Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Japan/Archive/July 2014

Names.
Just to be sure, 宇野十 = Jū Uno (real name?), and 未来ちゃん = Mikuru-chan, can someone confirm it? Many thanks! PS. Google translate says Mirai-chan/Miku-chan.. --83.132.55.175 (talk) 06:01, 4 June 2014 (UTC)
 * Do you have any sources? I can't find any reference to 宇野十 on the internet. 未来 is usually Miku, a girls' name, but once again there's no way to tell without context! --Prosperosity (talk) 13:30, 10 June 2014 (UTC)
 * Why is this even being discussed? Both are probably names. Kanji for names can have various readings hence why furigana on top is important as a key to read them. The character for love can be Ai, Mana, Yuki, etc...Correctron (talk) 05:44, 2 July 2014 (UTC)

Toho Kingdom
Is Toho Kingdom considered a reliable source? It's being used as a source on an anime article but Toho is rather out of my scope and I'd like to check before I remove it as unreliable or leave it for now. SephyTheThird (talk) 15:15, 2 July 2014 (UTC)

Use of italics, and inclusion criteria, in the Emperors of Japan template
I made these two edits from my phone a few weeks back. I was gonna post on the talk page about it but ran out of battery before I could, and forgot about it until now.

My reasoning was that marking female tennōs off from their male counterparts with italics seemed like either "benign sexism" (discriminating arbitrarily between male and female) at best, or making a contextually inappropriate modern-day political point ("Look! There have been female emperors in the past! Japan should change its succession law!") at worst.

Another problem is that the template includes Empress Jingū, who is not usually included in the list, but was an imperial consort and regent, of whom there have been a LOT, almost none of whom are included in the template. I'm honestly not sure why she's there, other than that she's more famous than most of the others. But she's probably not more famous than Prince Shōtoku, who is not in the template.

After my edits, italics are used for Empress Jingū, who is marked as being a consort and regent, but this doesn't seem ideal.

Any thoughts/ideas?

Hijiri 88 ( 聖やや ) 14:45, 28 June 2014 (UTC)


 * It is not arbitrary or random. There have been far more emperors than empresses and current law doesn't even permit female succession. It makes sense to italicize the empresses because they are unusual cases. Stop throwing around words like "sexism" and what-not. Correctron (talk) 05:49, 2 July 2014 (UTC)
 * Can you explain to me why they are unusual cases? In the 8th century (when virtually all the female emperors reigned) they most certainly were not unusual cases. The fact that empresses regnant existed is not in itself of much interest, and the reason they existed is (or should be) explained in the relevant articles, not in the template. Can you also explain to me why Empress Jingu is included? She was not a female emperor but an imperial consort. Please actually read my comment rather than just assuming bad faith.
 * And yes, including a random selection of female regents and lumping them in with empresses regnant is completely useless and, yes, arbitrary.
 * Hijiri 88 ( 聖やや ) 23:01, 2 July 2014 (UTC)
 * By the way, I think you don't know what the word "sexism" actually means as used by me in the above comment. I appended the word "benign" and went out of my way to explain it, so I can't imagine why you couldn't understand, but anyway...
 * I do not mean "misogyny" or "discrimination against women". I mean "arbitrary discrimination based on gender". And yes, by this definition, the previous status quo in the template most certainly is arbitrary. Almost no one who reads the history of the Nara period thinks "Huh. There seem to have been a whole lot of female emperors. Why doesn't the current succession law allow that?" (if they do, they are most certainly focusing on the wrong things) and, probably more importantly, virtually no news stories describing the modern succession law debate go into detail on the historical female emperors. I've seen some that say "Oh and by the way there were 7 historical female emperors. Not 8. Because Jingu certainly doesn't count. Because in both the historical sources she is listed as an imperial consort." (Well, actually only the first sentence was said directly. Wikipedia is the only source on the planet that sees fit to include Jingu in the list at all, so others don't even mention her.) And if you're going to use the emperors of Japan template to make a contemporary political point then why not also include Himiko? Unlike the later female emperors, we aren't completely certain that her position as a female sovereign was an accident of succession. I'll tell you why we don't include Himiko. Because she's not part of the official list. And neither is Jingu.
 * (I know that in an article on the current emperor or maybe his father a discussion of the modern political debate might be relevant. But we must bear in mind that those articles make up only a tiny portion of the articles in which this template is included.)
 * Hijiri 88 ( 聖やや ) 23:21, 2 July 2014 (UTC)

Reading of 木曽直次良
Can anyone tell me the reading of the name of the ukiyo-e artist 木曽直次良? Kisoji Jira? Curly Turkey ⚞¡gobble!⚟ 11:46, 27 June 2014 (UTC)
 * Waseda says Kiso Naojirō. --Prosperosity (talk) 13:40, 27 June 2014 (UTC)
 * Tahnks, Prosperosity—somehow I didn't notice your response. Curly Turkey ⚞¡gobble!⚟ 01:50, 3 July 2014 (UTC)

Does MOS:JAPAN require disambiguation for cities that aren't disambiguated from anything?
According to MOS:JAPAN:


 * For cities, use the form {city-name}, {prefecture-name}; for example, Otaru, Hokkaido. Exception: For designated cities, use {city-name} without appending the prefecture unless disambiguation from another city or prefecture is necessary.

Does this require, say, Yuza being moved to Yuza, Yamagata, even when there is no other Yuza (as MChew has done)? In fact, Yuza redirects to Yuza, Yamagata! This seems to be in violation of normal titling guidelines—normally we don't disambiguate unless necessary. Curly Turkey ⚞¡gobble!⚟ 06:21, 17 June 2014 (UTC)
 * It's generally thought that there may be minor municipalities throughout Japan that share names with larger more notable places. It's the same thing that's going on with US cities and why Hilo, Kahului, and Lihue are all appended with "Hawaii" even though there are probably no other cities with those names in the world.— Ryūlóng ( 琉竜 ) 12:54, 24 June 2014 (UTC)
 * Is there a guideline recommending they do that, or are editors just going ahead and doing that? We're not supposed to preemptively disambiguate.  For example, per WP:PRIMARYTOPIC, Toronto isn't Toronto, Ontario, even though there's a Toronto, New South Wales, Toronto, County Durham, Toronto, Illinois, Toronto, Indiana, Toronto, Iowa, Toronto, Kansas,  Toronto, Ohio, and Toronto, South Dakota.  For Yuza there there is only one article of that name—more UNARYTOPIC than PRIMARYTOPIC. Curly Turkey ⚞¡gobble!⚟ 22:56, 24 June 2014 (UTC)
 * If there is no other article with that name, then it is acceptable to have the article at Yuza and have Yuza, Yamagata redirect to it. If there is ever another entry for Yuza, then we can disambiguate at that point. The "City, Prefecture" article should always exist, though, even if only as a redirect. ··· 日本穣 ? · 投稿  · Talk to Nihonjoe ·  Join WP Japan ! 21:14, 28 June 2014 (UTC)
 * Every of the several hundred Japanese municipality, and former municipality articles use the {city-name}, {prefecture-name} format, with the sole exception of designated cities. This was settled through consensus several years ago, and is now regarded as the standard MOS, so is should not acceptable to have the article at "Yuza", unless someone wants to reopen the discussion and a consensus is reached to change the MOS. As the MOS currently is written, it is fine to have "Yuza" redirect to "Yuza, Yamagata" rather than the other way around. --MChew (talk) 01:04, 13 July 2014 (UTC)
 * Can you provide us with the rationale behind it? It's an unusual practice and seems to run counter to sitewide guidelines that say to avoid unnecessary disambiguation. Curly Turkey ⚞¡gobble!⚟ 09:28, 13 July 2014 (UTC)

Languages in censuses and Race and ethnicity in censuses
Pleas add information about this country to this articles. --Kaiyr (talk) 17:09, 28 July 2014 (UTC)
 * Japan doesn't do a census by ethnicity; a Japanese citizen is just Japanese. I don't think they record languages either. Can someone with more expertise on the Japanese census chime in?  ミーラー強斗武  (StG88ぬ会話) 23:27, 28 July 2014 (UTC)

Sasebo schoolgirl murder (Murder of Aiwa Matsuo)
More eyes needed here because we have an inexperienced editor who is a bit enthusastic about sourcing, and also because it's a current event.

I'm also not sure how to title the page because the "Nevada-tan" murder doesn't have the murder victim's name in the title, and neither do any other murders in Japan.— Ryūlóng ( 琉竜 ) 16:08, 31 July 2014 (UTC)