User talk:Gustmeister

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We're so glad you're here! Meatsgains^(talk) 18:24, 25 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia and copyright

Hello Gustmeister, and welcome to Wikipedia. All or some of your addition(s) to Nùng people have been removed, as they appear to have added copyrighted material without evidence of permission from the copyright holder. While we appreciate your contributions to Wikipedia, there are certain things you must keep in mind about using information from sources to avoid copyright and plagiarism issues here.

You can only copy/translate a small amount of a source, and you must mark what you take as a direct quotation with double quotation marks (") and cite the source using an inline citation. You can read about this at Wikipedia:Non-free content in the sections on "text". See also Help:Referencing for beginners, for how to cite sources here.
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It's very important that contributors understand and follow these practices, as policy requires that people who persistently do not must be blocked from editing. If you have any questions about this, you are welcome to leave me a message on my talk page. Thank you. — Diannaa 🍁 (talk) 20:33, 27 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@Diannaa: Thanks. So, to add the deleted paragraph, I should have rephrased it. Is it correct? Gustmeister (talk) 21:10, 27 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@Diannaa: I am going to add some more examples about Kra-Tai substrate in Southern Chinese dialects. To add the exampes, I will have to write something like: the author ABCD provides the following examples as Kra-Dai substrate in Southern Chinese dialects..., and then proceed with citing his examples. Right? Gustmeister (talk) 21:14, 27 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Material you find online is almost always copyright, and cannot be copied here; it's against the law and the copyright policy of this website to do so. Everything you add to Wikipedia needs to be written in your own words. Don't copy from the source documents at all. They should be a source of information, but not of prose. — Diannaa 🍁 (talk) 21:26, 27 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@Diannaa:OK, understand. What about citing examples that includes comparative linguistics to clarify information in the article like the ones I've cited in Nùng people? Is it ok to cite them (with author name and date)? Gustmeister (talk) 21:40, 27 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Of course it's okay to cite them; everything you add here needs citations. What's not okay is to copy their material word-for-word. — Diannaa 🍁 (talk) 21:44, 27 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@Diannaa:OK. So, for examples in comparative linguistics, I'm going to cite them with my clarification of author name and date of his article. For other information, I'll write in my own words.Gustmeister (talk) 21:50, 27 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]

March 2018

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May 2018

Part of your additions to Yue (state) and Baiyue has been removed, as it appears to have added copyrighted material to Wikipedia without evidence of permission from the copyright holder. If you are the copyright holder, please read Wikipedia:Donating copyrighted materials for more information on uploading your material to Wikipedia. For legal reasons, Wikipedia cannot accept copyrighted material, including text or images from print publications or from other websites, without an appropriate and verifiable license. All such contributions will be deleted. You may use external websites or publications as a source of information, but not as a source of content, such as sentences or images—you must write using your own words. Wikipedia takes copyright violations very seriously and persistent violators will be blocked from editing. See Wikipedia:Copying text from other sources for more information. — Diannaa 🍁 (talk) 17:07, 5 May 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@Diannaa:Ok. Thanks for notifying me. So I would paraphrase the passage as follows:

(Original) One fact about the ancient Yue that comes out saliently from the historical literature is that they were unique among the sinicised states of the time in having navies. Indeed, these states seem to have relied heavily on military fleets, both seaborne and riverine. This enabled the Yue to move with what commentators at the time regarded as remarkable speed, moving much faster than the cumbersome land armies of the time. Yue military boats were large enough to hold 50 men, along with three months’ provisions, and could travel 300 li downstream in a single day. The battles with Chu and with other states usually took place on rivers and inland lakes, but the Yue were also given to seafaring, both along the coast and further afield. To this day, Tai communities far inland continue to sing ‘boat songs’ as part of various indigenous ritual practices, and the seas and sea voyages feature in the geography of their spirit world.

(Paraphrased) The possession of navy was what set the Yue apart from other Sinitic states of the time. With the advantage of having navy, the Yue army was able to move at the speed of 300 li downstream within one single day with each military boat carrying as many as 50 troops on board, which was regarded to be exceptional by Sinitic writers at the time. With their seafaring culture, the Yue were inclined toward inshore and offshore sailing. The present-day Tai speaking groups living far away from the coast have still preserved the memory of the coastal origin of their ancestors by singing 'boat songs' in ritual practices.

But how could I paraphrase the following bolded words: the Yue culture was distinct from the Chinese in its practice of naming boats and swords. A Chinese text described the Yue as a people who "used boats as their carriages and oars as their horses" ? I find it impossible to change these original words. Gustmeister (talk) 19:43, 5 May 2018 (UTC)[reply]

You don't have to paraphrase "practice of naming boats and swords" because it was not (as far as I can tell) copyvio, and was not removed from the article. Your paraphrase is inadequate, because it has only superficial changes to the wording and sentence structure. Content has to be written in your own words and not include any wording from the source material. One thing I find that works for me is to read over the source material and then pretend I am verbally describing the topic to a friend in my own words. Stuff should also be presented in a different order where possible. Summarize rather than paraphrase. Leave out less important material and off-topic material. This will typically result in your version being much shorter than the source document. There's some reading material on this topic at Wikipedia:Close paraphrasing and/or have a look at the material at Purdue or study this module aimed at WikiEd students. Here's my version of the paraphrase:

Unlike other Sinitic states of that period, the Yue had a navy, which was used both on rivers and the open sea. Each ship could hold up to 50 men and their provisions, and could travel downstream at the rate of 300 li per day, which was much faster than travelling overland. Present-day Tai-speaking groups still preserve the memory of these times in some of their songs and traditions.

— Diannaa 🍁 (talk) 20:02, 5 May 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@Diannaa:OK. What's about paraphrasing only a sentence instead of a paragraph ? What am I going to do about it? Gustmeister (talk) 20:37, 5 May 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Do you have a specific sentence in mind? if it's the one above, "used boats as their carriages and oars as their horses", I would paraphrase it as follows: "Boats were their primary mode of transportation." — Diannaa 🍁 (talk) 20:44, 5 May 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@Diannaa:This sentence for instance: "the Yue culture was distinct from the Chinese in its practice of naming boats and swords." Gustmeister (talk) 20:56, 5 May 2018 (UTC)[reply]

I might word it "Unlike the Chinese, the Yue named their ships and swords." Why is it important to compare with the Chinese? you could say "The Yue named their ships and swords." — Diannaa 🍁 (talk) 22:08, 5 May 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@Diannaa:Thanks for the wording suggestion. It is not important to compare with the Chinese. It is due to the book author putting the sentence in that way. But I'm thinking now, the comparison with the Chinese can be removed.Gustmeister (talk) 00:01, 6 May 2018 (UTC)[reply]

The reason sources emphasize Yue's difference from the Chinese is because the Yue were later assimilated into the Chinese and ceased being a separate ethnic group. It's important to note how different they used to be. -Zanhe (talk) 00:54, 6 May 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@Zanhe:No need to introduce. I know that very well. But the User Diannaa may not know much about this topic, so I did not explain lengthy. Whose people who were called as the Yue by the ancient Sinitic peoples might have also compared them with some other populations as well since they had their own writing systems. However, their written documents got intentionally destroyed after the invasion of the semi-Sinitic state, Chu, and also got destroyed by other Chinese dynasties later, so there's nothing left to tell modern researchers about their viewpoints of themselves and of other peoples. Gustmeister (talk) 20:43, 8 May 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Nonsense. Chu, Wu, Yue all left many writings in the form of bronze inscriptions, and they're all written in Chinese, as were the cases of Japanese, Korean, and Vietnamese centuries later. The only known non-Chinese ancient writing system in East Asia is the undeciphered Ba-Shu scripts. Please do not write so confidently about something you have no clue about. Competence is required to edit Wikipedia. Thank you. -Zanhe (talk) 21:57, 8 May 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@Zanhe:Are you trynna mock me right now? The level of sinicization in Wu and Yue was different from that of Chu, where their elites were not Chinese. The Wu, Yue may have modified Chinese script to write their own language. But almost all of the materials from these two states were destroyed by later Sinitic states, so nothing left to the modern researchers to study about the existence of this kind of script.Gustmeister (talk) 11:22, 9 May 2018 (UTC)[reply]

As I said repeatedly, there's plenty of bronze inscriptions left by the Wu and Yue, and they're all written in Chinese. If they had their own scripts, they would have left evidence like the Ba-Shu people did. But there's zero evidence of that, so stop making things up. -Zanhe (talk) 18:02, 9 May 2018 (UTC)[reply]

WP:SYNTH

Hi Gustmeister, this edit of yours on Wu (state) is pure WP:SYNTH. The source you cite is about Korea and has nothing to do with Wu. The Wu Taibo myth was likely invented by someone (possibly by the Wu people themselves to make them appear more "civilized" in the interstate relations of the Spring and Autumn period, similar to how the Russian czars claimed ancestry from Roman emperors), but to attribute that to Sima Qian is nonsense as it predated his lifetime by centuries. I've removed the material. Regards, -Zanhe (talk) 00:28, 6 May 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@Zanhe:The source has nothing to do with Wu but it has a lot of things to do with Sima Qian and the ancient Chinese writers' tendency to describe non-Sinitic peoples around them, including the Wu. Therefore, it's relevant.

How do you know that the Wu Taibo myth was likely invented by the Wu ? Could you give me some research on that? and and how do you know that the Wu thought that they were less "civilized" than other Sinitic states? their metalworking technology was highly developed, moreover they possessed and cultivated rice, Setaria italica, and possibly Panicum miliaceum which was equivalent to the agricultural knowledge of Sinitic states. There is no way that they viewed themselves as "less civilized" than other Sinitic states. Documents (including documents about the origin of the kings of Wu), if there was any left to Sima Qian's times, would have likely been written in Wu language, how could Sima Qian read and understand them so that he wrote them down in his Shiji ? The only people who might have been able to read the language of Wu were the Yue elites and scribes. But they all were exterminated and ran away after the destruction of the state of Yue. Therefore, it is most likely that the story of the origin of Taibo was invented by Sima Qian, and NOT by the Wu. Gustmeister (talk) 20:43, 8 May 2018 (UTC)[reply]

"Wu language documents"? Don't make me laugh. I've read numerous books on ancient Chinese history and archaeology, and never heard of such a term. There are many bronze inscriptions left by the Wu and Yue (such as the Spear of Fuchai and the Sword of Goujian), but they're all written in Chinese. How do I know Taibo was not invented by Sima Qian? Because his legend is mentioned in numerous ancient texts such as the Zuozhuan and the Guoyu (see [1]), and an entire chapter of The Analects (Book 8) is named after him, all predating Sima Qian by centuries. Please, learn some ancient Chinese history before you write about this subject you seem so clueless about. I recommend The Cambridge History of Ancient China (p. 486 briefly mentions how Wu was almost "certainly" a non-Zhou people who took on a Zhou clan name), and Erica Brindley's Ancient China and the Yue if that's an area you're particularly interested in. -Zanhe (talk) 21:42, 8 May 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@Zanhe:Why it's laughable about Wu language documents? The languages spoken in Wu and Yue were non-Sinitic and completely different phonologically from Old Chinese. There is no way they could employ plain Chinese to record their own languages properly. The scribes of these states may have modified Chinese writing system to write their own language. But as the evidence of this type of modified Chinese script was intentionally wiped out after the destruction of these states so that the later Chinese dynasties could claim that these non-Sinitic peoples had no writing systems to serve their agenda of portraying these people as primitive. About the book recommendation, thanks for recommending, but unnecessary. The first one seems to contain a chapter by W. Bolz analyzing languages spoken in the lower Yangtze, but the information is out-of-date. The rest of the book is only about history and archeology. The second one I already read as it summarizes the most recent linguistic studies about the people of the lower Yangtze. Gustmeister (talk) 11:03, 9 May 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Of course Wu and Yue spoke non-Chinese languages, but that would not have prevented them from writing in Chinese, just as the Japanese, the Koreans, the Vietnamese all recorded their languages in Chinese until modern times. What's laughable is your making up non-existent things like "Wu language documents" out of thin air. The Cambridge History of Ancient China is mainly about history and archeology, and that's exactly why I recommended it, because you were writing WP:SYNTH nonsense about Sima Qian fabricating history that betrays your complete lack of knowledge in that area. -Zanhe (talk) 17:56, 9 May 2018 (UTC)[reply]