Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Japan/Archive/November 2011

Template:Infobox Chinese
Hello, I have a proposal I've made roughly 2 months ago at Template_talk:Infobox_Chinese concerning how the template adds Japanese information. I think there's a parameter bloat that could be cleaned up, but unsurprisingly I am biased in favor of the proposal. I think if we were to consolidate the romaji params to one, we could use a bot to clean it up. So far two users, myself, and one IP address have chimed in. Feel free to add comment. --Bxj (talk) 02:08, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

Murasaki Shikibu Nikki Emaki
I am looking for some more images for the Murasaki Shikibu Nikki Emaki. I already found some which I believe are from that scroll(s), but am unsure which edition they belong to. So I'd be happy if somebody could confirm that the images correspond to the respective edition. With some I am not sure whether they belong to the Murasaki Shikibu Nikki Emaki or am not sure which scene of a given edition they show. Also, if you know of any other images of the emaki please let me know or upload them to commons. Thanks. bamse (talk) 00:54, 31 October 2011 (UTC)
 * 1)  = : Hachisuka edition (蜂須賀家本) which scene!?
 * 2) : 第3段絵 of Hinohara edition (日野原)(former Hisamatsu edition 旧久松家本); this is a guess based on matching the text in page 17 corresponding to the image on page 18 of this with the text in here (わた殿にねたる夜とをたゝく...) !?
 * 3) (second image): 第7段絵 of Hachisuka edition (蜂須賀家本); based on matching text with text in here (そのよの御まへのありさまいと...)
 * 4) Hachisuka edition (蜂須賀家本) 第1段絵 based on text on scroll (which corresponds to the scene after the painting compared to text here!?
 * 5) (right part of image only): 第4段絵 of Hinohara edition (日野原)(former Hisamatsu edition 旧久松家本); this is a guess based on matching the text/images in pages 19-22 of this with the text in here (二宮の御いかは正月十五日そのあか...) !?
 * 6) =  =  =  (the image with caption: 中宮彰子と紫式部（紫式部日記絵巻）)
 * 7) : Morikawa edition (private) based on  and amherst (search for "Murasaki Shikibu Diary")
 * 8) : Hachisuka ed. painting 6 text 4; based on amherst and matching the text with here
 * As for #2, you are correct. It's an image of Fujiwara no Michinaga visiting Murasaki Shikibu and knocking the door in the night. I'll check other images later. Oda Mari (talk) 06:33, 4 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Thanks. Any chance to extract image captions from the text in if necessary (for some images I have English descriptions in other sources)? I would not need an exact translation, but maybe the names of people at least. bamse (talk) 09:51, 4 November 2011 (UTC)  Found an English translation of the diary. bamse (talk) 03:00, 5 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Image #1=#9. It's the scene of Murasaki Shikibu (on the right) lecturing on Bai Juyi's poems to Empress Shōshi (on the left). Oda Mari (talk) 07:06, 5 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Thanks. I joined the two above, so there is no more #9. I believe the one which is for sale is a reproduction and the other is the original, right? bamse (talk) 09:26, 5 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Yes, the one on sale is a reproduction. The linked page says 復刻版.  Oda Mari (talk) 14:41, 5 November 2011 (UTC)
 * As for #7, you are right. Oda Mari (talk) 15:20, 5 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Thanks. I'll be striking out those that I've already uploaded above. bamse (talk) 22:16, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

Clan/family
Is there a rule on how to translate 家 when speaking of ancestral heritage of pieces of art or writings. For instance, would 森川家本 be translated as Morikawa clan edition or as Morikawa family edition (or something else)? Would it make sense to use "family" for modern times (post Meiji restoration) and "clan" for before? bamse (talk) 11:25, 8 November 2011 (UTC)


 * First, I have to ask: are you sure it's not a name? Perhaps "Morikawa Iemoto"? If not a name, I might translate it to "house", as in "House of Morikawa" or since it's 本, like a "headquarters", it could be the "Morikawa Main House". I don't know what the conventions are (if any), but I usually use "family" for groups in which all members share the same surname, and clan if I am talking about the larger family affiliation that includes branch families, subordinate families (retainers), families of adoptees, etc. But, I know in medieval Japan there were several levels, and we really only have the 2 or 3 terms in English. Boneyard90 (talk) 12:35, 8 November 2011 (UTC)


 * I am basically sure that it is not a name, otherwise there would be lots of Iemoto's in here (Hachisuka Iemoto,...). I think I have seen 本 translated in such context as edition (as in: this piece of art belonged to the family/clan mentioned before 本), but don't remember where. Alternatively, maybe one could write: in possession of the Morikawa/Hachisuka/... house/family/clan, but for flow, I would like to refer to the set or artworks/writings that are in possession of a certain family somehow without writing: "the paintings that are in possession of the Morikawa clan" each time. bamse (talk) 16:00, 8 November 2011 (UTC)


 * I see you point about the name. If the kanji 本 can be translated as "edition", then it's a new one on me, but then art & literature aren't my strong points. I see that the website also uses han 藩, which I'm pretty sure is usually translated as "clan", when writers aren't using han. I think the word ie 家 is more often translated as family or house. The moto 本 is a little unusual here, I think, but in my experience is usually something like "main" or "headquarters". Hopefully someone else will weigh in. Good luck. Boneyard90 (talk) 22:52, 8 November 2011 (UTC)


 * Thanks for the reply. I was looking for an English/Japanese source which has both the kanji and english translation, but without success so far. The moto not only appears with families or individuals but also with institution such as 金沢文庫本. "Headquarter" kind of fits, as in this piece of art has its headquarter (=is commonly located=is owned by) at Kanazawa Bunko. bamse (talk) 23:20, 8 November 2011 (UTC)
 * I think "clan" is not appropriate for this purpose, because it includes all the family tree. "家本" indicates a family which possesses the book regardless of whether it has been passed down for generation. How about using a word "collection" instead of trying to translate "家本"? See UM, History of Art Department collections. Although I understand "Kebon" has an implied meaning of "edition" in addition to "possession", the word "collection" may also have an implied meaning of "edition". ―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 01:44, 9 November 2011 (UTC)


 * I like it. "Collection" seems to fit as the best interpretation, whereas the translation has fallen short of the intended meaning.Boneyard90 (talk) 06:04, 9 November 2011 (UTC)


 * How about "version" as in this source ("Hinohara version")? bamse (talk) 15:41, 9 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Please see the following Google book search results.
 * "hinohara collection" | "Hachisuka collection" | "Morikawa collection" "emaki" OR "ekotoba" 288
 * "hinohara version" | "Hachisuka version" | "Morikawa version" "emaki" OR "ekotoba" 1
 * I excluded "Okura Collection" because it produces a fair amount of spurious hits. I haven't examined all the entries, so spurious hits may still be included in above result. ―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 23:24, 9 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the links, but as far as I can see it is used differently: "in the ... collection" vs. "painting from the ... version". I would like to refer to the scroll itself, not to the owner in order to write something like: "The Hachisuka version/edition/scroll consists of 8 illustrations and 7 sections of text." Can't see how to do this using the word "collection". bamse (talk) 00:28, 10 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Hi Bamse, I think you should maybe try referring to them as the "Family name scroll", i.e the "Hachisuka scroll consists of 8 paintings/illustrations and 7 pieces of text". Hope this helps. Or you could refer to it as the "Family name fragment" because they are fragments of the whole. I.e. "The Hachisuka fragment consists of 8 illustrations and 7 pieces of text". Hope this helps. Truthkeeper (talk) 02:26, 10 November 2011 (UTC)
 * I like the idea. Prefer to use "scroll" since those are complete scrolls AFAIK. Will use "fragments" for the cut up scroll, i.e. Gotoh fragments,... bamse (talk) 08:13, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

GanghwaLanding.jpg
Hello from the Wikimedia Commons! We've received a request for the illustration on the right to be renamed. The requestor thinks that the file may be incorrectly named, but does not speak Japanese. Neither do I. Can someone please explain what the caption on the illustration itself says? Thanks. — Cheers, Jack Lee  –talk– 14:53, 10 November 2011 (UTC)
 * The requester is correct. The caption is "雲揚艦の兵士等 韓島の永宗城を襲ふ”. It means "Soldiers from the Un'yō attacking the Yeongjong castle. The ja text use 城/castle, but actually it was batteries. Oda Mari (talk) 20:24, 10 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Excellent. Thanks very much! — Cheers, Jack Lee  –talk– 20:58, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

Thanks indeed. Does “韓島の永宗城” mean that the fort (永宗城) is on a Korean (韓) island (島), or is “韓島” just a variant of the proper noun 韓半島? I guess what's meant here is the latter because the former would probably not have on'yomi furigana for 島, right? On the other hand, I've never seen the term “韓島” before and would not have thought of understanding 島 as a superset of 半島, just like my concept of “islands” does not include peninsulas.
 * Oops! Sorry. I forgot to put the word in the en translation above. It means "an Korean island". Oda Mari (talk) 05:54, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

Another thing that surprises me is the use of kan (韓) instead of chōsen (朝鮮). Do Japanese sources use kan frequently even before 1897? Were they freely interchangeable variants, or was there perhaps a reason for whoever wrote this in the 1870s to prefer kan over chōsen for the caption? Thanks in advance. Wikipeditor (talk) 02:25, 13 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Nihonshoki used the word Samhan and there was the Seikanron in 1873 and the Ganghwa Island incident happened in 1875. I guess they were interchangeable then. I cannot tell why the woodblock artist preferred kan over chōsen. He might be a supporter of Seikanron or he might use kan without any specific reason. Oda Mari (talk) 05:54, 13 November 2011 (UTC)
 * So is the complete translation of the Japanese caption "Soldiers from the Un'yō attacking the Yeongjong castle on a Korean island"? — Cheers, Jack Lee  –talk– 08:10, 13 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Yes, or it might be "Soldiers from the Un'yō attacking an Korean island's Yeongjong castle". It's difficult to translate as ja do not have articles a/an and the. 韓島 is Korean island, 永宗城 is Yeongjong castle and 襲ふ is the verb attack. The name of the island is also 永宗島 Yeongjong. So translating the caption without repeating "Yeongjong" in natural en is difficult for me. I think the caption on this page is a good description, it's not the translation of the ja caption though. Oda Mari (talk) 18:14, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

Shozo Fujita
I found this article with a proposed deletion tag on it, but contested deletion based on the fact the Japanese Wikipedia article (according to a Google translation) makes some claims of likely notability, and searches in English find some hints of notability. Could someone who can read Japanese check this out to see if notability can be substantiated? Phil Bridger (talk) 18:43, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

How old is this?
Does anybody know how old this is? As far as I can see, it says date unknown, but I don't need an exact date. Just wondering whether it is public domain due to age and whether images can be uploaded to commons. Also, does anybody know what the rules are for uploading ukiyoe to commons under public domain licenses are? Which date counts in this case, i) the date when the drawing was made, ii) the date when the woodblock was created, iii) the date of the actual printing? bamse (talk) 21:48, 10 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Anything written by Murasaki Shikibu would be in the public domain given the age (everything she wrote is over 900 years old, and some would be approaching 1000 years old). ··· 日本穣 ? · 投稿  · Talk to Nihonjoe ·  Join WP Japan ! 07:14, 11 November 2011 (UTC)
 * I am not an expert in licensing, but this is how I understand it: Any text by Murasaki Shikibu is PD because of age (so I could publish a book with her text without paying her or her relative anything). However, the item in question is a reproduction of the Murasaki Shikibu Diary Emaki (original from 13th century). I understand that any photographic/scan reproduction of the Emaki is PD (see this for the reason). Now the item in question is not a photographic reproduction but an ukiyoe reproduction. As such it involves some non-trivial work (transferring the painting to a woodblock...). That's why I am not sure that the same reasoning as for scans of old 2D artwork can be applied here. So at the moment I can see two options for uploading these ukiyoe reproductions to commons:
 * The reproductions are old enough. Not sure what the cut-off date is here (author died more than 100 years ago, published before 1923,...). Hard to say since no author is known. The ukiyoe book looks like Meiji period to me, so those conditions might not actually be satisfied.
 * The reproduction is considered straightforward (simple) enough to qualify for the PD-Art license. Will ask about this the licensing experts at commons. bamse (talk) 11:14, 11 November 2011 (UTC)

It seems that they cannot be uploaded unless their age can be determined to be sufficiently old. bamse (talk) 18:40, 11 November 2011 (UTC)
 * According to ja:紫式部日記, the book was originally published in the 13th century, so that's certainly in PD. ··· 日本穣 ? · 投稿  · Talk to Nihonjoe ·  Join WP Japan ! 23:07, 12 November 2011 (UTC)
 * There are three items, i) the Murasaki Shikibu Diary from the early 11th century, ii) the Murasaki Shikibu Diary Emaki from the 13th century which is an illustrated (text+pictures) version of the diary and iii) a woodblock/ukiyoe reproduction of (parts of) the emaki, whose age is not known per this (I'd guess Meiji for the age). I know that "i" and "ii" are PD, but am not sure about "iii", since I don't know its age. bamse (talk) 01:35, 13 November 2011 (UTC)
 * If they are reproductions of a PD work, then they are also PD. If they are interpretations of a PD text, that is different. Which are these? ··· 日本穣 ? · 投稿  · Talk to Nihonjoe ·  Join WP Japan ! 08:17, 14 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Well, they are ukiyoe, so rather interpretations, since it is not a one to one copy, but requires some artistic talent to carve the wood, etc. bamse (talk) 19:37, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

Move and merge of Ohōtsuku Subprefecture and Okhotsk General Subprefectural Bureau
I have just requested that the recently moved article Ohōtsuku Subprefecture be moved to Okhotsk Subprefecture to restore the widely-used official spelling "Okhotsk" rather than the romanized form "Ohōtsuku". I'm not too familiar with Hokkaido geography or politics, but there has been a lot of hasty article renaming to and fro in the past year or so following the official renaming of Abashiri Subprefecture to Okhotsk Subprefecture in April 2010, which also seems to have resulted in the creation of a parallel article, Okhotsk General Subprefectural Bureau, through a cut & paste move. This article has identical content to Ohōtsuku Subprefecture. I would be grateful if other editors can comment on the suitability of moving Ohōtsuku Subprefecture to Okhotsk Subprefecture and also merging the edit history of Okhotsk General Subprefectural Bureau. The move discussion is at Talk:Ohōtsuku Subprefecture. --DAJF (talk) 10:35, 11 November 2011 (UTC)

Y u delete my article??
Can someone help me with Nihon no Uta Hyakusen? Some guy I've never met before has marked it PROD, COPYVIO, and AFD in the space of about 48 hours. I don't know what his deal is but I don't like that it's a two-person argument so far and he is not communicating well. Shii (tock) 01:03, 12 November 2011 (UTC)
 * It is closed as keep thank to WP:Japan participants. However I prefer the title something like "The best 100 children ???????'s songs in Japan" than "Nihon no Uta Hyakusen" although I don't know any applicable guidelines. ―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 09:58, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

Rizana Nafeek and related nonsense on ja.wiki
Hi. I'm looking for help from someone who can write Japanese. I'm trying to resolve anomalies between the people considered alive on en.wiki and dead on other wikis. In the case of Rizana Nafeek, there's clearly a mistake on ja.wiki (ja:リザナ・ナシカ) which for some reason states that Nafeek has been dead for three years. That statement is not sourced and this isn't surprising since Nafeek is still very much alive and in the news. I'd really appreciate it if someone can fix the ja.wiki article. Thanks, Pichpich (talk) 02:05, 14 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Fixed ja article and explained in the talk page. --Kusunose 09:19, 14 November 2011 (UTC)
 * That's great, thanks. Pichpich (talk) 17:14, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

Portal:Baseball in Japan nominated for deletion
A portal related to this topic, Portal:Baseball in Japan, has been nominated for deletion. Please see the discussion, at Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Portal:Baseball in Japan. Thank you for your time. Cheers, &mdash; Cirt (talk) 04:16, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

Requested moves
I posted two requested moves: Please participate in the discussions. ―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 10:03, 18 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Cuteness in Japanese culture to Kawaii at Talk:Cuteness in Japanese culture
 * Nihon no Uta Hyakusen to The best 100 Japanese songs at Talk:Nihon no Uta Hyakusen

Lyudmila Pavlichenko


Hello, Wikiproject.

In Lyudmila Pavlichenko, several users/IP's have tried to remove one sentence and reference - e.g. (and many others; see history)

has repeatedly undone the change as 'vandalism'.

I have investigated the claim as best I can, and it seems to me that it is an inadequate reference to say she achieved popular recognition in Japan as a heroine. I believe the sentence should be removed. I do not believe that the edits removing it should be called 'vandalism'.

Please could anyone help resolve that issue; please see/respond on Talk:Lyudmila_Pavlichenko.

Many thanks,  Chzz  ► 15:11, 18 November 2011 (UTC)

Kanji of a person
I would like to know the kanji of Shizuka Saeki of Look Japan. The article she wrote that I got from the resource exchange doesn't state what kanji her name uses. How would one find it? Also Look Japan seems to have been discontinued, so I cannot contact them WhisperToMe (talk) 22:05, 29 November 2011 (UTC)