Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Bogan

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. Can't sleep, clown will eat me 03:52, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Bogan

I am sure that this nomination will be hotly contested, so I will explain my reasons carefully. Most of the article at present is either OR or unverifiable. I recently edited it to remove all this OR/unverifiable material, after which it looked like this. The remnants of the article were basically a dicdef. In short, I think the only thing that an article about 'bogan' can be is a definition of the usage of the word, encompassing its etymology and the full extent of its usage, to be sure – but this is what an entry in a major dictionary looks like. In short, this is one for the Wiktionary and not for Wikipedia. I am of course open to persuasion on these points. mgekelly 14:55, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

• Neutral Neologism. There is quite a bit of stuff written on the subject, which is quite surprising for an article on a word. I personally don't know its notability in Australia and New Zealand, but it links to quite a bit of things on Wikipedia (nearly 100). However, according to WP:NEO, we try to avoid writing articles on neologisms because Wikipedia is not a dictionary. This could be a candidate for a move to Wikitionary, but I think apparently that it's notable enough for Wikipedia. --Nishkid64 15:10, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
  • The amount contained in the article isn't a good guideline. Articles on pejorative stereotypes are original research magnets, that, unless given attention, just grow and grow as editors add their favourite personal novel contributions to the stereotype. It's exceptionally tempting for people to add their own personal views of what the stereotype is to such articles, or to use it to make sly (and not so sly) digs at their friends and enemies. Editors regularly have to throw out such additions to chav, for example, insisting upon sources. This article has not had the same attention paid to it, and cites no sources at all. How do we know that bogans are "prone to the use of marijuana", for example? How do we know that that wasn't simply made up by some editor who wanted to use Wikipedia insult their marijuana-using friend? The place to look to see whether there is a lot of stuff written on the subject is outside of Wikipedia. Uncle G 17:02, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
  • But if you actually check out those 100 linking-to articles you'll find many are talk pages, are other class-based pejorative stereotypes like Riff Raff, Redneck and White trash, and for some reason several characters of soap opera Neighbours, like Sindi Watts, have bio articles that use the term. Article The Comedy Company describes how the word became popular. Asa01 23:39, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
• Keep Bogan is a term used very frequently in Australia, esp in the Southern parts like Melbourne and Adelaide. Just as much as America has head bangers and the UK has Punks Aussies have Bogans. Potters house 16:28, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
  • Wikipedia is an encyclopaedia, not a dictionary. Whether a word is in use isn't a relevant argument here. That's an argument for Wiktionary. The question to answer for Wikipedia, which you haven't addressed, is whether there is scope for an encyclopaedia article about the stereotype that the word denotes. Uncle G 17:02, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
    • Bogan culture in Australia is unique and has been often mocked on comedy TV show etc. It is the mullet culture, and are basically the opposite to surfies. In Northern Parts of Australia they are called "Westies." Skeg is another term often used, and is equivilent to a surfie. For cultural trends bogans are described in a hit sone "No body likes a Bogan." How people in nothern Australai don't know what a bogan is and thus don't really get the song. But when I explain the "Westie" connection they understand compleatly. Perhaps the "Westie" could also be incorporated. Terms like "bogan mobile" refering to certain old trashy holden cars, a bogan hair cut - similar to the Mullet, these are cultural terms and shoud be revealed for wikipedians. Potters house 23:27, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
      • Article Westies (people) exists in WP already. Asa01 23:43, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
        • Come to think of it, that article has been the source (indirectly) of a recent AfD to do with Parochialism in Sydney, so perhaps this one (being the broader term, i.e. I've heard it used in Queensland) is the place to roll the entire thing up into. BigHaz 00:44, 2 September 2006 (UTC)
• Keep as the culture described is certainly notable in Australia (the word itself is a neologism, but it describes a cultural phenomenon, much like "goth" or "emo" IMO). That said, the article needs work - there'd have to be sociologists who've written on this, for a start. BigHaz 22:31, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
  • Google Scholar turns up nothing (except for a lot of people with this surname who've written journal articles) and searching Amazon turns up nothing. The nearest that I've found so far is this, which is anonymously written and has no evidence of having been fact checked. Uncle G 02:17, 2 September 2006 (UTC)
    • I'll admit to being very surprised, but who am I to disagree with the facts? BigHaz 02:20, 2 September 2006 (UTC)
      • The places where I expect that this will be covered are newspapers. Please search The Age and others to see whether you can come up with anything. Uncle G 10:40, 2 September 2006 (UTC)
        • If we're looking for scholarly articles, Melissa Campbell, an academic at the University of Melbourne has written a thesis and other articles, and given talks, on bogan culture. --Canley 10:28, 3 September 2006 (UTC)
          • This comment seems to be based on [this http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2002/07/15/1026185158244.html] newspaper article. Campbell appears to be a graduate student, therefore only an 'academic' in a rather broad sense. The only evidence I can find of her work on 'bogans' is an abstract [here http://www.emsah.uq.edu.au/mia/issues/miacp104.html] which does not provide material which would raise this article above the OR/dicdef level. mgekelly 22:06, 3 September 2006 (UTC)
            • I don't wish to inflate Ms Campbell's academic credentials at all, but that reference that she was a grad student is from 2002. I believe subsequently she was a staff researcher for the Cultural Studies Dept, possibly not "academic" enough for some people's definition. Also, I was not intending to cite Campbell's MA thesis as a source, more to check her bibliography for these elusive "reliable sources", which I will do tonight. Should provide more info than an abstract and a couple of web links. --Canley 05:03, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
• Comment - completely agree with Uncle G, this article is a magnet for editors to try and shoehorn in any old descriptions of people they don't like, or describe any tacky or trashy behavior. I keep trying to take out the long list of unverified exmaples, but any such deletions are regularly reverted. I was even called a vandal for deleting various things, even though each individual deletion was small and had a clear description to each edit. But maybe the only solution is indeed to move the entire thing to Wiktionary. Asa01 23:05, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
• Keep as per BigHaz. DXRAW 23:22, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
• Strong keep Widely used word for a significant and verifiable subculture in Australia. There might be case for this as a disambiguation as there is the Bogan River, Bogan Shire Council and poet Louise Bogan. However, the culture is the equivalent of the chav. Capitalistroadster 01:27, 2 September 2006 (UTC)
• Note: This debate has been included in the list of Australia-related deletions. -- Capitalistroadster 01:35, 2 September 2006 (UTC)
• Keep, notable subculture. Lankiveil 02:13, 2 September 2006 (UTC).
• Delete, one for wiktionary until reliable sources have more than a dicdef on them. Andjam 02:24, 2 September 2006 (UTC)
• Keep. Neologism?!?!? People really ought to actually do the most cursory of Google searches before nominating articles for deletion. Rebecca 04:28, 2 September 2006 (UTC)
  • And people really ought to look at what the nominator did and didn't say... Andjam 04:07, 3 September 2006 (UTC)
• Strong keep - if not speedy keep - this is NOT a neologism - the term is a well-known word that has been around for quite a while. Get your research and facts right before you nominate stuff for deletion. I'm sick of commenting on articles where people just haven't got the facts right. (JROBBO 05:04, 2 September 2006 (UTC))
• Comment - the nominator did not claim that bogan is a neologism. Asa01 05:08, 2 September 2006 (UTC)
  • Too right I didn't! I claim that this article is a mix of OR and dicdef, which no-one seems to be disputing, so I'd like to know what rationale they are following for asserting that it should be kept. This word is in very wide usage in Australia, but that does not imply there should be an article about. 'Bogan' is a slur, not a subculture per se. mgekelly 08:00, 2 September 2006 (UTC)
    • The fact that it's a slur isn't necessarily here or there. One could argue that chav is a slur, and yet the subculture which is associated with the slur is notable. The same is true of other subcultures, the names of which are seen as slurs by some/all members thereof. BigHaz 08:04, 2 September 2006 (UTC)
• Keep the Mullet (haircut), location (e.g., Elizabeth, South Australia), obsession with cars/motor bikes and anglo background are characteristics associated with Bogans in Adelaide. Paul foord 06:06, 2 September 2006 (UTC)
• Keep per BigHaz. pfctdayelise (translate?) 07:57, 2 September 2006 (UTC)
• Strong delete The article really is a mess. It is a magnet for origional research and nothing more the a dictionary definition. It is not encyclopedic. --WikiCats 09:34, 2 September 2006 (UTC)
• Delete - Wikitionary is that way, furthermore the article in its current form has a lot of OR with a lack of sources. --Arnzy (talk • contribs) 12:45, 2 September 2006 (UTC)
• Keep for reasons mentioned above. QazPlm 03:53, 3 September 2006 (UTC)
• Must Keep JC807 —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 211.30.222.222 (talk • contribs).
• Keep. I feel deletion is too strong an action here, as the "bogan" as an Australian cultural phenomenon is beyond doubt. I am also sceptical of the application of WP:NOR here, but we are perhaps interpreting it differently. I will work to improve this article as I have found a significant number of references in the media and other publications. We can at least bring it up to "white trash" standard(!). I think some of the more personal or regionally-specific observations could be pruned back, and uncited naming of "famous bogans" should definitely be removed except for fiction characters such as Kath & Kim (CUBs), Kylie Mole and Michelle Grogan and Ferret from Fast Forward, which should nudge it above the dicdef standard. --Canley 10:00, 3 September 2006 (UTC)
  • Comment it seems to me that no-one in this 'discussion' has managed to assert how this article can be more than a dicdef, which was my original reason for nominating the article. My use of WP:NOR was merely to point out that most of the article is at present OR, and that that's all that pads it beyond a dicdef. Even the assertion of fictional characters as bogans is largely unverifiable, except in a couple of seminal cases where the word 'bogan' was specifically used. The wide currency of a word in no way indicates that there should be an article about it. mgekelly 22:06, 3 September 2006 (UTC)
  • Comment agree with Mgekelly comment. No one wanting to keep the page seems to be coming up with any external references, which is what will save the page and its content. Deciding that Michelle and Ferrett (or any of these other fictional characters) are bogans is original research unless an external source can verify that they are bogans. (Personally I thought that Michelle and Ferrett were intended to represent anachronistic Mod Revival types with Michelle's platinum bob, black lipstick/white foundation combo and tight connie jacket and miniskirt - they are not like bogans at all.) It might be true that there are oddly dressed people around, and there are some commonly seen fashion trends visible, but for a Wikipedia editor to decide that these people are bogans or that a fashion look is that of a bogan is original research if there are no external references that designate the said people or fashion trend as that of a bogan. Asa01 08:04, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
    • Comment OK, I've posted a list of references to "bogans" I've found in the media on Talk:Bogan, so please tell me what you think. Point taken re: Michelle and Ferret, and I agree this is a large problem with the article - that much of its content is subjective categorisation. I'd be interested to know what people think of Melissa Campbell's (see above discussion) work or opinions on the matter (and she does by the way, class Michelle and Ferret as bogans [1]). Does she count as a reliable source (given that she was just a grad student)? Does the publication of her views and research in The Age make it more reliable or citable? Maybe post on the talk page as I don't want to clog up this AfD any more. --Canley 11:23, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
• Stong Keep. I can't believe this is up for VfD, this is the Australian equivalent of Redneck (which also doesn't cite any of its sources by the way, for the stereotype list or anything else) and a valid article for the exact same reasons (unless you think Redneck can't be more than a dicdef). Some sections, such as "Contemporary Evolution", could do with massive cleanup or complete removal, and it could probably be better structured, but calling for its deletion is absurd. The current citation-needed spam is also pedantic beyond belief for an article of this type; things like the stereotype of bogans being "Culturally blue-collar" is not remotely contentious to anyone even familiar with the term. I found this within 20 seconds of searching. Others will probably be more difficult to cite directly due to the nature of the phenomenon we're covering here, but the principle is the same. I seriously question the possible agendas/motivations behind people who want this article deleted or are attempting to discredit it by spamming fact tags after each and every sentence no matter how non-controversial it is. --Rankler 17:08, 5 September 2006 (UTC)
  • Sorry, but what 'agenda' could we possibly have in wanting this deleted, other than a stringent interpretation of Wikipedia policy and an aesthetic dislike of this article in particular? mgekelly 22:09, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

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.