Talk:Southeastern Ceremonial Complex/Archive 1

Archive 1

Complete re-write September 2008

I recently did a complete re-write of this page, with lots of citations, motifs, new imagery, and a map. I still want to add a few more things, such as the "Mothman" figure related to the Birdman, and the celestial imagery associated with the Great Serpent imagery, specifically from Moundville artifacts. Anythoughts from anyone about how it's looking so far?Heironymous Rowe (talk) 23:02, 14 September 2008 (UTC)

• I just added a new section concerning some of the new theories concerning the S.E.C.C. and proposals for the re-naming to M.A.C.C. or M.I.I.C. and tables showing some of the new explanations of the timeline for the S.E.C.C. Heironymous Rowe (talk) 05:26, 19 September 2008 (UTC)

Traditional Name Southern Death Cult

The traditional name of this culture (or at least part of it) is the Southern Death Cult.

What did that name refer to (a more limited region?), and who decided to replace it with Southeastern Ceremonial Complex?

Are we sure Southeastern Ceremonial Complex is the leading name to be found in the literature -- and not someone's current opinion of what is politically correct? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.36.149.22 (talk) 05:43, 17 October 2008 (UTC)

Read the section of the article where it talks about the name and theory, this has been the accepted name for a long time, altho some people are in favor of a newer, more accurately descriptive name. Changing it to make it easier to find The Cult or SOuthern Death Cult prolly wouldn't be a good idea. Alto the older variants of the name are a lot more METAL! Heironymous Rowe (talk) 05:48, 17 October 2008 (UTC)

Questionable Images and Tone

The illustration "Illustration of a warrior holding a ceremonial flint mace/war club and a severed head" seems to be a white-looking guy holding the severed head of a guy from a New Wave band. Is it a pop culture interpretation, or something appropriate for a scientific context?

The illustration "Piasa painted on a cliff in Alton, Illinois" appears to be freshly painted, with modern 3D shadowing -- and yet it is presented without comment as if an authentic cultural relic.

In general the article is leaning towards an unscientific "New Age practitioner" viewpoint, revealing to us the powerful and important spiritual significant of the culture, rather than an objective scientific presentation appropriate for Wikipedia.

For example: "A variation of the Cross in Circle Motif, it symbolized the Under World in all of it's creative, generative power."

This should be "A variation of the Cross in Circle Motif, symbolizing the creative, generative power of the underworld" -- if that has actually been scientifically established, and is not someone's interpretation based on a tarot card reading. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.36.146.72 (talk) 05:52, 17 October 2008 (UTC)

The Piasa is a modern repainting, the original is no longer there, I believe the cliff was quarried for stone in the past. As for the other illustration, it is a dig painting I did based on accroutrements from several S.E.C.C. shell gorgets, which are also represented. Changing the wording on the Swastika in Circle motif description to that sounds fine to me if you think it sounds too "new agey", because I am far from being that, nor do I want this article to sound that way . All of the motifs and descriptions are taken from "Ancient Objects and Sacred Realms", and altho the title sounds iffy, it's not new agey either. It's a series of essays from praticioners of the U of Texas Austin series of conferences about the S.E.C.C. Heironymous Rowe (talk) 05:59, 17 October 2008 (UTC)

Did that help? I changed the wording for the motif and on the Piasa. Heironymous Rowe (talk) 06:14, 17 October 2008 (UTC)

The interpretations listed are highly speculative and do not agree with interpretations held by Southeastern tribes. Take this article with a massive grain of salt! -Uyvsdi (talk) 00:56, 23 September 2009 (UTC)Uyvsdi

GA Review

This review is transcluded from Talk:Southeastern Ceremonial Complex/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Reviewer: Rationalobserver (talk · contribs) 21:59, 16 January 2015 (UTC)

Lead

• is the name given to

Maybe just "refers to", instead of this, which is a bit awkward.

• Contrary to popular belief, this development appears to have no direct links to Mesoamerica, but developed independently.

Is it accurate to say, "popular belief", or is this more about conflicting theories? Also, try to avoid using two variations of "development" in the same sentence.

• This ceremonial complex

I think "the ceremonial complex" is better.

• Other obsolete names for this ceremonial complex include Buzzard Cult and Southern Death Cult.[4]

Maybe it would be better to list all of these at the beginning, rather that including one obsolete name at the top and two more at the bottom.

Theories and names

• The social organization of the Mississippian culture

You should link Mississippian culture here, as this is the first mention outside the lead.

• Such objects occur in elite burials, together with war axes, maces, and other weapons. These warrior symbols occur

Avoid using "occur" twice in this short span.

• The term Southeast Ceremonial Complex refers to a complex, highly variable set of religious mechanisms that supported the authority of local chiefs.[7]

I think this would be better the beginning of the paragraph, versus the end.

• The S.E.C.C. was first defined in 1945

You should introduce the acronym after the first mention of Southeast Ceremonial Complex in the article body.

• Their concept was of a complex of a specific cult manifestation

This is an awkward construction.

• while using its trait lists as a foundation for critical analysis of the entire concept.

Since this ends a paragraph, it should have a citation following it.

• proposed a more archaeologically based

This would flow better if you swapped "a more" for "an". Also, maybe "archaeologically based" should be "archeology based".

Projected development of M.A.C.C. styles

• The prose in this section needs a citation or two, especially at the end.

Cosmology

• The first paragraph in this section needs a citation or two, especially at the end.

Motifs

• As with above, this section needs more citations; [2][11] seems to be orphaned at the bottom, but it's not clear what material they support.

Birdman

• As with above, this section needs more citations. Also, if "Birdman" is a motif, then this section needs a level four header so it's obviously a sub-section of motifs.

Red Horn and his sons

• Same as above; if this is an example of a specific motif, it should be formatted as a sub-section of "Motifs". Also, the first and second paragraphs need to end in a citation.

Great Serpent

• Same as above; if this is an example of a specific motif, it should be formatted as a sub-section of "Motifs". Also, the first paragraph needs a citation.

Artifacts with S.E.C.C. imagery

Looks good

Sites associated with the Southeastern Ceremonial Complex

This section lacks citations.

Refs

I fixed a couple of ref errors, but some others remain, specifically refs 17 and 18.

Sourcing

• hotcakencyclopedia.com is most likely not a WP:RS. I think the same applies to about.com and fortunecity.com.

The nominating editor has been inactive since December 2014, so I've failed this GAN. Rationalobserver (talk) 23:18, 28 January 2015 (UTC)

Obsolete terms

Yes, they are obsolete terms, the article you cited in your revision summary even states "as it used to be called" [1]. Some opinions to for a consensus on this from any other page watchers would be appreciated. I am at 2RR now and have real life to deal with so am logging off for awhile. Cheers. Heiro 17:42, 7 April 2017 (UTC)

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Plagiarized Source?

I was doing some research and found the following paragraph: "The social organization of the Mississippian culture was based on warfare, which was represented by an array of motifs and symbols in articles made from costly raw materials, such as conches from Florida, copper from the Great Lakes area and Appalachian Mountains, lead from northern Illinois and Iowa, pottery from Tennessee, and stone tools sourced from Kansas, Texas, and southern Illinois.[8] Such objects occur in elite burials, together with war axes, maces, and other weapons. These warrior symbols occur alongside other artifacts, which bear cosmic imagery depicting animals, humans, and legendary creatures. This symbolic imagery bound together warfare, cosmology, and nobility into a coherent whole. Some of these categories of artifacts were used as markers of chiefly office, which varied from one location to another. The term Southeast Ceremonial Complex refers to a complex, highly variable set of religious mechanisms that supported the authority of local chiefs.[9]"

The entire quote is plagiarized from https://peachstatearchaeologicalsociety.org/index.php/21-southeastern-ceremonial-complex/365-southeastern-ceremonial-complex-symbols

It is a word for word copy and paste. Whoever submitted this also put in two other in-text citations, but did not cite the plagiarized source on the page at all. This is the first time I have seen such an egregious copy and paste from Wikipedia, and the situation could very well be the linked site is the one plagiarizing from Wikipedia. With some investigation I'm sure the answer could be ascertained. Regardless, if it is a blatant copy and paste from a source not cited, it is obviously plagiarism and should be rewritten with the cited source.

I do not contribute to Wikipedia so I am unsure of the process or guidelines, but I would be very surprised if stuff like this was acceptable considering it would be a tactic approval of plagiarizing sources outright with no due credit. If it becomes a fact that the editor who added that did in fact plagiarize that source, then that would also throw into question that editor's entire credibility as a contributor if they've done further edits and "additions" elsewhere.

71.212.203.64 (talk) 04:57, 7 May 2020 (UTC)

No, you have it the wrong way around. Peach State routinely copies verbatim from Wikipedia articles, even going so far as to have used the same illustrations from articles. And not crediting Wikipedia as their sources or using the correct attributions per the image page requirements. It is rather egregious. But you were correct about one thing, if it had been the other way around it would have been a very serious breach of our policy on copyright or WP:COPYVIOs. Heiro 08:04, 7 May 2020 (UTC)