Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2023 October 17

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October 17

Men Writers

Wikipedia has an article on Women writers but Men writers doesn't exist. I ask Google. Google tells me that "women writers" will give me 9,360,000 results. "Men writers" will give me 61,600 results. "Female writers" will give me 1,700,000 results. "Male writers" will give me 665,000 results. The very first edit of Women writers is from 08:49, 26 August 2006. I am not sure if I should be the first person to create Men writers. Where do I begin? From the dawn of human civilization? How can we confirm the sex of a writer in ancient times? The main article can be Men writers while the redirect can be male writers. Yrotarobal (talk) 01:59, 17 October 2023 (UTC)

Maybe you could try drafting such an article and see how it looks. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 02:13, 17 October 2023 (UTC)

I think the rationale is that writers were traditionally always men, so when women writers came on to the scene it was necessary to differentiate them. That default assumption probably still applies, although it's far from true anymore. For the same sorts of reasons, we have lots of lists and categories about LGBTQI++++ people, but none about their straight counterparts. Straight is the cultural default, gay is the minority. -- Jack of Oz ^{[pleasantries]} 02:56, 17 October 2023 (UTC)

It's a bit like when we Americans have "Black History Month", and some joker will say, "When is White History Month?" And the answer is, "It's the other eleven." ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 04:04, 17 October 2023 (UTC)

I am not certain whether you are serious, or are trolling out of an anti-woke sentiment. In any case, we have no article Men writers for the very simple reason that the topic is not notable. In contrast, many books have been written about the topic of women writers.  --Lambiam 10:33, 17 October 2023 (UTC)

You should say "possibly not notable", or you should mention doing a WP:BEFORE check; it's possible that books have been written on the topic. Nyttend (talk) 19:37, 17 October 2023 (UTC)

If it was anti-woke, it would be a complaint that "men identifying as women" are being listed in the women writers category. 97.82.165.112 (talk) 13:17, 17 October 2023 (UTC)

Probably pre-woke, but we have articles on Ms George Eliot and Ms George Sand. Cookatoo.ergo.ZooM (talk) 16:58, 17 October 2023 (UTC)

Tomamae, Hokkaido

The mayor of Tomamae Town is Atsurō Fukushi ("福士敦朗") from April 23, 2023. Can you help me to find more detailed info about him: place and date of birth (it could be Tomamae in 1954), family, education, career, etc.? Thank you very much. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 193.207.137.38 (talk) 15:01, 17 October 2023 (UTC)

Kakhovka Reservoir

According to our article (complete with pictures), the reservoir has been completely dry (but for the river channel itself) for some time. When there was still a reservoir of water there, the Russian front line ran along the southern edge of it and the Ukrainian front line ran along the northern edge of it, with all the water in the middle. Now that most of the water is land, who controls it? I can't find any mention of either side moving to occupy it. -sche (talk) 17:13, 17 October 2023 (UTC)

I have been wondering this myself. It seems to me that there is a tacit agreement by both parties to avoid offensive operations near the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant. So they probably have advanced some observer units to the new/old river banks and halted. Also, there's no cover or roads there, so reinforcing the mudplain would just expose more personnel to enemy fire. Abductive (reasoning) 18:56, 17 October 2023 (UTC)

The lakebed may be dry, but it's probably still too soft for heavy equipment to move on. I expect this may change soon as winter comes and the ground freezes over. — Kpalion^(talk) 08:53, 19 October 2023 (UTC)

Letters for US Federal Reserve branches

US banknotes historically included (and the $1 note still includes) a small seal indicating what branch of the Federal Reserve originated them. As you can see on this image, it says "Federal Reserve Bank of/New York New York", with a large "B" in the centre. All New York City notes have a "B", and there's a similar letter-to-branch correlation for each of the other branches.

Aside from banknotes, has the Federal Reserve ever commonly used this system to refer to branches? If so, it might not anymore; its website uses numbers to refer to the branches, and its description page for the New York branch doesn't have any appearances of "B", except mentioning how its trustees are grouped into Classes A, B, and C. Nyttend (talk) 20:00, 17 October 2023 (UTC)

User:Nyttend, I think "A" is Boston, "B" is New York, and "C" is Philadelphia. Georgia guy (talk) 20:06, 17 October 2023 (UTC)

...and D is Cleveland, Cincinnati, and Pittsburgh. But, why are they called the "Cincinnati branch" and "Pittsburgh branch" of the "Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland"?? Why can't they simply be called the "Federal Reserve Bank of Cincinnati" and "Federal Reserve Bank of Pittsburgh"?? Georgia guy (talk) 20:11, 17 October 2023 (UTC)

Understood, but again, other than on banknotes, have these letters routinely been used for these branches? Nyttend (talk) 20:35, 17 October 2023 (UTC)

The Federal Reserve regards those letters as part of its serial numbering system. If you look at higher denomination bills, that letter is in the second position but not on the seal. The Fed uses data on the bills shredded at each reserve to request new replacement bills be printed by the Bureau of Engraving and Printing. So "B" (New York) and "L" (San Francisco) have way more bills printed with their letters than, for instance, "I" (Minneapolis). The Fed still makes an effort to ship the new bills to the correct branch. Abductive (reasoning) 21:37, 17 October 2023 (UTC)

"The Federal Reserve officially identifies Districts by number and by Reserve Bank city (shown on both pages) as well as by letter (shown on the facing page)."^[1] The "facing page" is actually the overleaf page 14. The same information is supplied in that publication in a list, whole stating, "The Federal Reserve Districts are listed below along with their identifying letter and number. These are used on Federal Reserve Notes to identify the issuing bank for each note."^[2] The number and the letter are shown together on the obverse of the one-dollar bill. I have not found an indication that they have been used for any other purpose than for identifying the issuing bank on banknotes. Note that in this context "branch" is not the same as "bank"; most of the Reserve Banks have several branches.  --Lambiam 07:15, 19 October 2023 (UTC)