Template:Did you know nominations/Muthkwey
- The following is an archived discussion of the DYK nomination of the article below. Please do not modify this page. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as this nomination's talk page, the article's talk page or Wikipedia talk:Did you know), unless there is consensus to re-open the discussion at this page. No further edits should be made to this page.
The result was: promoted by Crisco 1492 talk 02:19, 29 November 2024 (UTC)
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Muthkwey
... that məθkʷəy̓ was not harvested or walked over, because oral tradition held that it had grown from the droppings of a two-headed serpent?
- Source: "Another story tells that our ancestors had never seen this plant before, and that they considered it to be sacred because it came from sʔi:łqəy̓ (Musqueam Indian Band, 2011). Our people were not permitted to walk over or harvest it." Sparrow, Corrina (2006). "Reclaiming Spaces Between: Coast Salish Two Spirit Identities and Experiences". Bachelor of Social Work, University of Victoria: 50–51. Retrieved 20 September 2024. "muthkwey come again year come next.year muthkwey. When it was another year, next year then that plant muthkwey spread out when it grew. It bloomed like any other plant. But it was not like any other plant. The old people did not step on it. It was thought sacred. It was from the droppings of the monster, the seelthkey." Suttles, Wayne P. (2004). Musqueam Reference Grammar. Page 545 UBC Press. ISBN 978-0-7748-1002-9. Retrieved 20 September 2024
- Reviewed: Noken system
- Comment:
Will work on the QPQ shortly,thank you to the reviewer in advance! Done the QPQ!
Created by Ornithoptera (talk).
Number of QPQs required: 1. Nominator has 43 past nominations.
Ornithoptera (talk) 23:02, 30 September 2024 (UTC).
- @Ornithoptera: Just a question: is the weird spelling of the subject on purpose? IIRC, non-standard/stylized spellings are discouraged on DYK. Narutolovehinata5 (talk · contributions) 12:22, 2 October 2024 (UTC)
- Hi Narutolovehinata5, the "weird spelling" in question is the Americanist phonetic notation that is used for Indigenous North American languages. Like many terms in the languages of the Pacific Northwest Coast, məθkʷəy̓ is not "romanized" in the traditional sense because they still use Latin characters and contemporary inclusions of the notation are often unedited, such as "ʔálʔal Café" rather than "All-all Cafe" I will provide some examples of such:
- The hən̓q̓əmin̓əm̓ word “məθkʷəy̓” was initially transcribed in English as “grass,” resulting in xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam) People being known as “People of the River Grass.”
- The tall grass is to represent Musqueam, the flowering plant məθkʷəy̓, which grows in the Fraser River estuary. Stories have been passed on from generation to generation that explains how we became known as the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm — People of the məθkʷəy̓ plant.
- The Musqueam people are the people of the məθkʷəy̓, the river grass, and we have stewarded the mouth of the Fraser River since time immemorial.
- The name xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam) relates back to the flowering plant, məθkʷəy̓, which once abundantly grew throughout Musqueam territory.
- The məθkʷəy̓ was described as a saχʷəl, which means “grass” or "plant." It was initially transcribed to English as a grass, and for some time the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm people have been known as “people of the river grass.”
- For further reading, here is a quote from the University of British Columbia on the matter: "In the 1970’s, the Musqueam community began their journey towards language revitalization, and formally adopted the North American Phonetic Alphabet (NAPA). NAPA allows the sounds of hən̓q̓əmin̓əm̓ to be more accurately conveyed in writing. The symbols that may be unfamiliar to you, including ə, q̓, θ, xʷ, and more have corresponding phonetics that you can learn in order to pronounce written hən̓q̓əmin̓əm̓."
- There is no "standard" transliteration, most English language sources refer to the plant as məθkʷəy̓ with no alteration. The article title was based on the one that Wayne Suttles employed in his 2004 Musqueam Reference Grammar, but there are multiple ways to transliterate this term without a standardized form, nor is there much of a need to, as the base of the notation are Latin characters. I thought it would be ideal to use the term with no alteration as many other sources have before. Ornithoptera (talk) 21:04, 3 October 2024 (UTC)
- I see. I was asking because, from what I remember, DYK usually doesn't use non-Latin characters in hooks. I'm pretty sure there was a guideline about it (I think using the language template?) Narutolovehinata5 (talk · contributions) 22:24, 3 October 2024 (UTC)
- To my understanding Narutolovehinata5, the Americanist phonetic notation is (to a degree) the Latin alphabet, and I'm sure there have been instances where letters such as Þ or ð have made their way into DYK before. For the record, I am comfortable with adjusting it if at the end of the day it is in violation of DYK guidelines, but I thought it might be good to have my thoughts on the matter before jumping the gun. I do hope that there isn't a double standard for some non-standard characters from certain languages over others. Ornithoptera (talk) 00:12, 4 October 2024 (UTC)
- I see. I was asking because, from what I remember, DYK usually doesn't use non-Latin characters in hooks. I'm pretty sure there was a guideline about it (I think using the language template?) Narutolovehinata5 (talk · contributions) 22:24, 3 October 2024 (UTC)
Full review needed. BlueMoonset (talk) 05:02, 6 November 2024 (UTC)
Hi @Ornithoptera: this interesting article, created on the 23 September, is new enough, long enough, well-cited, and presentable. QPQ done. Hook short enough and cited. Nice work. My only gripe is that the "Tradition" section doesnt make totally clear the distinction between legend and real history (this is also true, to some extent, of the hook) as per MOS:WAF. I'll also suggest the following ALT, as this seems to be the headline of the story:
- ALT1
... that the identity of the sacred plant məθkʷəy̓ is unknown?
- ALT1
- Best, Tenpop421 (talk) 23:04, 7 November 2024 (UTC)
- Hello Tenpop421, thank you for taking the time to review this article. I have always been wary about using the term "legend" within articles that discuss Indigenous oral traditions. Members of Indigenous communities have been typically cautious of outsiders using terminology that implicates their oral traditions and histories as simply mythological (for various reasons). Corrina Sparrow in her Reclaiming Spaces Between: Coast Salish Two Spirit Identities and Experiences explicitly states: "I will mention; however, that this story is not told as a myth or a legend; it captures an actual encounter with sʔi:łqəy̓ that happened thousands of years ago." I'm wondering if we can preface the original hook with "according to Musqueam oral tradition" instead? If that is not an adequate compromise, I'm amenable to the alternative hook you have provided. Ornithoptera (talk) 03:06, 8 November 2024 (UTC)
- Hi @Ornithoptera: That's a fair point. I have made some edits so that it is flagged in each line that we are referencing oral tradition (rather than, say, contemporary observation). I also removed two sentences from the article - one about a story told about xʷməθkʷəy̓əm and Mink, which Suttles cites to the Charleses, but wld probably require too much context for it to make sentence in the article; another about the Musqueam relating to the plant, which seems to me to be a duplicate of something already mentioned above. Also, in the first hook, I've replaced "because" with "because oral tradition held that", for the same reasons of flagging oral tradition (this, with all respect to Sparrow, is surely myth). Let me know if this is all good with you. Best, Tenpop421 (talk) 15:40, 8 November 2024 (UTC)
- Tenpop421 thank you for the adjustments, everything should check out here on my end. Ornithoptera (talk) 02:54, 9 November 2024 (UTC)
- Hi @Ornithoptera: That's a fair point. I have made some edits so that it is flagged in each line that we are referencing oral tradition (rather than, say, contemporary observation). I also removed two sentences from the article - one about a story told about xʷməθkʷəy̓əm and Mink, which Suttles cites to the Charleses, but wld probably require too much context for it to make sentence in the article; another about the Musqueam relating to the plant, which seems to me to be a duplicate of something already mentioned above. Also, in the first hook, I've replaced "because" with "because oral tradition held that", for the same reasons of flagging oral tradition (this, with all respect to Sparrow, is surely myth). Let me know if this is all good with you. Best, Tenpop421 (talk) 15:40, 8 November 2024 (UTC)
@Ornithoptera, BlueMoonset, Tenpop421, Narutolovehinata5, Crisco 1492, Fram, AirshipJungleman29, and Jlwoodwa: per issues raised at WP:ERRORS (permalink here: [1]) this has been pulled for further consideration. There are issues around transliteration and accessibility. — Amakuru (talk) 23:47, 14 November 2024 (UTC)
- Hi @Ornithoptera: You mentioned above that there is no "standard" transliteration of Americanist phonetic notation. Is there a transliteration we can apply uniformly to the page to make this more readable for the average user? Best, Tenpop421 (talk) 23:15, 15 November 2024 (UTC)
- Hi Tenpop421, it is unfortunate that this nomination has been quite a challenge but I understand the challenges involved. I have given it some thought, and my struggle is that there is no "standard transliteration" because English is not phonetically consistent like the Americanist Phonetic Notation system is, nor would there be a need to transliterate a phonetic system because the intention is that the phonetics give way to a 1-1 character to sound pair. Thus there is no uniform "this symbol equals this sound" because as you know, plenty of letters in English have alternative pronunciations (see the a's in "Australia" for a good example). I used "Muthkwey" primarily because Wayne Suttles used it in his Musqueam Reference Grammar, and because of the fact Wiki did not allow for the characters to be inputted into the article title. However, the typical usage in secondary sources is typically the "untransliterated" version, and there is no usage I can really WP:COMMONNAME to apply it to. The most ideal one is probably Suttles' transliteration because of his work with the Musqueam, but again this isn't universally adopted over məθkʷəy̓. Ornithoptera (talk) 19:22, 16 November 2024 (UTC)
- @Ornithoptera: Yeah, I agree, transliteration seems to be a bit of a pain here. The secondary sources all seem to prefer keeping the American Phonetic Notation, and asking for a transliteration seems rather like asking for a transliteration of the IPA. I think the point raised by the other editors is that we need a transliteration of all the Americanist Phonetic Notation words in this article (xʷməθkʷəy̓əm, mə́cəkʷ, sə̀k̓ʷməy̓, cəlqáma, etc.) per MOS:NOTLATIN. If there's some standard transliteration, we can apply it uniformly; if there isn't, I'm not sure how to proceed (maybe just finding individual transliterations of each word?). Let me know. Best, Tenpop421 (talk) 22:25, 17 November 2024 (UTC)
- Truthfully speaking, this is a very frustrating situation to be held up in. Any transliteration that would be produced here exclusively would probably be a violation of WP:OR, there is just no existing "transliteration" of Americanist Phonetic Notation that exists out there for the reasons mentioned previously. Anything that would be produced here would be without any research or logic applied to it, and I would assume just wind up being original research. Americanist Phonetic Notation, per its own article, *is* Latin, albeit augmented with Greek. Could we insert a lang template, a lot of the words are isolated instances, as a possible solution? The pre-existing English renderings are few and far between, and there is not a strong demand for individual words rather than names, such as sən̓aʔqʷ as Senakw or x̌ʷay̓x̌ʷəy̓ as X̱wáýx̱way. Though in the latter example the name was not as altered for the purposes of that article. Ornithoptera (talk) 02:01, 18 November 2024 (UTC)
- @Ornithoptera: I am inclined to agree with your position here. I haven't been able to turn up anything like a transliteration and the secondary sources (including ones intended for a popular audience!) do not transliterate. However, your average Wikipedia reader probably just can't make sense of a lot of the symbols in Americanist Phonetic Notation, so this does pose a problem for accessibility. I confess that I don't know how to deal with this problem. It seems beyond the scope of a DYK nom. Perhaps a request for comment at WT:MOS may be a better forum? I apologise that this has proved to be a source of frustration. Best, Tenpop421 (talk) 03:47, 18 November 2024 (UTC)
- If you are able to do so Tenpop421, or another individual involved in this process could make a comment, it would be greatly appreciated. I don't have much time on hand to make another discussion and follow up on a timely manner. In terms of accessibility, a lot of the instances are simply examples, "cəlqáma" is a good one, where the context at the end of the day is simply "this word is different from this other word, because the root word is different". Viewing it, even though it is entirely made up of Latin characters (the upside down e is a schwa, a Latin letter!), is not necessary at the end of the day. However, without it would remove a huge chunk of the context, but if it doesn't view correctly, that should be fine regardless. Another example could be found in the Salishan languages article such as
such as ʔux̌ʷ 'goes' and sbiaw 'is a coyote'
. There is no transliteration involved, but it is an example of a word that does not necessitate transliteration since it is simply an example with added context. A good chunk of the words involved in the Muthkwey article are provided with enough context that even if the words don't display, they are provided with (in my view) enough context regardless. Ornithoptera (talk) 05:29, 18 November 2024 (UTC)
- If you are able to do so Tenpop421, or another individual involved in this process could make a comment, it would be greatly appreciated. I don't have much time on hand to make another discussion and follow up on a timely manner. In terms of accessibility, a lot of the instances are simply examples, "cəlqáma" is a good one, where the context at the end of the day is simply "this word is different from this other word, because the root word is different". Viewing it, even though it is entirely made up of Latin characters (the upside down e is a schwa, a Latin letter!), is not necessary at the end of the day. However, without it would remove a huge chunk of the context, but if it doesn't view correctly, that should be fine regardless. Another example could be found in the Salishan languages article such as
- I'm sorry I haven't followed up on this; I've been very busy in my personal life, and I was hoping someone else might intervene with any insight. Absent any consensus about the use of APN or easy way to transliterate it, I want to put my vote in that this DYK go ahead with the ALT
- ALT2: ... that muthkwey was not harvested or walked over, because oral tradition held that it had grown from the droppings of a two-headed serpent?
- Best, Tenpop421 (talk) 20:54, 24 November 2024 (UTC)
- If the spelling "muthkwey" is good enough for the article title, it should be good enough for use in the body. ~~ AirshipJungleman29 (talk) 11:08, 25 November 2024 (UTC)
- @AirshipJungleman29: What do you propose be done about the other APN words? Tenpop421 (talk) 18:19, 25 November 2024 (UTC)
- Tenpop421, per my previous response, citing prior examples, they should probably be retained. Most of the terms are isolated examples. I can understand with the title, but the remainder should probably be retained. Edit, bit of an update but I've left a message on WT:MOS here, hopefully that can provide some clarity... Ornithoptera (talk) 19:29, 25 November 2024 (UTC)
- If they are singular usages to highlight etymology/definitions, as Ornithoptera says, they can be kept in the article. ~~ AirshipJungleman29 (talk) 20:43, 25 November 2024 (UTC)
- @AirshipJungleman29: What do you propose be done about the other APN words? Tenpop421 (talk) 18:19, 25 November 2024 (UTC)
- If the spelling "muthkwey" is good enough for the article title, it should be good enough for use in the body. ~~ AirshipJungleman29 (talk) 11:08, 25 November 2024 (UTC)