Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Russian History

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This page is for discussion of all matters related to Wikiproject Russian History MarshallPoe 14:10, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

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[edit] Banner

Our banner reads, in part, "a collaborative effort to improve Wikipedia's coverage of tulips." Tulips???

Changed Tulips to Russian History here and in the template - thanks for pointing it out. I'm not sure how to locate the pages, if any, which already have the incorrect template added. Phaedrus86 01:05, 6 December 2006 (UTC)
Thanks for changing it. I had added the banner to an article before the change, and it looks like it was automatically updated.--Hafar 01:33, 6 December 2006 (UTC)
"Tulips" was my fault. I just copied the template from the Wikiproject help page (with tulips), went to feed my cats, and forgot to up date it. In other words, I'm an idiot. Thanks for updating it, Pheadrus. MarshallPoe 14:10, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

More important question: If an article has been 'claimed' by another WP project (Ivan IV falls under the biography and military history projects, for example)do we need to talk to those projects before adding the banner and editing the articles? --Hafar 22:52, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

I don't think so. I've been adding the banner to Talk pages and have seen many with multiple projects. It seems to me a case of "the more, the merrier." MarshallPoe 14:10, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Profiles

Guys (those in red ink :)), could you please create profiles for yourselves? I think we can all benefit from knowing each other just a little bit better. Thank you! KNewman 06:07, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Where to Place the Banner

You say "Place the Russian History WikiProject banner on the TALK PAGE of every entry tagged with Category:History of Russia". How about articles that are not tagged with Category:History of Russia, but are about Russia and its people? Please, clarify. KNewman 17:44, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

Good question. The answer, I think, is that the banner should be on the talk page of every Russian history related page. I've changed the front page to reflect this. Using the "History of Russia" category page is just a way to find Russian history related pages that need the banner. MarshallPoe 20:34, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Transliteration

Are we following LOC transliteration? If so, what do we do with an article ("Andrey Kurbsky") where the title itself is mistransliterated? If we change it to Andrei Kurbskii, will people looking under the former spelling still find it? (At the moment, if one searches according to the correct spelling, nothing comes up.)--Hafar 06:37, 8 December 2006 (UTC)

  • That's one of the disadvantages of wiki search engine. If you make a spelling mistake, it won't find anything. They should really address that issue. KNewman 11:42, 8 December 2006 (UTC)
  • Is there any reason not to follow LOC trans other than the "former (incorrect) spelling" issue? It seems to me that there are ample ways to get to "Andrey Kurbsky" from "Andrei Kurbskii." Seems to me we should go with LOC. MarshallPoe 16:02, 8 December 2006 (UTC)
  • Yes. Definitely LOC. It's simply a question of people being able to find things easily. Is it difficult to set up something so that a search for 'Kurbsky' (or 'Tolstoy,' etc)is redirected to the article with the proper spelling? I know it's possible, Andrei Kurbsky redirects to Andrey Kurbsky. (although a search for Kurbskii leads only to the page on Dan Waugh)How do we set up redirection of that sort? It may not be readily apparent to all users that searching for 'Kurbsk*' is the best idea.--Hafar 19:57, 8 December 2006 (UTC)
    • Gentlemen, you can find more at Wikipedia:Redirect. But it doesn't mean you can create redirects for entries like Andre Koorbskii, Andreii Kurbskyy etc. You have to understand that if some people have no idea how to spell someone's name, they have to use other sources to find out the most commonly-used spelling of this name in English (or whatever language) and then search the Wikipedia for the article on this person. You shouldn't create redirects that are similar in spelling to Andrei Kurbsky. Does it all make sense :)? KNewman 20:54, 8 December 2006 (UTC)
      • Thank you, I didn't know how to set such things up. I agree that a redirect for Andrei Kurbsky does not make sense, but it probably predates this project.--Hafar 21:34, 8 December 2006 (UTC)
        • What I mean is that a redirect Andrei Kurbsky to Andrey Kurbsky is fine (Andrei and Andrey are both used in English quite often), that's why it exists. Redirects for the rest of the possible spellings would be nonsense (Koooorbskyy and the like). Examples may be numerous: Smirnov and Smirnoff (fine), Khrushchev and Khruschev (fine), George Bush and George Boosh (do not create a redirect), Condoleezza Rice and Condolisa Rice (do not) etc. Common sense, really. KNewman 21:53, 8 December 2006 (UTC)
          • Clear enough, thank you. To fix this particular problem, I did the following: Moved the former article to "Andrei Kurbskii" which, I read, has the effect of setting up a redirect from the old article to the new one. I'm hoping that fixes things without breaking anything.

--Hafar 05:32, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

There is a Wikipedia page on "Romanizing" Cyrillic (Russian) script: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Romanization_of_Russian Allen1861 18:52, 1 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Just a suggestion

Maybe we should just pick a badly written article or a stub on the Russian history and try to improve it collectively instead of tagging ALL of the artciles pertaining to Russia? It'll last forever... But then again, if my suggestion passes, we'll roll back to the Collaboration of the Week thing (Wikipedia:Collaborations), which used to be so popular in Wikipedia and later died down due to the lack of enthusiasm. KNewman 21:44, 8 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Armenian SSR

Hey all, how come Armenian SSR was tagged? Are we assuming Soviet Union == Russia? - Francis Tyers · 23:39, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

Hi Francis. Sort of. I think Rus', Appanage Rus', Muscovy (and all its territories), the Empire, the USSR (all of it), and *some* of the former territories of the USSR fall under our purview. This purview is *not* exclusive. We aren't imperialists! We just want to help keep the articles accurate. If the Armenian History Wikipedia Project (should such ever exist) wants to monitor the "Armenian SSR" article as well, that would be great. The more the merrier. I'd be interested to see what others think. MarshallPoe 14:10, 11 December 2006 (UTC)
  • It's already been tagged by the projects for Armenia and the Soviet Union - I think it falls under their purview rather than ours, and I half believe it should be removed. I tagged the page for the RSFSR but deliberately left the pages for the other SSRs alone as I wasn't sure what to do with them. I don't think our purview should be restrictive but a line has to be drawn somewhere - are we concerned with the history of Russia (which would include Rus', Muscovy et al), or are we concerned with the history of the Soviet Union - which already has it's own Wikiproject? Perhaps discussion of this, also, should move to the talk page of the article concerned? Adereterial 13:44, 12 December 2006 (UTC)
    • Granted, but I would say that in marginal cases (like this) the more projects involved in monitoring articles, the better. All any project tag means (IMO) is "We want to help" (NOT "We own this"). If multiple projects want to help, all the better. As long as everyone maintains NPOV (which we will), multiple projects bring more attention to the tagged articles and, by "Wikimagic," more attention should result in better articles. I imagine that someone will get POed about our tag on a site that they think "their" project "owns," but I think we should deal with that on a case by case basis. MarshallPoe 15:27, 12 December 2006 (UTC)
  • I agree with MarshallPoe here. Russian history has long been understood to include the history of its empire and of the Soviet Union. This is a convention, though, not a claim to "ownership." Peshkov 19:40, 12 January 2007 (UTC)
  • This "convention" is wrong and potentially offensive, even if it is clear through this discussion page that the honest authors clearly mean no offense. An ancyclopedia exists to get things right, not to propagate misunderstandings and conventions. The name should be changed or the scope limited to reflect reality rather than convention. 86.6.11.56 08:58, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
  • To limit the scope would wrongly efface the fact that Russia WAS an empire, that "Russian history" involved imperial, even colonial, relationships (often very oppressive) with nations besides ethnic Russians. But what name change would work? "The History of Russia and its Empire" works only until 1917. "Soviet History" works only 1917-1991. "Russian, Russian Imperial, and Soviet History" might work but is rather unwieldy. Also, to call this project "Russian History" and to include non-Russian areas and peoples reflects historical terminology (Rossiia, i.e. "Russia", often stood for the whole empire and still today stands for many areas in which ethnic Russians do not predominate). By the way, it seems to me that offense should only be taken (and my ancestors were themselves non-Russian subjects of the empire) if it was said that Armenia, for example, could ONLY be discussed by the Russian History project. --Peshkov 22:29, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Scope

Just what exactly is in scope of this project? I saw someone tagging Sergei Eisenstein as part of this project; while I'm not opposed to this (he did make some excellent movies about Russia's history after all), he wasn't that crucial with respect to Russian history himself (as opposed to Lenin, Stalin etc). Errabee 23:32, 12 December 2006 (UTC)

  • I will withdraw my name from the memberlist if it all comes down to simple tagging. I don't see any sense in it. KNewman 13:05, 13 December 2006 (UTC)
    • No, tagging isn't all that is planned: "This WikiProject aims to add, improve and monitor articles concerning Russian History in all periods." Tagging, I think, is just for the purpose of cataloging everything we have to work on.--Hafar 18:34, 13 December 2006 (UTC)
    • What Hafar said. IMO, we need to find out how well Russian history is currently covered in WP, then we can focus on those areas that are weak. That's why tagging is the first task. Also, producing a catalogue of all the Russian history pages will help experts (the professors we are targeting on H-EarlySlavic and H-Russia) determine what they can do within their specialties. Besides, I seem to be the only one tagging en masse (I've tagged approximately 600 articles so far). If you (KNewman) want to do something else, that's fine too. As for the question of scope, I think we want to be as catholic as possible inorder to draw as many people to the project as possible. As I've said, the tag doesn't say "We own this," it says "We just want to help." -MarshallPoe 19:47, 13 December 2006 (UTC)
      • Just in case - a user can monitor articles by adding them to his/her watchlist (Help:Watching pages). KNewman 19:55, 13 December 2006 (UTC)
        • I'll explain why I tagged Eisenstein, if it helps? Firstly, his films form a major resource for my current works, yet I know too little about the man himself - the article is tagged as requiring cleanup, which is surely the main aim of this project? Secondly, and most importantly, his films - and in particular October - were crucial in influencing how the Soviet (and Western, for that matter) people viewed their Revolution. For that reason, IMO, he warrants inclusion. Thirdly - whilst I don't currently have the knowledge or time to revise the article myself, perhaps someone involved in this project (or who later becomes involved) may do so, and we all benefit as a result. Adereterial 20:17, 13 December 2006 (UTC)
It becomes more unclear by the moment. Now Modest Mussorgsky is tagged as in scope. This is rapidly becoming a clone of Wikiproject Russia, and I don't see the added value of this project anymore. Errabee 00:10, 14 December 2006 (UTC)
  • Here's the added value: it brings Russian historians and people interested in Russian history to Wikipedia. If you look at the "members" list, you will see a lot of new names, that is, new to Wikipedia. Many of these people are professors and students of Russian history (I know many of them personally--I recruited them). I'm sure that some of them have more than a passing interest in the history of Russian music. I, btw, taught Russian history for years at the college level, and I always did a lecture in the survey on 19th century Russian culture, including music. Hence, Mussorgsky belongs. As I've said, if the WikiProject Russia, or WikiProject Russian Music, or WikiProject Mussorgsky, or any other project wants to put its banner on Mussorgsky, great. We could use the help. The idea is to improve the Russian historical content in Wikipedia. Anyone can participate, and everyone is invited to do so. -MarshallPoe 13:22, 14 December 2006 (UTC)
Basically, what you're saying is that you're creating a clone of the WikiProject Russia, as anything related to Russia is also related to Russian history. You just aim at other participants. No thanks, one project is more than enough. Errabee 14:31, 14 December 2006 (UTC)
  • I agree a defined scope is needed, to be honest. Not everything related to Russia needs tagging as within the scope of this project. I strongly suggest that we collaboratively decide on the scope and stick to it, and discuss marginal cases here and remove the tags if necessary. Otherwise we'll end up tagging everything related to Russia whether it's historical or not. We must limit the scope or we'll never, ever achieve anything other than adding a banner to every page, and there seems little point expending energy when all we'll do is become clones of WikiProject Russia and Soviet Union.Adereterial 17:58, 14 December 2006 (UTC)
How’s this for a first suggestion as to scope: ‘Any person, place, thing or event that might reasonably be included in a college course on Russian history.’ This excludes a lot that is Russian but not ‘historical,’ e.g., Russian pop stars, Russian sports teams, Russian companies, Russian business people, Russian drinks, Russian cloths, Russian highways, Russian mountain ranges, etc., etc. Still, there is going to be some overlap, particularly where the person, place, thing or event continues to exist today, though it was important in ‘Russian history’ (e.g., Moscow, Gorbachev). Thoughts? -MarshallPoe 13:52, 15 December 2006 (UTC)
That's better - in which case, it would exclude, in my opinion, the Armenian SSR as discussed above, which I would doubt would get more than a passing mention at best in any course on Russian history. Also, for the benefit of those who aren't in the US - could you clarify that 'college' means education post-18? I assume it does. Adereterial 18:45, 15 December 2006 (UTC)
  • A suggestion regarding the scope of the project. We need to break it up into higher and lower priorities: For example: a high priority may be articles that fall within the scope of historical study (the analysis of specific eras and events in the Russian history). This may be political, social and cultural history. A lower priority, but still within the scope of the project may be biographical articles (for example, Mussorgsky, Stalin, Witte). They have a definite connection to the political, social and cultural history of Russia. Russian geography (highways, mountain ranges, etc.) is definitely out. Russian food and drink is definitely out, unless we are discussing them in a context of cultural history. Current Russian personalities is a bit of a grey area. Putin, Yeltsin, Gorbachev, Khodorkovsky have historical dimension, as they started exerting their influence since mid-1980s. We need to decide on these. Any suggestions? IgorYeykelis 02:13, 25 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Indentation

I see many comments on this talk page use unordered lists for indentation by inserting '*' at the start of the paragraph. While this works and therefore must be considered a good solution, it is more common to use the indentation operator ':'. The advantage is you don't get a superfluous dot which makes it a dot point, and it is therefore easier to read. Here is an example - edit the page to see how it is done.

This is indented
This is indented another level. Phaedrus86 22:05, 14 December 2006 (UTC)
Thanks for the pointer, Phaedrus86. I'll use this form from now on. -MarshallPoe 22:20, 14 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Next Tasks (After Tagging)

Once the tagging is done (soon), I'm going to write the members of both H-EarlySlavic and H-Russia (>2000 scholars) a short note saying "If you want to see what's in Wikipedia on Russian History, go to this page." My hope is that some of them will look for their specialities, see that there is much to be done, and join the project. Whatever happens, we need to think about what our next (post-tagging) task is going to be. Thoughts? -MarshallPoe 13:58, 15 December 2006 (UTC)it

Perhaps the next task could be to identify which articles need the most work, and then work collaboratively using the discussion boards to revise these articles. That wouldn't preclude working on other articles, but it seems wise to me to start with those articles which have major problems. Alternatively, perhaps consider a search for what is not currently present at all on Wikipedia and work towards filling the gaps. There is, though, no reason not to run both at the same time. Adereterial 20:33, 15 December 2006 (UTC)

The one thing that we would need to do is to start looking at the actual articles within the Russian History domain. How are they written, what is the content?. Also I suggest that we start participating in the discussions (see discussion page on these articles). Sometimes these discussions give an indication on the direction that the article might take in its evolution. We as historians might guide the article into a more balanced and nuanced direction by participating in the discussion as well as in editing the actual articles. Also, from what I saw in the Russian History domain in Wikipedia so far, it is extensive and there are lots of "white spots" there. This will need to be an ongoing project, and we will need to approach it gradually. In other words, we should not aim to rewrite the whole article at once (unless this is the only thing that we do :) ); instead we look at the article and see if there are things there that make a particular article problematic as a work of history. These things may include

  • factual errors;
  • important areas that are are not covered but should;
  • no references.
We start with these lesser things and go for larger chunks (like restructuring articles or the whole domain) as we become more confident with this domain. IgorYeykelis 06:12, 25 December 2006 (UTC)
I would assume by now that those that have been tagging will be aware of stubs, blank spots etc which could be worked on by this project. I'd suggest compiling a suggestions list for topics requiring either expansion or major revision. Those who have the knowledge or interest could then collaboratively participate (on the discussion boards for those topics) to expand or revise those articles. I would also suggest including here a 'tasks completed' and 'works in progress' list which could be updated every time something major is done, so we keep a firm record of what's going on. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Adereterial (talk • contribs) 02:07, 22 January 2007 (UTC).

[edit] For those who don't know

Just want to make sure that new Russophilliac :) (is that the word?) members know about this Portal:Russia/New article announcements. This way you'll be able to monitor what is currently being done regarding articles on Russia in general (not just history topics). KNewman 21:02, 15 December 2006 (UTC)

I think that most people in here found out about this WikiProject from New Article announcements. --Ineffable3000 21:41, 16 December 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Lobachevsky Article

I think it would make sense to remove the article about Russian mathematician Nikolai Lobachevsky from the scope of wikiproject Russian History and transfer it to wikiproject Mathematics since Lobachevsky is important because of his mathematical ideas, research, and discoveries, not because of his impact on Russian history. NikolaiLobachevsky 2:34:59 12/26/2006 (UTC)

It should be pointed out that it's perfectly normal for an article to be within the scope of multiple WikiProjects. Let's not have any turf wars, please. Kirill Lokshin 02:50, 26 December 2006 (UTC)

I'm not trying to have a turf war, the wikiproject about Russian history and the wikiproject about mathematics are both good, I just don't see how Lobachevsky is relevant to Russian history, his importance is in the history of mathematics, not his Russian identity or his impact on Russian history. NikolaiLobachevsky 3:18:19 12/26/2006 (UTC)

Well, he's Russian and historical, basically; I doubt that this project is trying for a more complex definition of scope than that. ;-)
(Everything is possible, of course; but I'm probably not the best person to comment on that point.) Kirill Lokshin 03:58, 26 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Wikipedia Day Awards

Hello, all. It was initially my hope to try to have this done as part of Esperanza's proposal for an appreciation week to end on Wikipedia Day, January 15. However, several people have once again proposed the entirety of Esperanza for deletion, so that might not work. It was the intention of the Appreciation Week proposal to set aside a given time when the various individuals who have made significant, valuable contributions to the encyclopedia would be recognized and honored. I believe that, with some effort, this could still be done. My proposal is to, with luck, try to organize the various WikiProjects and other entities of wikipedia to take part in a larger celebrartion of its contributors to take place in January, probably beginning January 15, 2007. I have created yet another new subpage for myself (a weakness of mine, I'm afraid) at User talk:Badbilltucker/Appreciation Week where I would greatly appreciate any indications from the members of this project as to whether and how they might be willing and/or able to assist in recognizing the contributions of our editors. Thank you for your attention. Badbilltucker 20:57, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Do you have a user account?

I read about this WikiProject in the latest issue of the Signpost and decided to check it out. Once here, I noticed that there were a very large number of redlinks for user's talk pages, so I decided to give everybody a proper Wikipedia welcome. What I found a little odd was that a couple of the people listed as "members" did not show up as User accounts. That could mean that they did not type there user name correctly (spaces, and except for the first letter, upper and lower case letters are significant), or it could mean they have not yet signed up for a user account under that name. The following are the names that did not have user accounts: User:Ostrowski162, User talk:WalterMoss, User:Jennifer L. Hanuschak, User:Nathaniel Knight, and User:ChrisDickmeyer.

PS: I hope that this group does very well, and that it becomes a model for the participation of other academic disciplines on the Wikipedia. BlankVerse 05:06, 30 December 2006 (UTC)

Hi Blank Verse. Thanks for sending the greetings. I know the good folks in question (all Russian historians) and will contact them by email. And thanks for your best wishes on the project. MarshallPoe 15:46, 30 December 2006 (UTC)
It seems from [1] that Christine Dickmeyer is registered as User:Theharleyc. Good luck on the project. Superm401 - Talk 00:30, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Banner Problem

For some reason the image "George_novgorod.jpg" has disappeared from the project banner template. It appears in the code (that is, the template includes "Image:George_novogorod.jpg"), but the image doesn't appear in the template. Can't figure it out. Anyone have a fix? MarshallPoe 14:08, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Templates on the project page look ok. Can you give a page and a template where the problem occurs? Phaedrus86 22:14, 6 January 2007 (UTC)
Yup, the template is fine. There is something wrong with Firefox on my computer. MarshallPoe 13:50, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] English Versions of Russian Names -

I am against articles pertaining to Russia being listed under the English version of a name.....for example Michael for Mikhail, George for Georgy, Paul for Pavel, and so forth.....

I noticed this when I looked at the article on Grand Duke Michael Alexandrovich of Russia....the man's name was Mikhail, not Michael - his parents did NOT name him Michael. It is the same with the article on Grand Duke George Alexandrovich of Russia - the man's name was Georgy, not George!

Another example of this is the page on the Mikhailovsky Palace, which is put under the ridiculously incorrect name of Michael Palace.

I feel that the actual Russian name should be used - even though the English derivation is the same in essence, they are still different names nonetheless!!

P.S. - My Grandfather's name was Riccardo, not Richard, and he would have raged had someone made an English version of his name, as they are still different names.

--Mrlopez2681 09:04, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Military history of the Soviet Union FAR

Military history of the Soviet Union has been nominated for a featured article review. Articles are typically reviewed for two weeks. Please leave your comments and help us to return the article to featured quality. If concerns are not addressed during the review period, articles are moved onto the Featured Article Removal Candidates list for a further period, where editors may declare "Keep" or "Remove" the article from featured status. The instructions for the review process are here. Reviewers' concerns are here. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:45, 1 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Russian-Circassian War

I have tagged the Russian-Circassian War article as needed the attention of an expert on the subject. I have contacted two of the historians who are mentioned in the references section, inviting them to take a look at it, but I would still appreciate someone from this project taking a look? Thanks, SGGH 15:57, 3 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] AfD nomination of Maksim of Orenburg

An article that is in this project, Maksim of Orenburg, has been listed by me for deletion. If you are interested in the deletion discussion, please participate by adding your comments at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Maksim of Orenburg. Thank you. -- ArglebargleIV 13:15, 4 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] New article: List of Soviet tank factories

List of Soviet tank factories. —Michael Z. 2007-02-06 07:59 Z

[edit] Pages needing the most work

I thought that we should make a list of pages that need more work than others. What does anyone else think? Eurohistbuff 16:04, 8 March 2007

[edit] Russian-Circassian War

I am working on the Russian-Circassian War article, hoping to get it to FA some day, all contributions and thoughts welcome! SGGH 11:46, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Name for pre-SSR: "Belorussia" vs. "Byelorussia" in US English

I've posted this query on the Belarus discussion (Talk) page and would appreciate input from the Russian History WikiProject crew: I need to know the preferred spelling in US English for this region's name when it was part of Imperial Russia. Is there a particular etymology for either of these variants that indicates which might be the more authoritative? -- Thanks, Deborahjay 06:36, 5 April 2007 (UTC)

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