Talk:SovRoms

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Contents 1 What is meant here? 2 Sovromcuart vs Sovromquartit 3 Russian sources 4 Wider topic? CAER?

[edit] What is meant here?

"reminisence" can't be correct; the closest English word is "reminiscence", but that can't be right either (it is like the Romanian amintire). -- Jmabel | Talk 05:02, 20 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Sovromcuart vs Sovromquartit

Florian Banu in an article in DI gives Sovromquartit. This article on other refs gives Sovromcuart. Which is it? Daizus 21:15, 5 April 2007 (UTC)

I have two for "Sovromcuart". But you can give it as an alternative, which it likely was. Dahn 21:19, 5 April 2007 (UTC)

Oh, and on Ro tag. Doesn't it matter for an English audience the source is not written in English? Daizus 21:16, 5 April 2007 (UTC)

As I have said in my summary: those icons are designed for online sources exclusively. I suppose their point is to tell people that the site does not have content in English, so they don't waste their time looking for it. Whereas a written source, which cannot be opened by users, does not need to project that information (a source you cannot read yourself can be in whatever language). Dahn 21:19, 5 April 2007 (UTC)

I've noticed their usage in standard citation templates and I understand your point. I do not wish to make a big deal of such minor issues, I will just present why I do think they can't be anything but helpful. I am an editor and a reader. I am verifying not only the online sources (even as a reader). Sometimes I search for them in libraries, bookstores, even order them on the internet if my curiosity overcomes the price. I also believe several of the European languages and few of the world languages I can reckon from few words (the title of the book, in our case). But not always I can tell Russian from Bulgarian or Norwegian from Swedish. And I want eventually to be able to get a rough translation of the title using a dictionary, eventually to search for more convenient editions/translations, or to be able to ask someone "I'm looking for a Birmanian book named <...>. Do you know if it was published in English/French/Romanian/etc./a language I can read?". Also occasionally that language flag helps me (as editor but also as reader) realizing faster and better how an article was built or how is it covered by secondary sources. It's useful to know IMO that an article was built only with sources from a single non-English language. It's useful to know a topic is relatively uncovered in English language sources (like Fântâna Albă). Maybe most of users do not care about these, but I do not view the language flag that bothering, considering it is already there for the online sources. Daizus 04:55, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

Sorry, it seems we've gotten in a bit of an edit conflict here. I was just about to add info, when I noted more had been added in the menatime. I went ahead and put what I had (gotta be quick!), but now it needs some polishing and better chronology. How about a separate paragraph on Sovromcuarţ? To my mind, this is the most interesting of the bunch, I think it may even warrant a separate heading. Turgidson 21:42, 5 April 2007 (UTC)

You have no idea how many times I had to change my own updated version between the two of you editing :). If we can find more data, sure we could create a separate section; but this look a bit flimsy for now. Dahn 21:50, 5 April 2007 (UTC)

One could probably make a study of how editing frequency varies per page: there seem to be long periods when things are dormant or barely crawl along, and then, boom! bursts of activity occur. We need a grant to study this! As for sections on this article: yes, a bit flimsy for now, let's wait a while. the other SovRom I'd be interested to find out more about is Sovrompetrol, since it may provide material for the "Oil industry in Romania" that I'd like to see off the ground at some point. Turgidson 22:03, 5 April 2007 (UTC)

I don't know what got into all of us: I can tell you how and why yours truly began editing this page today, but it is a rather dull story. I just noticed you were originally calling for a paragraph, not a section (complicated to report, but I was the one to merge the paragraph into the text when it was only a sentence long; when you guys kept adding to it, I re-created it, and only then answered you question etc.). About Sovrompetrol: I just don't know where more info would be available. Dahn 22:46, 5 April 2007 (UTC)

I found a discrepancy: the article (quoting Banu) says that Romania delivered 17,288 tons of uranium to the Soviet Union between 1952 and 1960; Diehl (per ref) says that the the total production from Romanian uranium ore between 1950 and 1992 was 16,850 tons, 2,350 of which came from the Feldioara mill near Braşov, which only opened in 1978. So, even if we assume that all uranium production in the 1950s went to the Soviet Union (which seems to be the case, according to sources and to plain common sense, too), and that no uranium production occured in Romania from around 1960 to 1978 (again, plausible), this leaves (according to Diehl) something like 14,500 tons of uranium ore shipped to the Soviet Union between 1952 and 1960, not 17,288. I don't know how important this discrepancy is, but still, it would be good to resolve it. Any idea how? Turgidson 22:29, 5 April 2007 (UTC)

Presumably, the Diehl reference relies on official data. If we include it in the text, we just add "official data" in reference to it - I'm guessing that, if at least part of the production was kept secret, official data was tailored. Dahn 22:42, 5 April 2007 (UTC)

OK, makes sense. I'd say we can leave it like that for now, but at some point (especially if this gets substantial enough to make it to a full subection), one should explain the data more carefully. Note that the 2,788 tons discrepancy is not quite trivial: for comparison, the total uranium ore production of Russia in 1992 was 2,900 tons, while that of Niger (of Yellowcake fame) was 2,964 tons. Turgidson 23:05, 5 April 2007 (UTC)

The 17,288 number simply pops up in Banu's text, it doesn't have refs or a calculation from some other sources. However on the same page, there's an excerpt from the meeting of CC or PMR from April 15-22 1964, where tov. Bujor Almăşan replies to Gheorghiu Dej: "we delivered USSR 18 thousands tons of uranium ore". I expect round numbers in a meeting, therefore I take it as a confirmation (though on the other side I can't tell how reliable were the numbers given in that meeting). Daizus 03:09, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

Also, on Diehl vs Banu, there's the issue of Băiţa mine. Banu says USSR was interested to mine the deposits discovered in Romania in Ştei and Băiţa areas and Sovromquarţit was created by a governemental decision on December 31, 1951 and started its mining activity in April, 1952 at Băiţa, Bihor. I don't know if mining was performed at Băiţa before this SovRom, but otherwise Banu's account gives a more detailed chronology. Maybe a history of that mine would clarify this issue. Daizus 03:33, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

[1]: Mineritul uranifer in Romania a inceput in 1952, in Muntii Apuseni (Baita Bihorului). Aici, fusese depistata, in timpul celui de-al doilea razboi mondial, din avion, o anomalie emanometrica. Germanii au conturat destul de bine zacamintul insa n-au mai apucat sa-l cerceteze in detaliu pentru ca au fost nevoiti sa se retraga. Exista afirmatii conform carora rusii au preluat planurile de cercetare si exploatare ale germanilor si n-au facut decat sa le dezvolte.

Cercetarea s-a facut, intr-adevar, extrem de rapid, zacamantul intrand in exploatare dupa un an, prin Societatea “Sovrom Kvartit”. S-a exploatat in cariera deschisa, intr-un ritm “ametitor”, probabil pe vremea aceea aparand si expresia “oricand din munti el face-o vale”. and more on that page in "Mineritul uranifer in Romania" subsection. Daizus 03:40, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

Unfortunately, there is no page on en.wiki on Băiţa (almost every little dinky vilage has one, but almsot never when you need it!) On the other hand there is a page at Băiţa, Bihor, which contains quite precise info (though they talk about 300,000 tons!?). A good starting point would be to translate the ro.wiki page for Băiţa, and take it from there. How does this sound? Turgidson 03:43, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

Quite a bit on info on that page you found--looks good. It wil take a while to digest it. One thing to understand is how these people measure things. It could be that some authors refer to "gross weight", while others to "net weight"? After all, the ore must have been mixed up with lots of soil and rock -- from what I understand, there was no treatment whatsoever on location, the whole thing dug out and shipped directly to the Baltic coast facility. So maybe some estimate the more-or-less usable stiff, while others count the whole thing? I'm just speculating now, trying to explain somehow all these varying numbers. But maybe someone with more expertise could explain... Turgidson 03:54, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

I will look later today on it. On 300 vs 17 thousands I believe (I'm no expert in mining) it's about extraction and processing. Probably 300 thousands tons tones were extracted, then further processed reaching to 17 thousands tons. Please note a part of mining was done in quarries (Banu says in the first period 50% of mining was in quarry and only later deep mining was developed), and I assume that means a lot of non-uranium ore or with low percentages of uranium (I was writing in the same time with you and it seems we reached about the same conclusion, I will leave my text though as it was intended). Daizus 03:56, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

On possible Estonian connections with facilities in Sillamäe, I can take a look through my Baltic sources to see if anything is mentioned. I found this link [2] which includes references to original sources and mentions Soviet documents falling into the hands of the Estonians in 1994. —  Pēters J. Vecrumba 21:05, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Russian sources

Talking of Russian, it occured to me to search Google for "Совром". I've found a book "Отношения между Советским Союзом и Румынией 1944-1949" (Relations between USSR and Romania 1944-1949) published in 1985. And one of the excerpts given by Google books engine is this: "Добыча нефти в объединениях «Совромпетроля» в 1948 г. по сравнению с 1947 г. увеличилась на 14,3%, а в нефтяных обществах ..." which using Google translation tool I find it rendered as "Oil production in association <sovrompetrol> in 1948 compared to 1947 increased by 14.3%, while oil companies ...". Anyone with better knowledge of Russian to understand more (and eventually search for more)? Daizus 05:18, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Wider topic? CAER?

I don't find the wider topic to include the SovRoms. Aren't there topics on Soviet-Eastern Europe relations, CAER or at least Soviet-Romanian relations? I'm asking beacuse in the same issue of DI there's another article I've placed in "Soviet occupation" article: Liviu Ţăranu, "RPR-URSS: Relaţii economice în numele «internaţionalismului proletar» (Communist Romania and Soviet Union: Economic Relations in the 50's)". There are some interesting points, but I'm not sure where to add them:

• propaganda: "new type" (de tip nou) relations, mutual cooperation is to "help commrades", "an internationalist duty", etc.
• the "theft" ("bad side") but also the development ("good side") brought by these cooperations with USSR.
• various factoids and sub-points: e.g. 1952 constitution reglemented the exports to be state monopoly. Most Romanian exports went to CAER (83.2% in 1950, 80% in 1955, 77.2% in 1957, 77.8% in 1958 - I wonder if the slightly descending slope is meaningful), in the 50s the economical balance of Romania was on minus ("deficitară"), the article I've invoked notes a corelation between the dependencies on Soviet imports and the official propaganda ("Poporul român manifestă o caldă recunoştinţă faţă de poporul sovietic pentru sprijinul frăţesc internaţionalist pe care-l primeşte patria noastră din partea Uniunii Sovietice"), the scientific and tehnical colaboration may deserve a space, too - USSR provided thousands of documentations and projects and hosted a large number of students; Romania received between 1950 and 1958 ~1500 documents and almost half of them were from USSR - the projects for developing Hunedoara siderurgy complex or Braşov truck factory were of Soviet provenience, Romanian hydro plants were based on Czechoslovakian projects etc. Daizus 06:12, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

You will find a link to CAER, under its English name Comecon, at the bottom of the page. As for the rest: my suggestion, in order to avoid content forking, was not to create articles on various wide and purely analytical topics that relate to Communist Romania. Instead, one would be better advised to detail the content there

I don't understand why you do not simply add those facts, to the measure where you can source them, to this article. They provide content here, while they would simply be irrelevant details in any other article. It is always better to create an article on a concrete, objective and self-defined, topic, and include in it analytical information on context, than to create one that simply creates an analyitical link between two concrete articles.

For example: creating an article on "economic relations in South-Eastern Europe during the Cold War" is absurd when one has articles on the Eastern Bloc, the Comecon, and the indivdual history of communist states in the region.

What I would do with that DI article is the following: add concrete stuff and some context here; add context to its place in the Communist Romania article; add generic bilateral stuff in general to the Soviet occupation of Romania (or at least do so when you guys are getting somewhere with that article). You can even duplicate some content to the Comecon page, if you feel like it.

What do you think? Dahn 11:29, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

There are several issues/questions here, let me address only a couple. I don't think everything that happened in Romania between 1945-47 and 1989 can fit in on a single page, to wit, Communist Romania. One needs to treat certain topics in-depth, as done in any encyclopedia. Now, this has been done quite well and quite thoroughly lately when it comes to individuals. But when it comes to deeper, wider trends in economy, foreign relations, etc, the material is still not as well organized or developed, I think. So that's (partly) why we're having this discussion, and why I think one needs to think things through. The process is not necessarily tidy and pretty -- there got to be some false starts and some trial-and-error till one finds the right balance -- after all, I assume none of us is a paid professional at this stuff, we're all doing it for fun in our spare time, right? So I say, let's approach this with a spirit of patience and cooperation and understanding (do I sound like CAER propaganda?) Concretely, now, yes, if there is some stuff that can be added easily to the Comm. Rom. page or the Comecon page, sure, go ahead. But if one finds that it doesn't fit naturally -- it's either too long, or straddles too many subjects -- why not create a new page? Be bold! As for Soviet occupation of Romania: yes, it's kind of dead in the water now (alas). What needs to be done to kick-start it again and get it out of the morass in which it has sunk (after all the efforts put into it, unfortunately) is to start the August 23 coup page, and focus whatever energies pople have to fight over in there, leaving the rest of the page (about which almost nobody has objected) in peace, so that it can grow and develop at ease. Turgidson 13:41, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

The issue I am presenting is a bit more complex than that. We all seem to share the notion that Communist Romania is destined to remain the main page, from which various subarticles are/should be developed. The actual issue is on what basis do we develop those articles further. First of all, I want to avoid the mess present in, say, pages related to Czechoslovakia, where highly redundant "overkill" articles have been developed as essays whose main purpose seems to be to confuse the reader. Let's look at what we have:

• an article on Soviet occupation, whose purposes are to link 1944 to 1948, to provide context for the Soviet military presence as ongoing in Communist Romania, to detail content relating to Soviet-Romanian relations for that period. For additional content on economic relations, we also have the Comecom page. This Sovroms article, with the details on context and ending, fills in/will fill in all the possible gaps for that particular period.
• on the issue of repression, we have the Securitate article, and we could build an umbrella article for the penitentiary system (as I recall, you suggested one a while back), with additional info on each of the penitentiary sites (present or pending). The article on the penitentiary system could easily expand to cover the issue f repression in 1964-1989, with additional overviews in Communist Romania (and perhaps even the Revolution article), and with narrow detailed articles on various events related to that (the Braşov and Jiu strikes, SLOMR etc.). In addition, one could add Romanian-related content to the article on involuntary commitment for that period, as well as to other generic articles I cannot think of right now.
• on the issue of sheer politics, we have the Communist Party article, which also traces the link between 1924 and 1989.

With this in mind, I frankly cannot see just why we would think content is missing: we have more or less a streamline to the story, instead of creating repetitive and abrupt articles that would then, if kept, have to be linked in about 1,000 different articles. Dahn 14:07, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

I have missed the Comecon article (not knowing that Comecon stands for CAER). I'll try to stick information where I'll find it fit.

On your discussion, now, the history tends to get very complicated (and I read more ancient and medieval history, where information is more scarce). That's why even a single period cannot have a single flow of events. We have many articles on Romanian Communism, from Systematization to SovRoms, from Soviet Occupation to July Theses, however, I find it of encyclopedic interest a hierarchy, coming from topics like "Economy in Communist Romania" or "Censorship and Repression in Communist Romania" or "Woman's life in Communist Romania" (perhaps this is too daring, I'm just suggesting anyway) ... (and you can find books on many of these wide topics). A story there is, but many of its topics are missing. In DI I've found articles on Romanian Constitution from 1952 (currently a stub), on the history of Paratroopers at the end of WWII and during Communism (apparently missing, not sure if should be a topic or a section in a Romanian army topic, for instance), on the incidents in Bern in 1955 (again, apparently missing) and many many others. And it's always the same question: "where do I put that?".

A suggestion is templates (as you were trying to do with the cabinets), templates joining these articles (I've seen some nice templates on Jewish history or Military history where you have a big box, which is divided in some sub-sections and each section is divided in topics, so it's a kind of double hierarchy which allows IMO information to be structured better). It's an ambitious project, but since it seems this part of Romanian history receives a lot of attention from editors, maybe it's something we can think of. Daizus 15:09, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

Why go for abstract when you can have concete? (Note: the way in which literature deals with the issues is not necessarily a model: for example, there are many works on "Stalinism in Romania", but that is a cross-section used by historians, not one used by encyclopedias, which are not essays.) I think most economic history articles can be split into "Communist Romania", "Soviet occupation", "Sovroms", and, just perhaps, an "Economic history of Romania" (though even that may be overkill). I see absolutely no reason for separate "history" articles for topics that are themselves "history" (I personally cannot understand the difference between "Soviet Union" and "History of the Soviet Union"/"Economy of the Soviet Union", "Ottoman Empire" and "History of the Ottoman Empire", "Communist Czechoslovakia" and "Economy of Communist Czechoslovakia" etc.). On the issue of repression: instead of using the potentially ambiguous "repression", we could have one, as I have said, about prisons etc., and we could also have a separate one on "Censorship". I really see no point and no use and no precedent for "Women's life" - but we could have, as Biruitorul suggested a while ago, an article on the "Women's movement in Romania", which would inevitably detail problems faced by women. Most of the examples you cite already have not one, but several places to fit into, and, if need be, further narrow articles can be developed (per the wikipedia call to look before you leap).

I can see a template for "Communist Romania" on the "Jewish history model" (though I would rather have it arranged horizontally, for practical reasons). However, note that much of its purpose is already filled by the eponymous category, and that the criteria for inclusion are potentially endless (one should always start only what one can see finished; I mean, how do we decide what doesn't belong in the template?). I find a "Romanian Communist Party" much more practical, at least for starters. Dahn 15:29, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

I find this is an interesting discussion, going at the core on how to organize the info on a given country (Romania) -- for starters, in the Commnunist era, but potentially, throughout. Evidently, other people have contributed much more thought and content to this than I've done. But I'm willing to think it through, as part of this debate -- or even better, a wider debate, on some better read talk page. For starters, I will, as suggested, look at the Communist Czechoslovakia articles to see what's good and/or bad about it (I did a few edits here and there in that field, but have not looked at it globally yet). More later. Turgidson 17:07, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

Corint published some years ago a book containing a transcription of the discussions taking part at Braudel days in 1984. There were three topics: Mediteranean world, Capitalism and France - each one was discussed in a different day. But for each a topic a number of notable scholars discussed from many points of view: e.g. Mediteranean world was discussed as origins, Byzantine Mediteranean, Islamic Mediteranean, Western (as in Western civilization) Mediteranean, conflicts in Mediteranean world, pathology in Mediteranean world, Mediteranean world's autonomy, Mediteranean world in long term history, etc.. Most of these views, though many of them follow the same flow of physical time, are almost impossible to be overlapped in a single flow of events, in a single chronological article, dealing with phenomena as they happen. They have even different rythms of happening, so that will create a really confusing chronology and almost impossible to follow.

Well, Braudel is a well-known scholar of Annales. But these days, many other historians followed their path, so it's no longer Annales school vs other historiographies. This is a common practice of creating complex narratives of the same phenomena, from many points of view.

I understand the conceptual differences between "Ottoman Empire" and "History of the Ottoman Empire" or "Economy of the Ottoman Empire". Let's take Byzantine Empire for instance (I have better examples at hand). You can check the impressive online work from Dumbarton Oaks. It is not a book about Byzantine Empire, it's not a book about Byzantine Empire's history, it's just about its economy. Another book would be Hélène Ahrweiler's "L'idéologie Politique de L'empire Byzantin". Again, this is not Byzantine Empire's history or economy. It's about state politics, state propaganda, ideologies, mottos, values, etc. For a quasi-encyclopedic view of world history you may want to check Drâmba's history of cultures and civilizations. You will find out that the sequential history, the event history is just a small chapter for each civilization. Religion, culture, economy, social life are wide topics, sometimes wider than the "proper" history. So it's not at all an abstract vs concrete, it's a rather "old history" vs "new history". Do we intend just to tell the flow of events, or give complex views, details, which taken together in "history of Communist Romania" give a much richer perspective than a simple chronology which will be either dimissive or almost impossible to follow? I believe the second answer is already accepted, though some people may not realize it. The article on SovRoms, and article on Soviet Occupation and perhaps some other articles, cover the same time span (late 40s, early 50s) but from different points of view.

Now perhaps not every of these topics are large enough to create article by themselves and they will remain just sections in other articles. But to break them and stick them to other articles it means to dillute them, to lose those topics. Maybe we can afford to do that for "Woman history" (given the sources we have access to, not that I have something against gender studies), but we can't afford to do it for a "Censorship history" with so much information available around us. Coming back to our case, "Economy of Communist Romania" is a huge topic. Daizus 09:23, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

The templates used for Communist Czechoslovakia are a good way to start (I don't necessarily agree with their topics, just with the way of thinking a structure). As I already wrote, I believe each entry from this template should have other subentries (e.g. Communist Romania - Economy of Communist Romania - SovRoms). Daizus 09:45, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

It seems they have used such a resource for both developing the structure and the content. Daizus 09:47, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

Daizus, it is quite exhausting that you chose to expand on a particular part of the point I make. First of all, let me note again: methodologically. an encyclopedia and a historical essay (by Braudel, by Drimba, by Ahrweiler, by whomever) will differ in essence and forever. Wikipedia, like any encyclopedia, is not historiography, it is info, presented as coherently as possible. I too can understand the factual difference between, say, Ottoman Empire and Ottoman economy (I would have to be an idiot not to), but this is about editing text that is not entirely repetitive: what does the reader want to know about the Ottoman Empire if not its most important aspect (economic, social, etc. - all of them also historical)? Presumably, all of those can be outlined in the article on Ottoman Empire, and (this is a part of my argument you are ignoring) all the individual articles related to the vocabulary of the Ottoman Empire can have their own articles: "devshirmeh" instead of "Children in the Ottoman Empire"; "Janissaries", "Sipahi", "Military of the Ottoman Empire", instead of "Infantry and cavalry in the Ottoman Empire"; "Ottoman fleet", "Lepanto battle" etc etc instead of "Sea battles of the Ottoman Empire"... You will note that, in these examples, all the article titles could work as titles in academia. However, none of the second parts of each example can or should be a separate article on wikipedia. As an example, I do not use Tismănenau and Frunză to create an intricate new topic about Stalinism in Romania between 1922 and 1989, though both center their work on it: the subjects they refer to are divided along other criteria, destined to help the reader, not just the student. In other words, one's duty as an editor is to take the abstract and use it for the concrete.

There is no reason why doing that will be "dismissive or almost impossible to follow" (in fact, I consider not doing it impossible to follow). First of all, there is no reason why an article like that should be small it currently is. Secondly, we shouldn't guide ourselves on how much detail we can provide, but on how relevant, especially in overviews. If you read again my full argument, you will notice that I say: make an overview for the whole topic in the relevant article (which one is supposed to do either way), then, when you have to expand on issues, use autonomous subjects. Inevitably, if the overview is to be done correctly, it will outline both political and economic events, whether it wants to or not; this means that we will already have an economic overview, and it also means that, in explaining political context (necessary for the average reader), a separate "Economy" article would itself become redundant to the main overview - in between the two of them, they will say largely the same thing, not just in one place, but from top to bottom. To avoid forking, I proposed creating instead articles that deal with precisely that which makes the difference between the overview and the "Economy" article, for the same purpose. This article is one of them - you will notice that it is not, in fact, redundant to any article. Furthermore, if one wants an outline of the economy that provides accurate, minimally-repetitive and relevant content, I can agree to an "Economic history of Romania article" that can outline the major trends throughout Romanian history (say, from the treaty of Adrianople).

As you will note, the issue of redundancy is not about period discussed, but about content. I see no problem in having several articles for the same period, but I do see a problem in having several articles for the same content... It is also a problem of having an article that stands on its own two legs, not simply overlap with other present or would-be articles. As I have said, I do see a point for an article on censorship (because it can detail content that will not possibly be presented in full detail in the "Communist Romania" one), I do see a point for an article on "penitentiary system" or whatever it should be titled, but I do not see a point for creating several overviews of the same thing. I similarly can see a reason for an article on the five-year plans, for one on collectivization in Romania, for one on Centrocoop, or even for on Gostat and Aprozar, but I see little point of creating an article to place them together instead of an seeing where placing them into already existing articles leads us.

Now, if you guys disagree and tell me that at least you are going to take these issues into account when you begin work on that "Economy" article, I will concede. There is, however, no reason I can imagine for having an article such as "History of women" (in "Communist Romania" or elsewhere). Not only do gender researchers carve out a subject which cannot possibly be encyclopedia articles, but because, as I have said, its topic can be covered by "Women's movement" - as per wikipedia guidelines, most such articles also cover their context and their contrary (one should not have separate articles for "juror clergy" and "non-juror clergy"). Similarly, one should not create an article on "la longue duree in Romania" or "dialectical-materialist history of Romania" or "historicist history of Romania" - a vision on history can be given full exposure in an article that is not dependent on it ("Women's movement" instead of "Women's history"). Dahn 12:17, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

I expanded the point I thought it's essential, i.e. why wouldn't we create more narratives for Romanian Communism? (or any other part of Romanian history). I find incorrect to call my examples "historical essays". Ovidiu Drâmba's work is rather encyclopaedic than an essay (being a voluminous compilation of secondary sources whose intention is to offer a summarizing perspective on each of the civilizations and cultures the books deals with). Ahrweiler's book is a study, Dumbarton Oak's EHB is a monograph, though many of the points discussed in Braudel days have an essayistic nature (due to the dynamics of the conversation), those topics are actually covered by the experts participating there in their works, by their careers. These are not essays, these are those secondary reliable sources on which we claim to build content.

Your examples I do not find persuasive. Once any of the topics you invoked becomes rich enough to become a topic in itself, it will become that way (check articles like [3] or [4] or many, many others - better or worse written, better or worse justified). I think this is the process which justifies the content. The content grows until it requires a new article for itself, otherwise it will get into "dismissive or impossible to follow" state.

Redundancy is unavoidable. Even in a casual material intended to show something, the author gives an overview and then proceeds to expand various points. This schema can be repeated recursively, as such, the reader can actually follow the content. Eliminating redundancy and hierarchical structuring leads to "dimissive or impossible to follow" situation. I am aware of the relevancy issue, that's why I was cautious when I suggested a "woman history" (and not "women movement", because that would focus rather on emancipation; e.g. dealing with Romanian Communist pro-natality practices it is not a topic of "women movement" IMO, that not to address topics like "Woman's image in Romanian Communist propaganda" or whatever we information we can find to add in that article but also in other articles).

However, some topics are truly huge. Just take the current example which would be damaging to be integrated fully in "Soviet occupation" article, and moreover, it could even develop further more articles on each SovRom of greater importance (as it was already suggested), once the proper content is there. I believe a real topic of "Economy of Communist Romania" is much more than what is currently summarized in the articles we have. And it will be also much more than the sum of the articles which can be derived from it for at least two reasons: a) it will provide the general perspectives b) always there will be sections unproperely developed to form articles in themselves. This is the general case of all overviewing articles, I don't see anything bothering in that.

On your last point, again I'm not sure, since there are more or less controversial articles in Wikipedia dedicated to theories, views, paradigms. It should obey to the same rules as above, once the content is there and it's acknowledged as notable/relevant enough, the article should emerge. Daizus 12:54, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

Dahn: For me at least, it's not a a case of agreeing or disagreeing -- it's simply a case for groping for an aswer, and trying to discern what's best and most coherent. You make a good case, I probably agree with most of it, but I still need to see how this applies to concrete articles (or putative) articles to have a more definite opinion, and even then, only in the cases I know something about.

From the examples you give, perhaps the clearest I can see a need for is Collectivization in Romania. For one, in the "mother article" on the topic, Collective farming, Romania does not even rank a mention, let alone a subsection! For another, without checking carefully, I much doubt the topic can be developed to the full extent in existing articles. But also, I can see some potentially interesting sub-stories in there -- like Nicolae Ceauşescu's personal participation in the repression of the peasants resisting the policy of collectivization (I think one instance occured at Vadu Roşca, Vrancea, in the lates 1950s), which, I remember reading at some point, was one of the factors that led to his further ascension in the Party hierachy. This is an example of what I would call a hook -- something that may grip the reader's attention, or, if you want, something that can be mentioned in a DYK nomination.

Also, as you know, I'd rather concentrate on something like Oil industry in Romania, where something important can be said, going beyond the general economic aspects. Eg, providing a historical context for Operation Tidal Wave, and for Sovrompetrol for that matter. Also, Coal industry in Romania -- with all those connections to strikes and worker's unrest in the Jiu valley, but (as with oil) also with relation to Romania's economic development. Both stories I think could stand on their own, and provide gripping hooks for the reader. On the other hand, "Woman's image in Romanian Communist propaganda" sounds indeed too narrow, and not something that can be developed well on its own. Also, I don't see an obvious hook there, except perhaps this otherworldly painting! — Turgidson 13:32, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

"Fetele de la Apaca"? Daizus 14:34, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

On a serious note though, I had in mind materials like: [5]. Daizus 14:35, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

Apaca? That was a big textile factory in Militari, right? Wonder if it still exists. As for the book you link to: OK, that looks quite serious, and well developed. Would this talk about the politics of birth control (and increase in natality rate) in Romania during that time? That could be an angle worth pursuing. Turgidson 14:45, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

"Fetele de la Apaca" is a syntagm used coloquially which noted the "de-feminization" of proletarian woman in Communist Romania. Daizus 19:26, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

Dazius: I now read more carefully your previous--longer--message, and I see you also mention the politics of natality. So I think we agree on that aspect being worthy of pursuit. Not clear though in which putative article -- why concentrate on "women's image" and not on demographic tends, or health issues, or social services, or whatever? I guess I'm still struggling to see what's the best framework. But I agree a good deal with your statement, "I think this is the process which justifies the content. The content grows until it requires a new article for itself, otherwise it will get into "dismissive or impossible to follow" state." One needs to start small, and proceed from praxis. Anybody ever had that stunning insight before? :) Turgidson 14:57, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

I really do not have in mind to start right now in such direction (I confessed below, gender studies were just an example to expand our view on adding content), but it is nice to know that if we'll ever get there, there'll be some support. Daizus 19:26, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

I had a longer reply in mind, but it seems that we are getting somewhere without it. First of all, Turgidson, I notice that we actually agree on all topics (go through my messages, and you will note that I support an article on Collectivization in Ro" etc.). I also think that an article on natality policies, as opposed to an abstract and potentially-OR "Women's image" or something (don't get me wrong - it would be the same for a "Men's image"), is in a perfectly valid one to have. I will point out again that wikipedia should not degenerate into historiographic or image studies articles, and that their purpose can be filled by more to-the-point articles.

One final issue, Daizus: my point about "dialectic materialism" etc. was to be read as such: while it is perfectly acceptable to outline dialectical materialism in its own article, to expand on its concepts in other articles, and to include Marxist sources in various topics, it would be absurd to create parallel histories of Romania or any other country along ideological or historiographic lines (just as absurd as creating an article on "Anthropology in Romania", on "La longue duree in Romania", etc.). Mutatis mutandis, this also goes for a "History of women", "Image of" articles etc. Not because they are un-academic - far from it -, but because the object of study in academia does not follow the same guidelines as the ones we abide by here. We are to use abstract sources in concrete articles, or in articles that deal specifically with the theories discussed (not with their application). I could easily write an article about the image of Gypsies in Romanian culture, but most of that will logically belong in the article on the Roma minority.

So, yes: an article on policies involving women in Communist Romania would fit with logical and objective parameters. So would an article on the women's movement (which, again, will inevitably deal with the problems faced by women - given the Romanian context, it will likely deal with the problems more than the actual movement, which is not bad in itself). If you can find other articles relating to this that could work on their own (for organization, status, etc.), it's even better. But creating an abstract article that could fit just anything relating to women in a certain period or overall is not a good idea. Dahn 15:32, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

Dahn, there's estabilished scholarship in gender studies. You do not want Romanian articles on that, you consider it OR, do it and use your power to argue and vote whenever you consider it necessary. "Woman history" was just an example of topic out of our hand (and my concern was because we do not have/have access to enough sourced content), but it seems your opposition goes deeper than that. I do not have any interest nor particular knowledge to develop such a topic. It was just an example of how IMO content really should look like, to go beyond "X did Y". There is plenty of content on Jews image in other cultures, for instance (e.g. Judensau and much from the antisemitism category). Because Jews history is a major topic and there are Jewish studies everywhere, including in Romania. For other countries where gender studies are much more valued, develop such topics on Wikipedia (e.g. History of women in the United States with several derived articles like Republican motherhood though generally there's little insight on perceptions and mentalities, perhaps there's more if one searches more). There are plenty of Wikipedia materials dedicated to historiographic positions (also Republican motherhood, but also articles like Decline of the Roman Empire, plus I've found sections on historiography for many battles and events where in the last years much scholarship emerged offering a large variety of interpretations). You say it's absurd to do that for a history of Romania (or a part of it), it seems other people did not find it absurd for other histories of other statal entities or even those "parallel" histories like the history of women. One of my projects for instance is to develop the content for Battle of Rovine, only that is one major problem which makes a fair attempt to write that content very difficult and slowly progressing. It's controversial in virtually all its aspects (dating, location, winner, consequences). Historiography is unavoidable in any attempt to give NPOV when it's a lot of written reliable material. Or worse, ignoring historiography, one would create original research through synthesis, attempting to create a single narrative out of several narratives which are rather often incompatibile in essential points (if not even paradigms).

I do not understand what is meant by an abstract source. For me everything is content. And you simply cannot stuff content into the same articles for ever. It will reach that moment when either the article will be hard to read due to enormous length and quantity of information and threads of happening, or they will simply have to ignore further information just to be kept readable. Daizus 19:15, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

Daizus, you are answering to things I did not say. First of all, you continue to talk about status in academia, even though I clearly said I do not debate that. You also apparently believe that I have said "historiography should be ignored", though I remember a previous discussion where I have clearly shown you that is not the case, and though all my comments were precisely about how it should be used, in relation to topics. Most of the examples you cite deal with historiographic concepts, which are themselves topics, not with separate articles on history according to a particular historiography. Secondly, though (as indicated), I have no objection to most articles you cite, an article on the "History of women in the United States" is not less absurd just because it exist; furthermore, by glancing through its content, I noticed that it could easily be titled "Women's movement in the..." or merged into an article with that title (if one already exist). Just because I don't have the energy to debate everything that I consider absurd on wikipedia does not mean I can consider it a precedent (and, rest assured, I have initiated the removal or renaming of such vague articles in the past).

You also misinterpret me with the "create a single narrative" issue. Yes, by all means, a single topic should have a single narrative. Just because all perspectives are featured in one place (as wikipedia norms tell us they should) doesn't mean that we are "merging them", whereas creating a separate topic for each conceivable thing can only lead us to chaos and redundancy. In short: a Marxist history of, say, France may be, in theory, "another history" in comparison with an Integralist history of France, but that does notmean that, when dealing with the history of France, one should create two sets of history - what one should do is present the two points of view on respective pages, and detail the matter in articles related to both Marxism and Integralism.

With reservations that I believe you have as well (and detailed in WP:NOT), I can agree that "everything is content", but the issue here is about what makes an independent article, not about restricting articles. Structuring, not curtailing. Relating, not tailoring. Usefulness, not abstraction. Dahn 19:57, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

I've read again the entire debate and frankly I do not understand the opposition against the possible content I was suggesting, nor even the latest counterarguments. I noticed arbitrary (until will get a proper justifications) labels like "abstract" or "absurd" but I cannot understand what exactly they mean, I can at most assume "abstract" opposes "concrete" (as suggested by your text, also) but it doesnt' make sense to me. A topic like "X's image in Y" is not an abstract one, it is particularized, individualized, it represents a phenomenon, it has all qualities one would expect from non-abstract entities.

My argument is basically multiple narratives are a must if we want to reflect properly the secondary sources, if we want the content to be truly NPOV and properly weighted. What you call "status in academia" I'm deducting from books written for a large audience, i.e. how this information can be found in sources accessible virtually to anyone, sources which fully cover a historical phenomenon (period) from a point of view, sources which are rather monographs and/or popularizing (quasi-encyclopedic) materials than indepth studies written in some peer-review journals read only by scholars and students. I've already presented the example of Drâmba (present in many Romanian houses as encyclopedic source), I'm pulling now another one just because the structure proves so wonderfully my point. The book is called "Dictionnaire raisonné de l'Occident médiéval" (translated into Romanian as "Dicţionar tematic al evului mediu occidental") by Jacques Le Goff and Jean-Claude Schmitt (actually a large group of experts wrote those articles). It is a quasi-encyclopedic book, browsing a certain period of history of Western Europe from all the important aspects they found significant, of course, under the influence of modern schools, particularly the Annales school. The first chapters from Romanian edition are: "Adunările", "Alimentaţia", "Amorul Curtenesc", "Animalele", "Artizanii", "Biblia", "Biserica şi Papalitate", "Bizanţ si Occident", "Bizanţul văzut din Occident", "Castelul", "Catedrala", etc.. They each form a substantial and almost (of course, justified by the purpose of the book, by the views Le Goff subscribes to) independent chapter, whose correspondence in Wikipedia would be rather an article than a section or a paragraph. I'm not suggesting to follow their model, just to show that an encyclopedic material can be written like that and it is written like that if you want to take some serious and recent scholarship in consideration. To keep the analogy with Romanian Communism, which triggered this discussion, I've already provided a scholarly source for "Woman's image in Romanian Communism", a topic which you chose to call "absurd". To say such a topic could not be an "independent article" would be a serious misrepresentation of the source making it a separate chapter, a separate topic, a separate issue to deal with. I believe 50k (For example) Wikified content on "Woman's image in Romanian communism" would qualify for a separate article, if the text would be well-written and not against Wiki policies.

As for how historiography is already presented in Wikipedia, I provided only two examples, one which deals indeed with a historiographical concept, but the other one, the Decline of the Roman Empire , it is not, it actually an article containing several summarized accounts/narratives of the same historical period, of the same historical phenomenon, the decline/fall of the Roman Empire. I wouldn't call one out of two "most". Also please note, not all those narratives are currently held in academia, many are provided to illustrate some historiographical traditions, my take is due to their notability (e.g. the Pirenne thesis or Edward Gibbon's famous History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire). If editors could provide many enough scholarly accounts and large enough content, you could do the same on other parts of history of France. It is actually done in several sections of some articles (there are a series of battles, for instance, where there are debated their historical macro-significance; not all authors agree on that, and the debate is a bit more complex than X disagrees with Y, as sometimes it is a matter of rather paradigm clash; recently even an article dedicated only to such battles survived an AfD vote, and at this moment I believe it still develops as a separate topic, dedicated to this special view that some battles could have influenced greatly the course of human history).

Romanian Communism probably can be written at least with a rich structure following the scholarly interests and areas of research (and possibly, if we have a large enough perspective, even evidentiating several schools of thought). The narrative on "perception" is a valid one but I agree it may be hard to be added in the current articles. However, that was an example. Most complete descriptions of an era have several chapters / narratives: history proper, economy, social life, culture, religion (a list which can grow or shrink: probably the modern tendencies would be to add human rights, women movement, censorship, etc.). You can't collapse them all in a narrative, most sources do not, even the encyclopedic views of Romania do not. And indeed surprisingly even here I found a Economy of Romania#Historical overview, Culture of Romania#culture inside communist Romania, Literature of Romania#Communist era, topics (and narratives) uncovered in Communist Romania, content rather undeveloped and unfortunately not even wikilinked. Daizus 17:06, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

Daizus, you say that you have read my messages again, yet you are replying past my arguments. I am perfectly aware of what research and, yes, popular books do, and I do not at all object to them being used. I also do not object to creating more articles, and to detailing content. I do object to creating articles on an unrealistic basis, articles that segment content on the basis of very subjective perspectives. There is nothing intrinsically wrong in a source detailing content on the basis of a subjective approach, there is something wrong with creating new articles just because sources treat the same factual information in different ways. I also wish that you point out to me where I have said that I do not agree with including several perspectives on one issue, because this is the third time in this discussion that I imply I did.

It is on this basis, for example, that I objected to creating an article on the Union of Transylvania with Romania instead of one on the Directory Council - of the two, the second could fit the same information, but would do it on rational basis - around an institution, not around a sentence that is bound to be vague. I recently expanded the article on Take Ionescu, much of it on the basis of information provided by C. Xeni in his recollections; assuming that everything is content, I could just as well go and create an article on the "Recollections of C. Xeni about Ionescu", instead of doing the logical thing and presenting Xeni's perspective in the same article...

After all, our job here is to help the reader get an accurate image of events and ideas expressed about events, not on all possible ways in which one could detail the very same content, and not creating new articles because we can, but because they would make sense (i.e.: would have a conceivable beginning and a conceivable end, and would not rely on how a series of sources structure an event-based content, but on the events themselves). It is always better to have articles such as Communist Romania and, yes (for the fourth time), articles expanding its content on a similar, event-related, basis.

If it is not clear: I have no objection whatsoever to gender studies and the valuable information they provide. I do have an objection to creating separate articles on "women's history", because I have an objection to creating one for "men's history" (of which it would be a precedent, and we would never get to see the end of this trend). Instead, I have, from the very beginning of this conversation, indicated ways in which the same material could be structured with the reader in mind. Mutatis mutandis, this works for other conceivable but entirely abstract articles. Dahn 18:50, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

I still don't understand what your objection consists of, what "unrealistic basis" is, what is "abstract", what is "entirely abstract", how one can have no objection whatsoever to gender studies but have an objection of creating a separate article (I assume in extenso topic, chapter, section) on a "women history". I do not understand how the subjective approach is defined or on what grounds do you estabilish between several interpretations of the same facts, which is more subjective (or wrong, or right) than the other, given the fact they all enjoy scholarly support. Also I sense here a dangerous mixture between narratives as several alternative interpretations of the same facts (which are sometimes required to provide a balanced view) and the narratives where also the/some facts differ (which would be the case of gender studies), because in other narratives they are thought insignificant. A history of mentalities, or of culture usually comes along with a lot of information you won't find in a political history or an economical history. Battles, political parties, wheat price, clothing worn, stereotypical sayings about Jews or women, common boy names, folklore legends on Easter, they are all recorded, they are all phenomena, they are all history, they can be all presented to "make sense".

A different narrative doesn't mean the position of a certain X (to answer to your C. Xeni analogy) but of a certain X which is an estabilished position accepted by scholarship (as currently valid or as historically important). I am talking about required narratives, required to provide an accurate image. I'm not a feminist, but I understand the need of gender studies simply because it was an undeniable bias along the human history due to the cultural disbalance between man and woman in almost all civilizations worldwide. A "men history" would be probably superfluous. Let's not be political correct just for the sake of it. Daizus 20:19, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

Daizus, I will say this as bluntly as I can: I am not debating creating content, but structuring it. Yes, all those things you mention are history, and I never even begun to deny that, but most of them do not form independent articles, but can be discussed, at length, in articles created along more concrete lines. Again, I believe that historical interpretations should fit in articles about historical events, not the other way. Could I make it clearer?

Each history of mentalities is, almost universally, a history created by and through a historian's thesis. A historian's work does not have to be bound by anything in respect to chronology or depth, and its structuring belongs, like that of literary works, to the historians' own priorities. No history of mentalities is a history of all mentalities, but a history of those mentalities a historian uses to draw a conclusion. This is all fine, but we arfe here to create an encyclopedia, whose main concern is to answer to the questions "who? when? where?". If you write a history of the Third French Republic, you have at least the semblance of objective limits in treating an autonomous subject; if you write a history of the women in France, anything ever relating to any French woman can fit in there. You can write a history of the Jews in Romania (as we did), and outline the issues of how Jews were perceived (as we did). You can expand on it by adding relevant content to the article on the Iron Guard, by creating articles about the LANC, by adding to the article on Crainic, on x Jewish-language magazine in Romania etc, etc - all from books that deal with these issues indiscriminately. But creating an article on the "perception of Jews in Romania" is bound to lead nowhere and to create no autonomous content (because, again, we are not writing a historical essay, but an encyclopedic and easy-to-use collection of topics). I can only hope that you will see that: a) I used the "men's history" as a reductio ad absurdum, not as a manifesto for political correctness (and I assure you that it does apply, since there is nothing preventing one from starting it by using the precedent, and since such debates took place in the past on wikipedia); b) I never stated or implied that the information you talk about is not to be used (and neither did I ever imply, as you persistently say, that I would decide on which of them is right), just that it is a bad idea to create articles around it. I also note that, while your argument about "why have a women's history" is compelling for the general idea (the reason why one should and does publish a book about it), but that it is still your argument; I'm sure I can find plenty of people on wiki who would want to write articles on "Liberal history of America", "Non-revisionist history of Marxism", "Trotskyist history of Christianity", or "Aryan history of Europe", but that does not mean that those articles should be created. Please address these issues instead of arguing ad nauseam for the "why not?" position. Dahn 20:59, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

Content without structure is not content, but chaos. We structure letters and sounds to create words, we structure words to create phrases, phrases to create paragraphs and so on and so forth.

The "things" I mentioned can form independent articles if they are independent topics in academia, are written in independent books and so on. If scholars can independently discuss a topic, why can't we?

Also please note, I do not ask to present an interepretation without events. All I have asked, given the a new narrative of the same events (or of new events; most information from a potential "history of women in Romania" article is untold and probably considered irrelevant in all the other articles on Romanian history), to be allowed to form content.

Mentalities are factual just as any human activity we study. And certainly it is not just "a historian's thesis". You know, these historians happen to agree to each other like any other scholars, they quote each other, they raise new theories based on the conclusions of others - it's not at all a one man, one theory. Actually I do not know any field which can be described so. Of course, only some mentalities are filtered to illustrate a point in a certain book/article/thesis, likewise you wouldn't mention the battle of Vaslui in a history of WWII. On Jews, there are already encyclopedic perception articles on them - a large part of the antisemitism series (take a look at an article like Judensau which is dedicated exclusively to perception). The antisemitism is largely a perception. It also varies in time and in space, which makes a complete (luckily Wikipedia content is never complete) view on it very hard to encompass without a serious study or many contributions worldwide. As we're here, I actually stopped using Oişteanu in the article on Jews in Romania, precisely because I couldn't stuff anything more than factoids, while Oişteanu's work's value is much more than that. Like I said "dismissive or hard to follow". It crossed my mind to add Oişteanu's stuff in the articles on antisemitism, but unfortunately there's little geographical particularization (I think in one of them there're some Chilean verses, though). Lacking an article like "antisemitism in Romania" or more widely "perception on Jews in Romania", that content will not be added here. And Oişteanu is not alone, there's considerable more scholarship on this topic.

On your reductio ad absurdum, I really do not understand its purpose, but probably because I do not understand what your examples are supposed to show. What is a "liberal history"? What is an "Aryan history"? I specified I'm talking about reliable scholars. I specified I'm talking about views held in academia or at least historically important (also scholars are to determine this importance). Your examples not only that do not fit in any of these categories, they are also absurdly built (probably on purpose). I certainly didn't support something like a rewriting of the entire history of Romania in Fomenko's chronology. I'm not advocating controversial theories, nor I intend to leave room for them. Daizus 23:29, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

Hi, Daizus: Thanks for mentioning the articles on Fomenko. I was aware of those theories (controversial is the least one can say!), and I know some of his mathematical work (he is quite well known for that), but I didn't know there was a wiki article on those theories. Wikipedia is still full of surprises! And yes, by all means, let's avoid Fomenkoism when talking about the chronology of Romania's history :) Turgidson 00:03, 14 April 2007 (UTC)

Hi! I've also found the article on his New Chronology after I wikilinked his name. I was always puzzled by how great minds come to create such things. Daizus 00:36, 14 April 2007 (UTC)

Well, I dont think I can afford to look at it! Turgidson 00:53, 14 April 2007 (UTC)

You can however check another material written in the same manner: [6]. Daizus 12:13, 16 April 2007 (UTC)

I see. "Scots = Scyths. In other words, Scotland = the Land of Scyths", and so on. OK, I think I'll pass. :) Turgidson 14:48, 16 April 2007 (UTC)