Wikipedia talk:USPOV

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Hey -- we Yanks write like Yanks. We can try to take a broader view. But we are limited by who we are. The solution to me seems to be than non-Yanks contribute. In the case of conservation, name some European Enlightenment figures, Alexander von Humboldt, maybe, who articulated a need for and system of conservation. Name some studies of how conservation practices developed in the Asian rice culture and fisheries. The main thing in the article so far is a non-Christian tradition of sacred places. The concept of sacred places is one being developed in the article, but that is hardly the whole of conservation. Pull us Yanks out of our narrowness. Give us stuff to expand our horizens. Or force those boundaries with words of your own. BobCMU76 12:52 19 May 2003 (UTC)

I did not want to be provocative. I have hope for this one. If I had hope for all the english-centred articles on irak war, I would add them on this page :-). I put the ref to sacred places myself if I remember :-) Hell, I probably put most of the initial article before you changed it. There was nothing before at all. I started it in hope someone will go on. The comments I had was it was not hitting the point, was poorly written, and was pov. So...bounderies with my own words...Bah ! Anthere


well.. some things to bear in mind would include: 1. don't assume the reader is familiar with US customs, brand names, species, etc. Examples:
Thanksgiving originated when .... (but hasn't said what Thanksgiving is!
an (exotic animal) is ... ..., about the size of a chipmunk. (assuming the reader is familiar with chipmunks) —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Tarquin (talk • contribs) 12:56, 19 May 2003 (UTC).

I guess this is related to americocentrism, too: what's wikipedia's policy on american vs. british english? -- Schnee 00:50, 9 Aug 2003 (UTC)

Generally speaking, you can use whatever you like, although it's best to be consistent within one article. There's a sort of casual rule to use American spellings in articles on American subjects (such as biographies of Americans), but British spellings in British subjects, but most people aren't too bothered and will let anything go. I think it's fair to say that it would be considered bad manners to change American spellings into British or vice versa without a good reason - it's normal to stick to whatever the original author has written (unless, as I say, you're just making the article consistent with itself). This is written down on some other policy page, I think, but I'm not sure where... --Camembert
See section 3.9 at Wikipedia:Contributing_FAQ
At Wikipedia_talk:Articles_using_American_English_titles, Brion states that &ltquote>The policy has always been that Wikipedia has no preference among the major national varieties of English, but that it is good form to keep usage consistent within a given article.&lt/quote>
The issue is also mentioned at Wikipedia_talk:Be_bold_in_updating_pages
Angela 01:00, 9 Aug 2003 (UTC)
There is also Wikipedia:Manual of Style#Spelling style. --Camembert
Thanks a lot, folks. :) -- Schnee 11:22, 9 Aug 2003 (UTC)

--- Re the main page: Suggestions of additional information--and, especially, non-US sources for anniversaries--would be useful here. Also, while most of the anniversaries listed for August 12 are American, Singapore isn't, and Fat Man is as much Japanese as American (and affected the entire world). Vicki Rosenzweig

True, the Spork can also be regarded as a global phenomenon. Our own date pages have some suggestions for more international events. It been exactly 120 years since the last quagga died, 60 years since the Soviet's tested their first H-bomb, 3 years since the Kursk sank, and 500 years since Christian III was born. As to news there are many sources, we should probably have something on the European heat wave, the Kelly inquiry, and maybe the violence in Nepal. - SimonP 14:55, Aug 12, 2003 (UTC)

Geez, this is one POV article. RickK 04:39, 30 Oct 2003 (UTC)

What do you mean? -- Tarquin 13:19, 30 Oct 2003 (UTC)
  1. Americocntrism is, because it's about America, bad.
  2. Americans are too self-centered to be able to write about anything but America.
  3. Americans are too stupid to be able to write about anything but America.
  4. America is bad.

RickK 16:44, 30 Oct 2003 (UTC)

You're misreading. Wikipedia is international. It should not be written from the POV of any nationality. Given the proportion of US people here, given that there is a tendency for the US media to be US-centric and that therefore many US people are influence by this, it is something we should particularly be aware of. On the matter of point 3 -- no, they're not stupid. It can seem to non-US wikipedians that the USians don't seem to grasp that there are other countries in the word! It's more likely though that US people don't stop to think that Wikipedia is an international project. -- Tarquin 17:33, 30 Oct 2003 (UTC)
I keep seeing this argument, that, for some reason, Americans are supposed to write about other countries, while it is not incumbent on people of other countries to do the same. RickK 03:21, 31 Oct 2003 (UTC)


I don't think it is that at all. There is nothing wrong with people writing only about their own country -- though with the number of Americans here, that would lead to an imbalance in the number of articles. The problem is one of point of view. A good example is Thanksgiving. The article on this assumed the reader already knew what it was. It didn't say when Thanksgiving is, or even what it was. -- Tarquin 10:53, 31 Oct 2003 (UTC)
So why don't you put something in the article's talk page asking that it be changed, instead of demanding that Americans stop writing about American topics? RickK 20:52, 1 Nov 2003 (UTC)
I did. But this is something that happens very frequently. -- Tarquin 20:59, 1 Nov 2003 (UTC)
Cheer up Tarquin, as time goes by this we will sort itself out. Its only a matter of time. The great thing about Wikipedia is that we all get our hidden biases assaulted, and thus revealed. Its a chance to grow as a person : 195.92.67.66 21:11, 1 Nov 2003 (UTC)

Hey, Tarq. I appreciate the problem but I think there's a better solution than making an issue of Americocentrism. When I came across the lacrosse article I found that it had an Americocentric focus, but I just added text about non-American lacrosse. As a result of that I ended up writing the articles about the Mann Cup, the Minto Cup, box lacrosse, and indoor lacrosse. So not only is the article less Americocentric but so is the Wikipedia as a whole. That's also how the truth about Christina Aguilera's mother's birthplace ended up in Wikipedia (correcting a piece of AmericoHibernocentrism there). [I revised this entry because I'm not trying to be offensive, but the original version probably sounded impertinent.] Trontonian 21:17, 1 Nov 2003 (UTC)

I forgot -- there is no standard Canadian spelling so Canadians can't follow it. Canadians spell how they want to. Trontonian

I think it would be extremely amusing (for a few minutes) to see an edit war over Canadian spelling...one side defending "-our" endings, the other defending "-or", etc :) Adam Bishop 21:29, 1 Nov 2003 (UTC)

There would be so many differences to debate, though. I adhere to -our, -ize, -re, -lling, jewellery, cheque, judgment, and program myself. Trontonian

I use -ise, and judgement, but otherwise I'm the same (and actually, -ise only for certain words, like "practise"...if it's a verb I sometimes use -ize, but it depends on the word). Adam Bishop 21:51, 1 Nov 2003 (UTC)
I'll bite: the Oxford dictionary on -ise vs. -ize, Canadian exploration from CBC News, and this last bit. It seems that "-ise" is primarily a Britishism (perhaps trying to be more like French spelling) and not the other way around (that "-ize" is an Americanism). As far as how I spell, well, I'm American so you can guess. Daniel Quinlan 22:29, Nov 1, 2003 (UTC)

Adam's attitude is the Canadian one. Some POV: one of the distinctly Canadian characteristics is a dislike of consistency. Trontonian 23:18, 1 Nov 2003 (UTC)

I see my solution above is actually supplied in the article. So what is the point of the article? It isn't exactly clear even if you ignore that solution. Neutrality is American? Common sense is American? Get away. On a more serious note, perhaps it would help if some examples of nonAmericocentric articles were provided. Trontonian

And who uses American to mean anything but a citizen of the United States? I'm a North American, but you can be damn sure I'm not an American. I realize that other languages have different usages (like many Canadians I am infuriated by French translations of Engish-Canadian books which say they've been traduit de l'américain) but this is the English Wikipedia and don't nobody use it no other way in English. Trontonian

There was a discussion about that a few months ago, somewhere (I just can't find it now). I remember saying that some particularly US-friendly Canadians I have met like to say we are "American" as well, but to everyone else the term is "North American" or "South American," and "American" alone means the US. I don't know if that argument was ever resolved. Adam Bishop 05:09, 2 Nov 2003 (UTC)
By "US-friendly Canadians" I take it you mean members of the Alliance. They are Americans. Just joking, sort of. Trontonian

This page is perhaps a bit too strong. Please note that I didn't write it -- but I raised this issue long before this page existed. I agree that calling it an "ism" is perhaps not encouraging. -- Tarquin 13:25, 2 Nov 2003 (UTC)

I picked on you because you had interesting opinions. I still think that the dispute would be alot closer to being resolved if someone could prvide examples of non-Americocentric articles. Trontonian 18:32, 2 Nov 2003 (UTC)

How about an article about national POV rather than USPOV? Most of the sports articles seem to have been written from a British POV, for example, and a lot of effort has been put into making them not only NPOV but more accurate. American football is one example, I just now spent some time editng the ice hockey article so that it doesn't leave the impression that there is only one code of rules, the IIHF's. Trontonian 19:33, 2 Nov 2003 (UTC)

A page on "National POV" could be a good idea. "POV" rather tna "-ism" is much better. -- Tarquin 20:24, 2 Nov 2003 (UTC)


[edit] Americocentrism

This discussion has been moved to: Template_talk:In_the_news#Americocentrism