User talk:Obsidian Soul/Archive 7

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Austronesia

Hi. I'm not sure this article doesn't conflict with WP:DICT and WP:FORK, but pared down as you have it, it's not so bad. We do have articles on other words, after all. But I have a few issues with it.

• per your sources, the primary definition of the word is the oceanic islands, not the range of the AN languages
• the majority of AN in the ethnographic sense is not volcanic islands (though in the geographic sense perhaps it is)
• the majority is not within 10 degrees of the equator
• the Torres Strait Islands are not Austronesian. If the map is supposed to show just contact, then it should also include the northwestern coast of Australia and much of mainland Southeast Asia, at the very least Champa, most of the rest of coastal New Guinea, Timor and the Bismarcks. Since it doesn't, I assume that it's supposed to be where the languages are spoken, which isn't in the Torres Strait.

— kwami (talk) 21:10, 17 February 2020 (UTC)

Hi, @Kwamikagami: First off, I think you need to stop thinking of this in terms of languages alone. If you take a look at the sources on the topic, "Austronesian" and "Austronesia" covers far more than languages in academic literature. From art (e.g. Austronesian Painting Tradition, Austronesian Engraving Style, the Lapita "tattooed" dentate-stamped red-slipped pottery, etc.), to archaeology, genetics (human, cultigens, commensals, etc.), sociology, etc. hence why I think this article is necessary. There are topics here easier to define simply to Austronesia (and are discussed that way in sources, e.g. my recent contributions to Barkcloth, or Lashed-lug boats), instead of repeatedly saying "parts of Oceania, Island Southeast Asia, parts of Mainland Southeast Asia, Taiwan, Madagascar, etc." as if they have nothing in common. The region is discrete from neighboring regions, not only in terms of language but also in shared culture and human prehistory. Redirecting links of the word in the geographic sense to the article on the Austronesian languages would be confusing to readers.

• If you mean the dictionary definition of American Heritage, that seems to be based on the older definition of "Malayo-Polynesian", which excludes Madagascar. But neither does it mean Oceania, since it clearly includes Indonesia. Merriam-Webster defines it more accurately on the second sense (though they define it literally on the first). Regardless, the academic sources discuss it as the range of the Austronesian expansion and the languages. And the term itself was coined originally from the name of the language family, not for the region. I don't think it ever entered common usage outside of academic literature (unlike similar terms like "South Seas", "South Sea Islanders", or "Oceania").
• This is directly in the source:

Most of the AN world lies within ten degrees of the equator, making it almost exclusively tropical or sub-tropical. Many of the islands are volcanic in origin, and several areas, including the island of Hawai’i (from which the Hawaiian chain is named), parts of Vanuatu and western Melanesia, and an extensive zone skirting the southern and eastern boundaries of Indonesia and extending northward through the Philippines, are centers of active volcanism and seismic activity.

Blust, Robert A. (2013). The Austronesian languages. Asia-Pacific Linguistics. Australian National University. hdl:1885/10191. ISBN 9781922185075.

• The map is supposed to show migration and settlement by Austronesians, regardless of what they speak now or even if they still exist. Not just languages, and not mere contact. It includes Norfolk Island and the Pitcairns for example, whose settlers moved out or died out. And yes, it does include Cham/Sa Huynh areas. There is actually a larger map that shows possible contacts per Blench 2009. Regardless, I can remove the Torres Strait Islands from the map if you want, though then it would contradict part of the text in other articles.

This paper examines the possibility that we should take a broader view of the expansion of the Austronesians. Studies in Austronesian linguistics are dominated by a characteristic map, looping from Madagascar to Easter Island, and reconstructions of Austronesian culture confine themselves to forms derivable from existing languages. This is perfectly acceptable as a purely linguistic process, but rather limited as a contribution to human history. A subset of linguists and archaeologists accept the Austronesian peoples as a historical reality, and assume were highly mobile, making use of advanced maritime technology. It therefore seems reasonable to assume that they were able to reach many places other than those where their languages are spoken today.

Blench, Roger (2009). "Remapping the Austronesian expansion" (PDF). In Evans, Bethwyn (ed.). Discovering History Through Language: Papers in Honour of Malcolm Ross. Pacific Linguistics. ISBN 9780858836051.

-- OBSIDIAN†SOUL 02:01, 18 February 2020 (UTC)

No-one proposed "repeatedly saying 'parts of Oceania, Island Southeast Asia, parts of Mainland Southeast Asia, Taiwan, Madagascar, etc.' as if they have nothing in common." When you're not referring to the AN languages, you're referring to the AN peoples, and those two articles are adequate. The article on AN itself is largely OR.

Borneo, the largest island in Asia, is not volcanic in origin. Neither are many of the others. The Sunda region is continental. Though it's true that many of them have volcanoes, so does Italy, but we wouldn't say it's largely of volcanic origin.

Whatever Blust says, most of the region on the map is not within ten degrees of the equator. So either Blust is wrong, or the map is.

If the map is supposed to show migration and settlement by Austronesians, then it partially fails. It's missing Champa and much of New Guinea, for example, as well as showing gaps in the Moluccas and Melanesia which don't really exist. And no, it's doesn't show the historical Cham area, but only where the languages are currently spoken, and not even all of that. So it's an odd mix of the current or recent AN area with a very few historical expansions but not many others. In other words, it appears to be rather inconsistent OR.

It's weird trying to define exactly what "Austronesia" is geographically, when AFAICT none of your sources do. Your Blench article never even mentions it. That's why I first merged the article as OR. I'm not convinced that it shouldn't just be merged again. — kwami (talk) 03:20, 18 February 2020 (UTC)

@Kwamikagami: Then which of the two articles should we redirect to? I repeat, this is the main reason why I think we should have a separate article for the region, independent of both articles. The terms "Austronesia" (which is used in sources, even when not defined explicitly) and "Austronesian" as an adjective can again be used variously in terms of language (in which case it should redirect to Austronesian languages) or culture, archaeology, and genetics (in which case it should redirect to Austronesian peoples). They do not share the same scope, although they do refer to the same geographic region. Linking to a disambiguation page would not be ideal either.

You are giving greater preference to the dictionary definition than the academic sources I have provided. It is not restricted to Oceanian islands in its usage in academic literature (and it is certainly not a synonym of Polynesia), no matter what the dictionaries say or its literal meaning. Are you denying that the term is used geographically? Because:

In contemporary academic mappings of musical cultures, the term 'Austronesia' is far from common currency. It does not seem particularly handy at first glance: the area where people who speak Austronesian languages live covers a huge amount of the globe's surface from Madagascar to Rapa Nui, making it a seemingly elusive category of reference. Conventionally divided into Taiwan, the Malay Archipelago, Oceania, and Madagascar, Austronesia comprises a huge number of diverse cultural traditions, bound together by their affiliation with the Austronesian expansion and language family, and a shared ancestry. This has restricted the usage of the word mostly to linguistics and archaeology.

Abels, Birgit (2011). Austronesian Soundscapes: Performing Arts in Oceania and Southeast Asia. Amsterdam University Press. pp. 16–21. ISBN 9789089640857.

The bulk of the landmasses in the Austronesian region does also lie within ten degrees of the equator. Maybe you're confusing the vast empty ocean in the maps as part of the territory. If you insist on saying the source is wrong, then I'm fine with removing it. It's not necessary to the article. Blench never uses the term, true, instead using "Austronesian world", which arguably is in the same geographic sense.

I've fixed the map. Removing Torres Strait Islands and expanding Champa and coverage in coastal New Guinea per Bellwood in Chambers (2013) and Chambers & Edinur (2008).-- OBSIDIAN†SOUL 05:41, 18 February 2020 (UTC)

Comment: Austronesia is a back-formation from "Austronesian" (and so is my user name:) ). So it is essentially dependent on some kind of Austronesian XXX. Very few scholars deliniate a region "Austronesia" that is merely geographical, and which would then allow us to include anything pertaining to that region even if is not been discussed under the header "Austronesian" (OR-alert!). Every term "Austronesian XXX" derives somehow from another term "Austronesian YYY", and not from "Austronesia" (except maybe for the cringeworthy "Austronesian music").

Linguists hardly use the term "Austronesia", except in a humorous or ad-hoc manner, so Austronesian languages is an inappropiate potential target for a redirect. I would relate the term "Austronesia" to the extended use of "Austronesian" beyond the language family, from valid topics such as "Austronesian seafaring" all the way to dubious concepts such as "Austronesian music". The broad article about all these concepts is Austronesian peoples, so this is IMHO the logical target for a redirect. –Austronesier (talk) 11:12, 18 February 2020 (UTC)

@Austronesier: Yes it is a back-formation. I was the one who pointed that out. That doesn't invalidate it. It does not mean South Sea Islands either, just because it literally means "south islands". I think it's both of your biases as linguists showing. I have a bit of an idea of the controversies in Austronesian linguistics (though I have zero expertise in linguistics), as well as the population replacements in Melanesia post-expansion that means the Austronesian-speakers in that region only have traces of Austronesian ancestry, aside from language and bits and pieces of the Austronesian material culture. But that is not relevant here. Yes few linguists use the term. It's used plenty in other disciplines (see Google Scholar results). Regardless, since you both think it should be redirected, I agree with the proposal on redirecting it to Austronesian peoples, although I still have my misgivings. -- OBSIDIAN†SOUL 11:32, 18 February 2020 (UTC)

Oops, sorry, though it was still kwami.-- OBSIDIAN†SOUL 11:37, 18 February 2020 (UTC)

FWIW, at least two thirds of these citations are written in languages where "Austronesia" means "Austronesian" (I've tried to filter out some keywords [1], and yes, lots of typos [2], [3]), [4], [5], [6] (still on page 6 of the search). My rough guess is there are c. 1000 valid counts in the search. There is a coherent use among archeologist and cultural anthropologists who use "Austronesia" equivalent to "area populated by Austronesian peoples". But whenever "Austronesia" appears in a "geographic" sense in enumerations, the borders are quite random: "...Austronesia, the Pacific, the Americas...", "...Europe, Africa, Asia, Austronesia...", "...Australia, Austronesia, and Papua New Guinea...", "...mainland China, Austronesia, Oceania and Japan..."; the weirdest of all is "...Europe/Africa/Latin America/Asia/Anglo-Austronesia (white Australia and New Zealand)..."(!!!). By itself, the idea of "Austronesia" is still just too fuzzy for a stand-alone.

I don't think that kwami and I have a linguist's bias. We indeed agree in our critical position towards equating large linguistic groupings e.g. with groups of ethnicities, but this is not necessarily the common linguist's POV. Quite to the contrary, many linguists naturally think in their own classificatory categories, and often are actively involved in projects that go beyond their own discipline to find commonalities, often entering into circular fallacies (Blust–Bellwood are the classical case of interdisciplinary circular reinforcement). The one-to-one application of labels from discipline A to discipline B in a Kossinna-ian manner more often is an obstacle than a benefit when we want to understand the beautiful complexity of our human history. –Austronesier (talk) 17:14, 18 February 2020 (UTC)

@Austronesier: @Kwamikagami: Fair enough. Thank you for the explanation. I'm going ahead and redirecting it to Austronesian peoples. Transferring part of the results of the discussion here to the Geographic distribution subsection as well, since it also applies (re: volcanic islands, etc.). -- OBSIDIAN†SOUL 00:04, 19 February 2020 (UTC)

Disambiguation link notification for February 23

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Barong tagalog

Regarding your reversion of my edit, as it stands it is still incorrect. The material you are calling silk clearly isn't silk and as such it should not be called silk and should not be linked to silk. Presumably the barong tagalog may also be made of actual silk as well. What material is the stuff you are calling silk made of? Polyester? If so, that is already listed. The options are to remove the word "silk" (but that then suggests that no genuine silk barong tagalogs are made), or remove the word "cheaper" (which to me makes sense, since there are both cheaper and more expensive modern materials. Lexicon (talk) 15:51, 29 February 2020 (UTC)

This is organza

@Lexicon: I thought organza was linked in the article already, apparently not. The material is known as organza, and yes it is made from silk (with the specific type mimicking jusi or piña known as jusilyn in the Philippines - note the prices in those links). Yours is a common misconception. Silk is a fiber, not a type of fabric. I'm guessing you're unaware that silk can be woven into many different types of fabrics, ranging from very cheap to very expensive. What you're probably thinking of when you hear the word "silk" are the more luxurious fabrics like silk satin, crêpe de chine, silk charmeuse, chiffon, habutai, shantung, shot silk, etc. Organza is cheaper than all of those and it is far from being a "luxury" material. But it is silk.

Neither are barong tagalog made from any of those "more luxurious" types of silk fabrics, because none of them would work. I'm also assuming you have never seen or touched a barong tagalog in real life. It is silky in texture, yes, but very different from sheer "luxury" silk fabrics like chiffon in that it's quite stiff, has a rougher weave, is less "glossy" than silk, and the fibers are not of the same width. And if you tried making a barong tagalog from the more opaque "luxury" silk fabrics like charmeuse, the end result would be a limp glossy shirt that would look more like a changshan. Organza barely works as a substitute for traditional piña or abaca fabrics as it is.-- OBSIDIAN†SOUL 16:55, 29 February 2020 (UTC)

Disambiguation link notification for March 10

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Massive update on Waptia

Hi, I see that you were the main contributor to getting Waptia to GA in 2012, however in 2018 a massive restudy came out, the images are free to upload to commmons, are you interested in collaborating to update the article? Hemiauchenia (talk) 19:25, 7 April 2020 (UTC)

@Hemiauchenia: Oooh. Finally they pay some attention to it. Haha. Sure, I'll help out wherever. Though I don't collaborate much at all, so I don't know how it even works without edit conflicts.-- OBSIDIAN†SOUL 22:51, 7 April 2020 (UTC)

Polynesian migration image

Hi Obsidian Soul, I've seen your illustration File:Chronological dispersal of Austronesian people across the Pacific (per Bellwood in Chambers, 2008).png; the text style and migration arrow locations demonstrate that this is an obvious copy of the image from the cited paper, but that paper has copyright restrictions. An alternative version of this image can be found in Benton et al. (2012), but that publication is CC-BY, not CC0. Could you please change the license (or demonstrate that you have permission to license this image as CC0), and use appropriate attribution. Thanks. gringer (talk) 11:01, 15 April 2020 (UTC)

Hi @Gringer:. Please see Wikipedia:Image use policy#Diagrams and other images. Technical data is uncopyrightable. The diagram is self-created and thus can be released under CC0 regardless of the license of the source material. P.S. We can directly upload the one from Benton et al. separately under the CC-BY license, if you wish. -- OBSIDIAN†SOUL 11:14, 15 April 2020 (UTC)

While technical data is not copyrightable, the presentation of data in a graph or chart can be copyrighted. You cannot make a copy of an image in a research paper, claim it as your own, and release it into the public domain. This should at least be treated as a derivative work of the image in Chambers, 2013. You need to demonstrate that Geoff Chambers has given you permission to use this presentation of the data. gringer (talk) 12:59, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

@Gringer: This best explains my understanding of the policy, please read: Copyrightability of Tables, Charts, and Graphs (Glushko, 2011)

None of the aspects of the map I have recreated pass the threshold of originality. They are bare facts (which are discovered, not created). The arrows themselves only present that data. You can not change the number, direction, etc. of those without changing the underlying data. The labels and dates are similarly data. The map of the earth is derived from a CC0 map on Wikipedia. The names of the islands and regions are public knowledge.

While the policy says "presentation" can be copyrighted, from my understanding (again see examples in the link above), it means that it can be copyrighted if the presentation itself involves creativity. Which is not the case here. If they had used snakes instead of arrows, added drawings of boats on the water, and added Māori ornamentation on the border, I would not be able to copy those things. But I would still be able to recreate the data presented as long as I do not use snakes, boats, or Māori borders; or use worms, dragons, and a Celtic border design instead.-- OBSIDIAN†SOUL 14:56, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

The form and direction of the arrows is the creative aspect, and represents something that is not present in the data represented on the image. As one example, there is an arrow from the Solomon Islands that splits prior to Fiji, arriving at Samoa and Tonga. An alternative interpretation of the data (which is consistent with the represented times) is that there was one migration from the Solomon Islands to Fiji, then from Fiji on to Samoa, then from Samoa to Tonga. As another example, the arrow from the Northern Mariana islands has a dotted styling, which is different from most other arrows. Again, this styling is not obvious from the date data presented in the image. gringer (talk) 13:12, 20 April 2020 (UTC)

@Gringer:Arrows are not creative. If they were creative, then the mere fact that my arrows are not the exact same shape would make them different, don't you think? But no. Because what matters in the arrow is the direction based on data, not on what shape or form they are in. And I repeat, that can not be changed.

The dotted styling simply represents unknown migration times. There is a limited number of ways you can distinguish arrows from one another. Would changing them to a dot and dash style make them different enough to satisfy you? Of course not.

You are arguing copyright status for incredibly basic information symbols. It's as nonsensical as claiming the angles of a line graph are copyrighted. Or the direction of arrows in a chemical reaction, the shape of the borders of a range map, the number and direction of bonds in a structural formula, the circular shape of a pie chart.

As an exercise. Think of another way to show direction. What other ways can I represent directional data on a map, in conjunction with date estimates? None. Only arrows work, because that's what arrows are for.

Alternative interpretations is not part of this specific source. If we used another paper, I'd add the alternative interpretations gladly. But since this is sourced to Bellwood's data, it specifically follows Bellwood's interpretation. Making the direction of the arrows different for the sake of making them different is OR.-- OBSIDIAN†SOUL 13:40, 20 April 2020 (UTC)

Sorcery in the Philippines

As a follow-up, I think we should actually take Babaylan#Witches and turn it into an article called Sorcery in the Philippines, and merge Kulam, Barang (magic) and Managilunod into it. What do you think? Glennznl (talk) 16:01, 19 May 2020 (UTC)

@Glennznl: I would disagree with taking the section out of babaylan, as it is relevant there. But writing a new article combining those three articles is a good idea. The information on sorcery in babaylan can be replicated and expanded upon in detail, but it should not be removed from the babaylan article itself. Some topics do overlap.

Also I don't think the title "Sorcery in the Philippines" would work, because it's not exactly "sorcery" nor are there other articles in the format of "Sorcery in <insertcountryhere>". I think like in Babaylan/Katalonan, choosing the better known term and then redirecting would be best. In this case, the merged article should be under the title "Kulam".

Speaking of which, I will restore the old section naming for Babaylan, and smooth out the merging. For one, "witches" unnecessarily equates them with the European idea of witches. Secondly, kulam/barang was not exclusive to "bad" babaylan. Most babaylan practiced them in conjunction with their other roles. There was no such thing as a "negative counterpart" to babaylan. Black magic is thus a better descriptor.-- OBSIDIAN†SOUL 18:10, 20 May 2020 (UTC)

@Obsidian Soul: For some reason I did not get pinged, odd. Alright, I will merge those other articles into Kulam and also copy over info from Babayang. Some overlap isn't a bad thing I guess, in this entire subject of Philippine religion and mythology, almost everything overlaps. Glennznl (talk) 19:49, 20 May 2020 (UTC)