Talk:C. W. Nicol

Life Details

He is currently introduced as a Welsh-Japanese writer, which is an attempt to highlight his birthplace. However, it implies that he writes in the Welsh language, which he does not. It would be better to remove this detail altogether, except that it might look to a reader who has not come across him before (just "Japanese") as unlikely and a result of vandalism. I propose to therefore change this to "British-born". If there are any objections/comments please add otherwise I shall go ahead with this.--Capristic (talk) 11:58, 28 November 2018 (UTC)

No. Calling Tom Jones a Welsh singer does not imply he sings in Welsh, nor does calling Oscar Wilde does not imply he writes in the Irish language. People don't automatic assume someone is fluent in Cymraig if they hail from that part of the country. --Kiyoweap (talk) 17:56, 30 December 2020 (UTC)

Bit late to the party, but seeing as the issue persists and people are citing this discussion as some kind of consensus, I'll revive the thread so we can put a nail in this coffin and be done with it.

I agree with Kiyoweap above; "Welsh-born" has no implications of what language he writes in. It means what it says on the tin. He was born in Wales. There's more than enough sources that call him Welsh to warrant it's inclusion[1][2][3][4], as well as his own words in interviews[5] (also see reference 1 in the article). WP:UKCHANGE is always worth a read for any arguments of 'but British is the legal designation'. – ².O.^Boxing 18:54, 8 July 2023 (UTC)

"Loss" of citizenship

The statement "He became a Japanese citizen (and thus lost his Canadian and British citizenship)" is misleading. It implies that it was either automatic or involuntary or both. In actual fact, the only way Nicol could have gone from being a British national to a former British national is by applying (to the British authorities) to renounce his British nationality. This is entirely a voluntary procedure initiated by the applicant, and as such, is giving up nationality, not losing it.

On the Japanese side, they are not able to compel a dual national to give up their foreign nationality. So Nicol either gave up his British and/or Canadian nationality voluntarily, or he simply retained them. The latter course is no less possible and is far from unknown, and it is not illegal: specifically, as the Japan Nationality Law provides almost no power to simply revoke someone's Japanese nationality, such cases are rare-going-on-nonexistent.

The original statement needs to be more specifically sourced. If not, it really needs correction, because the default assumption should never be that a person taking Japanese nationality has given up their other citizenship. The default status is actually the opposite: a person receiving Japanese nationality in this way is by definition already a holder of another nationality (ie not stateless), and when the Japanese nationality is granted, they are still the holder of a foreign nationality.

In summary, Nicol may well not have given up his birth nationality at all, but if he did, it was definitely voluntary. He didn't lose it in the sense that "lost" would be understood by almost any reader.

Seto Sea (talk) 14:13, 23 September 2020 (UTC)Seto Sea