Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Four Great Ancient Civilizations

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was Keep (non-admin closure), multiple keeps, only one delete Leonard^(Bloom) 18:00, 12 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Four Great Ancient Civilizations

The article is on a Chinese-exclusive phrase used to promote nationalism and cultural pride. The phrase itself is not notable in English, the phrase is translated literally. The content of the article is composed of definition and etymology which belongs on wiktionary. The content is covered more thoroughly by the article cradle of civilization. Voidvector (talk) 06:52, 7 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of China-related deletion discussions. —Voidvector (talk) 07:25, 7 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Keep The article may be Chinese-exclusive or promote nationalism and cultural pride, but i do not think this is good reason for deletion. The subject may be obscure but may be of interest to some. I do not think that if a subject is covered in another article that this is good cause for deletion, the opposite can be true. As to the terms relating more to wiktionary, I felt the article had a subject mater that goes beyond the simple definition of words.Czar Brodie (talk) 14:17, 7 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Neutral I can't be a good judge of possible sourcing but (to respond to the comment above) if an article is basically a standing NPOV violation, that is sufficient grounds from deletion (apart from just having a POV section or POV wording). However, if we find some secondary sourcing talking about the concept (rather than arguing from it), we may rewrite this article as "In history, the Four Great Ancient Civilizations is a conception forwarded by Chinese historians to describe..." and the write the article on the concept from a dispassionate viewpoint. However, the humanities are not my strong point (for research digging), so I can't say either way. Protonk (talk) 16:34, 7 July 2008 (UTC) Hmm. Actually READING the article suggests that it is already written in the current fashion. I would suggest that more independent sourcing be added to promote the claim in the article (right now we have a high school history text, a article from a buddhist journal and an article from a chinese company). where are the historiographers when you need them? Protonk (talk) 17:11, 7 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Keep but improve. The article need to properly cite the origins of and use of the term. However, Wikipedia is not a paper encyclopedia, and is large enough to encompass topics that originate from non-english speaking cultures. Suggesting otherwise is like suggesting that the article on Nessun dorma (which by the way, needs work), should be restricted to the Italian language Wikipedia. --lk (talk) 05:29, 9 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I understand this position (and I know the policy about non-english sources) but I think we ought to be cautious about including too many articles based largely on non-english sources. given that our "is wikipedia the right place" page directs monolingual non-english speakers to non-english wikis we are relying on the translation by multilingual editors to ensure that sourcing verifies the text (not to mention is reliable, etc). I'm not disagreeing with you on your !vote, just putting things out there. Protonk (talk) 06:02, 9 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Keep, with improvements as may be needed. Or possibly merge into a suitable article on the world view the phrase is said to promote. IMHO, there is nothing wrong with article not about "things", but about people's views or concepts of them, as reflected in catch phrases used in the popular or academic discourse within various cultures or subcultures. For that matter, as long as the "concept" (and the associated catch phrase / cliche) is important enough in its culture's or region's public discourse (whether to "promote cultural pride" or any other PoV), it may be notable regardless of the actual existence of the "thing" it purports to describe, or correctness of the theory behind the phrase. Compare: Third Rome, Free world, Leader of the Free World, Golden billion, Classical element, Proletarian internationalism, Fiat currency, Zionist Occupation Government, Welfare queen, Prester John, Class struggle, Political correctness, New class, or Abiogenic petroleum origin. Vmenkov (talk) 06:11, 9 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
- Reply I never deny the existence of topic or the coverage of it. The topic is covered thoroughly by the article cradle of civilization. And the current content is composed of definition and etymology, which belongs on Wiktionary. --Voidvector (talk) 06:44, 9 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I agree that the content has been already suitably housed in Cradle of civilization. But what I was trying to say is that e.g. besides the "factual" article about President of the United States, Wikipedia happens to have a separate small article about the (history, etymology, and use of) phrase "Leader of the Free World", because the phrase itself - and the world view associated with its users - is notable enough. Thus, if "四大文明古国" is a common "classification" or "concept" used in e.g. public education or journalism in China (and I have no idea if it is), than there may be nothing wrong about a separate small article about this concept, from Liang Qichao's essay (supposedly, important enough for forming the nation's world view?) to its current use and effect on public mind (if any). In principle I have no objections of its merging either into Cradle of civilization or into some suitable article on Chinese historical/political/philosophical theories (some counterpart of the American exceptionalism or Third Rome or Historical materialism articles, perhaps), and setting an appropriate redirect. In practice, however, if I am looking at the topic X and thinking "X can be merged into A... or into B ... or into C", I often find it easier to keep X as a separate article, and refer to it from A, B, and C via the \{\{main\}\} tag. Vmenkov (talk) 07:09, 9 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Delete Basically an interesting topic, but one blog, one poem and one, say, romance page as sources? Please. What is needed here more than elsewhere is serious scholarship which unfortunately utterly lacks. Gun Powder Ma (talk) 00:31, 11 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Comment - This is not a China-specific subject and, as such, I don't see why this article is China-centered. In grade 6 in New York I learned this very same theory of the four earliest river civilizations (Nile River, Tigris/Euphrates Rivers, Yellow River, and Indus River), and, thus, if this article is to be kept, it should not be China-centered. Badagnani (talk) 14:55, 11 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
- Reply Yes, the English article --> "cradle of civilization". this redundancy is one of my reasons for this AfD. --Voidvector (talk) 23:17, 11 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.