Talk:Abdallah Marrash

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Syria Start‑class Mid‑importance

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Overlinking[edit]

WP:OVERLINKING is part of the linking guideline. It states

Unless a term is particularly relevant to the context in the article, the following are not usually linked:

Everyday words understood by most readers in context
The names of major geographic features, locations (e.g. United States, London, New York City, France, Berlin...), languages, nationalities (e.g. English, British, American, French, German...) and religions (e.g. Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism...)
Common occupations

It is not clear to me how it is particularly relevant to the context in the article to link Syrian people and Syria, which did not exist at the time of this subject. The latter is clearly a major geographic location and the former is a common term. So please explain how linking those terms helps me to understand Marrash. And do ping me since I am not watching this article. Walter Görlitz (talk) 19:33, 6 June 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Pinging ‎Walter Görlitz, you're supposed to wait and discuss and, especially not revert to your new edit; as is explained in WP:BRD. The above overlink guidelines mention no major geographic features, and NYC is mentioned, however if you look at the POTUS article, Queens, New York is linked and so is NYC itself. In the article about Dwight Eisenhower, his Lutheran religion is linked. In the article about Marrash, I think it's informative for the reader to contrast Ottoman Syria with the modern day state. Canada and the US are indeed major geographic nations, however very few people know where Syria is even located; that is the overall guiding logic behind linking it to the article. My philosophy on WP is not to be reductive. Moreover, to your point about "Syria" not existing at the time, the current borders did not exist at the time, but the geographic concept did (in Arabic known as blaad al sham) and so did Syrian nationalism which is closely linked in time to the nascent forms of nationalism that came about following the early 18th century Napoleonic invasions of other European nations (early 1800s). (EX:When the Americans founded the American university in Beirut in 1866, they first called it the "Syrian Protestant College".)

Anyways, back to the point of overlinking, there's seems to be a lot of cherry-picking, in that, in the mate article, you had no qualms about the links to Southern Brazil, which is obviously very relevant; however how is the number one (nation) importer of mate not relevant to mate either? Now, I concede that France is not relevant to Marrash himself, but the link to the Arabic-speaking countries that were reading Marrash's material is relevant to subject himself, it also provides context to readers about the region Marrash hails from George Al-Shami (talk) 20:40, 6 June 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not supposed to wait and discuss. You're supposed to read the guidelines and not get into an edit war over this. I'm sorry you think there's cherry-picking. I simply run a script and it excludes countries. Southern Brazil is not listed in this article, so you're bringing in issues from another article. If you want, I can get rid of it in that article as well. You have still failed to make the case as to why linking a nation that did not exist at the time that Marrash lived is important. I don't need to know about the country to understand that the subject is a writer. If however that subject is recognized as the national writer in a specific genre for that country, that would likely be a different issue. Walter Görlitz (talk) 22:24, 6 June 2017 (UTC)[reply]