Forum:Birthplace and nationality

Forums: Index > The Wizengamot > Birthplace and nationality

I'm posting this topic ina neutral forum so that everyone has the opportunity to discuss. Recently, there was a source of contention where an interview says they serve the UK and Ireland. This seems to make it as not necessarily say a person has to be born in the uK nor has to be British national, but at least be living there. I wanna hear your thoughts. MechQueste 12:21, June 21, 2020 (UTC)

In real-life British nationality law: Living in Britannia doesn't require to be born in it. If a child was born outside the UK, the child will get British citizenship if at the time of the child’s birth either mother or father is a British citizen.

Fleur Delacour was born in France but she become British after she moved to Britain and married Bill Weasley. --RogueOwner (talk) 13:08, June 21, 2020 (UTC)

Do you have a source that proves Fleur was ever granted british citizenship? Sirius (talk) 17:37, June 21, 2020 (UTC)

Well, Fleur Delacour is in English individuals category. --RogueOwner (talk) 18:03, June 21, 2020 (UTC)

That's most likely an error. You don't just become English by marrying an English person. Sirius (talk) 18:09, June 21, 2020 (UTC)

Actually, the contention was about another user putting Graham Montague in British individuals category. But then I removed him from that category because there's no any proof of him being British and since Hogwarts serves both, British and Irish, there's as much percents chance him to be Irish as British. --RogueOwner (talk) 18:49, June 21, 2020 (UTC)

Given that Hogwarts serves Britain and Ireland, it would seem that we need another category above "British individuals" that covers these individuals. Although not ever fully defined, Rowling's statement seems to indicate that Hogwarts serves all of Britain and Ireland, so basically the United Kingdom right before 1922. However we don't really know what national boundaries Hogwarts follows, so maybe the parent category should be "British Isles individuals" or another more general term for the geographic area involved. Thoughts? --Ironyak1 (talk) 15:28, June 26, 2020 (UTC)

I think we need a new term too. I think "British Isles individuals" works, and any other term I could think of just basically says the same thing in a slightly different way. We could consider using "British Isles inhabitants". Anyone attending Hogwarts has to live in Britain for nearly a year unless it's the holidays, and it doesn't rule out that they can still be British or Irish too. - Kates39 (talk) 12:28, June 27, 2020 (UTC)

Perhaps it's simplest to call it "British or Irish individuals" as that aligns exactly with the wording Rowling used as well as the {{GBorIE}} template we apply to all Hogwarts students, and fits well and consistent as a child of Category:Individuals by nationality and parent of both Category:British individuals and Category:Irish individuals in the category tree.

Yeah, simple seems to be best here IMHO - can anyone see problems with this approach? Thanks --Ironyak1 (talk) 14:53, June 27, 2020 (UTC)

I think that's definitely the simplest approach and wording. It's best to keep it close to how Rowling has worded it. So, I think it's fine to go and ahead to do that.

I have found a second issue by looking in those categories which I feel having a "British or Irish individuals" one could solve too. Irish people are not British unless they are Northern Irish. Northern Irish are both Irish and British. But we have put "Irish individuals" in the "British individuals" category and it's inaccurate. So I think taking it out and keeping it separate in a new category will sort that out too. - Kates39 (talk) 15:58, June 27, 2020 (UTC)

Good catch about the current category hierarchy. Given Hogwarts founding date, I've always interpreted "Hogwarts just serves Britain and Ireland" to likely mean the geographic islands of Britain and Ireland, regardless of the national borders that have changed over the millennia. But this is just my head canon on the issue as Rowling has never explained more fully and we've been left to speculate. Arranging the categories this way avoids all those somewhat contentious issues.

I'll leave this up for a day and see if anyone else has thoughts or concerns. Thanks as always for your input! Cheers --Ironyak1 (talk) 16:12, June 27, 2020 (UTC)

Is the plan to delete the existing separate Irish individuals and British individuals categories and merge them into one? Yak said "another category above "British individuals"", and what I understand from that is that the existing Irish and British cats will continue to exist as subcategories of the new category, with individuals also in the new category but not in those two solely being those of unknown nationality within the British Isles.

The issue Kate mentioned could be resolved by changing the criteria for inclusion in Category:Irish individuals from "individuals from the island of Ireland" to "individuals from (specifically) the Republic of Ireland". Yes, Northern Irish people are Irish, but only in the same way as Spanish people are Iberian. Northern Irish people's nationality is British, because that is the demonym of the United Kingdom. - MrSiriusBlack Talk 16:17, June 27, 2020 (UTC)

For clarity, the idea is to create a new "British or Irish individuals" category that can be used for those people we know attended Hogwarts, but we don't know if they were British or Irish. There will still be separate categories for "British individuals" and "Irish individuals" for those individuals where it is known for sure, such as Hermione Granger's father (British) and Seamus Finnigan (Irish).

The trouble with trying to sort out what exactly Ireland means in the Rowling universe is that we know the British Ministry of Magic delegation is there for the 1994 Quidditch World Cup between Ireland and Bulgaria, and there has been no canon mention of a Irish Ministry of Magic. Whether this just means it's North Ireland covered by the British MoM, or if the Wizarding World doesn't recognize the separation between North Ireland and The Republic of Ireland, or if the separation never happened in the Rowling universe is all unclear. All we know for sure is there is some region known as Ireland and that Hogwarts serves it and a region known as Britain. Hope that helps --Ironyak1 (talk) 16:53, June 27, 2020 (UTC)

I just went through the "Irish individuals" category and we don't know of any Northern Irish characters, and we don't know if everyone was from the Republic of Ireland. So we can't have two separate sub-categories yet. Northern Irish are entitled to be British and Irish by nationality. They don't have to be just one. If we had a Northern Irish character, we could create a "Northern Irish individuals" category and put it in both British individuals and Irish individuals.

However, Republic of Ireland object to being British and it's inaccurate to just put Irish individuals in British individuals. Keeping the categories separate for now will avoid any controversial issues surrounding a complicated situation that loads of people find confusing. And it's unclear what Rowling intends by Britain and Ireland in the Wizarding World. - Kates39 (talk) 17:03, June 27, 2020 (UTC)

I think the original intention was that British individuals encompassed people from the entirety of the British Isles and not just "British" as in "someone from the United Kingdom" (as you can see in the category tree that it is a parent to English individuals, Welsh individuals, Scottish individuals, and Irish individuals), since there doesn't seem to be a proper term for it.

No matter the specifics of the wizarding polity are not fully known (which can have substantial differences to their Muggle counterparts -- i.e. wizarding U.S. predating the actual U.S. by about a century; Abyssinia and Assyria still being a thing in some way, shape or form, etc.) it does seem that Ireland is a single entity and under the jurisdiction of the British Ministry of Magic (the British and Irish Quidditch League, headquartered in the Ministry in London, has a team from Ballycastle in Northern Ireland and a team from Kenmare in the Republic of Ireland).

However, I can see how using "British" this way is potentially problematic and might lead to confusion. The "British and Irish individuals" solution might be the simpler fix, and it probably is the one that sticks more closely to canon terms (British and Irish Quidditch League, Dragon Species of Great Britain and Ireland, "Hogwarts just serves Britain and Ireland", etc.) -- Seth Cooper owl post! 00:32, June 28, 2020 (UTC)

I always forget the Ballycastle / Kenmare evidence for a united Ireland when this topic is raised. I should have learned this by now, so thanks, once again, for the schooling old-timer ;)

However a point of contention about the conjunction in the new category. While the new category is composed of "British AND Irish individuals", the characters in question are "British OR Irish individuals" which is how it should appear on the articles I would posit, as no single individual is a "British and Irish individual". Thoughts on this? Gold star or a Black Quill effort? --Ironyak1 (talk) 10:25, June 28, 2020 (UTC)

I'd argue "and" would be more correct in the (still presumable, but likely) event that the entirety of the British Isles are a single wizarding political entity? In the same way that strictly speaking, some people are Bosnians and Herzegovinians. -- Seth Cooper owl post! 17:00, June 29, 2020 (UTC)

People who are from mainland Great Britain, for example, are not British AND Irish, they are just British, which is why I sit against having "and" in the name of the new category.

Is the plan to have the new category be parent to British, Irish, Welsh, Scottish and English cats, plus individuals of unknown origin within the British Isles? In other words, the characters with known nationalities staying in the categories they are currently in, rather than everyone moving to the new category as one? - MrSiriusBlack Talk 17:18, June 29, 2020 (UTC)

An easier option would be simply to rename Category:British individuals to Category:British Isles individuals, and let that be that. - MrSiriusBlack Talk 17:26, June 29, 2020 (UTC)

As I understand it, I don't think that last suggestion would work as we know individuals that live specifically on the island of Britain (like Hermione Granger's father), so just renaming it would take a category that is more specific and makes it more general. Instead, we need both a "British individuals" category and a category for those that all we know is they live on either Britain or Ireland, as they attended Hogwarts. Seth's suggestion is that in the Wizarding World there appears to be one single governing area "Britain and Ireland" (i.e. Britain&Ireland) so these people would be "British and Irish individuals". Hope that helps - the terminology is tricky. Cheers --Ironyak1 (talk) 17:43, June 29, 2020 (UTC)

Hermione Granger's father would fit into Category:English individuals. Unless what you mean is that the Eng, Ire, Welsh & Scot cats should be deleted? - MrSiriusBlack Talk 17:46, June 29, 2020 (UTC)

Sorry I just grabbed an example currently in Category:British individuals without considering the details. An article should always have the most specific category for that topic, so yes, Hermione Granger's father should have Category:English individuals instead, which is a child of Category:British individuals, which would be a child of this new category "British and Irish individuals". The categories are arranged in a parent-child tree, so when you assign a category to an article it inherits all the parent categories, as in this example, all "English individuals", "Welsh individuals", & "Scottish individuals" are by definition "British Individuals". This new "British and Irish individuals" would be for those that we don't know anything more specific than they are from the British / Irish area administered by the Ministry of Magic and served by Hogwarts. Sincerely hoping this is helping - the parent-child hierarchy of the categorization system can be a bit of a maze at times. Cheers --Ironyak1 (talk) 17:59, June 29, 2020 (UTC)

My question, in that case, is this: What is the difference between criteria for inclusion in the existing Category:British individuals and in the new category? - MrSiriusBlack Talk 18:03, June 29, 2020 (UTC)

There is the possibility that we know a character "hails from the island of Britain" but nothing more, so we can't put them in "English", "Welsh", or "Scottish individuals", only in "British individuals" whereas we have lots of individuals that all we know is they attended Hogwarts and are "British or Irish" (we have a template {{GBorIE}} for this as it is so common), so they would be in this new "British and Irish individuals".

I agree with Seth's assertion that for Hogwarts & the Ministry there appears to be a "Britain and Ireland" region, but I am worried given the real-world contention possible from an individual being called "British and Irish". Is there another term like "British / Irish individuals" or such that might work in a similar manner but avoid the real world controversy so we don't have to have this whole explanation about wizarding-world jurisdictions every time someone sees "British and Irish individual" on one the hundreds of affected articles and takes offense or changes it? Cheers --Ironyak1 (talk) 18:20, June 29, 2020 (UTC)

I'd go with something along the lines of 'British Isles individuals', 'British Isles natives' or 'British Isles-native individuals', something like that - MrSiriusBlack Talk 18:36, June 29, 2020 (UTC)

I'm not opposed to a "British Isles individuals" category, but I still think "British or Irish individuals" sounds fine too. It should be one of those two. I wouldn't use "British and Irish individuals" because in that context it could still sound like individuals are both and that doesn't solve the issue.

Rowling's depiction of Britain and Ireland has been confusing. She always phrases it geographically, and yet she appears to put Ireland under the British Ministry of Magic. But in Quidditch Through the Ages, she specifically says Ballycastle Bats are "Northern Ireland's" celebrated team. So Northern Ireland does exist in the wizarding world, but they don't appear to have their own national team. She doesn't detail Ireland in the wizarding world any further than that. So I feel when we specifically discuss nationality, we need to keep British and Irish separate. - Kates39 (talk) 21:18, June 29, 2020 (UTC)

Similarly, the 1994 Quidditch World Cup final was between Bulgaria and Ireland, so Ireland was at least distinct from Britain in that regard, although that doesn't necessarily mean anything as there was also English, Welsh and Scottish national teams at that World Cup - MrSiriusBlack Talk 21:37, June 29, 2020 (UTC)

My concern with "British Isles individuals" is that the term "British Isles" does not appear anywhere in the canon texts although we do have Category:British Isles that discusses some of these difficulties. The lack of its use in canon isn't an automatic disqualifier of course, more just a warning bell to me that the real world and Rowling world may differ on the topic. As a slight aside "United Kingdom" was used just once, back in History of the Quidditch World Cup so that is canonically a thing, although it isn't real clear what it designates, and we are redirecting it to Great Britain so...

Not to sound biased (note the single "s" Kates39 :) but it seems like "British or Irish individuals" most closely matches canon terms and avoids the real-world controversy over deeming someone a "British and Irish individual". I'm not saying it has to be the "OR" option but if you really want "British and Irish" Seth, I will be sure to send all the edit-warring and complaints to your Talk page (just joking, not joking ;) My head hurts --Ironyak1 (talk) 23:03, June 29, 2020 (UTC)

To be honest, while I do prefer and since it implies the same thing all available canon seems to imply (though it's frustratingly left unsaid), I don't feel strongly against or (in a real-world context, I'd say or, as in the inclusive logical disjunction, is actually the only correct option -- sorry, nerding out.)

I can see the appeal of "British Isles", since that would also include individuals from places that technically are neither Britain nor Ireland (like the Hebrides, Hermetray, or the Isle of Skye -- and indeed, some other fictional islands like the Isle of Drear, or Avalon). Perhaps now that we're tweaking it, we ought to include into the category tree an upper-level, less-specific category called "British Isles individuals"? This is what I'm proposing, anyway:

British Isles individuals (e.g. Morgan le Fay)
1. British or Irish individuals (e.g. Cassius Warrington)
  1. British individuals (can't think off the top of my head of a character singled out as "non-Irish" -- this could either be done away with or kept as a meta category?)
    1. English individuals (e.g. Harry Potter)
    2. Welsh individuals (e.g. Celestina Warbeck)
    3. Scottish individuals (e.g. Minerva McGonagall)
  2. Irish individuals (i.e. people from the entirety of Hibernia; e.g. Seamus Finnigan)
    1. (if there ever is a need -- currently there doesn't seem to be -- this would include the sub-cats "Republic of Ireland individuals" and "Northern Irish individuals")

The difference between "British Isles individuals" and "British or Irish individuals" might be subtle enough to render it useless, mind you. Thoughts? -- Seth Cooper owl post! 18:39, June 30, 2020 (UTC)

I like the completeness of this arrangement (and the avoidance of "and" :) As most individuals are in "British individuals" currently, as they are moved into their more or less specific category, I'm guessing there will be at least a few left over to justify keeping the category but can discuss again "when" we get there ;)

My only remaining question is for people in the "British Isles individuals" category what is the entry for the infobox |nationality= field? British Islanders? Given this I'm not sure there is a real-world answer but we'll need something to put there. Thanks for the hard work and clear examples in finding this possible solution! Cheers --Ironyak1 (talk) 19:01, June 30, 2020 (UTC)

My only disagreement with these latest messages is about the necessity of a British Isles individuals cat separate from British or Irish. Unless there is someone somewhere in Potterverse history who hails from the Isle of Man (the only region of the British Isles actually autonomous from the UK and Ireland in the real-world), then the only nationalities possible within the British Isles is British or Irish. - MrSiriusBlack Talk 19:16, June 30, 2020 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Thanks for the interesting link! ("Atlantic Archipelago" makes me cringe -- it sounds like no one in Great Britain is aware of the existance of Macaronesia; no one, except of course, that one family from Budleigh Babberton.)

As for the nationality field, my best suggestion would be sticking to plain old "British". And it's definitely not just because this whole tricky business is getting me on the verge of a mental breakdown :P -- Seth Cooper owl post! 19:25, June 30, 2020 (UTC)

Ireland is still part of the British Isles :P I think {{GBorIE}} suffices. - MrSiriusBlack Talk 19:34, June 30, 2020 (UTC)

Duh, yeah, sorry, {{GBorIE}} is what I meant. -- Seth Cooper owl post! 20:06, June 30, 2020 (UTC)

But is Avalon really part of Britain or Ireland? Let's discuss as I have epistemological quandaries to consider ;)

Actually I think we have done more than our fair share to contribute to the millennia of argument on this topic. I'd be happy to be done and move forward. Any objections? Going once, going twice... --Ironyak1 (talk) 20:12, June 30, 2020 (UTC)

Well I for one have no objections. I think we can bang the virtual gavel on this one - MrSiriusBlack Talk 20:23, June 30, 2020 (UTC)

Also, some templates automatically put the articles in which they appear into categories; is it worth doing that for {{GBorIE}} to save some time? - MrSiriusBlack Talk 00:14, July 1, 2020 (UTC)

┌─────────┘

Great discussion! To answer MrSiriusBlack's question, yes, it's worth it; previously, certain Users were actually categorizing all Hogwarts students without explicit nationality as "British individual" and most of the time referencing the content used in {{GBorIE}}; if you look at the template's editing history, you can probably see that at one point I was misled by the action and did briefly include the "British individual" CAT alongside the template; it was afterwards for me to go "wait, but Irish (the not Northern Irish one) isn't British" and removed it from the template. Once the new CAT name is decided, it def. could be added. =] (P.S.: I'm all for "British Isles individuals" but if the term being not canon is iffy, I wouldn't oppose the other option, either.)

--Sammm✦✧(talk) 07:24, July 1, 2020 (UTC)

I like Seth's category hierarchy idea too. I don't have any objections and I think it's a good solution. So I feel we should go ahead, and conclude one of our many discussions on the wiki right now! - Kates39 (talk) 10:16, July 1, 2020 (UTC)

Overall, I appreciate Seth Cooper's suggestion for the hierarchy, although two categories could just be compacted together into Category:British Isles individuals. Also, if the template {{GBorIE}} is added, can it automatically transclude a category? MechQueste 18:46, July 1, 2020 (UTC)

My concern about including the category in the template is that it will put everybody who has {{GBorIE}} up into the parent category "British or Irish individuals" (or "British Isles individuals") as needed, but this parent category won't include many of the other individuals in the child categories as they didn't attend Hogwarts and likely don't have GBorIE. What is the purpose of just having those with GBorIE show up in the top category, but not the other articles in these child categories?

Note this is different than say like {{Spell infobox}} which transcludes Category:Spells. This works great because nearly all Spell articles have the infobox and therefore are part of the parent category as well as their specific sub categories. (as an technical aside this arrangement also works well because the bot doesn't see the parent category in the article text so it's doesn't try to remove it as redundant with the more specific categories, compared to having the Spells cat directly added to each article). My 2 knuts on the matter, but may be missing something of value in the idea. --Ironyak1 (talk) 19:06, July 1, 2020 (UTC)

Then we put the non-Hogwarts GB or IE folk into the category manually. Using {{GBorIE}} to automatically put the Hogwarts students in would still at least save some time. - MrSiriusBlack Talk 19:10, July 1, 2020 (UTC)

Sorry, taking a step back, why do we want all theses individuals in both "British Isles individuals" and their specific regional category "English", "Irish", etc? We generally only apply the most specific category so just trying to understand the interest in this arrangement here. We for instance don't have ant also listed in Category:Creatures. Thanks --Ironyak1 (talk) 19:16, July 1, 2020 (UTC)

Uh what? I just meant the ones whose nationalities within the British Isles are unknown, those whom this whole forum is all about...

Anyway, is it really absolutely necessary to have 'British or Irish individuals' and 'British Isles individuals' as separate categories? - MrSiriusBlack Talk 19:34, July 1, 2020 (UTC)

speaking of stuff, I think we all also should address birthplaces a lot of people. I'm thinking that there are a lot of pages that list birthplace in the British Isles, but I'm fairly sure its not 100% certain. MechQueste 19:40, July 1, 2020 (UTC)

Let's slow down for a second as it seems we are talking past each other. Many articles for Hogwarts students have {{GBorIE}} for the nationality field on their infobox. As Rowling has said that ""Hogwarts just serves Britain and Ireland." we know that every Hogwarts students is either "British or Irish", regardless of their birthplace. However, most of these also have Category:British individuals on the article as that was the default category for the "British Isles region" and contained "Irish individuals" as a child. See Roger Davies as an example.

So now if we add Category:British or Irish individuals to {{GBorIE}}, Roger Davies and all those articles like him, will appear in both the "British or Irish individuals" category (from the GBorIE template) and the child "British individuals" (from the category on the article itself). Why would we want to have this article in both categories as opposed to the only one we really know is true, "British or Irish individuals" ?

Instead of transcluding the category, what needs to happen is the articles in Category:British individuals need to be reviewed and moved up into "British or Irish individuals" if that is all which is known, or down into a more specific category like Hermione Granger's father as you pointed out should be in "English individuals", or left in "British" on the odd enough chance that we know they are from the island of Britain but nothing else.

As for the "British Isles individuals" category, as Seth noted in his proposed solution there are people from places we have in canon like Avalon and the Isle of Drear that are part of the British Isles, but distinct from the island or nation of Britain. My "joke" about having epistemological concerns regarding if Avalon is really in Britain was only half-in jest. Note that thinking about these terms in geographical considerations frees up worrying about what the actual national boundaries or definitions were was for various historical periods back through to the founding of Hogwarts c. 990, before Scotland was a nation and we'd be stuck figuring out if Hogwarts served Cináed or the Kingdom of Moray.

It seems like the use of the term "nationality" might be suspect and we need some other "is from the region of" terminology. Note, this would just be a change in the Infobox field name, all the considerations above still hold true. Cheers --Ironyak1 (talk) 20:16, July 1, 2020 (UTC)

I think nationality is bit of a stretch to include. Maybe the infobox could just include "from", which seems best overall. The statement is pretty vague in itself. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by MechQueste (talk • contribs).

Perhaps individuals from Avalon and the Isle of Drear should get their own categories under Cat:British Isles individuals then - MrSiriusBlack Talk 21:42, July 1, 2020 (UTC)

But what would that category be called? If there is more than one individual per location then there could be "Avalon individuals" and such of course, but how would you group individuals from the various locations together in a way that makes sense from an in-universe perspective? (if that is what you are proposing) Cheers --Ironyak1 (talk) 23:24, July 1, 2020 (UTC)

The Quintaped of the Isle of Drear is listed in Cat:Creatures from Scotland, and the only thing I can find that is anything to do with Avalon is Morgan le Fay, listed in Cat:British individuals. Is there any point in changing that actually? - MrSiriusBlack Talk 23:31, July 1, 2020 (UTC)

Is there "any point" in helping to organize the minutia of a fictional universe to begin with? ;) If there is, then the next point, for me and many others, is likely: to be as accurate as possible in those efforts given the canon information we have available.

I'm happy to explore this philosophical quandary of "where is Avalon" in the Harry Potter universe; I do worry though it might take as many words as above and still not reach a conclusion (because of epistemological limitations). Maybe better done on Talk:Avalon? Cheers --Ironyak1 (talk) 23:43, July 1, 2020 (UTC)

Hi folks, I'm going to admit I'm confused why there's the problem above. Unless {{GBorIE}} is now used for purpose other than what's stated in its template description, I failed to understand the problem. Why would Roger Davies have both CATs? If his nationally can be pinned down as "British", then it is not "British or Irish", it's just "British", right? "GBorIE" was created for those who hadn't been specified, mainly the {{PS2 only}} and {{NDS only}} characters but applicable to Hogwarts students that we just don't have info on. If any Hogwarts student has additional info come out, their ref for nationality should be what's applicable and not the generic GBorIE; an example I can think of for the moment is like this update. What am I missing? --Sammm✦✧(talk) 23:44, July 1, 2020 (UTC)

I did not at any point suggest trying to work out where Avalon is, neither to I have any desire to.

As I can only find one thing to do with Avalon (not actually even from there necessarily) and one thing from Isle of Drear, each sorted under British and Scottish respectively, I again see no reason for the existence of Category:British Isles individuals separate from Category:British or Irish individuals. - MrSiriusBlack Talk 00:18, July 2, 2020 (UTC)

As Seth noted in the example layout we need a "British Isles individuals" for Morgan le Fay (at least) who we know was queen of Avalon. Best we "know" is that Avalon is in the British Isles so Morgan is a "British Isles individual"; nothing more specific can be said for her. As Seth noted as well, other areas to consider with this approach include the Hebrides as how does the Island of Britain, which contains the geographic region of Scotland, somehow also contain these separate islands? These might end up like Avalon and being shifted to under British Isle individuals as the details are worked through.

Sammm鯊 - I think the idea was that if we add Category:British or Irish individuals to {{GBorIE}} then all those individuals will automatically end up in the right spot. The problem is that most of the articles with GBorIE have Category:British individuals on it (as British was the umbrella term for everyone in the British Isles) so these individuals need to be checked and moved by hand up into "British or Ireland individuals" or down into "Scottish individuals", "English individuals", etc... Just adding "British or Ireland individuals" to the GborIE template will lead to the articles being in both categories. Hoping that helps --Ironyak1 (talk) 05:25, July 2, 2020 (UTC)

Oh, then if that's the only problem, MassCatergorization can be helpful in a way. If CAT "British or Irish individuals" is added, then theoretically we'd get somthing close to Special:WhatLinksHere/Template:GBorIE (on the bright side, it's less than 500 entries? lol;) when using the script, then we can enter add content from CAT "British or Irish individuals" to get the target; then choose to perform Remove CAT "British individuals"; if the pages don't contain the CAT, they won't be affected; if they do, well, I think it'd be a quicker way to see what pages got changed to then see some actually needed GBorIE gone instead of the Brit CAT; if that makes any sense. But that's just a way I know to remove the additional CAT, there's probably some smarter way. xP --Sammm✦✧(talk) 05:40, July 2, 2020 (UTC)

The trouble is we already know of some entries in Category:British individuals that should actually be more specific e.g. Hermione Granger's father which should be in Category:English individuals. So there should probably be at least an effort to review the all the "British individuals" and move those needed into more specific categories ("Scottish" "Welsh" "English", "Irish") before any Mass re-categorization happens to move all "British individuals" up to "British or Irish individuals". Good idea though to automate that final switch over (although during the review it would be good to note any individual that actually belongs just in "British individuals" and needs to stay there). Almost a plan? --Ironyak1 (talk) 05:54, July 2, 2020 (UTC)

Hi there, I think I failed explaining. Granger's dad won't be affected, because I assume, he himself would not use GBorIE, he doesn't go to Hogwarts, the ref is irrelevant to him (and just checked, I don't think his article used that template.)

Cat "British or Irish individuals" currently literally only has one article.
1. So when Cat "British or Irish individuals" is added to GBorIE; the additional ones showing up in that CAT, would be the ones using GBorIE template.
Then, from this batch, remove CAT "British individuals".
1. My description does not tackle the entire current entries for "British individuals"; it subtracts what uses GBorIE and ought not to either:
  1. Have CAT "British individuals"
  2. Or the GBorIE template itself.

Filtering unspecified individuals like Granger's dad is a separate issue to tackle, and likely would be easier when filtering the known ones that couldn't go beyond "British or Irish individuals". --Sammm✦✧(talk) 06:02, July 2, 2020 (UTC)

It is possible that some articles would still need additional fixing, but process wise, ideally it should be easier than going through 1.4K pages to manually check what's wrong (if choosing to start from CAT "British individuals") --Sammm✦✧(talk) 06:10, July 2, 2020 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Gotcha - no your explanations are fine (ver 2.0 is even better :) I was combining both concerns together but your approach works better as it handles the majority of the articles in the initial re-categorization, which leaves behind a smaller set for manual review and any necessary adjustments (as you highlighted). From the sound of it, you've got the tech issues covered and are willing to do the work for the re-categorization when/if we get there?

I'll ping Seth so he takes a look at all this and weighs in before we move forward. Thanks! --Ironyak1 (talk) 06:15, July 2, 2020 (UTC)

Probably just tired but if we use a simple article like B._Dunstan as an example.

- He has {{GBorIE}} so would be added to "British or Irish individuals" when it is added to the template

- He has Category:British individuals on the article so if you remove articles in CAT "British individuals" then he would no longer be in the set to fix (although he does need to have "British or Irish individuals" added to the article and "British individuals" removed as all we know is he went to Hogwarts)

Maybe just use the set of "WhatLinksHere/Template:GBorIE" to add CAT "British or Irish individuals" and remove CAT "British individuals"? Going to rest on the matter and check back tomorrow. Cheers --Ironyak1 (talk) 07:01, July 2, 2020 (UTC)

Hi there, the last paragraph above is basically what's needed to be achieved; if there is a way to perform "WhatLinksHere/Template:GBorIE" to add CAT "British or Irish individuals", I am not aware lol. I can see a list, but if selecting to copy, I would also be pasting the "(transclusion) ‎ (← links)" stuff to the scripts window, and then have to manually remove them. If bots could do this, then that'd be great. If not, trust me when I say manually pasting the list and removing the "(transclusion) ‎ (← links)" is not worth going through comparing to having CAT "British or Irish individuals" within Template:GBorIE lol. I know the ratelimit for this action isn't as terrible as Move for Content Moderator, but I know I'd likely have to process it a couple of times, still. I remember recategorising certain images that had to be performed more than once, but I don't remember if less than 500 entry would be a problem. (I might not be needed for this operation, since bots are guaranteed to perform better, but if I'm needed, feel free to let me know haha.) --Sammm✦✧(talk) 07:25, July 2, 2020 (UTC)

If I get you a clean list of articles in "WhatLinksHere/Template:GBorIE", can you use it to do the Add CAT "British or Irish individuals" and remove CAT "British individuals" steps? I could get the bot to work but it would be messy to wedge this into the current arrangements so if the tools you use line up for this, I can get the list ready. Cheers --Ironyak1 (talk) 08:01, July 2, 2020 (UTC)

^ Yes; I looked at the script's edit history, it doesn't look like it's been modified in a major way since I last used it, so assuming Fandom hasn't changed restrictions for Content Moderator, I should be able to process it, at least process it faster than manually lol. --Sammm✦✧(talk) 08:53, July 2, 2020 (UTC)

cool cool - looks like just over 400 articles total with {{GBorIE}}. I'll pull the list and get it ready. Let me know if the article names need any brackets or quotes or other formatting around them or a deliminator like a commas between values otherwise it will just be plain article name like Tulip Karasu on each line of the list.

Let's give Seth some time to review and provide feedback in case there is something we missed but I think we're pretty close. Thanks to everyone for their participation in this discussion - end result is looking pretty good! Cheers --Ironyak1 (talk) 09:14, July 2, 2020 (UTC)

A list in <pre></pre> would be nice, like:

Fat Friar
Poppy Pomfrey
Argus Filch
Sybill Trelawney

(copied the first one I'm seeing on WhatLinksHere/Template:GBorIE)

It could probably be shared in this Forum post and another section (or a different one lol,) just so anyone who viewed could be prepared that those pages would be swept. IDK. --Sammm✦✧(talk) 09:22, July 2, 2020 (UTC)

I personally rather the British Isles individuals be compacted with the British or Irish individuals category. Not really needed to keep them separate imho. Avalon is somehwere in the British Isles, but its not special enough to get its own category. MechQueste 14:37, July 2, 2020 (UTC)

Keeping British Isles individuals separate has been designed for various characters, not just the one from Avalon. What if a character was from a certain era and place in Britannia when nations like England, Wales, Scotland and Ireland did not exist? Can we technically say they had a nationality like British, English, Scottish, Welsh or Irish? So we thought to do it clearly by geographic location instead. If we get rid of a British Isles individuals category and put everyone in one category, how do we distinguish characters put in British or Irish individuals by nationality, from characters put in it by geographic location?

British or Irish individuals will be for characters like Hogwarts students who have to be British or Irish, but we don't know which one. - Kates39 (talk) 17:26, July 2, 2020 (UTC)

Characters who are definitely from somewhere in Great Britain (but exactly where unknown), like the ones you just mentioned, are usually sorted into British individuals. - MrSiriusBlack Talk 22:00, July 2, 2020 (UTC)

The category British individuals sounds like it's for a nationality. British Isles individuals clearly shows that it's for characters from a geographic location who's appropriate nationality cannot be known. Having both distinguishes that. I think we've started going round in circles and saying the same things over and over, when the category naming has concluded and they have been created and soon to be filled up with the needed pages. - Kates39 (talk) 22:16, July 2, 2020 (UTC)

The description of Category:British individuals says 'from generic places on the island of Great Britain'. No nationality specified. Category:British Isles is for those of unknown nationality in the British Isles, with the island of Ireland still a possibility. - MrSiriusBlack Talk 22:43, July 2, 2020 (UTC)

We had a very in-depth discussion about the way certain category names sounded. We concluded their names didn't add up with the description editors had intended years ago. It has caused confusion for years, and we decided to distinguish things better. Like I just stated, British individuals sounds like it's for a nationality. British Isles individuals has been set up to distinguish characters that don't fit. The category Category:British Isles has been used for places, e.g. countries - it's not for characters.

I don't see what saying everything again will achieve. Seth outlined a good category hierarchy above which distinguishes everything, and a group of editors have gone ahead and set it up. So, I think we need to just roll with it now. - Kates39 (talk) 23:11, July 2, 2020 (UTC)

Sorry, I know I'm beating around the proverbial bush too much, I just can't get my head around why Category:British or Irish individuals exists, it doesn't seem different enough from British Isles individuals. Seth himself said "The difference between "British Isles individuals" and "British or Irish individuals" might be subtle enough to render it useless, mind you. Thoughts?", and that's what I'm talking about. - MrSiriusBlack Talk 23:26, July 2, 2020 (UTC)

I agree with Kates39 that we've gone in circles on this a few times now. The current Category Hierarchy is both logically consistent and handles all the cases we currently know. My guess is that as we work through Category:British individuals there will be some that make sense to move up to "British Isles" and some that make sense to stay put so there is no general rule that can be figured out now. We'll just have to look at the specifics involved for those individuals.

As for the distinction between "British Isles individuals" and "British or Irish individuals", I'll say again, is Avalon in "Britain or Ireland"?

As Seth proposed the structure, I suggest we give him some time to catch up and provide his feedback. The articles and categories are not currently being affected or broken so there really isn't any need to rush on this. Cheers --Ironyak1 (talk) 23:36, July 2, 2020 (UTC)

If 'Category:British or Irish individuals' were to be deleted and 'British Isles' was the one we went with, the Avalon thing wouldn't be an issue. But yes, let's wait for Seth. - MrSiriusBlack Talk 23:38, July 2, 2020 (UTC)

┌─────────────┘

Hmmm, so while the process is currently not going anywhere; I belatedly remember I do have a list of documentation on some of the PS2 and NDS only Hogwarts students; some of them have not been updated to using {{GBorIE}}, while also being misguidedly categorized under British individuals ( *coughs, could have been Irish* .) Probably won't help much but I'll just go through them since the list I have only contains 102 individuals. xP (Also don't know how, but when I last provided number in British individuals, I wrote 1.4K to go through, and checking just now... it was 2K... lol I guess a lot of previously not-determined-to-be-British individuals were determined lmao.) --Sammm✦✧(talk) 02:49, August 19, 2020 (UTC)

I've been pondering this issue as well so I'm glad you brought it up Sammm鯊. Given Seth appears to be on extended holiday, it seems like we should just continue on given that everything was complete and we were just waiting for a last review.

Basically, as extensively discussed, for anyone where all we know is that they attended Hogwarts, they would be Category:British or Irish individuals, and everyone else is put in the most specific geographical region that we know they live in - Scottish individuals, Welsh individuals, English, etc...

I think ultimately we need to change the term to something other than Nationality as that doesn't really seem to apply to the wizarding community: "Nationality is a legal identification of a person in international law, establishing the person as a subject, a national, of a sovereign state. It affords the state jurisdiction over the person and affords the person the protection of the state against other states."

Wizardkind and other magical beings would generally not be subjects or citizens of the local Muggle nation and don't pay taxes, vote, etc. They just reside in that same geographical region. Do the Centaurs of the Forbidden Forest have British Nationality? Are they British individuals? Or do they just reside in the region of Scotland?

Not sure what the new term should be but if we can think of something that allows for multiple entries we might be able to capture some more complicated cases such as Jacob Kowalski - Polish by birth but American currently, or Fleur Delacour - French by birth but resides in England, actual "nationality" unknown.

However, this change wouldn't have any impact on cleaning up Category:British individuals now and sorting everyone into the more correct Categories as each category can just be renamed en masse as needed once we determine a better term. Cheers --Ironyak1 (talk) 04:51, August 19, 2020 (UTC)

Not sure if the following is the first and last place where the conversion to "nationality" was discussed, but for people who weren't in on the discussion (or needing memory refresh like I constantly do lmao,) here: Talk: Lestrange Manor#Location. I mean.... when we describe such-and-such individuals (such as Japanese individuals,) aren't we essentially describing individuals whose nationality is Japanese? And that kind of CATs is under Category:Individuals by nationality, so I admit I didn't think deeper and just thought a nationality field would suffice. I'm not sure about Centaurs or other sentient beasts/beings because sadly it didn't occur to me for them to be considered, mostly because they use a separate infobox but more because I just personally won't think to tie them to a nation lol. Human... I did. xP

I feel like the definition you gave on nationality does not feel wholly inapplicable; there's international wizarding laws? There's laws within wizarding communities that may different from other wizarding communities? There's jurisdiction? They are just not offered by the non-magical counterpart of the nation? Otherwise, why the need for Category:Magical governments? When talking about nationality, does it have to be about "the local Muggle nation"?

(I have no understanding about how things works in the UK, but I know in the States, certain types of non-citizens can still go to school there... And then... what we know IRL doesn't always apply so lmao. JKR could just mean Hogwarts serves whoever has temporal residency in GB or IE, or whatever, but no idea how to efficiently fit this into infoboxes.)

Could be just me being slow. lol --Sammm✦✧(talk) 01:20, August 20, 2020 (UTC)

The points you raise are good ones and I think you pinpointed the issue which is what do we really mean by "Nationality"? Most people appear to be interpreting this as an individual from/in the related Muggle nation. The trouble I see is that there are so many instances where either the conventional Muggle nation state, or even the Wizarding Government jurisdictions, don't really apply.

For instance Salazar Slytherin is said to be British or Irish - but what do these terms mean circa 993 AD? There is neither a unified Muggle nation of Britain, nor a Republic of Ireland, nor a Ministry of Magic that oversaw the the entire Britain and Ireland region (the jurisdiction for the Wizards' Council is even more unknown than the modern British MoM ;) So what we seem to mean is that he is from the geographical region of Britain or Ireland, regardless of any national borders or jurisdictions at that time.

Similarly, various Centaurs are in Category:British individuals such as Unidentified dun-coloured centaur (though their |Nationality seems not to be set). So what can this mean? Centaurs are certainly not subject to the Muggle nation of Britain or the UK. Maybe it could mean they are under the British Ministry of Magic but that's certainly not clear from the term. It seems most likely to mean they are from the geographical region of Britain.

Maybe instead of Category:Individuals by nationality these categories should be redefined as "Individuals by region", integrated with Category:Individuals by continent, and be based entirely on geography? If so what would the |Nationality= term become? Home region? Residency? Either of these might work as we could list multiple known places of residency (e.g. Jacob = Poland (formally); NYC, NY, USA (currently) and he could be both a Polish and American individual?) However, I'm not entirely sold on either term and hoping someone has a better thesaurus.

Again, this is all just brainstorming ideas on some arrangement that might better capture and reflect what is actually known especially for the many individuals we have who fall outside the modern notion of Nationality; it shouldn't stop us from moving forward with the reorganization of British individuals as the groups would still be the same regardless. Cheers --Ironyak1 (talk)

We do have a Category:British Isles individuals which has been put in Category:Individuals by nationality but that doesn't add up because being a British Isle individual doesn't mean your British by nationality. But it's a good category to start putting characters like Salazar Slytherin or even Fleur Delacour and the Centaurs because they did live in it. I think we should put that in an "Individuals by region" category instead, and keep the "by nationality" one for categories like Category:British individuals.

We could have two separate infobox fields and use the appropriate one per character. So we could have |Nationality = for people who we know are British or American etc., and a |Region = one for people who live in a specific place. So Fleur could have her nationality be French, and under that, she would have her region be France, then Shell Cottage etc. Other words instead of region could be "Known locations" or even "Home town" since it can be used for any fixed place you live or have lived. I think it's just a case of wording everything better. - Kates39 (talk) 10:39, August 22, 2020 (UTC)

I agree that wording is at the root of the issue and the solution. The trouble I'm seeing is that we really don't know the Nationality of almost any character, it's just being inferred from where they live. However, given the Statue of Secrecy, wizards aren't likely to be Nationals of the country in which they live, so they don't actually possess that Nationality. Moreover, there are yet more examples of where this term fails for various individuals.

Josefina Calderon is said to be a "Mexican Healer", and is in "Individuals by Nationality" - Category:Mexican individuals, but the nation of Mexico wasn't founded for another 100+ years after her time. Editors have tried to work around this possible anachronism by listing her Nationality as "New Spain" but this is problematic for two reasons: 1) There is no canon mention of New Spain so we don't know if it was a thing in the HP Universe 2) New Spain wasn't a nation either, just a territory of the Spanish Empire so there is no related Nationality. More likely Josefina was from the region of Mexico, a term that goes back at least 100 years before her time.

As such, I think we need to move away from Nationality altogether and just base the information on the related geographical region. Saying the British Prime Minister in 1996, Xenophilius Lovegood, and Unidentified dun-coloured centaur and all have British Nationality, as we currently do, makes little sense, but saying they are all from the same region is true and easy to gather from the sources. This really just involves two changes: 1) Move the items from Category:Individuals by nationality into Category:Individuals by continent. This would make one Category branch, instead of overlapping but separate ones, that covers all the possibilities from general British Isles and South American individuals (which is likely to be helpful for FB3) to specific Canadian and English individuals. 2) Change the |Nationality term in the infobox to display Regionality (yep it's a word :) for now. In time, this might become Residences where we could list the known places an individual has lived, but this will also require changing back to place names instead of Nationalities (e.g. from British to Great Britain] so there will be some work involved (the house-elf can help in some limited cases). This would also allow us to link to specific residences like 4 Privet Drive and 679 West 24th Street or list multiple ones like France and Shell Cottage for those like Fleur.

Anyhow, I think that's the most complete solution and allows for handling all individuals without having to infer their legal status with their host nation or the existence or borders of nations at different historical times. Thoughts? --Ironyak1 (talk) 17:11, August 22, 2020 (UTC)

I think that's probably the best way to avoid inferring the legal status of characters while indicating what it could be. I just have one concern about getting rid of nationality, and that's because we do know at least a few characters nationalities because they have been described by Rowling to be "Scottish", or "American" etc., so I still see a good purpose to keep it for cases like that. However, it will be stated in their biography anyway so I don't have an objection because changing it in the infobox and category will cover a variety of situations. - Kates39 (talk) 11:55, August 23, 2020 (UTC)