Category talk:Scholars by subject

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[edit] Merge "Academics by subject" and "Scholars by subject"

  • Suggest merging Category:Academics by subject and Category:Scholars by subject into Category:Scholars by subject. Although these two terms are sometimes used synonymously, many "scholars" are not full-time permanent academics. There seems little point in maintaining two significantly overlapping category trees. I also posted at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Academics#Scholars versus academics to get further discussion. --lquilter 17:31, 7 November 2007 (UTC)
    • But since all academics are scholars, surely the simple solution is to have every "foo academics" category a subcat of the "foo scholars" category? --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 13:38, 19 November 2007 (UTC)
      • Yes, that makes sense from a purely category purist perspective (I said something similar in a longer posting below.) The problem that I foresee (and see in current categories) is that most editors don't observe this fairly technical distinction, so the structure will require a great deal of policing. That may still be the preferred solution, of course. --Lquilter (talk) 14:52, 19 November 2007 (UTC)
        • I guess I am inclined to be category purist, so that's fair comment! But there are many other situations where the parent/child category needs constant policing, and the example I'm most familiar with is my own pet subject of British Members of Parliament. There are many cases where there is an MP category as a child of a "politician" category (e.g. Cat:Conservative MPs (UK) is a child of Cat:Conservative Party politicians (UK)), and duplication is avoided only policing. But it does work! :) --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 15:17, 19 November 2007 (UTC)
      • I'm not opposed to it. I just worry about doing it. We who are interested in academics are rather overwhelmed, at present, by those who are interested more in fictional biographies of entertainers from fictional TV series X. <g> --Lquilter (talk) 17:01, 19 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Copied from Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Academics where I posted a fuller statement of potential concerns and issues:
Hi. We have two biographical article trees for Category:Academics and Category:Scholars. These terms are often used synonymously. Technically, academics should refer to people who are full-time faculty at academic institutions, generally with both teaching and research duties. Scholars on the other hand is broader than academics insofar as scholarship/research goes, but doesn't necessarily entail teaching. However, in practice there doesn't seem to be any clear rationale for picking one or the other; any given field usually just one (not both) as well as a "teachers of" category (usually if there are also primary and secondary instruction); and the two trees are circularly placed.
I am putting this out there for discussion, and tentatively proposing that probably most subject categories could have an "x scholars" and an "x teachers" category rather than (("x scholars" or "x academics") and ("x teachers")). It doesn't seem necessary to have two trees ("x scholars" and "x academics") since most editors don't really observe the (rather academic) distinction. (Indeed, the various "x academics" categories are sometimes in "teachers of x" and sometimes not.) Still, the category trees are pretty well-established (although not, I think, with a lot of planning), so it would be good to get a lot of discussion about these categories.
The other way of handling this consistently would be to really thoroughly clean up the two trees, creating lots of container categories, such that "Category:Academics by subject" are all enclosed within Category:Scholars by subject and Category:Educators by discipline. This would be "purer" I think and may be the preferred long-term approach.
I also posted a Merge notice on top-level categories to get some discussion. See Category talk:Scholars by subject. --lquilter 18:04, 7 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Fine distinctions not observed comment - We have Category:Teachers, Category:Scholars, and Category:Academics. Ideally (IMO) and if we were being precise, Category:Academics would be defined as full-time faculty at universities with both teaching and scholarship requirements. People who adjunct would get Category:Teachers; if they do scholarship privately they would also get Category:Scholars. ... In practice, I am concerned that editors will simply not maintain a distinction between scholars and academics. While some of the academics trees are quite good, btw, with no non-academic scholars, most of them clearly just use "academic" as synonymous with "scholar". This could just be a weeding problem but I think it's a very serious weeding problem that would require constant maintenance and supervision because, frankly, most editors don't know or use the fairly precise differences. --Lquilter (talk) 12:54, 19 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Adjuncts comment - Responding to Cgingold on adjuncts: Adjuncts are usually practicing professionals in their own field, who teach at a university. They are not considered academics in the more precise sense of the word. They can and do offer scholarship -- in my own field, law, practicing attorneys are often scholars: Bill Patry, for instance, I'm certain has adjuncted; he has written a treatise (the height of scholarship by some measures); but I believe he has been in private practice the whole of his professional life. Thus, he is a scholar; a teacher; and an attorney -- but not an academic. --Lquilter (talk) 12:58, 19 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Scientists comment - In a separate conversation, DGG and I also talked about the problem of scientists. They have their own trees, but in fact, most scientists today are academics. As JohnBod points out, most scientists in the past would be better considered scholars. Just putting this issue out there too. --Lquilter (talk) 13:03, 19 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Pre-academia scholars comment - Plus fields with many scholars before the expansion of universities are difficult - Darwin cannot be called an academic. Johnbod ... So Category:Academics is like "scholars by performance"? <g> --Lquilter (talk) 13:26, 19 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Proposal

See proposal at Category talk:Academics to combine the trees as Category:Scholars and academics; this tree would then be Category:Scholars and academics by subject. --Lquilter (talk) 23:57, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

... Discussion continuing at Category talk:Journalism academics --Lquilter (talk) 01:38, 28 December 2007 (UTC)