My desire in creating these articles is to record the history and impact of present and former notable faculty, of who most have held a named chair appointment or distinguished professor appointment, at a flagship seminary, Columbia Theological Seminary, of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.).
This is a project to review a batch of biographies created by Jcstanley, primarily for Notability under ACADEMIC. Of course general BIO or other specific notability criteria may be satisfied. Jcstanley is working in good faith, in my experience references and claims always check out. However care is needed on the significance of those factual items - publication lists may contain blogs, award lists may contain items of questionable significance, president of X may need examination of what X is.
Note: The initial notability justifications below may be preliminary. I said Don't try to address things like "significant impact in their scholarly discipline" yet, unless it's a single sentence with maybe a single link that makes it very obvious. Most can be left blank on the first pass. Let us Green tick the easiest most obvious cases first, just to narrow down the list. Alsee (talk) 11:02, 9 December 2015 (UTC)
General discussion
editI don't have much experience on ACADEMIC specific notability. I'm assuming the current and former presidents of Columbia Theological Seminary qualify Criteria 6. Professor Emeritus and all these Named Chairs seem very questionable? Does this satisfy our usual notability standards in this area? Pinging E.M.Gregory, Cordless Larry, DGG, Nagle. I'll post on the talk page for WT:Notability_(academics). Alsee (talk) 11:02, 9 December 2015 (UTC)
- I have some specific concerns, which I have started to post about below, but more generally, I would like to point out that these articles are very poorly referenced. Most of them contain long passages of text, the sources of which are unclear. This issue needs to be resolved, or the articles trimmed back to what can be sourced. Cordless Larry (talk) 11:13, 9 December 2015 (UTC)
- Cordless Larry, yeah independent sources are particularly in short supply. But my first focus is Notability tho. There's little point improving an article if it will end up deleted anyway. Alsee (talk) 11:34, 9 December 2015 (UTC)
WP:PROF is only a shortcut—there should be significant coverage in multiple reliable, independent sources (?) for each one of these academics and if they actually had an impact on the field, there should be sources that say so. Instead of repeating it on each section, I'll add that PROF#5 does not include all emeritus profs—only those who hold (or one held) a named chair position (e.g., the Jimbo Wales Prof. Emeritus of X) czar 14:24, 9 December 2015 (UTC)
- Agreed that WP:PROF is a shortcut, but it's widely believed that someone who fulfills one of the criteria fully will have significant mentions in multiple reliable independent sources if someone cares to do a library search on them. In years of going through WP:PROF the only cases where that hasn't been the case have been places where their institution itself has been of marginal notability (diploma mills, very newly founded schools) that use the trappings of academic titles (president, X Professor of Y) without actually being a reputable institution. One area of focus thus could be the Columbia TS itself to give more RS there about its significance and impact. Notability is not inherited, but it can be a sign to look harder. Columbia TS was established in 1828 and has a small faculty and distinguished history (esp. in the late 19th c.) which might explain the higher than average number of professors with named chairs. It's also important to realize that the list of faculty on the site and here is selective (removing assistant profs., lecturers, etc.) which can help with questions of motivation of the author. A quick look suggests that most of these articles will survive a deletion process. I'll comment on the few that will need some more work. Agreed that Prof. Emeritus does not count for C5; they are, however, rarely deleted at AfD (in part because the probability of using the article as a way of advancing status in the field is much lower. It's also the case that having a wikipedia article is far less of a trophy to attain in the theology and humanities worlds than in some science and art fields -- that's not a criteria for keep, but an experience that has helped guide people in discussions later. I'll start from the bottom of the list and work up. -- Michael Scott Cuthbert (talk) 15:15, 9 December 2015 (UTC)
- Btw -- if any of these articles come up for AfD, would you please use the "ping" template to alert anyone who comments (for or against) below. Thanks! -- Michael Scott Cuthbert (talk) 15:39, 9 December 2015 (UTC)
- Got through the last ten (Leon Carroll and below). I hope to be able to return later to comment further. Great job writing btw! Very interesting to learn about these fascinating people. To me it looks like at least 3/4 would pass AfD.
Can you say a bit about John Knox press? The majority of writers have books published through them -- is this an in house publisher for the Presbyterian church or for CTS (ah yes: Westminster John Knox? I've been focusing on library holdings and on books published by other presses, because it does not seem that it is particularly selective for the publications of professors of theology within the church. OTOH, many of its books are widely held by major and small libraries, so it's clearly not a vanity press for the church either. -- Michael Scott Cuthbert (talk) 16:18, 9 December 2015 (UTC)
- It is a Presbyterian press. but it also publishes works in other religious traditions by people associated with those traditions,including non-Christian traditions; but most of its publications are aligned with Presbyterianism. [1]It is a high quality press, and its academically oriented publications are on a part with most university presses; however,it also publishes a large number of popular devotional works, and works specific to Presbyterian worship. Only the academic books show notability as an academic.
- (1)WP is not a shortcut, it is explicitly an alternative to the GNG. It reads Academics/professors meeting any one of the following conditions, as substantiated through reliable sources, are notable. Academics/professors meeting none of these conditions may still be notable if they meet the conditions of WP:BIO or other notability criteria. It differs in this respect to most other special notability guidelines, which show only presumed notability.
- (2)The named full professorship rule applies only to those at a " major institution of higher education and research" . It is not clear to me that CTS qualifies. It is a significant institution, but it offers only the following doctoral degrees: Doctor of Ministry (DMin) "a leadership development program", Doctor of Educational Ministry (DEdMin), Doctor of Theology in Pastoral Care and Counseling (ThD); None are truly research degrees. The school it is not the equivalent of , say, the Princeton Theological Seminary. Note the research in the wording of the guideline, which in effect limits it to major research universities.
- (3).Professor Emeritus is not a distinguished professorship title. "Emeritus" means Retired.
- (4)The problems with these articles are far more than notability . They are written in a style and format more appropriate to a web page for the college. The section on "Thought" in many of the articles is not encyclopedic content. The sections on Honors often includes too many trivial awards.-- awards from their own university should not be included. The sections on Publications include too many trivial articles and what amount to individual sermons, and need to separate academic books from devotional or organizational. The wording is not compact, e.g. "He has also served in a variety of other roles within the church." followed by the sentences describing the roles. As a matter of style, we do not use the terms Dr. or Prof. or Rev. within an article. The articles contain such puffery as "Throughout his career he built a wealth of experience and knowledge about international mission". These factors give a strong impression of promotionalism. Borderline notability combined with clear promotionalism is an accepted reason for deletion.
- (5) Nothing said here is definitive. The only way to decide is individual AfDs. Expect them.
- (6) My very strong advice is to clean up these articles, removing puffery and minor publications awards and positions. Academic CVs by convention include everything possible; encycopedia articles do not. DGG ( talk ) 17:40, 9 December 2015 (UTC)
NOTE ON AFDs: I intended more time here before opening any AFDs. I see 5 have been opened. Lets hold off on any more for a while. There is NORUSH here. Alsee (talk) 19:30, 9 December 2015 (UTC)
- Agreed! -- Michael Scott Cuthbert (talk) 18:14, 10 December 2015 (UTC)
- Have things stalled here? Do we need to consider starting AfDs again, or should we wait longer? Cordless Larry (talk) 21:07, 21 December 2015 (UTC)
- I'm still here and keeping an eye on things. We have four still going from before and only one completed (delete). My preference would be to talk here about agreement on things not to take to AfD and things to definitely take and ones that we might disagree on which may or may not be worth taking. My sense is that there's disagreement (or consensensus to list) for:
- Have things stalled here? Do we need to consider starting AfDs again, or should we wait longer? Cordless Larry (talk) 21:07, 21 December 2015 (UTC)
Catherine Gunsalus Gonzalez- John Azumah
- Mark Douglas (ethicist)
- Rodger Nishioka
- Sara Myers
and the rest have at least one strong argument (beyond the first) for keep and zero or one for delete. I'd suggest doing these five four next, but maybe after at least three of the four current AfDs close, so we can learn from them what is likely to be kept, and what is so likely to be deleted as to just PROD. -- Michael Scott Cuthbert (talk) 00:26, 22 December 2015 (UTC)
- AfDs have concluded with three keeps and two deletes (+1 expired PROD). I have reorganized into sections: Unresolved, Consensus here keep (no need for AfD), AFD Keep, and Deleted. I only moved to consensus keep if all the arguments were for keep and someone besides me expressed a keep position (maybe someone else will move some of "mine" there from unresolved). I've made an argument for keep for Gonzalez now also. It looks to me that what is emerging from AfD is that the named professorship rule is counting for CTS -- none were deleted w/ a named professorship and several without have been kept too. So I don't suggest trying to take named profs here to AfD. @Alsee:? -- Michael Scott Cuthbert (talk) 17:49, 26 December 2015 (UTC)
Where do we stand now? I see that Jcstanley has recently created another article, Kathy Dawson. Cordless Larry (talk) 23:27, 3 February 2016 (UTC)
- My sense is that we've concluded that the articles here have a mix of clearly notable, probably notable, probably not notable, and almost certainly not notable -- in other words, they're like almost any randomly chosen collection of biographical articles on WP. If that's the case, then we should probably do what we do normally, which is that if someone wants to bring an article to AfD and thinks that it'd succeed, they should go ahead, but it'd be courteous to do it in small batches (2-3 at a time) and very nice to update the "active AfDs" section on this page. I listed four above that I would probably vote delete on, above, but none of them offend my sensibilities enough to want to bring them to AfD myself -- spending more of my time on vandal fighting and reverting unsourced BLP entries on articles about individual TV show episodes; somehow, having sourced articles that are well-written but before WP:PROF notability standards exist seem to me the least of WP's problems. :-) -- Michael Scott Cuthbert (talk) 18:41, 4 February 2016 (UTC)
- It also looks from the latest batch that many of the "Unresolved" would survive. I'd suggest moving "Brian Wren", "Catherine Gunsalus Gonzalez", "Jeffery Tribble", "Marcia Y. Riggs" to "Resolved Keep" (it doesn't prevent anyone from nominating them later, of course, but I doubt that they'd get deleted). Leaving only "John Leighton Wilson" and "Mark Douglas (ethicist)". -- Michael Scott Cuthbert (talk) 17:52, 23 April 2016 (UTC)
- Hi again, Mscuthbert. Yes, it appears from the AfDs that most of these academics are considered notable, even where we had concerns here, and I think the best thing to focus on now would be improving the content of the articles - particularly their referencing. That said, I do note that Jcstanley has created more of these articles since this page was set up, and would like to take a look through those when I get time, to make sure that the subjects are notable. Cordless Larry (talk) 15:01, 24 April 2016 (UTC)
- It also looks from the latest batch that many of the "Unresolved" would survive. I'd suggest moving "Brian Wren", "Catherine Gunsalus Gonzalez", "Jeffery Tribble", "Marcia Y. Riggs" to "Resolved Keep" (it doesn't prevent anyone from nominating them later, of course, but I doubt that they'd get deleted). Leaving only "John Leighton Wilson" and "Mark Douglas (ethicist)". -- Michael Scott Cuthbert (talk) 17:52, 23 April 2016 (UTC)
Active AFD
editI believe fulfills WP:ACADEMIC Criteria 5 in holding the distinguished position of Professor Emeritus and as the former Director of the Division of International Mission for the Presbyterian Church in the United States.
- Emeritus is not notable, and the other position is not enough for notability either. An honorary doctorate is an indicator of notability , but not " school he helped create." Books published by XLibris are self-published--I need to look at the other books further. There are many unsourced claims in the text that need explicit references. If not fixed, I will consider AfD. DGG ( talk ) 18:13, 9 December 2015 (UTC)
Unresolved
editI believe fulfills WP:ACADEMIC Criteria 5, as the named chair Conant Professor of Worship and Professor Emeritus, and multiple WP:NMUSIC Criteria.
I believe fulfills WP:ACADEMIC Criteria 4 and 5, in holding the distinguished position of Professor Emerita.
- #5 does not include emeritus profs—only those who hold (or one held) a named chair position (e.g., the Jimbo Wales Prof. Emeritus of X) czar 14:22, 9 December 2015 (UTC)
- Focuses too much on husband's role at the top, but she was the first female faculty member at the seminary, which usually is enough for a notability keep -- generally glass ceiling breakers have tended to be far above the average for any discipline but do not often get rewarded w/ titles, positions. I would vote keep. (This comment was added by Mscuthbert btw -- not sure of original date: -- Michael Scott Cuthbert (talk) 18:41, 4 February 2016 (UTC))
I believe fulfills WP:ACADEMIC Criteria 4 evidenced by the wide spread use of his publications in academic institutions [2].
- We need to see evidence of this impact in independent sources. Cordless Larry (talk) 11:11, 9 December 2015 (UTC)
- I think that the reviews of the book (one cited in the article in a major journal) plus a library holding count around 400 will be sufficient for C1 (not C4 unless syllabi can be found that include it), but agreed, it would be helped by more sourcing, to take a difficult AfD to an easy keep. -- Michael Scott Cuthbert (talk) 15:57, 9 December 2015 (UTC)
I believe is notable due to the fact a book, By the Rivers of Water (2013, Basic), has been written about him and that he was the first missionary to West Africa by the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions.
- Certainly seems notable, but the article is largely unsourced. The book published by Basic should be cited, as this seems like a key source. Cordless Larry (talk) 11:17, 9 December 2015 (UTC)
I believe fulfills WP:ACADEMIC Criteria 5 in holding the named chair J. Erskine Love Professor of Christian Ethics.
- Agreed. Library holdings are in the 200s-400s for both her books and for her edited volumes. I think that with the named chair will be more than enough. Removing the notability tags. -- Michael Scott Cuthbert (talk) 16:06, 9 December 2015 (UTC)
I believe is notable because he is the chair of the board of Georgia Interfaith Power and Light, the largest faith-based environmental organization in Georgia and fulfills WP:ACADEMIC Criteria 8 as the founder and editor of the peer-reviewed online journal of Columbia Theological Seminary [3].
- Criteria 8 refers to major well-established academic journals, and I don't think that the seminary's in-house journal qualifies as such. As for Georgia Interfaith Power and Light, see WP:NOTINHERITED. To establish that Douglas is notable, we need to see evidence of significant coverage in reliable, independent sources. Cordless Larry (talk) 15:15, 9 December 2015 (UTC)
- This is going to be a tough call; I see it going to delete or no consensus. As @Cordless Larry: notes, the journal of the CTS will probably not be enough for C8. I think the best route is going to be to get multiple reliable sources talking about his work (as he was a newspaper columnist this shouldn't be impossible if the columns are notable) and if reviews of the books have appeared. The library holdings for the two books (88 and 30ish) won't be enough on their own to say that the two books pass notability. I think I'd lean towards a weak keep, because I take the "Average Professor Test" pretty seriously, and this is substantially more noticed work than average, but my bar is lower than at least 1/3 to 1/2 of the other voters, and I see a difficult road to a clear keep. -- Michael Scott Cuthbert (talk) 15:51, 9 December 2015 (UTC)
Resolved: Consensus Keep here
editI believe fulfills WP:ACADEMIC Criteria 5 and 6 in holding the positions of President of Columbia Theological Seminary and Peachtree Professor of Evangelism and Church Growth.
- Agreed. Pass for 5+6; plus no BLP issues (RIP). Expand "IVP" to "Intervarsity Press" in works list. -- Michael Scott Cuthbert (talk) 15:17, 9 December 2015 (UTC)
I believe fulfills WP:ACADEMIC Criteria 5 in holding the named chair Samuel A. Cartledge of New Testament and the distinguished position of Professor Emeritus.
- Publications seem to be sufficient. I cleaned up the promotionalism . DGG ( talk ) 17:57, 9 December 2015 (UTC)
I believe fulfills WP:ACADEMIC Criteria 4 through her published works.
- Crriteria 4 states "The person's academic work has made a significant impact in the area of higher education, affecting a substantial number of academic institutions". If you believe that this is the case, then you need to establish this impact in the article. That she has published is not the question - we need to see evidence of the impact of these publications. Cordless Larry (talk) 11:09, 9 December 2015 (UTC)
I believe fulfills WP:ACADEMIC Criteria 5 in holding the position of Distinguished Professor of New Testament and Professor Emeritus.
- Yes. and the "J. Edward and Ruth Cox Lantz Professor Emeritus of Christian Communication at Yale Divinity School" post will definitely make it a slam dunk. -- Michael Scott Cuthbert (talk) 16:13, 9 December 2015 (UTC)
I believe fulfills WP:ACADEMIC Criteria 6 in holding the position of President Emeritus.
I believe fulfills WP:ACADEMIC Criteria 5 in holding the named chair J. Davison Philips Professor of New Testament.
I believe fulfills WP:ACADEMIC Criteria 5 and 6 in formerly holding the position of William M McPheeters Professor of Old Testament and as the former President of the Catholic Biblical Association.
- Agreed -- clear pass. Also has a lecture series named for her (yes, it's at CTS, but that still says a high importance). Lots of contributions to major presses. Should be an easy keep. -- Michael Scott Cuthbert (talk) 16:12, 9 December 2015 (UTC)
- CBA is a major national society. DGG ( talk ) 18:38, 9 December 2015 (UTC)
I believe fulfills WP:ACADEMIC Criteria 6 in holding the position of President Emerita.
I believe fulfills WP:ACADEMIC Criteria 6 in holding the current position of President of Columbia Theological Seminary.
I believe fulfills WP:ACADEMIC Criteria 5 in holding the named chair Christiane Brooks Johnson Memorial Chair in Psychology and Religion at Union Theological Seminary and formerly the Ben G and Nancye Clapp Gautier Professor of Pastoral Theology, Care and Counseling at Columbia Theological Seminary.
- Easy and clear pass. Named chairs at two different reputable institutions (show that she does have national prominence). All books have at least 100 holdings, with two over 400 (in musicology I can state from experience that the Schoenberg book is notable and often cited). Fulbright winner (not enough for a pass in itself but will make people investigate further). Reviews of books in many journals. A vote against this article seems incomprehensible to me. Update position now that July 1, 2015 has passed. -- Michael Scott Cuthbert (talk) 15:46, 9 December 2015 (UTC)
- Yes, but most of the rewards are trivial and including them does not help the article. DGG ( talk ) 18:46, 9 December 2015 (UTC)
I believe fulfills WP:ACADEMIC Criteria 5 in holding the named chair William Marcellus McPheeters Professor of Old Testament.
- Agreed. Plus a book with Oxford University Press; should be an easy or speedy keep. -- Michael Scott Cuthbert (talk) 15:16, 9 December 2015 (UTC)
- Yes, and the article is not promotional. This gives a general lesson: Where the notability is really clear it isn't necessary to resort ot the minor things that indicate promotionalism; conversely, where thearticle is written promotionally, usually (but not always) there's not much notability . DGG ( talk ) 18:26, 9 December 2015 (UTC)
Resolved: AFD Keep
editI believe fulfills WP:ACADEMIC Criteria 5 as holding the named chair of the Peter Marshall Associate Professor of Preaching.
- As elsewhere discussed, does not apply. The publications are devotional, not academic. The style is promotional .I've listed it for AFD DGG ( talk ) 17:44, 9 December 2015 (UTC)
- listing is at Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Anna_Carter_Florence -- Michael Scott Cuthbert (talk) 00:13, 22 December 2015 (UTC)
I believe fulfills WP:ACADEMIC Criteria 5 in holding the distinguished position of Professor Emeritus.
- #5 does not include emeritus profs—only those who hold (or one held) a named chair position (e.g., the Jimbo Wales Prof. Emeritus of X) czar 14:21, 9 December 2015 (UTC)
- as above. Listed for AfD. DGG ( talk ) 17:44, 9 December 2015 (UTC)
- at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Ben Campbell Johnson I laid out my points where based on library holdings and citations of his translations I think he's a keep on C1 or probably better C4. Continue discussion there. -- Michael Scott Cuthbert (talk) 18:58, 10 December 2015 (UTC)
- as above. Listed for AfD. DGG ( talk ) 17:44, 9 December 2015 (UTC)
I believe fulfills WP:ACADEMIC Criteria 5 in currently holding the named position Peachtree Associate Professor of Evangelism and Church Growth .
- Similar issue with the next entry regarding Criterion 5 for named associate prof. chairs (I'm working bottom up), but I think this should pass WP:PROF C1 pretty clearly. His Hip-Hop redemption has 250 library holdings (both university and public libraries) with a review of it in a major journal (Religious Studies Review, v38 n3 (September 2012)) which is generally enough for a keep. Articles in many major journals and in collected volumes pub'd by NYU Press, Oxford, etc. There may be some people who because of the associate prof. title will vote WP:TOOSOON, but I think it passes and it definitely improves the encyclopedia in an area (African-American religious experience) of which we have bias in writing about, which will probably get more keep votes. -- Michael Scott Cuthbert (talk) 15:38, 9 December 2015 (UTC)
- Listed at Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Ralph_Watkins. -- Michael Scott Cuthbert (talk) 00:26, 22 December 2015 (UTC)
I believe fulfills WP:ACADEMIC Criteria 6 as the the Founding Director of Interfaith Research & Resource Centre in Accra and is notable as the former the International Deputy Director of the Lausanne Movement in Africa.
- Neither position is important enough for notability. There are very few positions of any sort so important that the Deputy is also notable . The publications need further evaluation. DGG ( talk ) 18:23, 9 December 2015 (UTC)
I believe fulfills WP:ACADEMIC Criteria 5 in holding the named chair Benton Family Associate Professor of Christian Education.
- Not sure. Named chairs on non-full professor roles, such as the Benton Associate Professor, or something like the Homer A Burnell Career Development Associate Professor of Music (to show that I'm playing fair) are not in themselves immediate passes of Criteria 5, which implies that it is a pass for people who have recognition beyond that of the "typical" full professor in their field. He's only seven years out from his Ph.D. (he does have significant experience before that) with no journal articles except as chapters in books, and these books and his own are not from immediate "got it!" presses (I recognize Zondervan academic as a well-known press; the rest I don't, but I'm not in the field). Worldcat holdings show about 15-20 copies of his book in libraries, and 100-200 for edited volumes he's in. I don't know what would be an average number for theology publications so I don't know if this is good enough, but it looks a bit thin and I'm pretty sure that the more science-oriented voters at AfD will see it that way. Might be a case of WP:TOOSOON. -- Michael Scott Cuthbert (talk) 15:29, 9 December 2015 (UTC)
- Not on the basis of the named chair. The explanation above is perfectly correct. DGG ( talk ) 16:18, 9 December 2015 (UTC)
I believe fulfills WP:ACADEMIC Criteria 5 and 6 in holding the position of Professor Emerita and formerly the President of the American Theological Library Association .
- Emerita isn't enough for 5. Criteria 6 is stronger, though the ATLA article could have more RS establishing it as a major academic society. I think it'd get a keep, but not absolutely sure. This would be a good article to focus on for other sources.-- Michael Scott Cuthbert (talk) 15:20, 9 December 2015 (UTC)
Resolved: Deleted
editI believe fulfills WP:ACADEMIC Criteria 5 in holding the distinguished position of Professor Emeritus.
- As others and myself have noted, Emeritus isn't a C5 position. Unfortunately, I don't see anything else for a keep here -- the publication record is entirely in house. Probably wouldn't pass WP:PROF, so it's going to need reliable sources to get a GNG pass. As currently listed, I think it'd be a delete. -- Michael Scott Cuthbert (talk) 16:09, 9 December 2015 (UTC)
- Listed for AfD. I'm not going to list any more today--I think it's prejudicial to list to many at once, because it overwhelms people who might want to comment. DGG ( talk ) 18:19, 9 December 2015 (UTC)
- Link at Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Leon_Carroll -- Michael Scott Cuthbert (talk) 18:24, 10 December 2015 (UTC)
I believe fulfills WP:ACADEMIC Criteria 5 and 6 in holding the distinguished position of Professor Emeritus and as the former President of the Association for Clinical Pastoral Education.
- Criteria 6 Association for Clinical Pastoral Education Inc.[4] does not appear to be major academic institution or major academic society. Alsee (talk) 08:24, 9 December 2015 (UTC)
- Listed for AfD. no significant publications either. DGG ( talk ) 18:17, 9 December 2015 (UTC)
- Listed at wp:Articles for deletion/Jasper Keith (and 21 Dec: deleted) -- Michael Scott Cuthbert (talk) 18:34, 10 December 2015 (UTC)
- I agree with the PROD nominator and @DGG:. This is the first article I've reviewed (bottom up) that, at least as written, stands almost no chance of surviving AfD. You might want to make a copy in your user space for your own records in case the subject gets more notability later, but I'd let the PROD expire. -- Michael Scott Cuthbert (talk) 15:41, 9 December 2015 (UTC)