Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Australia/Conventions/Indigenous draft

Capitalisation

Thanks for your additional work on this, Poketama and Mitch Ames. I don't have a lot of spare time or energy to spend on this just at the moment owing to off-wiki pressures, but this could be a useful time to discuss what to do about the capitalisation issue. MOS:CAPS doesn't really cater for exceptions based on cultural respect, and I know there's a mix of capitals for Traditional Owners, for example across different articles. If we are to establish our own standard then there needs to be agreement among most interested Australian editors, and at some point this style guide should be upgraded out of its draft status so that it can be referred to on other style guide pages (although I'm not sure exactly how this is done - I did start looking into it years ago but gave up owing to apparent lack of interest by other editors). Laterthanyouthink (talk) 02:17, 21 May 2023 (UTC)

MOS:CAPS doesn't really cater for exceptions based on cultural respect — And so it shouldn't. Capitalisation is per English language rules, not to show respect or "importance or specialness of something".

From memory (of previous discussions on articles) "traditional owners" is not generally capitalised in sources (although some do), and by any reasonable definition it is not a proper noun - it does not identify "a single entity" - so ought not be capitalised. (In fact to treat it as a proper noun, identifying a single entity, incorrectly and potentially offensively implies that there is a single homogeneous group of such owners, which we know not to be the case.)

If we are to establish our own standard ... — which ought not contradict MOS ...

... at some point this style guide should be upgraded ... (although I'm not sure exactly how this is done — Examples of other similar guides, which might help:

• Category:Wikipedia Manual of Style (regional)
• Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Contents#Country-, region- and language-specific

Mitch Ames (talk) 07:51, 21 May 2023 (UTC)

Please bear with me as I'm new to Wikipedia editing and this is slightly unrelated but I've found that the word 'Indigenous' is inconsistently capitalised across Wikipedia articles - should there not be a standard of capitalising Indigenous, just as there's the standard of capitalising Aboriginal?

Also, I'd argue that while yes capitalisation is per English language rules, it shouldn't also abide by colonial concepts, although of course with the wording of 'Traditional Owners' there doesn't seem to be consensus surrounding capitalisation, whereas capitalising Indigenous is near-universally agreed upon. I definitely agree that capitalising TOs can be homogenising especially when used as a general/non-specific term, but it's also the most common/accepted way I've seen the term written...

As an aside: I don't think we/Wikipedia shouldn't reinforce white colonial standards as the 'norm' and have cultural protocols as 'exceptional' - Indigenous epistemologies should be fairly and equally represented in the English language/on English Wikipedia, though of course the English language very occasionally fails to capture Indigenous concepts in its terminology. If this isn't in the scope of Wikipedia/Wikipedia's interests, maybe it should be, especially as English Wikipedia (its sources, articles, editors etc.) are majority white/non-Indigenous?

This is just my perspective as a (new) Wikipedia editor & Aboriginal person myself :) AnElectricShangriLa (talk) 05:56, 22 May 2023 (UTC)

Hi AnElectricShangriLa and thanks for your contribution to the discussion.

It is mainly in Australia that the word Indigenous is capitalised when referring to people - for other uses around the world, and when referring to other indigenous things such as languages or plants, it is not capitalised. This is one of the things I was trying to address when I started on this draft a few years ago (when I was a pretty new editor).

I've added some context to the section on Capitalisation (which is fairly new) and hoping it will lead to further discussion and consensus as to what should be included there.

Yes, agree about reinforcing white colonial standards, and this is a big topic and sometimes hard to address, especially without the minority voices represented. I am not sure if there is a single project or forum to address this on Wikipedia, but others may know more about what may be being done in this space. There are so many topics concerning Aboriginal people (and Australia in general actually) that are inadequately covered simply because we don't have enough editors (compared with, say the UK or US). Laterthanyouthink (talk) 12:10, 22 May 2023 (UTC)

Hi all, very new editor here. Trying to bring together an article about a young boy brought to the UK in the 1850s. Looking at how Wikipedia might incorporate Acknowledgement of country and warnings for material related to deceased persons. Wondering if you have seen this used on any pages? Ideally I would not refer to the young man repeatedly by the name he was given by his 'protector' but I'm not sure 'this child' will be accepted instead. Does anyone know where this might be discussed? In a wider matter, there is also a whole vocabularly around 'research' that is problematic to those who have been subject to being studied. Someone must be addressing this? Any thoughts gratefully received. Queenday23 (talk) 13:31, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

"Acknowledgement of country" is not something that belongs in a general article about a person.

"Warnings for material related to deceased persons" are not included in articles, per WP:DISC, WP:NOTCENSORED, WP:OM.

Ideally I would not refer to the young man repeatedly by the name he was given by his 'protector' but I'm not sure 'this child' will be accepted instead. — Generally use a name or pronoun, not "this child", but it may depend on context. If the boy has a known Indigenous name, that could be used.

If there's a draft you could point us to, that would probably help. Mitch Ames (talk) 14:44, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

Thank you, that is useful. His Indigenous name is lost. Working on the draft and would be grateful for thoughts when I get closer to shaping it up. Queenday23 (talk) 14:47, 12 January 2024 (UTC)