct 9th regarding a single article was the only discussion (other than edit summaries) that you've had with him on the issue or not. In any case, especially given that he's a long-established and respected user I'd say the most important thing is just to continue a dialogue with him to try to come to an understanding--your point about not fixing double redirects is probably an easy one to come to an agreement on. Then if things don't improve, you can escalate it, but I'd advise that that should only be an option after discussing the whole issue carefully with Kwami, if he ignores your concerns and continues with the same types of edits before any sort of consensus has been reached. Or, if you want the two of you could bring the general issue of 'dab-ing terms that refer to both a people and their language' to one of the WikiProjects, although I'm not sure which one would be most appropriate--I say this because although you're posting this concern here, Kwami's edits apply to people/languages from many different families and regions of the world, not just North America. That's my two cents, anyway --Miskwito (talk) 08:47, 18 October 2011 (UTC)
 * Okay, tried another discussion (yes, there've been several in the past). -Uyvsdi (talk) 17:46, 18 October 2011 (UTC)Uyvsdi


 * I've tripped over that too. Kwamikagami does seem to have a worldwide focus and not always disambiguate with the best grammar or understanding of use, but s/he seems to be acting in good faith and, so far as I have noticed, mostly within current WP guidelines, if a bit more boldly than might be desired.  S/He cites to NCP and NCLANG, and for situations where the language has the same name as the nation, people or ethnic group, I think this it is correct (this week in WP admin land, anyway) to disambiguate.   I personally have other fish to fry than to get into general guideline wars, especially over national and ethnic titling (my god, the edit wars they have over things like the definition of "Irish"  Sheesh!), so my take is that if it IS within the general guideline and we have no particularly unique reason to object and do otherwise, might as well sigh deeply and go along with it.  While I DO wish this person did a little more work on cleanup and suitable new names ("people" instead of "tribe" for example), this editor kind of does have a point where there is ambiguity; The analogous situation is Chinese -- language or people?  Looks to me like the WP guidelines fit if it's an ambiguity issue, but not, say if we have Latin and Romans.   Montanabw (talk) 19:14, 19 October 2011 (UTC)
 * I'll just add that I fully agree with your analysis of things. The good news is I think this is a situation where there's a good prospect for everyone involved genuinely achieving a consensus without too much animosity! --Miskwito (talk) 20:17, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

Request for comment on article naming conventions for peoples, ethnicities and tribes
There is a discussion at Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions (people) on how ethnicity articles should be named. Specifically, whether the article on the Foo people should be at "Foo", or at "Foo people" with "Foo" as a disambiguation page distinguishing the Foo people and the Foo language (and any other uses). The current convention is to disambiguate, but this is based largely on discussions at WP:NCLANG and I have suggested that a wider consensus including people interested in ethnicity and indigenous peoples as well as languages would be desirable. joe&bull;roet&bull;c 21:27, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

Manis Mastodon Site
Hey folks, so, I did this article years ago, and just this afternoon heard a story on NPR talking about a bunch of scientists finally figuring out that the theory of the original archaeologist of this site were right. The findings were published in the journal Science (here if you have a membership or whatever), and its getting tons of press (here and here], since it kind of threw the whole Clovis first theory out on its head decades ago, but people ignored it. Anyway, this seems like a really good opportunity to get a scientifically/historically important article up to good or featured status. And yeah, I know, SODOIT and all that, but I just don't have the time to delve back in to wikiland. So, just consider this a friendly prod! Murderbike (talk) 05:21, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

What to do with Anishinaabe Nation in Treaty No. 3
Discussion started at WP:IPNA/Nish. Please look over and discuss. miigwech. CJLippert (talk) 15:57, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

Rumsen Ohlone language page
Rumsen (Ohlone) language: Current page seems to be more about the people than the language itself.DKaufman (talk) 17:02, 12 November 2011 (UTC)


 * Well, IS there a separate article on the people? Could they be merged?   Montanabw (talk) 04:17, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

Since this is about one specific article, this discussion should probably take place on that article's talk page. The article was "Rumsen"; User:Kwamikagami made a typically unilateral, undiscussed move to Rumsen language without changing any of the content. The logical move would be to take the ethnic group information and create a Rumsen people article. -Uyvsdi (talk) 18:39, 13 November 2011 (UTC)Uyvsdi

Proposal to change first paragraph of naming conventions for ethnic groups
A new proposal for ethnic groups naming conventions can be found here: Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions (people). I'm trying to do this correctly, with real consensus, unlike the drafting of the current naming conventions. I've posted on the Wikipedia talk:Article titles, Village Pump, etc. Your input would be greatly appreciated. -Uyvsdi (talk) 19:44, 13 November 2011 (UTC)Uyvsdi


 * I'll wait to see how it starts to shake out before I comment. Thanks for the heads up.   Montanabw (talk) 22:25, 13 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Sounds good. I posted at all the suggested locations (WP:Article names, Village pump, etc), so hopefully any new conventions will actually be based on informed consensus. -Uyvsdi (talk) 02:38, 14 November 2011 (UTC)Uyvsdi

Article on Silko's Ceremony needs to be restarted
The previous article on Ceremony (Silko novel) was deleted as a plagiarism. I've recreated the stub, but please feel free to rebuild the article. Thanks, Aristophanes 68   (talk)  18:34, 28 November 2011 (UTC)

The red road
I just stumbled upon this article. Anyone want to look it over? -Uyvsdi (talk) 19:10, 29 November 2011 (UTC)Uyvsdi
 * I have had that on my watchlist for a while now - and it has not improved. Time to be drastic, perhaps? Rmhermen (talk) 18:03, 5 December 2011 (UTC)

Category for Woodland period
I've gotten into a discussion at Category talk:East and Great Plains periods in North America on an issue involving categorization of articles by periods. I'm bringing it, specifically the issue of a category called "Great Plains and East periods", here for a wider discussion. I have also now noticed that some sources define a Plains Woodland period followed by a Plains Village period. As I am not familiar with the Plains cultural area, I'm hoping someone else can shed light on this. -- Donald Albury 12:46, 5 December 2011 (UTC)


 * Your explanation on the talk page has helped me understand the concern, and I responded there. I now understand that I was lumping Great Plains in with the "East" from this page based upon what I've read about Woodland cultures from the Plains pertaining to Colorado (I went into more detail on the other talk page.  There are some locations, mostly from the south-east (specifically in "Florida and adjacent parts of Alabama and Georgia, by culture") now left in Category:East and Great Plains periods in North America.  I'd be more than happy to make the changes if we can come up with a good name for the remaining locations!--CaroleHenson (talk) 17:35, 5 December 2011 (UTC)


 * As an FYI, I've since removed all links and associations to Category:East and Great Plains periods in North America and am ready to set the delete template when the discussion is done on the talk page.--CaroleHenson (talk) 20:19, 5 December 2011 (UTC)

"Controversy" over casinos
Hi, are there any thoughts about the sections in US tribal articles about resistance to casino development? They are definitely POV, but it seems like the NPOV thing to do is mention resistance to casino development in a sentence with proper references and move on. Lytton Band of Pomo Indians is probably the most extreme example (improved over time but still mostly about the casino). Since this phenomenon is common enough, should a general guideline by developed or should it remain a case-by-case basis? Any thoughts would be greatly appreciated. -Uyvsdi (talk) 04:48, 22 December 2011 (UTC)Uyvsdi


 * I've not edited or even read much in article about current tribes in the U.S., but I think the best place for any extended discussion of the history of casinos on reservations, including opposition to them, would be in Native American gaming. So maybe we do need to state that as a working policy for the project. -- Donald Albury 11:54, 22 December 2011 (UTC)


 * It may be a case by case basis. Some tribes have a lot of controversy, others very little.  I agree that the gaming article is the core and where most of the work should go.  Some tribes have little or no casino operation, others rely extensively on them, yet others are somewhere in between.  The biggest problem are the inaccuracies and myths people have about the issue in general,and where those occur, work is needed.  Montanabw (talk) 01:04, 23 December 2011 (UTC)


 * It occurs to me that casino controversies are part of a broader issue of perceived privileges enjoyed by tribes. I know that a number of years ago there was considerable controversy in south Florida over businesses on Seminole land selling untaxed cigarettes. I also recall something about a controversy in Minnesota over hunting and fishing rights guaranteed by treaty to tribes there. -- Donald Albury 11:20, 23 December 2011 (UTC)
 * It's usually editors new to Wikipedia that just have an axe to grind against a particular tribe's casino. Maybe just a short mention about whatever "controversy" and a link to the Indian gaming article. Since this is an encyclopedia, it seems the focus of the articles should be on confirmed facts about the tribe in question, not folks who don't like the tribe. I hate Walmart, but I don't edit their articles about how awful it is they are building another Walmart in my town. -Uyvsdi (talk) 18:11, 23 December 2011 (UTC)Uyvsdi
 * Just tried to summarize an IP's commentary on Kialegee Tribal Town. Another reason for keeping the anti-casino screeds short is they tend to be completely ignorant of the basics of Indian law in the US. -Uyvsdi (talk) 17:54, 24 December 2011 (UTC)Uyvsdi


 * Inevitably, these disputes usually involve either a misunderstanding of the sovereignty of Tribal nations or plain old racism.  Montanabw (talk) 03:13, 26 December 2011 (UTC)

Yellow Wolf
I'd like to introduce myself. My interests seem to be ranging all over the place, but at the moment I see myself writing articles along the lines of this one. That being said, this one is starting to do what other articles I have spent time on have done...go all over the place. Also afraid of stepping on toes--it is strange writing about a Native American perspective as reported by a white American. Anyway, I feel the need to have those with their toes in the water fire shots, so I can improve this article. The biography I am working out of is running out of things to say about Yellow Wolf, and more about the Nez Perce War, so at some point, I think I will have to pull material from one article to move to the other.Jacqke (talk) 10:40, 5 January 2012 (UTC)
 * When in doubt, footnote! WP:V, [{WP:RS]] and WP:CITE may not be purple prose, but they are your best friend and best edit-war preventers.  Montanabw (talk) 22:48, 5 January 2012 (UTC)
 * ThanksJacqke (talk) 06:03, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

Deletion nomination of North American Indigenous visual artists template
Please participate in the discussion here! Templates_for_discussion -- SarahStierch (talk) 21:39, 9 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Consensus seems to be emerging that the template needs to be renamed and restructured to link to articles, not categories. If you are interested, please contribute to the discussion at Template talk:North American Indigenous visual artists. Thanks, -Uyvsdi (talk) 18:19, 11 January 2012 (UTC)Uyvsdi

Featured article candidates/Fellows v. Blacksmith/archive1
I have nominated this article&mdash;about a Native American law case from the U.S. Supreme Court in 1857&mdash;for featured article status. Comments from participants in this project would be welcome. Savidan 08:19, 28 January 2012 (UTC)

Help with a POV cleanup
Wilderness Road appears to me to have a pronounced pro-settler (US-American) and anti-native American (and to a lesser extent, anti-European) POV. (See Talk:Wilderness Road.) If anyone here is available to do some POV cleanup, I'd really appreciate the help. Thanks, cmadler (talk) 19:30, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

WikiWomen's History Month
Hi everyone. March is Women's History Month and I'm hoping a few folks here at WP:Indigenous peoples of North America will have interest in putting on events (on and off wiki) related to women's roles in within Indigenous North American society. We've created an event page on English Wikipedia (please translate!) and I hope you'll find the inspiration to participate. These events can take place off wiki, like edit-a-thons, or on wiki, such as themes and translations. Please visit the page here: WikiWomen's History Month. Thanks for your consideration and I look forward to seeing events take place! SarahStierch (talk) 19:10, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

RfC on Indigenous people
I have started an RfC at talk:Indigenous people regarding the definition and scope of the article because some editors are using the page to include all ethnic groups who claim to descend from the first known inhabitants of a place - such as Germans, Finns, Russians, Georgians etc. This definition would exclude several indigenous groups that have migrational histories from the scope and conflict with the established political definitions of the term. Please weigh in on which definition to use.·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 20:28, 24 February 2012 (UTC)

Featured article candidates/Fellows v. Blacksmith/archive2
I've re-nominated this article for featured. It's about a very important 19th century Supreme Court precedent concerning indigenous land rights. The first such case won by an indigenous party, and possibly the first Supreme Court case on any subject won by an indigenous party. Would appreciate comments from participants of this project. Savidan 03:00, 11 March 2012 (UTC)


 * Actually, the Marshall trilogy was also won by "indigenous parties" they just lacked the army to counter Andrew Jackson, who ignored Cherokee Nation v. Georgia -- well over 20 years prior to this case. The article is interesting, but too weak for FA status at present, IMHO.   Montanabw (talk) 20:23, 12 March 2012 (UTC)

Ward Churchill
Anyone else feel like taking a look at the new last paragraph of Ward_Churchill? I pulled out the obviously unreliable references (self-published blogs, discussion forums). -Uyvsdi (talk) 20:17, 16 March 2012 (UTC)Uyvsdi
 * I think I'd rather not get involved in that extremely difficult issue. Is there doubt that Russell Means said this?·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 20:39, 16 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Citations and footnotes, citations and footnotes... Montanabw (talk) 05:22, 18 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I think it's moving towards a slightly more NPOV place. The challenge is a new user threw a bunch of tangentially relevant links and books as references. I wouldn't care except that journalists tend to use Wikipedia as a source for articles (sad but true). -Uyvsdi (talk) 16:53, 18 March 2012 (UTC)Uyvsdi
 * Indeed. Although "scary" is more like it!  LOL!   Montanabw (talk) 20:36, 19 March 2012 (UTC)
 * The Guardian UK sure uses Wiki for all of their Native American info. -Uyvsdi (talk) 02:44, 20 March 2012 (UTC)Uyvsdi
 * High-quality sources, eh?  Montanabw (talk) 17:20, 20 March 2012 (UTC)
 * We sure should ought to take that as motivation for stepping up the quality of our Indigenous related content.·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 17:46, 20 March 2012 (UTC)
 * You'd have to change the definition of WP:RS for that. Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 > haneʼ 08:36, 21 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Reminds me of the old astronomy joke: If you look through a telescope and see Uranus, you know light travels in circles!   Montanabw (talk) 20:46, 21 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Well, actually we can just enforce a stricter standard of RS in Indigenous related articles. Luckily the RS policy makes us able to remove information from sources if it is found to conflict with more reliable information. We could also make a project wide decision to deprecate (certain) news sources. We could develop a guidleine similar to MEDRS for medicine related content, I know they are doing that for WP:HISTORY now.·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 20:59, 21 March 2012 (UTC)

Oh gawd, don't say MEDRS to me! That thing gets used as a hammer to blast areas where there is little peer-reviewed material out there. Anything actually produced by an actual tribal government would be challenged for not being peer-reviewed! =:-O Of course we also have the opposite problem, the Green cheese dilemma. I think that the general RS policy works OK if it is enforced. But the problem is that a lot of "scholarly" stuff on the west is crap -- I spent well over a week of my life I'll never get back convincing a (now blocked sockpuppet) editor that no, not every rodeo begins with a parade down main street even though someone with a PhD in history said it did. (big, deep sigh) I also wasted too much time defeating an easily debunked and total baloney but never challenged theory one person proposed in a history journal that buckaroo came from an African word for "white man." (Sigh)( Montanabw (talk) 21:46, 21 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I think MEDRS is quite a good solution and I also believe that some areas with too few scholarly sources should not have coverage. If we were to make a policy for sources on indigenous topics we could specifically include guidelines for how to treat tribal sources or other official news sources for indigenous peoples. But basically as you say we don't need to make a new policy, we can just enforce WP:RS, and actively remove for example sources that use wikipedia as a source.·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 21:53, 21 March 2012 (UTC)
 * The main problem with a MEDRS standard is, indeed, that a lot of the true knowledge is held by the Native people themselves, sometimes written in obscure sources or in self-made web sites, and a lot of peer-reviewed scholarly works in this area contain utter bullshit. I do fully agree that wikipedia cannot be a source for itself, nor can other wikis be a source. WP:RS is dead right on that one.   Montanabw (talk) 05:56, 31 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I don't think self-referential sources are an issue with Native articles. There's a flood of unreliable material about indigenous peoples in the mainstream press and online - I think we already know to avoid them as references. I agree with with Montanabw that much "scholarly" work is factually incorrect, but better material is constantly being published by indigenous scholars and more careful non-indigenous scholars than in the past. -Uyvsdi (talk) 18:45, 31 March 2012 (UTC)Uyvsdi

Ojibwe
I left a message on Talk:Ojibwe language. Migwetch, Amqui (talk) 04:28, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

Poetroglyph Point
Would you please take a look at Talk:Petroglyph Point Archeological Site see if the importance scale is appropriate? Thank you ... --Bobjgalindo (talk) 23:54, 1 April 2012 (UTC)
 * This WikiProject doesn't have importance scales. Cheers, -Uyvsdi (talk) 03:26, 2 April 2012 (UTC)Uyvsdi

Translations of the Bible into Native American Languages
An editor moved the N.A. languages into a separate article (which was a good move), most of what was in Bible translations by language left long ago for separate articles. But for some reason Dakota was left behind? Can someone take a look please. Thanks. In ictu oculi (talk) 07:05, 4 April 2012 (UTC)

Wikipedia in Shoshoni
This is just to let you know that a Wikipedia in the Shoshoni language had been created in the Incubator. You can reach it there. Thanks you, a̲i̲shenda'ga. Amqui (talk) 20:15, 14 April 2012 (UTC)

New user problems
We have a User:Poesam who is creating many, many articles (all related scope of WP:IPNA/Nish), but mostly uncited (or not easily verifyable), not in a NPOV, and often contradictory to both indegenous oral traditions and anthropological records. The volume is beyond what I can keep in check. Help appreciated in encouraging this particular user to be more civil. Thanks CJLippert (talk) 14:44, 16 April 2012 (UTC)
 * I believe you wanted a new header. (If not I wonder how many Shoshoni speakers we have around here.) Rmhermen (talk) 16:05, 16 April 2012 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the great catch ;-) CJLippert (talk) 16:11, 16 April 2012 (UTC)
 * Of the many, many duplicative articles created, the new user have created a significant article named Muskegoes which I have re-directed as Swampy Cree, and we have now gone back and forth on deleting the redirect and restoring the unreferenced, non-NPOV, OR-containing article. How do we curb the user's article-writing abuse while encouraging the user to put energy into constructive contribution to articles? Admins, please help! CJLippert (talk) 15:17, 18 April 2012 (UTC) ‎
 * I just warned Poesam about edit-warring. However, you also need to be careful, CJLippert. Two opposing editors are sometimes blocked together for edit-warring. I can also protect the article to stop an edit war, but you may not be happy with the version that gets protected. Admins can't settle content disputes with our admin powers. You can try one or more of the remedies at Wikipedia:Dispute resolution. -- Donald Albury 20:53, 18 April 2012 (UTC)

Terminology
I've edited a few plant articles (like Cactus) in which there is a need to refer to use by the indigenous peoples of North America. I've generally used this phrasing (i.e. "indigenous people") in anything I wrote myself, but have left "Native American" untouched. I have however always changed any use of "Indian" I found. Recently another editor has been changing back to "American Indian". I had assumed there must be something in the Manual of Style or its subpages about this, but I can't find anything. Is there any policy I can quote when reverting? Peter coxhead (talk) 08:51, 7 May 2012 (UTC)
 * The problem is in interpretation of the policy at Article titles, "Article titles should be recognizable to readers, unambiguous, and consistent with usage in reliable English-language sources." Some editors feel that "Native American" is ambiguous, or has other problems. Some editors have stated (and I have no personal insight into this) that many "Native Americans" prefer to be called "Indian" or "American Indian". I try to use the name (at least as used in an article title in WP) for a specific people, if possible. In a broader sense I often use "indigenous people", but that term has its own problems when used outside the Americas. In appropriate historical contexts, I will also use "Indian" when the meaning is consistent with the sources and unambiguous. -- Donald Albury 09:57, 7 May 2012 (UTC)
 * The issue I have isn't with article titles or situations where there are clear historical and/or legal uses to give guidance, but what term to use in running text when talking about the use of plants by those people who lived in the Americas before Europeans arrived. So, other than general advice (e.g. on consistency within an article), there isn't any specific guidance anywhere on terms to use? Peter coxhead (talk) 10:07, 7 May 2012 (UTC)
 * that's right, there isn't because there is no generally agreed-on terminology. Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 > haneʼ 11:01, 7 May 2012 (UTC)
 * Usually, "Native American" will piss off the fewest people, though the term does annoy some folks. Try your best to call living groups of people what THEY want to be called -- when you can find specific guidance for a given tribal nation or ethnic group, it's best to use that (i.e. Blackfeet, Lakota, Apache, etc...) If you can pinpoint a time/place in prehistory (i.e. Clovis culture, Folsom culture, Hohokam culture, Mississippian culture,  Pacific Northwest cultures, etc.) use that. For pre-1492 stuff, "pre-Columbian" might work in some contexts, or better yet " prior to European contact." (Don't ever say European "discovery"- the land was already "discovered" - say "contact") As for the generic terms, "Indian" is actually preferred by some Native people over "Native American," which they consider too academic or weird, while other people find "Indian" to be really offensive. (In my case, I've run across BOTH attitudes amongst people in the same tribe!)  A lot of people in my area (Montana) have been using "Native people" for the last 20 years of so and that is pretty safe.  Some people like just "Native" more than Native American, but yet find words like "Natives" (in the plural form, at least) to be condescending.  So yes, it's a total minefield.   I'd say the trick is that whatever terms you use, use them with great respect, and not in a "these are primitive people" sense. Phrasing and context counts for a lot.   Montanabw (talk) 17:23, 7 May 2012 (UTC)
 * Agree with Montanabw, although personally I used "Natives" all the time. If the mainland US is being discussed either phrase is fine and accurate (and both are consistently used in scholarly literature today). I've started just letting new editors change things back and forth as they please. There's no consensus, so it's pointless to try to force one. I will change terms in article if non-Indian indigenous American people are being discussed or if the article is about Canada. South of the United States, "Indian" makes more sense as term than "Native American" – and "indigenous peoples" is the most neutral throughout the Americas. -Uyvsdi (talk) 17:42, 7 May 2012 (UTC)Uyvsdi
 * For a Briton, like me, "natives" is awful, because of the way it was used in the context of the British empire. I can see that it may not have that resonance to Americans, but I think that you would do well to avoid it in a international encyclopaedia.
 * Anyway, thanks for all your comments; I still prefer "indigenous peoples", but will leave other editors to "change things back and forth as they please". Peter coxhead (talk) 08:31, 8 May 2012 (UTC)
 * What's really hard to parse if you aren't part of the culture is that I think that many Native American folks would have a similar gut reaction to "natives" plural and lower-case, but "Native" in the singular or part of "Native People" is OK, you see "Native Pride" bumper stickers out here a lot.  And using "natives" in the plural is kind of OK for people to use amongst themselves in an "we're going to own the word and not let others insult us with it" manner, but white people can say it only at their peril.  I've noticed that two groups of people from the same tribe can hold 180-degree different views.  Safest option is to always use the tribal nation identity when possible, though this site shows the variety of the lingo amongst Native People themselves.   Montanabw (talk) 01:16, 11 May 2012 (UTC)