Talk:Asian American

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Talk Archive 1: 2004-June 2006
Talk Archive 2: June 2006-Dec. 2006


Contents

[edit] Demographics subsections

All of the demographics subsections need to be treated very delicately. Aggregating the Asian sub-groups can lead to faulty conclusions about what may be a bimodal distribution. The Income section, for example, uses the median household income metric which does not count the number of income-earners within a household, which tends to be higher among Asians. The false impression is one of "wealthy" Asians, when you might have three adults earning moderate incomes living together in a small home.

Also, the link provided points to an AP report republished by MSNBC--but the underlying data are from the Census Bureau. We should link to the Census Bureau report since the data are public and the links are more likely to be stable. At some point I will be editing along these lines. --Ishu 21:32, 11 December 2006 (UTC)

I deleted the section on buying power/purchasing power. This discussion is misleading, since the figures are a combination of income and population size:

Asian American purchasing power, currently at $427 billion, is the second-fastest growing after Hispanics. By 2011, the Asian buying power is expected to increase to $626 billion, a growth rate of 46%.[1]

In other words, a reader could infer that incomes are growing at 46%, when most of that growth is a product of population growth. Reading the actual reference shows that the context refers to the attention of marketers, not of income. --Ishu 14:33, 18 December 2006 (UTC)

I'm going to note for future reference that Asian household income declined faster than any other group between 2000 and 2001. See Census Bureau document p60-218, "Money Income in the United States: 2001," page 2. --Ishu 19:27, 18 December 2006 (UTC)

The entire demographics section should include a discussion that qualifies aggregate Asian American statistics. Relevant considerations include:

  • The misleading median for bimodal distributions
  • Differences among different Asian American ethnic groups

Please contribute other considerations. We can draft such a qualifier discussion here. --Ishu 15:58, 18 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Style Guide development

I think we need to develop a style guide for this page. Two issues leap to mind, both related to individual Asian American ethnic groups. Let's please discuss any and all style issues.

  • Links to individual groups: How often shall we link to an individual ethnic group? Perhaps a reasonable compromise would be only once within each major (level 1) topic.
  • References to the ethnic group of individuals: This is stickier. Especially in the Asian Americans Today section, there's a lot of clutter. Much of this is the list-y nature of the section that I'm working on. But two sentences from In science are typical:
Chinese Americans Tsung-Dao Lee and Chen Ning Yang received the 1957 Nobel Prize in Physics for their work in particle physics. Indian American Har Gobind Khorana shared the 1968 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his work in genetics and protein synthesis.
I suggest that we strike the ethnicity for people who have articles. If there is a theme of progression from one ethnic group to another, it's probably appropriate to mention the ethnic groups, but in general we should avoid it.

What thoughts do people have? --Ishu 13:18, 15 December 2006 (UTC)

I like your suggestion of not including ethnicity when we're listing off these names of famous people. Unless of course, their ethnicity actually plays a part in why they're notable. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 17:44, 1 February 2007 (UTC)
For what it's worth, most of the individual names have been removed. However, I think I will create a style guide. Should it be a sub page from here, or should it be attached to the Asian American project? Ishu 18:19, 1 February 2007 (UTC)
I would suggest attaching it to the Asian American WikiProject, and maybe ask participants over there for collaboration on it. I haven't signed up as a member of that project, but I'll help by reviewing and commenting on your suggestions. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 18:40, 1 February 2007 (UTC)

I have opened a topic at Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Asian_Americans#Style_guide. --Ishu 18:19, 2 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Regions in InfoBox

I removed Southwest (link to Southwestern United States from infobox--that article does not even provide a coherent definition of the region. Only 10 states have >4.5% AsAm pop'n, most in NE or Pac Coast. Only if we include California in the "Southwest" does this make sense, but Cal. is already included in "West Coast." --Ishu 04:33, 18 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Metro regions

I have made a percentage list of AA for the D.C. and Baltimore areas together (although they aren't technically the same metro area): Washington-Baltimore Area Asian American Demographics. (eventually it should have which jurisdictions are growing the fastest) I would like to do one of the San Francisco/Los Angeles areas and see similar articles for all major metro areas as well.--Old Guard 13:56, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Significant rewrite underway

Dark Tichondrias is busily editing the article, with over 50 edits in the last 24 hours alone. I've reviewed a few of them, and most appear to be citation additions and a number of factual improvements. However, am I the only one concerned about the volume and scale over such a brief period? I have no problem with being WP:BOLD, but as a matter of style, collaboration, and courtesy, I am more comfortable when a statement of intent is added to the discussion page. It's noteworthy, if not admirable that DT has provided extensive edit summaries for nearly all, if not all edits. Comments, anyone? --Ishu 21:05, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

Agreed. A little something in the Talk page here would be much appreciated. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 20:04, 31 January 2007 (UTC)
I placed a request on the editor's talk page. --Ishu 01:31, 1 February 2007 (UTC)
I added the encyclopedic content that had been lacking in the article. A lot of the improvements come from a sociologist book about Asian Americans. These were citations and charts. I also found sources over the internet to back up claims made in the history section. The other type of improvement was the removal of original research. The long lists of Asian Americans who have done something in their field and the lists of Asian Americans who blog in the external links section gave no information about Asian Americans. I also removed the Asian pride section which encompased original research, because I couldn't find a sociologist source to back up the claims made in the section. I may go to the library and get a book on Asian Americans from which I can add more sources, possibly re-adding the Asian pride section if I can source it.--DarkTea 01:50, 1 February 2007 (UTC)

Any plans to (re)expand upon the "In science and technology" section? It was taken out a while ago because it was very unwieldy and basically mentioned any and all Asian American scientists for one sentence each scientist. I think Ishu and I had planned on re-writing it, but somehow it just never happened. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 02:02, 1 February 2007 (UTC)

according to sociologist CN Le few AsAms are into sports (from edit summary explaining removal of Michelle Kwan picture) Whether or not this is true, Michelle Kwan is as widely recognized if not more so than many other people whose pictures remain on the page. I don't understand why the picture should have been removed. I select this example mainly because it is the most recent, but it is emblematic of editorial decisions that override several discussions that have occurred on this Talk page over the past 6 months or so. This I find troubling because the logic of it just escapes me. Perhaps some explanation would help. --Ishu 05:00, 1 February 2007 (UTC)

For example, now that I look at the In government section of Asian Americans Today, I'm not sure what's not encyclopedic about the previous version, yet all of it was replaced with new copy that discusses voting, but not contributions and accomplishments in government service, which was the main point of the previous version. Both are legitimate subjects for the article (or somewhere in wiki), and deleting the existing copy here (and elsewhere in the article) goes against Editing policy, specifically "whatever you do, try to preserve information.". More than a few such edits occurred under edits bearing the minimal edit summary of "added citation" or similar. Given that, I'd like to request a halt to edits for a while, excepting true citation addtions. Comments? --Ishu 05:25, 1 February 2007 (UTC)
It is not relevant in this article to have a list of every Asian American who has ever done anything. The relevant information would be an anaylsis of Asian Americans in government by a sociologist.--DarkTea 07:25, 1 February 2007 (UTC)
The previous version of In government was hardly a list of anyone or anything. It is entirely appropriate for this article to be historical as well as sociological. I am open to being convinced that the prior content was not encyclopedic. --Ishu 18:53, 1 February 2007 (UTC)

Also, this might be a good pause to address some of the style issues that I posted a couple of topics above this one. --Ishu 05:01, 1 February 2007 (UTC)

And DT, please be more careful with the text you write. Example: In the 1970s, Korean Americans, Japanese Americans and Chinese Americans were legally the "Mongolian race" while the Filipino American was part of the "Malay race" for the purposes on legally stopping their miscegenation with whites in California.

"the Filipino American was part of the 'Malay race' for the purposes on" should be "Filipino Americans were part of the 'Malay race' for the purposes of."

--Lukobe 18:11, 2 February 2007 (UTC)


Here are several concerns I have about Dark Tichondrias's recent edits, in descending order of magnitude:

  1. Deletion of existing content: I have commented on this earlier. Basically, it violates editing policy, specifically "whatever you do, try to preserve information." For example, while a possible reduction of Asian Americans today has been discussed elsewhere on this page, DT implemented a reduction based solely upon DT's own definition of encyclopedic which has not been discussed on this page. Major changes like that should reflect consensus, per consensus policy.
  2. Edit summaries: Most of the edit summaries labelled added citation in fact contain content changes as well. So at best, it's difficult to follow what happened, and at worst, it's misleading as to what occurred.
  3. Additions to the lead section: It is now too long and unnecessarily cluttered. Some edits to the lead section are good, but others added too much information.
  4. Heavy reliance on a single source: 21 of the references come from the web site asian-nation.org, which appears to be credible, but the heavy reliance on this one reference should be reduced.
  5. Flow of prose: More than a few insertions don't seem to care about the flow of prose around them. While this can be addressed by clean-up editors, the more attention to such detail we can put on the front end, the less we have to "fix" later.

What to do? No single one of these issues is a big deal by itself, but after 100 edits and probably 30-50 reference additions, it'd be good to pause and try to get something resembling consensus before continuing with such major changes. Of course, if nobody else pipes up, then I guess I'm the only one who has any issues, in which case, more power to DT. --Ishu 02:22, 3 February 2007 (UTC)

I agree I've been watching this editing and it made me nervous. More communication would be a good thing here. futurebird 04:15, 3 February 2007 (UTC)

I'm interested in reviewing the current state the article is in, but I've been concentrating on other editing endeavors. But please do keep the discussion going, and I'll definitely pitch in my opinions if you see any specific problems. And 21 citations from asian-nation.org does seem a little excessive. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 04:37, 3 February 2007 (UTC)

Another issue regards the reliable sources guideline. Maybe half of the sources listed are scholarly references. For the remaining non-scholarly sources, the main concerns are (in no particular order) attributability, editorial oversight, declaration of sources, recognition by other reliable sources, and persistence. Also, most of these sources would not fall into the definition of secondary sources, which WP:RS defines as:
The informed and expert interpretation, interpolation, extrapolation or corroboration of primary sources to synthesize a conclusion. In general, Wikipedia articles should rely on reliable secondary sources.
It's easy to provide a reference to a statement. In general, we need only one good reference, and I think the article falls short on that count. --Ishu 20:21, 3 February 2007 (UTC)

Dark Tichondrias now appears to be too busy editing other pages to contribute to this discussion. Any suggestions as to how we might proceed on this page, given the changes made? --Ishu 22:17, 4 February 2007 (UTC)

Revert them all? Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 22:27, 4 February 2007 (UTC)
You should only remove the citations that do not come from a credible source.--DarkTea 13:01, 5 February 2007 (UTC)
Do you care to comment on any of the issues discussed above regarding your edits? It would be nice to achieve some consensus. --Ishu 14:50, 5 February 2007 (UTC)
In regards to the contested edits, I merely removed the unencyclopedic content. This involved removing unverifiable original research and pointless lists of every Asian American who has ever done anything. When we find more sociological sources, it will be easy to re-add any verifiable statement that was removed.--DarkTea 23:48, 5 February 2007 (UTC)
Would it not have been better to just put a "citation needed" tag on specific claims that need to be verified or suspected to be original research, and then remove them after a period of time passes and no editor has provided sources? Now that you've said you removed these types of content, I really wish you would have discussed first before doing so much editing. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 00:15, 6 February 2007 (UTC)
DT, you keep saying that the deleted content was "unencyclopedic" and that we need for the content to be "more sociological." For the third time I ask: what is your definition of encyclopedic? And please remember that this is an encyclopedia, and not a sociology textbook. --Ishu 03:54, 6 February 2007 (UTC)
When I said "encyclopedic", I meant that it could be verified by a credible source and did not constitute a mere assembly of names in a list.--DarkTea 04:20, 6 February 2007 (UTC)
<----Undenting

Fair enough, but it's not clear that you've paid any mind to the discussion of Asian Americans Today that is currently at the top of this Talk page. It addresses the "list-y" nature of that section, and discusses alternatives. Rather than just deleting almost everything, it would have been more appropriate to discuss here first. The thing I dislike the most is how much effort we've had to make just to get you to discuss on this page. We know you're not a newbie to the page or to Wiki. If you want to go in and make as many changes as you have, be prepared to discuss the changes before you implement them and after you implement them. If you're gonna blaze in and blow out, then next time I'd be inclined to revert right away. From what I've seen, your m.o. (or maybe "style") isn't confined to this page, either. --Ishu 04:33, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Going through DT's edits

I will be tediously going through DT's edits and correcting/reverting any edits that I do not feel were justified. Again, I really wish she had discussed some of her edits first. Here is one[1]. The source actually does support what the text was saying. It was a report by the US Census, specifically saying that Asian Americans are not a homogenous group, and that they differ in language, culture, etc. Here is my correct[2]. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 04:59, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

The source actually does support "Asian-Pacific Islander" being an official term. The interpretation that it says Asian Americans comprise a diverse cultural group is strictly an interpretation gathered from its data on varying languages and religions.--DarkTea 03:48, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
Actually I can't tell from your comment whether or not you're disagreeing with me. You removed a source that supports that Asian Americans are not a homogeneous group, and I re-inserted it. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 04:23, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
That source can be used in both situations.--DarkTea 04:42, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

Here is another one[3]. The source inserted actually supports the opposite of the claim that criteria defining what is "American" varies. The article basically says that there is common grounds on how "American" is defined, and that unlike a lot of other societies, it is defined by behaviour and ideas instead of race. Here is my correction[4]. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs)</ small> 05:18, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

The source says very clearly that the concept of the "American" varies. It says that there is a common ground, but it also supports the statement that the term varies.--DarkTea 03:52, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
The article was talking about how "American" is defined by behaviour, unlike many other countries, and that we have more common grounds than we think. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 04:35, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
That is what I said. It varies but has a common ground.--DarkTea 04:42, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

And the problem with this one[5] is that the added source doesn't actually verify those numbers it's supposed to support. The source gives different numbers than what was in the article. I've found a better source. Here is my correction[6]. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 05:44, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

Your source was written by the US Census Bureu in 2000. My source was written by the US Census Bureau in 2004, so the numbers are different. My newer source is the correct source.--DarkTea 03:54, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
Yeah, but you threw the source in without updating the numbers! So then you've got a bunch of numbers in the article that's not actually supported by the reference provided for it. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 04:42, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
Then, update the numbers in accordance with the updated information. Don't remove the true source to make the statement comply with the older source.--DarkTea 04:47, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

Another one[7]. This is what I was talking about when I said that it's better to add citation tags instead of deleting content. There's an whole seperate article devoted to the section in question, but DT removed the entire section anyway. I've added it back in and added citation tags. DT also added in a new section in the same edit. I've asked for citation for a couple of the statements in that new section. Here're my corrections[8][9]. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 06:13, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

That section is completely original research. I could not find any credible sociologists who have commented on the issue of "Asian pride". The only internet source I could use to cite this concept was removed from the Asian pride article. It was not an academic source, but you'll never find an academic source for this topic. I removed the section because it comprised original research which I considered to be false.--DarkTea 04:01, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
Or you could have put some citation tags on it... This is why we've asked you to participate in discussion first. Other editors may disagree with your edits. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 04:42, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

Another one[10]. That source doesn't actually say that "Asian American" is an acceptable term for most formal usage. It's only a list of acceptable terms specifically for the University of Texas. Here is my correction[11]. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 06:27, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

The source says the term "Asian American" is used to "reflect an attitude of awareness, respect " and is an "appropriate references to various publics" in "communications". This supports my use of the citation to show that it is the term that is currently accepted in formal usage.--DarkTea 04:07, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
DT, your source is a University of Texas guideline on how the university's documents should be worded to avoid stereotypes. It's not an article, it's not even an op-ed. It's not making a general statement for what is used for "most formal usage" in American society. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 04:45, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

Yet another[12]. A new sentence was added together with a source. But the source does not actually support what was in that sentence. My correction[13]. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 06:45, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

Quote from the Gorden Lee source, "very real barriers of language and history in order to come together as Asian Americans, and to build alliances with other communities. " The source actually does support the statement about language barriers preventing the realization of an Asian American identity.--DarkTea 04:11, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
The logic leap you made here is that specifically first generation Asian Americans did not identify as "Asian American". The article pertains to the origins of the Asian American identity itself. It does not specify that it was just first generation Asian Americans that did not identify as such due to language barrier. We're talking about the late 60s and early 70s. The language barrier might well have existed for second generation Asian Americans as well. We do not know that just from the source. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 05:00, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

Two differentedits to Terminology/History introduce inappropriate references for the following sentence:

Some Asian Americans feel that a real American is commonly understood to be a white American, specifically the mixing of European American ancestries that happened in the US, but they would like the common understanding to become more inclusive.

The Crevecoer citation (about the "mixing") refers to a primary source (from 1782). The first problem is that it's possible but unlikely that DT actually refers to the reference from 1782. More likely, this information is from a secondary source, which should be cited separately. Second, the reference doesn't fit with the sentence, which discusses how Asian Americans define American. Ultimately, it is unnecessary, since the "mixing of European" ancestries is common knowledge and should not require citation.

It appears you should have written that Thatamanil thinks an "American" is conceived to be a white American and removed the source about European American intra-group mixing because it is common knowledge. You did not have to remove Thatamanil's assertion on the usage of the word "American".--DarkTea 04:15, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
Thatamanil's assertion (your word) is just that: an assertion without any research. It is pointless to have the article state that John Thatamanil believe such-and-such. As I note below--such would only be meager cover for the weasel words in the removed statement. --Ishu 20:30, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

The Thatamanil article is an opinion piece which supports the phrases beginning with "Some Asian Americans" and "they would like." Since there is no research contained within the source, the reference only provides cover for weasel words.

Similarly, another edit

Others conceive an American to not be related to knowledge of culture which can be bestowed upon people living outside of the US, but a statement of allegiance to the US.

cites a 1926 reference. Do we really need a reference to say that there are cultural aspects to being American? --Ishu 17:02, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

This edit is redundant with Use of the word American and is unnecessary. So I reworded it to read:

Further ambiguity stems from variations in the use of the word American. For example, restricting American to include only U.S. citizens conflicts with discussions of Asian American businesses, which generally refer both to citizens and non-citizens. In other cases, American refers to people either born, raised, or currently living in the U.S.A.

--Ishu 17:02, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

You believe that that citation is unnecessary, because that statement already had a citation. I feel more citations backing a statement makes the statement stronger, so I added it anyway.--DarkTea 04:19, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
There is no research in the citation provided, which provides not one citation or reference. --Ishu 20:35, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

Hong, you've done a lot of work already. Maybe it really is time to revert all of the edits, and then go and restore them one-by-one. It seems to me that there's enough examples of problems, especially considering that 100 or so edits were made in less than 2 days. I would support a mass-reversion to the state prior to the edit-blitz, and then we can selectively restore subsequent edits. Wouldn't that be less work overall? --Ishu 13:33, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

Yes, I think that would be great. And there are still a whole lot of edits I have not reviewed. One thing that definitely needs to be worked on is verification of the added sources that are not available online. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 16:04, 6 February 2007 (UTC)
Why don't we wait a day or so for further responses and comments. If there are no protests, we can revert tomorrow some time. Another day won't hurt for the sake of discussion. --Ishu 17:04, 6 February 2007 (UTC)
I propose restoring this revision. Just for reference, here are some diffs so people can see:
--Ishu 04:34, 7 February 2007 (UTC)
No problem. Let's do it. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 06:15, 7 February 2007 (UTC)
Once again, DT's priorities appear to be elsewhere, and it's been at least a day and a half with no response. I reverted the page as discussed, although I botched the edit summary. --Ishu 11:41, 8 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Asian Americans in different cities

Would this be the article to have subsections on the different Asian American populations in different cities (New York, Los Angeles, Minneapolis, etc.)? Or would that be addressed elsewhere, such as, e.g., in the article "Filipinos", subsection "Filipinos in New York", "Filipinos in Los Angeles", etc. Thanks in advance. RahadyanS 13:28, 8 February 2007 (UTC)

Have you looked at Little Manila? It is a decent article along those lines. Japantown is much better than Chinatown, for example, or Little India.
I think this article is too long as it is. For most cities, these issues should be addressed in the city article. Exceptions for metropolitan areas might include Filipinos in metropolitan San Diego, for example. Hope that helps. --Ishu 15:39, 8 February 2007 (UTC)
Thanks very much! RahadyanS 15:50, 8 February 2007 (UTC)
Unless the Filipino American article is too long, I would think that information like that would go in there. But of course, if one is willing to do the research, s/he can write an entire article just on the history of one specific Little Manila. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 16:41, 8 February 2007 (UTC)
In my opinion, it's appropriate to include similar (even identical) copy in the ethnic-group article as well as within appropriate city/geography articles. But as Hong notes, individual articles like Little Tokyo, Los Angeles, California are appropriate where notability and available research make it possible. --Ishu 17:11, 8 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] New name for Asian Americans today

It's not a burning issue, but I think that we really need to rename this section. I'm not crazy about anything I can think of, such as:

  • Notable Asian American contributions (awkward, and begs question "to what?")
  • Impact on United States (same as in African American; but artificially limits to U.S.)

Any suggestions? The current section title is vague and encourages refactoring. A clearer title might reduce the likelihood of that and focus editing in a direction. --Ishu 17:29, 8 February 2007 (UTC)

How about just Notable Asian Americans? Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 17:41, 8 February 2007 (UTC)
I nixed that because it's just begging to be re-list-ified. --Ishu 17:44, 8 February 2007 (UTC)
I think no matter what we name it, there will be editors who come here to add more names and make it look like a list written out in sentences. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 19:27, 8 February 2007 (UTC)
[sigh] I guess I'll just leave it alone, then. Neither will I oppose any reasonable name change. --Ishu 20:19, 8 February 2007 (UTC)
I wish the Asian American WikiProject was actually active. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 20:49, 8 February 2007 (UTC)
People may check it once a week or month and consider it to be frequent, or be neutral and have nothing to add. Either name seems fine. Seräis 05:20, 9 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Reference checking

I removed the following clause from the lead section discussion of Oriental:

and had the effect of distancing Asians from other Americans.

The section of the article that pertains to this discussion appears to be:

many Asian Americans identified the term ‘Oriental’ with a Western process of racializing Asians as forever opposite ‘others,’

The reference supporting this statement is a reliable source, but it does not support the statement regarding "distancing," except as discussed in the previously referenced article on Orientalism. --Ishu 21:38, 15 February 2007 (UTC)

The whole "oriental" issue is arguable at best. We should try to avoid any definite wording when the article mentions it, unless a statement is well-sourced. From my experience, at least, some think it's ok, but some don't like it. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 21:48, 15 February 2007 (UTC)
It's my view that this should be the only reference to Oriental, since it is relevant to the shift to Asian American. All other views are unavoidably subjective. --Ishu 03:50, 16 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] My citations which were unjustly removed have not been compensated

It has become apparant that after a couple of weeks User:Ishu and User:HongQiGong never intend on evaluating my 50 citations they have removed. Their stated reason for removing them was that they felt I added too many citations in too short a period. Other than there not existing a Wikipedia Policy even remotely connected with this reasoning, it doesn't make sense. Are citations no good when they have been added too quickly? User:Ishu claims that s/he will evaluate each citation edit-by-edit to determine if they warrant inclusion in this article, but it has been several weeks and there has been no evaluations of this sort. Will these citations ever be evaluated? For outside observors, here is the article as it were before the 50 citations were removed.--DarkTea 00:35, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

I don't know why it is so difficult to discuss so many additions before you actually edit. We've invited you to discussions, but you were busy doing something else. Please note that silence is concensus. I'm personally concerned about your edits because many of them are not actually supported by the sources you provide, but are conclusions that you've reached yourself based on the sources you have. So please please please discuss before you add. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 01:19, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
The only sources that I interpreted were the couple blog sources. These blog sources did not have anything to say that could be directly translated into a concrete statement for this article, so I had to interpret them. The other peer-revied book sources were written by sociologists about the Asian American. I added no interpretation to these sources; I merely re-worded them to avoid plagiarizing them.--DarkTea 03:04, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
See an above section I started called "Going through DT's edits". I am honestly concerned about how you've been using some of your sources. Many of then don't actually support the statements you insert. For example, one source you used just recently from asian-nation.org said that it was difficult to poll immigrants to see how they voted, but you liberally "interpretted" this to say that immigrants don't vote. So like I've said, please just discuss your additions before you insert them. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 03:18, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
Wow. So it's not like anyone just randomly deleted this information. It seems HongQiGong has done a lot of work and tried hard to start a conversation about these edits with no response. At least people are talking now. futurebird 03:38, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

COMMENT: Saw this at RFC. "dark tea" has done a lot of work, but her changes should be pasted here on the talk page so that others can evaluate them before they go in to the main article. futurebird 02:12, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

She posted an RFC for this? Funny how she missed the instructions on the RFC page where it said, "Provide a link to the relevant section on the article's talk page." Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 02:31, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
Here is the requested link to the RFC Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Politics.--DarkTea 03:05, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Please have a discussion first.

DT - will you please actually hold a discussion before you add so much stuff? Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 04:30, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

I reiterate. Please discuss before you flood the article with additions. Just tell us, what do you want to add/change? We can discuss it so we can come to a concensus before you add it. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 05:07, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

I consider the wholesale removal of citations, because some of them appear weak, to be poor form. I feel the good-faith action would be to change the citation that you consider false rather than reverting all of them. I was in the process of amending the article to appease your qualms with it. I can only do this if I have the 80 citation article on the table and then apply the changes to it. When you revert the article to the 20 citation article, I can't fix your problems with the 80 citation article. I may have run out of revert priviledges for 24 hours, so I can't appease your wishes tonight by amending the article.--DarkTea 05:16, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
DT - my "wish", and that of User:Ishu, as always, has been that you discuss first before you add wholesale 80 citations, especially since I've gone through a number of them and found problems with how they were used. We did not remove your edits without good reason. You can see the discussion that took place right here on the Talk page. You did not discuss any of the specific additions you made, in an article that has consistent contributions from different editors, and you made a huge number of them. That, my friend, is bad form.
So like I said, what is it that you wish to add? And please, don't flood us with all of them at once. We can go through a few of them at a time. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 05:27, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
The WP:CITE policy says nothing about this exception to the rule I feel is being proposed by your party. There is no rule that one user must answer to other users when they cite sources. The WP:CITE policy also does not say users are allowed to remove citations from other users whom they do not trust as faithful contributors.--DarkTea 05:46, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
WP rules also tells us to build consensus and that we should not have original research. WP:CITE does not say we should keep citations around forever and ever if the accuracy with which they are used is questionable. We've asked time and again that you engage in discussion. It's not that difficult. Please mention a few of the things you've liked to add/change, and we can discuss them here. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 05:55, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
I concur with Hong's summary of our intent to discuss major changes before they are put into the article. In addition, please note:
  1. WP:CITE is a guideline, which is subordinate to a policy.
  2. As I note below, the new attribution policy is highly relevant to this discussion.
If we are going to refer to policies and guidelines, let's please acquaint ourselves with all of the relevant policies and guidelines, and with how they relate to one another. --Ishu 19:06, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] New article for Demographics of Asian Americans?

Are there any demographers who can chime in on whether it's time to create a separate article for demographics of Asian Americans? As things stand, for each demographic topic (population, income, education, occupation, etc.), there's one discussion for Asian Americans in aggregate, and then a separate discussion for sub-groups, usually accompanied by its own table(s). If we create a separate article, then much of the detailed discussions can go there and the main article can talk to the aggregates and some of the key differences across ethnic sub-groups. If we don't, I'm afraid the article will be 50% demographics at this rate. Also, the new article should be specifically to discuss the commonalities and differences among the sub-groups; otherwise, it would just be redundant with the demographic discussions for each sub-group. Comments, anyone? --Ishu 21:05, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

Not sure that I agree with you. Are you talking about strictly the "Demographics" section? Or are you talking about other sections as well? The Demographics section itself doesn't seem that big to me. And regardless of what we move, it'll take substantial re-write because the sub-sections aren't very big and they could probably be collapsed if we split off the content into their own articles. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 21:34, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
Let's just say I'm referring to content that "should be" in the Demographics section. For example, the occupational distribution table that's now in Asian Americans today probably belongs in the Demographics section. Wherever it is, it requires some supporting copy, or it should be eliminated. The Education section is almost certain to grow along the lines of the other sections. It's my opinion (as I've noted above) that the demographics often demand discussion by sub-group, since different sub-groups have different immigration histories, for example, that influence levels of education, income, etc. I'm trying to pre-empt a bloated section in an already-too-long article. I'm not committed to this idea, just floating it for discussion. In any event, I have little interest in making major contributions to a demographics article, but there's a constant push to provide too much detail in this article, in my opinion. --Ishu 22:14, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
I'm just trying to picture what this article would look like after such a split. Would we be collapsing and summarising the existing subsections? By the way, I notice the Asian Americans "In Arts and entertainment" section has exploded again. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 22:27, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
I was thinking the exact opposite. The main article would have summaries for each category (or maybe just one section that touches on them all). Then the demographics article would go into depth for each category, with appropriate tables. The main article is becoming cluttered with tables and graphs. Is that clearer? --Ishu 01:31, 26 February 2007 (UTC)
I think we're on the same page. This main article (Asian American) would summarise what's in Demographics of Asian Americans. Only I'm thinking, the subsections in the existing demographics section in the main article might be a little too small. Would it not be a good idea to get rid of the subsectioning? Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 02:47, 26 February 2007 (UTC)
Yes, please, let's eliminate the subsections. It would be much appreciated if others would join "our party" and contribute comments, pro or con. --Ishu 05:37, 26 February 2007 (UTC)
I'm keeping away from Arts and Entertainment, since that seems to be a favorite for list-i-fying, and it's a mishmash of genres and art forms. I don't have any idea for how to make it sufficiently concise. --Ishu 01:31, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

I have created a scratch page with a draft of this article. Right now I just copied what's on Demographics. Feel free to contribute. --Ishu 22:53, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

Nice work. I'll take a look later. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 02:13, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
I added a stub lead section, as follows:
The demographics of Asian Americans describe a heterogeneous group of people in the United States who can trace their ancestry to one or more countries in Asia. Because Asian Americans total less than 5% of the entire U.S. population, the diversity of the group is often disregarded in media and news discussions of "Asians" or of "Asian Americans." While there are some commonalities across ethnic sub-groups, there are significant differences among different Asian ethnicities that are related to each group's history.
--Ishu 02:45, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

If there are no objections, I will promote the proposed text to the new article at Demographics of Asian Americans in a few days. After that, I will downsize the current demographics section to a more manageable size. --Ishu 04:33, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

I have created the new article and removed the subsections. I would appreciate help in drafting appropriate summaries of the subsections for the new demographics section. Someone other than Hong would be nice--no disrespect to you, Hong. --Ishu 07:04, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Wikipedia:Attribution

I don't know how many people are aware of Wikipedia:Attribution (abbreviated as WP:ATT). It is a new policy, merged from Wikipedia:Verifiability and Wikipedia:No original research. Significantly, it is relevant to the discussions we've been having regarding sources. The nutshell version:

This page in a nutshell: All material in Wikipedia must be attributable to a reliable, published source.

Relevant excerpts include:

  • From the lead section:
Editors should provide attribution for quotations and for any material that is challenged or likely to be challenged, or it may be removed. The burden of evidence lies with the editor wishing to add or retain the material.
Reliable sources are credible published materials with a reliable publication process; their authors are generally regarded as trustworthy or authoritative in relation to the subject at hand. How reliable a source is depends on context; what is reliable in one topic may not be in another. In general, the most reliable sources are books and journals published by universities; mainstream newspapers; and magazines and journals that are published by known publishing houses. What these have in common is process and approval between document creation and publication.

Also relevant are:

--Ishu 15:58, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Maps and Definition of Asia: Included countries of ancestry

I replaced the map with the UN Asia regions map. The previous map was created and advocated by Dark Tichondrias in at least two separate discussions, in support of that editor's definition of Asia that is restricted to the ancestries included in the U.S. Census Bureau category for Asian.

Table 2 of Census Bureau document c2kbr-35 (dated 2004) notes that ancestries are reported only for individual countries containing more than 100,000 people (in the U.S.) as of 2000. This exclusion means that certain countries will be lumped into an "other" category because of the threshold, and not because the Census Bureau excludes those countries from its definition of Asia. Most likely, this exclusion rule has to do with the margin of error, not with how the Census Bureau defines Asia, since Table 2 is based upon probability sampling. At any rate, I have seen no document stating that the Census Bureau excludes countries like Afghanistan from its definition of Asia. At least one reference supports this conjecture, although it does not state its sources. --Ishu 20:43, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

Actually, one definition from the Census Bureau web site (from the 2000 census) notes:

Asian. A person having origins in any of the original peoples of the Far East, Southeast Asia, or the Indian subcontinent including, for example, Cambodia, China, India, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, Pakistan, the Philippine Islands, Thailand, and Vietnam. It includes "Asian Indian," "Chinese," "Filipino," "Korean," "Japanese," "Vietnamese," and "Other Asian."

Compare the above definition with the following:

White. A person having origins in any of the original peoples of Europe, the Middle East, or North Africa. It includes people who indicate their race as "White" or report entries such as Irish, German, Italian, Lebanese, Near Easterner, Arab, or Polish.

So the Census Bureau definition of Asian is not exhaustive, but the template map implies that it is. Common sense would place Afghan Americans, for example, in the Asian category, but the Central Asians as a group would be a point of debate, since some could be considered more like "Middle Eastern" people. (The reference cited here is note 11 on the page.)--Ishu 20:54, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

The whole thing about who really is "Asian American" gets tricky. I just hope we can keep the terminology section as it is now - short and to-the-point. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 16:43, 27 February 2007 (UTC)
What makes this all even more difficult is that the way the term "Asian" is used by the government in things like the census, and how it is used by everyday Americans is two completely different things. In every day life, Americans use the term "Asian" to refer to those people that previously were known an Orientals. People who are Indian or Pakistani etc.. are not considered included when the term "Asian" is used. This gets even more confusing because when Europeans use the term "Asian" they use it the exact opposite way with those people from India being "Asian" but not those people from China and Japan (orientals). It's the same thing in America with people from the middle east. The government will consider those people to be white, when in reality, every day Americans will not. Anyway, it really doesn't matter because when people fill out the census they probably 99% fill in what they consider themselves to be. It's only when they write in a country rather than identify themselves that the goverment will automatically classify them.151.204.130.83AR

[edit] Dark Tea

FYI, Dark Tea "has decided to leave wiki b/c it is stressful as of March 3, 2007." Of course, nothing stops any editor from revoking such a decision or returning under another user ID. --Ishu 02:50, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

Yeah if you can't enjoy editing WP for what it is, then it's probably good to take a break. But I'm sure she'll be back. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 00:57, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] List of Chinese Americans nominated for deletion

It looks like List of Chinese Americans has been nominated for deletion. Please weigh in if you're interested in the AfD. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of Chinese Americans. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 18:28, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Featured articles as models?

The following articles have been designated as Featured content, and so might give us some ideas as to how we can structure this article.

  • British African-Caribbean community: Describes a somewhat heterogeneous population, but the UK is much smaller than the US, and the African-Caribbean community has a long history of colonialism that binds them together linguistically and culturally.
  • Iranian peoples: A dispersed population, but the article discusses commonalities across the various diasporas.
  • Pashtun people: Similar to Iranian peoples.
  • Tamil people: The main difference is that there are Tamil people in other countries, but the largest number live in the home region. This bears some similarities to Asian Americans, but it's different because Asian Americans focuses on the US perspective (i.e., the "host" country) instead of the "home" country.

I present this only for ideas and discussion, since we haven't gotten very far just working with what we have. --Ishu 05:16, 12 March 2007 (UTC)

I don't think the current structure is that bad. It's a pretty logical structure. The article does need a lot of work though, but I think it's mainly copy-editing, referencing, and trimming down some sections that may be unnecessarily too large. Perhaps the thing to do is to coordinate on one particular section at a time. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 07:09, 12 March 2007 (UTC)
I used the word structure too broadly. I meant the structure of the content within sections. I basically agree that the current section structure is OK, and you'll see that these featured articles have a similar section structure, but don't have sections like Asian Americans Today and don't dive into as much demographic detail. I post these examples as guides for the content discussions that we've had so that there's some external references instead of just what a small group of editors decides (or disagrees over). Does this make sense? --Ishu 11:39, 13 March 2007 (UTC)
Actually, British African-Caribbean community does have sections that lists notable people, and I think the Asian American article mirrors that because they're both about an ethnic minority population. I think the only subsection in that section that really needs re-work is the arts and entertainment one. That subsection is basically a frivolous listing of names. But I don't think the entire section is absolutely necessary for the article. Are you considering deleting the section? I think at the very least, there's some useful demographic information in the subsections on business and politics that should probably be included, because they have real and practical effects on American society. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 15:49, 13 March 2007 (UTC)
I'm beginning to regret having mentioned this at all. But let me make lemonade, here. I think it's fine to keep Asian Americans Today, although I think it should extend the description of Asian Americans beyond quantitative demographic statistics. Perhaps we can achieve some consensus for that? (I'd appreciate some input from others besides Hong, especially since Asian Americans Today is the "most popular" section for drive-by editors. A strong consensus of focus would help us to avoid refactoring of this section.) I hope that the effort that I've put into editing these sections (vs. deleting them) is evidence of intent-to-keep. My intention in posting the featured articles was to give us some ideas about how to write this article that aren't necessarily my ideas. Of course, Hong, it's mostly you and me talking on this page anyway.... --Ishu 17:36, 13 March 2007 (UTC)
Hahhah well you've been doing the lion's share of the editing here anyway. Well, comparing with those articles, one thing in this article that's clearly lacking in substance is content about culture and community. But that may be intrinsically difficult to include because most sources about the Asian American population has been on demographics, history, and discrimination. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 17:56, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Terminology rewrite

I have rewritten the Terminology section. It now begins with a description of the most common official definition. See for yourself. I know that there is significant room for improvement, so please, help out. --Ishu 03:54, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Asian American cultural issues

This section should have its sub-heads removed, and possibly be merged with other sections. The long-questionable "Asian Pride" section has not been altered in some time, and the article Asian Pride rests on a single tripod web site. FYI, folks, it's ripe for deletion, though I have no intention of nominating it. The Vincent Chin reference probably belongs in the history section, while the model minority discussion might go with the demographics, or possibly in history. Once again, input from other editors would be greatly appreciated. --Ishu 21:37, 19 March 2007 (UTC)

I would not be against listing Asian Pride for deletion, because to be honest, good luck finding credible and verifiable sources that define the term and discuss its usage. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 21:49, 19 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Alleged Harm of Stereotyping

There is no support for the assertion that stereotyping can harm Asian students' performance. This appears to be just speculation, especially in view of Asians' high performance generally. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 12.4.116.14 (talk • contribs) 22:14, 29 March 2007 (UTC)

Firstly, not all Asian ethnic groups perform well academically. Some groups are very much at-risk groups. Secondly, there's no telling that, for those groups that do perform well, they might not do even better without the stereotyping. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 15:04, 30 March 2007 (UTC)
Strictly speaking, there is no support in the article for any assertion in the Asian American Cultural Issues section--as we have discussed previously. But logically, you are correct. --Ishu 19:09, 30 March 2007 (UTC)
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