Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/British silent horror

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The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was no consensus. The discussion has gone on for three weeks, and at present there is no clear consensus for deletion although there are legitimate concerns as to whether the topic deserves a separate article. At present the article does have some sourcing, but the scope is limited by nationality, genre and "silent", making for a very specialized topic. But there are no obvious policy violations to make me call a deletion here when there are clearly good faith calls to keep. Sjakkalle (Check!) 15:00, 26 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

British silent horror

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British silent horror (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log · Stats)
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PRODed for being a violation of WP:NOTESSAY - subsequently de-PRODed by another person other than the author but with no significant improvements made. — Matthew Wong (at PMA), 15:04, 3 December 2018 (UTC) striking confirmed, blocked sockpuppet Atlantic306 (talk) 20:47, 22 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Film-related deletion discussions. Thanks, L3X1 ◊distænt write◊ 15:42, 3 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This discussion has been included in the list of United Kingdom-related deletion discussions. Thanks, L3X1 ◊distænt write◊ 15:42, 3 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This discussion has been included in the list of England-related deletion discussions. Thanks, L3X1 ◊distænt write◊ 15:42, 3 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
We can't judge articles by the sources they use though, only by the relevance of the citations to them, and their relevance to the article. This is looking very weak. Andy Dingley (talk) 18:20, 3 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • We're not here to review and rate articles – such peer-review takes place at WP:PR; WP:GA; &c. The article is obviously a weak start on the topic but it's our clear policy that that's fine: "Perfection is not required: Wikipedia is a work in progress. Collaborative editing means that incomplete or poorly written first drafts can evolve over time into excellent articles. Even poor articles, if they can be improved, are welcome." Our job at AfD is to determine whether deletion is appropriate and for that, we need a reason to delete. Poor quality is not a reason to delete; it's a reason to improve. Andrew D. (talk) 18:31, 3 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • We don't need to review it, the article creator needs to demonstrate notability. It's all too easy to sprinkle an article with uncited, but unimpeachable, sources – yet unless they're used and relevant to the topic, they don't help to support that topic. Andy Dingley (talk) 20:33, 3 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • I gotta say, I agree completely with Dingley here, and find Davidson's apparent lack of healthy editorial skepticism quite concerning. Granted, I don't think he actually believes it's okay for a nonsense article to throw on the names of a bunch of "sources" without actually using them as sources, and this appears to just be an act (it's an act I've seen play out in a number of other AFDs previously), but still. It's really difficult to discuss content when AGF says we should assume other editors are being sincere if they don't say they're playing devil's advocate or anything like that, but assuming the other person is being sincere also necessitates assuming they have extremely low standards for Wikipedia content. Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 10:50, 4 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep Poor article with plenty of sources fails to make appropriate use of them in order to make its point. But that's not enough to make me want to delete this. There are plenty of national film genres where a group of films from a narrow period are seen as particularly significant (German Expressionist film being the obvious comparison), and I can't exclude this topic as one quite so easily. Andy Dingley (talk) 18:06, 3 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment: While the first source (Offscreen) is one that validates this cross-categorization of three topics (British film, horror film, and silent film), I am hard-pressed to find this validation in the other sources. We do not have cross-categorization articles of any two topics (e.g., British silent film, silent horror film, or British horror film), so this seems borderline against WP:DIRECTORY #6, "Cross-categories such as these are not considered a sufficient basis for creating an article, unless the intersection of those categories is in some way a culturally significant phenomenon." I am aware that this article is not a list, but I think the same logic can apply to prose articles. Considering that the remaining sources are not actually used in the article, I cannot tell if they truly indicate that this cross-categorization is culturally significant any more than if it was a section in a higher-level cross-categorized article. Erik (talk | contrib) (ping me) 19:01, 3 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Agreed. I'm inclined to delete. Reading what we do have here more carefully, I see this as just such an arbitrarily chosen intersection, not something that's described in one of the sources as a notable grouping. Andy Dingley (talk) 20:15, 3 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Overcategorization is only a reason to delete for categories. Applying this to articles is a category error (pun intentional). With articles, in such a case, we would prefer to merge to a broader topic, per WP:ATD, WP:PRESERVE, WP:OVERLAP. Andrew D. (talk) 21:38, 3 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • It's not a question of overcategorization, it's about treating a narrow categorization as if it's a notable category intersection. That requires some external source to have also identified that same intersection, and described it as notable. Andy Dingley (talk) 21:46, 3 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • There is no higher-level cross-categorization article to merge to. That's why this narrow topic is a question mark. While the Offscreen source counts toward notability, it is definitely not clear from the article body whether the other sources actually explore this topic other than tangentially. Considering that this was written by a student editor, it's possible that this is an essay that mixes the first source with other sources that do not actually comment directly on this topic. Erik (talk | contrib) (ping me) 22:03, 3 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete OR mess, nothing apparently worth keeping, and, at least according to my understanding, the history of the genre classification "horror" makes the very concept of this article problematic, since (virtually?) no films were billed this way on initial release until much later, and so any Wikipedia article on the subject would need to be a lot more careful with citation of secondary sources, and clarification of what is meant by the "British silent horror", than this one is. It borders on WP:NOTCLEANUP but the writing style of the article is also pretty abysmal: I find the no-doubt-accidental reference to lesbianism (and anachronistic reference to gay marriage) amusing, but if that's not a reason to delete the article it's certainly not a reason to keep it. Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 00:33, 4 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
(As an aside, I find the above back-and-forth between Andy D. and Andy D. to be almost as amusing. Not because of the content, as I haven't read it yet, but just because the usernames are similar. Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 00:35, 4 December 2018 (UTC) )[reply]
  • Delete. There is is no evidence here or at the article that British silent horror represents a "culturally significant phenomenon" as permitted by WP:NOTDIRECTORY. Just compare the google hits for it to that for anime and manga (which can be described in simple terms as Japanese animation), which does qualify as a body of work with a unique identity and is subject to wide coverage. Betty Logan (talk) 01:11, 4 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete per my comment above. Beyond the first source, it does not appear that the other sources are supporting evidence for the notability of this particular cross-categorized topic. My own search engine test does not appear to show this particular cross-categorization as "a culturally significant phenomenon" per WP:NOTDIRECTORY. I'm open to being proven wrong, though. Erik (talk | contrib) (ping me) 14:25, 4 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    Struck out for now per RebeccaGreen's improvements. Would like to see the discussion continue further. Erik (talk | contrib) (ping me) 19:24, 10 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep Well, it looks like this will be deleted. I have been doing some editing on the article by finding the sources listed, and any others, and converting them to inline citations as much as possible. It is clear to me that the themes mentioned in this article come from the sources. I do not know why Wikipedia does not have "cross-categorization articles of any two topics (e.g., British silent film, silent horror film, or British horror film)" as one editor mentioned above - British horror film is most certainly a topic covered at length in sources. Anyway, the non-existence of other articles is not a reason not to have this one. As for the "horror" classification, it was first introduced in 1932, so as a classification did not apply to silent films - but as this article makes clear, the Gothic genre was a strong influence on early British films, and whether it was called Gothic, horror, Gothic horror, etc, it was a genre in films of the time. I see enough coverage in sources of this topic to believe that it is notable. The article could do with much improvement - for example, while, as far as I can see, it is based on the sources listed, with no original research or synthesis, it only mentions 4 films, and there are other titles of which multiple silent versions were made (eg Faust (6 films by 1927), The Red Barn Murder (4 films by 1928)), which should surely be included because of their popularity and significance. RebeccaGreen (talk) 12:32, 10 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • One of my concerns is that this article does only mention 4 films. If that's the whole genre, then I don't think it's a notable genre. Now are there enough films which aren't listed here to make it one? As the article is, that's very hard to judge. If you've read the literature and think it is, then that would help a lot. I'm not a movie buff: I only have a couple of robust cinema books here and scanning those (which are giving some in-depth coverage to European horror in the silent era), they're still not talking about British film in that genre and period. Andy Dingley (talk) 12:52, 10 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • Unfortunately, I am currently relying on what's online. This webpage [1] would no doubt be considered unreliable, but does give an idea of the number produced. I don't currently have access to English Gothic: A Century of Horror Cinema - there is no preview online, but as it was published in 2006, it presumably includes films from 1906 on. It does come up when I search for its title plus "The Beetle", but not for the other films named in this article - so presumably it includes at least one other film produced between 1906 and 1919 (the date of The Beetle). The British Horror Film: From the Silent to the Multiplex mentions that the Maria Marten (Red Barn) murder had been filmed many times before the first sound version, and also discusses the difficulty British filmmakers had in competing with America and Germany - in general, as well as in horror films, another topic that could be included in this article. I haven't yet checked whether I can access the other sources listed in the article - I may be able to, but I'm not sure it's worth it if the article is likely to be deleted. RebeccaGreen (talk) 13:16, 10 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Sandstein 18:03, 10 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment: Pinging FOARP, Hijiri88, Betty Logan. Any thoughts on RebeccaGreen's edits and argument to keep? Erik (talk | contrib) (ping me) 19:24, 10 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
    The silent feature film era was relatively short (15–20 years) so it seems like an arbitrary sub-grouping to me rather than a cohesive body of work that merits its own article. You could pick out any decade of British horror (e.g. 1960s defined by Hammer, 1970s dominated by folk horror) and they all have distinct characteristics. You could probably find interesting well-sourced things to say about any of those eras but they probably belong in a general article about British horror. If you look at the sources they generally discuss British silent horror films within a wider context. Betty Logan (talk) 20:24, 10 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
My take: it's never a good sign when other people express serious concerns about the content of an article misrepresenting its cited sources, and someone comes along and adds a bunch of inline citations without changing the content itself. Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 20:34, 10 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
As the "someone" who came along and added inline citations, I would like to ask what you mean by "it's never a good sign"? A number of editors voted Delete on the basis that this article was original research. I simply checked the sources which are online, found which sources provide the information included in the article, and converted the "Sources" to citations at appropriate points. Anyone could do the same. Anyone could also change the content, if they feel it doesn't represent the sources well. As I have commented above, there are films which are not included in this article which some of the sources mention as being significant, and there are other aspects of the topic which also could be mentioned. It doesn't seem worth doing that if the article is going to be deleted. RebeccaGreen (talk) 23:12, 10 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
I would like to ask what you mean by "it's never a good sign"? Exactly what I said; I said that the article was extremely clumsily written and was not using its sources carefully enough, regardless of what those sources were, and then you came along and added a bunch of inline citations without changing a word of the text, except to fix a spelling error I had pointed out (which implies you read my comment here but chose to ignore the substantial parts of it). The article, if it is to be acceptable as an entry in the mainspace (I coulda sworn entries from new editors needed to be confirmed...) needs to be completely rewritten to actually reflect what the sources say, and to treat them as sources for an encyclopedia article rather than infallible fonts of factual information. Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 23:30, 10 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for your quick reply, though I am no clearer on what you mean. I fixed several spelling errors, typos and punctuation errors. You are, of course, equally free to revise or rewrite the article, or correct any spelling errors you notice. RebeccaGreen (talk) 23:41, 10 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • 'Keep: Well, it's an interesting discussion. I've checked the available sources (which is the criterion for notability, nothing to do with how badly the article is written (no matter how essaylike), nor even with whether the article bothered to cite the sources, check the policy for yourselves) and they aren't too bad, though the five in the References section seem to be most of those that exist. That makes notability a bit marginal - there aren't thousands of reliable sources out there on the topic as a whole: but there are 5 at least, which is surely over the "multiple" threshold (we often assume 3 is about the bare minimum, ridiculous I know). The article's history isn't great, but, again, that's not the criterion. I think we should keep this, though if someone is writing a rather specific article with a slightly broader scope like Silent horror film then I wouldn't oppose a merge. Chiswick Chap (talk) 21:08, 10 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
@Chiswick Chap: I would argue with you that in fact the sources are not there, since of the five only one is specifically about "British silent horror", while the other four are all sections of sources on British horror, and the fact that all of the sources are clearly misrepresented as revealed by even a cursory reading of our article means that, "notability" aside, we can't have this article in the mainspace as is and we don't even know what the sources say about the topic. But actually I too would not be opposed to a merge to British horror film (again, what all the sources are talking about). The problem is I don't see anything there to merge: if you or RebeccaGreen (talk · contribs) or Bmbaker88 (talk · contribs) want to write that article based on the sources, that would be great, but if anything from this article is kept you're going to have to defend it on the talk page anyway. Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 21:54, 10 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
How are the sources clearly misrepresented? You allege this without providing examples, while on my reading, the article can be clearly sourced to the references - and to one which was not included, but which I have added, showing that the ideas in this article are not limited to only one source. RebeccaGreen (talk) 23:23, 10 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
I already elaborated in my initial !vote above (which, again, you appear to have already read) how the very concept of this article is problematic and sources that talk about "British silent horror" either do so in a nuanced fashion (in which case we have to copy their nuance, otherwise we are misrepresenting them) or are not reliable for this content to begin with. The paragraph about literary influences looks like pure OR, and honestly it kinda offends/amuses me as a Dubliner (in fact a Clontarfian) that Bram Stoker's Dracula is called "British", since even when Ireland was part of the UK it was never part of "Britain" (which refers to the island). I believe Tom Shippey addressed this latter concern (the misconception that "Great Britain" and "the United Kingdom" are the same thing, which even most British people share) in one of his lectures on Tolkien and Beowulf, but I don't have the time to watch all five hours of them to find the exact location. I do recommend them to you if you haven't seen them already, mind, as they're pretty amazing. Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 02:02, 11 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
So you think Wikipedia doesn't have enough of an Anglosphere bias? Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear ... RobinCarmody (talk) 00:09, 11 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
I did not allege or imply that at all! Nor am I suggesting that those articles should not exist, merely expressing surprise that they do exist when there are not similar articles for countries like Germany, France or Japan, which all produced significant horror films, as well as the US and the UK. RebeccaGreen (talk) 01:32, 11 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
German horror films of this period are, from my understanding (mostly documentaries and lectures viewed on YouTube, mind...) normally discussed as "German Expressionism", which does in fact have an article (although only a portion of it is about film, and that not exclusively focused on horror. Again, if you want to create articles on the horror cinema of the UK or other European or Anglosphere countries, no one is stopping you, but if you see no problem with the kind of garbage that currently occupies this article and what you would write would be no better, that is a problem. Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 02:06, 11 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
@RebeccaGreen: Betty used the specific wording "silent feature"; the silent film era began when film began (and that exact point in time is actually disputed), but almost no feature films were produced before circa 1915 (The Birth of a Nation is frequently credited with popularizing the form, although I'm not sure what the first was or when). It's this kind of careful nuance that is missing from the article; you're not at fault for that, but you haven't helped it either. Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 02:02, 11 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks, neither have you. RebeccaGreen (talk) 02:17, 11 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Your behaviour is bordering on WP:BLUDGEON if not WP:HARASS at the moment. I only came back because I was pinged and specifically asked to comment on your edits to the article, and now you're just haranguing me for disagreeing with you. I never claimed to have improved the article, since I don't know enough about the topic to "fix" it enough that I would change my opinion on whether it should be deleted/draftified/userfied/redirected/whatevered. Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 02:27, 11 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Randykitty (talk) 12:16, 17 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
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