I think its new-ness bias and a related content bias and a popularity
bias rather than primarily a gender bias. Theres loads of new work
published all the time. Lots of it will not merit a Wikipedia article, just
as many novels by the male contemporaries of Clive Cussler dont get
Wikipedia articles either. Novels that have been around for years will have
had lots of opportunity for 3rd parties to talk about them to establish
notability. New novels have a harder job to establish notability because
they have been around for a shorter period of time for others to write about
them.
At the time the notability tag was added to the October article, there
wasnt a whole lot of content in the article. There was no mention of any
award. There were 2 cited sources, one of which was an interview with the
author. The publisher of October (The New Press) doesnt have a Wikipedia
article. And the only link to the October article is from the Zoe Wicomb
article which probably deserves a notability tag itself (based on the
citations, not the authors evident merits). The other Zoe Wicomb novels
dont have a Wikipedia article either (they are visibly red-linked on the
Zoe Wicomb article) and two of their publishers (Kwela and Umuzi) dont have
Wikipedia articles. One work was published by Virago Press which does have a
Wikipedia article though. If you look at it from the point of view of
someone who has never heard of Zoe Wicomb, it seems a notability tag for the
October article was not unreasonable; the evidence of notability of both the
author and her works and her publishers (as currently shown on Wikipedia)
looks pretty flimsy. I think if the Zoe Wicomb article was better
fleshed-out and there were articles about her other novels and her
publishers, the notability of her most recent novel would be more
self-evident. I suspect this in itself a form of bias; Ill call it related
content bias. That is, the presence of related content on Wikipedia
provides its own evidence of notability. Personally I often check the What
links here as a notability test if lots of other articles have previously
had red-links to this topic, it suggests that an article on this topic is
indeed needed (noting that needed is not necessarily the same as notable
but personally I think its a good reason for any articles existence).
I think comparisons with Clive Cussler are inappropriate. Whatever anyone
might think about his works (I am not a fan myself), its hard to deny that
hes an extremely popular author. Wikipedia readers would expect to find
Wikipedia articles about him and his works. An equally popular (probably
more popular) female author is J. K. Rowling; I note her very recent book
(under the Robert Galbraith pseudonym) The Silkworm got a Wikipedia
article very quickly (without a lot of citations but with obvious
notability weve all heard of J K Rowling). Zoe Wicomb isnt in the same
league for obvious notability as Cussler and Rowling. Ive never heard of
Zoe Wicomb until this thread but, to make it a fair test, I looked in my
local public library current collection: 384,380 works in total, 130 works
by Clive Cussler, 105 for J K Rowling, none whatsoever for Zoe Wicomb (they
did have You cant get lost in Cape Town previously, I guess it has since
been de-acquisitioned). (The count of work here include alternate formats:
book/e-book/audio-book but not physical copies, if anyone is wondering). So
I suspect the different treatment of Clive Cussler and Zoe Wicomb on
Wikipedia may reflect a popularity bias too.
I am not denying that we have gender bias issues on Wikipedia but I think in
this particular case I think there are definitely a number of other
considerations in play.
Kerry
_
From: gendergap-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org
[mailto:gendergap-boun...@lists.wikimedia.org] On Behalf Of Kathleen McCook
Sent: Tuesday, 22 July 2014 11:34 PM
To: Addressing gender equity and exploring ways to increase the
participationof women within Wikimedia projects.
Subject: [Gendergap] Zoë Wicomb or Clive Cussler?
Thank you. But I do not believe these Guidelines are used fairly when it
comes to author's gender. Again..why would every novel by Clive Cussler get
its own page but there be a notability query about one by Zoë Wicomb??
This seems to me pure gender bias.
On Tue, Jul 22, 2014 at 9:20 AM, Nathan nawr...@gmail.com wrote:
On Tue, Jul 22, 2014 at 8:54 AM, Kathleen McCook klmcc...@gmail.com wrote:
I took off the scheduled for deletion notice or maybe it was lack of
notability he put up. I couldn't bear. I am fearful he will put it back.
This is the issue--how can a male editor decide a woman's novel is not
notable. on what basis? On what basis in Clive Cussler notable?
Hi Kathleen, in answer to your question, the notability guideline is the
basis by which both male and female editors should assess articles. You can
find it here:
