Three new author CK fields

I've added three new author CK fields, with hint text below.

Country (for map): A currently existing, generally recognized country we can map against. This field is only necessary if the last entry in "Nationality" is not one. Country should be countries that can fairly and non-trivially "claim" the author as a citizen or resident.

Birthplace: Examples: Portland, Maine, USA; Halicarnassus; Bodrum, Turkey.

Place of death: Examples: Boston, Massachusetts, USA; Thurii; Thurio, Italy.

See http://www.librarything.com/topic/104017 for background.

Language edits encoruaged!

Great!

Thank you, thank you!

So, 'Country for map' trumps 'Nationality'?

A lot of the discussion on the other thread seemed to be about the author's feeling about home rather than a nation's claim on an author so maybe something like: 'Country' should be a currently existing country within whose borders the author would have worked and/or felt at home.

I'm sure there willl be other suggestions!

Ah, I see the potential of wikipedia like "edit wars" with people like Joseph Conrad. Ukraine! Britain! Lithuania! Poland!

Just stirring up trouble. Sorry.

For the record, I'd put Conrad in the UK.

Cool! Thank you, Tim!

*rubs hands together* Much fun to be had tonight!

Ah, I see the potential of wikipedia like "edit wars" with people like Joseph Conrad. Ukraine! Britain! Lithuania! Poland!

It's a multiple field. In drawing the map, I'll put him in as many as he has lines.

8: It's a multiple field. In drawing the map, I'll put him in as many as he has lines.

I think that's a fantastic way to do it and I think having a separate CK box should be helpful too.

Then why couldn't you have done that with the Nationality field? Oh, never mind.

I support #10. Would be great.

So for Birthplace and Place of Death, are we taking the information out of Places of Residence when there are fields with BlahBlah (birth) and Blah (death), or just duplicating it?

I would say : only if the author didn't actually also reside there.

10>

Because to map it, it needs to have current countries. There's no ISO country code for the Roman Empire, and people were throwing a fit about having to list Italy as a nationality for Julius Caesar to get him to show up on a map.

Plus, some authors have nationalities that have nothing to do with where they actually live.

15: yes but isn't that what we should map as well? If an author has an Indian heritage and spends her/his whole life writing about that heritage and relevant themes (immigration, racism, integration etc) should we really map her/him on the map as UK just because she/he was born in the UK?

It's an option, and I'm glad we can. Frankly I was thinking more about Europeans abroad during colonial times - like a Dutchman who spent most of his life in what is now Indonesia.

I think these should be decided on a case to case basis. For some it would be very appropriate, for others silly.

14> Because to map it, it needs to have current countries.

I wasn't complaining about that. In Tim's first post on this subject he asked if we should map the first or last field. I suggested much later on that all fields be mapped and he added a post saying something like "posters don't seem to have read my first post." I took that to mean that he said first or last and that was it. Now he says mapping all the fields is fine for this new field.

#18
I took that to mean that he said first or last and that was it. Now he says mapping all the fields is fine for this new field.

I'd assumed that too, mostly because he was presenting the results as a pie chart, and I'd taken it for granted that each author could only be counted once.

#16: It depends; you can long for India all you want, but if you've lived all your life in the UK, you should be mapped from the UK. Should Alex Haley be mapped to Africa, because that's his heritage, and that's what he spent his time writing about?

Being born somewhere doesn't mean anything, though; Isaac Asimov was born in the Soviet Union, and doesn't remember a bit of it. I guess given multiple mappings, I wouldn't delete Russia from his profile, but I think it's absurd.

#20

I agree completely. Listing someone according to where they wrote about is not at all useful. Edward Gibbon Would turn up in Italy, Elizabeth Peters in Egypt and Dante in hell.

21: it's not only that the author would write about a country (in my example), it's that that would be his heritage, (i.e. his cultural tradition, his parents' nationalities and thus his own nationality - unless granted UK citizenship, don't forget that unlike USA in Europe you do not get automatic citizenship because you were born in a particular country) To relate your example to what I said it would have to be true that Edward Gibbons had both Italian parents, spoke Italian, wrote about Italians, and had had an Italian passport. As for Dante, well, he would have to have Satan as a father. So, no, I don't think you can say it's the same thing. It's not just about having a book set in a country.

#20:"Isaac Asimov was born in the Soviet Union, and doesn't remember a bit of it"

If he was right about the afterlife, he doesn't remember anything at all.

#22: It is not simply true that "in Europe you do not get automatic citizenship because you were born in a particular country". France, the UK and Germany all recognize jus soli under some circumstances; prior to 1983, anyone born in the UK, even children of American servicemen, were British citizens. Furthermore, in those nations and several other European states that are nominally jus sanguinis have generous naturalization rules that would quickly provide for the naturalization of anyone who had been raised entirely in that country, should they wish it.

I think you're mixing things. It's not relevant what you write about, nor what language you write in. It is, IMO, of minimal interest at best what country your were born in. Nationality is about where you grew up, where you live as an adult, and what your citizenship is.

David McCullough is not an American author because he writes about US history. David McCullough is an American author because he is a citizen of the US, was raise in the US and has chosen to live here as an adult. If a person was born in a country and has lived all their life there, I would take that as their sole nationality, unless they have chosen not to be naturalized. Normally, if someone considers themselves of Indian nationality (which is different from of Indian heritage), they will actually have lived in India enough that this will not be a problem.

Normally, if someone considers themselves of Indian nationality (which is different from of Indian heritage), they will actually have lived in India enough that this will not be a problem.

But that's the thing I'm trying to argue against:one needs not have lived somewhere to have a certain nationality. Not if one's parents were both a certain nationality and if he will have socialized with that nationality and maintained his/her cultural traditions and thus see his/her country of residence from a foreigner's perspective. TO stick to my example, an Indian author living in the UK whose parents are Indians and whose social circle is also other Indians living in the UK. Someone who would see (and write about) the UK from a foreigner's perspective.

unless they have chosen not to be naturalized
precisely. Or tried to integrate or ever considered themselves natives of their country of residence.

Children don't choose to naturalize, it is what they do. Growing up is integrating yourself into the surrounding community. Unless a child growing up in the USA or UK were kept totally isolated from their surrounding culture they will always grow to be cultureized as a hybrid between home and community.

as a hybrid between home and community.
then why would you assign them one nationality over the other?

#25: one needs not have lived somewhere to have a certain nationality.

Yes, one does. You can consider yourself whatever you want, but if you've not been there, you aren't from there. There are plenty of Italian-Americans who have been told in no uncertain terms by Italians that their delusions of being Italian were just that.

thus see his/her country of residence from a foreigner's perspective.

But they don't. They see their country of residence from the perspective of someone who has lived there all their life. They may have a different perspective because of their social circle, but they will know their home country, and they won't know the country of their heritage in many subtle ways.

TO stick to my example, an Indian author living in the UK whose parents are Indians and whose social circle is also other Indians living in the UK.

I don't see how this is fundamentally different then someone who's gay living in the UK whose parents are gay and whose social circle is the gay scene in the UK. Or an Esperanto author living in the UK whose parents are Esperantists and whose social circle is Esperantists. Your social circle does not define your nationality.

#25: one needs not have lived somewhere to have a certain nationality.

#26 Yes, one does. You can consider yourself whatever you want, but if you've not been there, you aren't from there. There are plenty of Italian-Americans who have been told in no uncertain terms by Italians that their delusions of being Italian were just that.

There are large expat communities whose children emphatically have their parents' nationalities rather than that of the country where they live. Look at the European School in Brussels, for example: the children there are quite definitely a collection of all EU nationalities rather than being all Belgians.

The problematic hyphenate Americans are usually 3rd or 4th generation, where the connection to their ancestral homeland is pretty tenuous; that's quite different from the situation of children of diplomats, aid workers etc.

#29: There are large expat communities whose children emphatically have their parents' nationalities rather than that of the country where they live. Look at the European School in Brussels, for example: the children there are quite definitely a collection of all EU nationalities rather than being all Belgians.

I would submit that if they live their entire life in Belgium, they aren't going to be very Italian or Romanian; that anyone who moves to Belgium as a toddler, spends 12 years at the European School in Brussels, and then goes to the Université Libre de Bruxelles, the first time they went home, would find it a weird place, painfully out of tune with the EU sensibilities they spent their entire life imbibing.

As importantly to me, I don't find children an interesting part of this problem. The vast majority of our authors are adults, and when they reach adulthood, they have major questions about where they're going to work or go to school, and if they're going to try and be naturalized in the country they grew up in. The way they answer those questions for themself, that defines their nationality.

The problematic hyphenate Americans are usually 3rd or 4th generation, where the connection to their ancestral homeland is pretty tenuous;

Not always; again, I return to Isaac Asimov, who was second generation Russian. I don't believe that anyone who grew in Brooklyn would have passed for anything but American in their home countries.

that's quite different from the situation of children of diplomats, aid workers etc.

Yes. Which is not the example we were given, and few children of diplomats never go home.

I'd like a real example here. Again, for the original question, of an Indian author who was born in the UK, who lives as an adult in the UK, and who has never lived in India, I would say that the nationality is clearly UK.

>25 girlunderglass:

I think perhaps a better example would the Hungarian miority in Romania. Or perhaps the Russian minority in the Balitic states. Or the minorities in the former Yugoslavian republics.

#30
I would submit that if they live their entire life in Belgium, they aren't going to be very Italian or Romanian; that anyone who moves to Belgium as a toddler, spends 12 years at the European School in Brussels, and then goes to the Université Libre de Bruxelles, the first time they went home, would find it a weird place, painfully out of tune with the EU sensibilities they spent their entire life imbibing

I was disputing your claim that You can consider yourself whatever you want, but if you've not been there, you aren't from there. Of course they'll find it weird (at first) when they go home; nevertheless, if they're Italian passport holders, always spoke Italian at home, learnt Italian at school, and never learnt to speak Flemish to their next-door neighbours, they're Italian, not Belgian.

32: if they're Italian passport holders, always spoke Italian at home, learnt Italian at school, and never learnt to speak Flemish to their next-door neighbours, they're Italian, not Belgian.

My point exactly.

31: I think perhaps a better example would the Hungarian minority in Romania.
You are right, of course. Great example. I grew up in one of the areas with the highest population of Hungarians in Romania (even some road signs were in both languages, etc). I had Hungarian friends - some of whom went to Romanian schools and others to Hungarian. They all spoke Hungarian at home with their families. These people had either never been to Hungary or only been there on a holiday, maybe to visit a grandmother or another relative. Yet if you asked them what their nationality was they would have undoubtedly said "Hungarian". Furthermore, if you asked any of their Romanian friends what this person's nationality was they would have said "Hungarian", too. The fact that if they went to live in Hungary they would perhaps find it strange does not bear on this matter. They might find it hard to adapt at first, (then again so would a Hungarian moving from one part of Hungary to another, so I don't see how this is relevant) but they would still say they they are Hungarian if someone inquired about their nationality.

#31: I think perhaps a better example would the Hungarian miority in Romania.

And I think that's exactly my point. The Hungarian minority in Romania is no different from the Sami minority in Finland or the the Basque minority in Spain. Just because there is a Hungary, doesn't make them from it. To paraphrase #32, if they're Romanian passport holders, always spoke one of the languages of Romania, learned one of the languages of Romania at school, and learned to speak Romanian to their next-door neighbors, they're Romanian.

Yet if you asked them what their nationality was they would have undoubtedly said "Hungarian".

Then obviously we're using different definitions of the word nationality. Moreover, you're using a different definition of the word nationality then above, given that their ancestors may have lived in southern Transylvania for a thousand years, a piece of the world that has never belonged to the nation of Hungary. They have no heritage connected them with the nation of Hungary. That's not a statement about nationality; it may be one about ethnicity, but that's a different matter.