Category talk:Novels set in Israel

Israel within Category:Palestine (region) hierarchy

@Greyshark09: per WP:BRD, please explain why you removed this category from Category:Novels set in Palestine (region)? Israel is a sub-cat of Palestine (region) (via the intermediate Political entities in the Land of Israel), and the same goes for Works about Israel, Books about Israel etc. Why should Novels be excluded from that hierarchy? – Fayenatic London 21:34, 13 July 2016 (UTC)

I have a problem with the "Novels set in <region>", i think it should be set in "State of Palestine" or "Palestinian territories", because novels set in region of Palestine or region of Land of Israel is too vague and looses the historical dimension; we better avoid this fluid definition like what is geographically Palestine or Land of Israel. Typically we expect "Novels set in Syria" - referring to modern Syria and "Novels set in USA" referring to modern state of USA. I'm just wondering whether simply rename the whole category?GreyShark (dibra) 21:38, 13 July 2016 (UTC)

Of the six articles which are currently directly in the Palestine (region) category, only two could be recategorised as "set in the Palestinian territories" (Habibi (novel) and The Shepherd's Granddaughter). The others are set in much earlier periods and therefore in Palestine (region).

Those two could therefore be moved into a sub-cat, but the "region" category would remain as a parent.

Given that, do you accept that it should also parent this "set in Israel" category? – Fayenatic London 22:54, 13 July 2016 (UTC)

Redundant. The Palestine (region) categories should not overlap the State of Palestine categories. There is much confusion between the two, due to recent rename of Palestine to Palestine (region). We do not have any other similar regional definition like Category:Novels set in the West Bank, Category:Novels set in Syria (region), Category:Novels set in the Land of Israel, Category:Novels set in the Levant. So why do we have category:Novels set in Palestine (region), but do not have category:Novels set in the Palestinian territories or category:Novels set in the State of Palestine? Rename and reorder is the best solution for this mismanagement. I also suspect that renaming Category:novels set in Palestine to Category:Novels set in Palestine (region) was simply a misunderstanding due to the vagueness of what is Palestine; in the modern sense however it is a defined political entity and should be treated as such.GreyShark (dibra) 19:55, 14 July 2016 (UTC)

@Greyshark09: They do not appear redundant to me. Palestine (region) is described as comprising most of the Land of Israel, which is clearly more extensive than the territory held by the present State. As for the other novels currently categorised as set in the region, Black Mamba Boy apparently features Mandatory Palestine in the 1940s; The Haj, 1920s–50s; Ot me-Avshalom, 19th century and modern Israel; The Wells of Beersheba, 1917. What is normally done for the geographic setting of novels pre-dating current political entities? – Fayenatic London 20:58, 14 July 2016 (UTC)

I don't think we should determine the name of the category only according to its content - editors make mistakes and Wikipedia is not a source. We should look at the whole picture - State of Palestine is a semi-recognized state, observer at the UN with certain territorial control and should have its own categories. It is now a mess of Palestinian territories, Palestine, State of Palestine and Palestine (region) categories confused with each other, but in my opinion - State of Palestine should absorb most of the typical country cats, including Novels. As you know the mainstream approach to former countries is to create trees for former countries, so i see no problem with creating category:Novels set in Mandatory Palestine (within an already an existing tree of category:Mandatory Palestine) and Ottoman Empire (already existing category:Novels set in the Ottoman Empire.GreyShark (dibra) 16:15, 15 July 2016 (UTC)

@Greyshark09: OK, I think there is scope for all of those to be usefully populated, except State of Palestine which is too new to have novels at present. I also see scope for this category, Mandatory Palestine and Palestine territories (but not Ottoman Empire) to be put back into Palestine (region), like the rest of the hierarchy; why not? – Fayenatic London 19:52, 15 July 2016 (UTC)

So we mostly agree, let's create category:Novels set in Mandatory Palestine. Regarding this one - i simply prefer to get rid of it because of its vague nature and because we do not have any other regional geographic category such as this - better rename it to Category:Novels set in the Palestinian Authority or Category:Novels set in the Palestinian territories and populate accordingly (State of Palestine is only relevant since 2013).GreyShark (dibra) 06:11, 17 July 2016 (UTC)

We could set up the sub-cats, although they might be small. As for novel categories by region, how hard did you look? the parent is Novels set in the Middle East, and above that is Category:Novels by region of setting. I do not think the Palestine (region) one should be renamed, nor become a container category – it would be a loss of valid navigation links to exclude The Wells of Beersheba (which is set in the Ottoman period). – Fayenatic London 21:15, 19 July 2016 (UTC)

Palestine (region) categorization is the same as Land of Israel or Syria (region) or Transjordan (region) or West Bank categorization - not suitable. The upper level should be Middle East or Western Asia and not multiple artificial geographic definitions, which are politically loaded.GreyShark (dibra) 07:53, 17 January 2017 (UTC)

I have set up two of those sub-categories (Mandatory, and territories) and cross-linked them. The parent Category:Novels set in Palestine (region) still directly holds articles on novels set in Palestine before 1920 (these are also categorised as Category:Novels set in the Ottoman Empire). – Fayenatic London 14:06, 12 January 2017 (UTC)

I created Category:Novels set in Ottoman Syria for the contemporary geopolitical entity (subdivision of the Ottoman Empire, which is a full tree).GreyShark (dibra) 07:53, 17 January 2017 (UTC)