Talk:List of swamp monsters

Sources

Right now this article is basically a checklist of fictional monsters who happen to live in swamps. We really need to be looking for published sources which actually identify these characters as part of a specific tradition. I've got started by citing some sources which discuss the comic characters Swamp Thing, Man-Thing and the Heap together.
Incidentally, I notice that a large amount of these monsters are direct parodies of the Creature from the Black Lagoon. We can stand to trim some of those out as they're basically the same character. NeilEm (talk) 19:57, 19 February 2013 (UTC)

are these tags needed?

Concerning the reason for the tagging. [1] Does anyone believe to be a swamp monster, you can't just be a monster that is in a swamp, but instead have to be specifically called a "swamp monster"? Also does every single item on this list article need a reference behind it, when it links to the articles listed? No other list articles do that. Dream Focus 04:17, 11 February 2018 (UTC)

When the title of this article is "Swamp monster", and it is unclear what, if any, reliably referenced content assigns this particular description to an entry, as is the case for these entries, and a clear citation has been requested, as is the case here, then yes, a tag is appropriate until the issue is resolved. -- Begoon 04:32, 11 February 2018 (UTC)

In folklore[citation needed] and popular culture – in particular fantastic fiction – a swamp monster is a creature that is imagined to lurk in a swamp, occasionally emerging to attack unwary passers-by. Swamp monsters, also known as swamp creatures or swamp men, are generally described as having a vaguely humanoid appearance and being very powerful." It never says it has to be called that. The opening bit clearly says its a creature imagined to lurk in a swamp. Dream Focus 04:36, 11 February 2018 (UTC)

Well, even if we accept that would be a valid reason (which I honestly don't), I still fail to see how each entry in the tagged section makes clear that it is "imagined to lurk in a swamp, occasionally emerging to attack unwary passers-by." and is "generally described as having a vaguely humanoid appearance and being very powerful". It's not a valid answer to say, "well, if you read all of the information in all of the linked articles, then they kind of fit...", basically requiring the reader to duplicate your own WP:OR and WP:SYNTH, certainly not when that premise is obviously questioned. Anyway, we obviously disagree, so instead of a back and forth ping-pong match let's see what other opinions are. -- Begoon 04:49, 11 February 2018 (UTC)

Assuming I can bring up the content I removed yesterday, neither Nessy nor kelpies have anything approaching a humanoid appearance, and kappa (river spirits that to the best of my knowledge have nothing do with swamps) look more like turtles. The will-o-the-wisp and the Lernean hydra also definitely don't fit that description. Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 04:57, 11 February 2018 (UTC)

See also below. This section now touches on Wikipedia's coverage of an area on which there has been an abundance of high-quality scholarly research, so even if a popular entertainment actually said something like From the will-o-the-wisp to the hydra, swamp monsters have been a part of our culture for millennia. that would still not really be a sufficient source for this unless it were written by a respected folklorist/mythologist/comp-lit scholar/whatever, since we would then be faced with the question of why none of the scholarly sources on these topics use the term "swamp monster". Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 05:04, 11 February 2018 (UTC)

folklore tag

Does the word "folklore" at the start of the article need a reference? Do all other articles concerning folklore have that? Dream Focus 04:20, 11 February 2018 (UTC)

WP:OSE I don't know about other articles, but presumably articles about folkloristics topics would have no trouble being sourced as having to do with folklore. This article, though, is named for, and largely consists of discussion of, a concept that appears to originate in 20th-century American popular culture. It is OR to do as you admitted to doing and list various creatures from mythology (which is not the same as folklore) that one or more sources may have associated with a swamp of as "swamp monsters". In fact, I would go a step further and say that even if you found a popular entertainment source that called the Lernean hydra a "swamp monster" it would be insufficient since encyclopedia articles on mythological topics should be written using high quality academic sources, not popular entertainment books, magazines, websites, etc. Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 04:53, 11 February 2018 (UTC)