Talk:Saint Thomas Christian music

POV

There has been considerable discussion relating to the contributions of Robin klein to the Saint Thomas Christians article. These can be found at, for example, DRN, various sections at the STC talk page (eg: this one), and numerous other venues.

As far as I can tell, this present article and its redirects are yet another spate of what is now becoming a somewhat tendentious pattern and there is also a fairly high probability that the sources, although plentiful, have been mis-used/misrepresented/misinterpreted (take your pick). A fine-tooth comb is required here. - Sitush (talk) 10:42, 4 June 2012 (UTC)

POV: Undue weight to Jewish stuff is to be balanced urgently. --AshLey ^Msg 14:00, 4 June 2012 (UTC)

It so happens that I have access to Ross's article cited by Robin through JSTOR, and I can confirm that Robin has misinterpreted it in various places. Robin attempts to use the article to cite their typical thesis that the Saint Thomas Christians/Nasranis/Syrian Christians are the descendents of Jewish settlers in India who converted to Christianity (and retain elements of Jewish heritage and culture). However, at no point does Ross say any such thing. He compares Thomas Christian traditions with Jewish traditions because they may have similar roots, not because the former developed from the latter. He describes the traditions of the Saint Thomas Christians and Indian Jews as "similar" or "parallel" to one another, not that one is equivalent to or descended from the other.

Robin uses Ross to cite the following: "The traditional ritual music of Syrian Malabar Nasrani Christians or Saint Thomas Christian community is highly influenced by Jewish musical tradition [1]. This is due to the common history of Malabar Jews and Malabar Nasranis and the heavy impact of Malabar Jewish tradition on early Malabar Nasrani tradition [2]." However, what Ross actually says (emphasis added)is "... it is possible that the Syrian Christian liturgical and musical tradition has retained many of the characteristics of the earliest Christian musical rites of the Middle East [ie, music from before Christianity even came to India]. Since the influence of early Jewish synagogue on the early Christian church [again, before Christianity came to India] it may be illuminating to compare the rituals of the Syrian Christians with those of the Jews of Kerala, with similar roots and parallel history." (p. 80) This is a plain misuse of the source.

Robin also uses Ross to cite "This kind of musical form of accentuated bible reading is inherited from Jewish bible reading cantillation and chants"; Ross does not say anything like this. He also does not say anything comparable to "The common origin and influence of Jewish music and hymnal tradition on Kerala Nasrani christian musical tradition could be seen in the blessing hymn of the Malabar Nasranis and the prayer hymn of benediction of the amida of the Jewish tradition..."; he merely says it "follows rather closely".
There are even more examples. I have not checked Robin's other sources, but I have no doubt that the same tendentious POV-pushing, original search, and/or general incompetence will be found there.

There are even further problems beyond these critical issues. The title is patently silly and needlessly confusing ("Nasranis" are by definition Christian, and mostly all live in Kerala), and the article is riddled with abhorrent writing and glaring style errors. This is outright unacceptable.--Cúchullain ^t/c 16:58, 4 June 2012 (UTC)

I agree there may be passages in the article that may be open to interpretation. However, it is not done on purpose. This is likely to occur when only one person edits or begins an article. I am happy that you have got the Ross article and have tried reading it. I seek your assistance to remove the likely POV that might have crept up as a solo editor when I started this page. In my capacity in order to be as NPOV as possible I tried to get an Indian source and made a separate section dedicated to Syrian christian folk songs which are largely in malayalam. You could have said that I am engaged in POV editing if I wrote only about Nasrani syrian music and chant accentuation both of which is influenced by Jewish music. But I have made a separate section dedicated to Nasrani folk songs that are sung in the native language of kerala (malayalam). If I had written this article without a detailed description of folk songs in malayalam then you could have called it as POV. But I have gathered information from whatever legitimate sources that I could get regarding nasrani folk songs in malayalam language. As collaborative wikipedia experience please do help in removing POV that is likely to have crept though not on intent. I have at least never removed a citation on purpose and tampered with it. I do have a point of view, we all do. That is why different and competing accounts need to be mentioned. There is much that has to be improved in this article towards making it more neutral and grammatically valid. Please do help.

As for chant accentuation and cantillation this is a quote from Ross page 83 "The Syrian Christian accentuation system was instituted by the Syrian Masoretes, a group similar to the grammarians in Tiberias who codified the system of non-diastematic (nonintervallic) signs for Hebrew cantillation of Biblical texts in the ninth century C.E. (Segal 1953:143; Avenary 1963:10). The Syrian Christian system is a dot notation above, below, or on either side of the words of the text, paralleling the Palestinian dot system of the Jews, which was later incorporated into the Tiberian ekphonetic notation. This development took place between the fifth and tenth centuries C.E. (Avenary 1963:8). The names for these signs give an indication of the expressiveness that characterizes Syrian Christian Bible reading and Chant style, names like wonder" Again I may have made POV interpretation of this, which is likely but again as I said not with intent or purpose. If so then please do rectify it. I added in this page whatever I could given my access to sources. I have tried to give balanced perspective by referring to Indian source of Choondal from Kerala. Please do add more material from other sources. Again I state that I agree there may be passages in the article that may be open to interpretation but it is not done on purpose. Please do help in improving this article by editing and adding information from more sources. I am afraid to say that I feel hounded and persecuted on the wikipedia. I hope we can have more trust in each other and not see our works with bad intent. An article written by only one person cannot be entirely NPOV especially when it deals with culture or religion or the like. Your help is needed to make this a better and a more neutral article. thanks Robin klein (talk) 17:39, 4 June 2012 (UTC)

Sorry, Robin, but we've heard this before. You continue making the same grievous errors in the same type of articles. These issues are apparent to everyone else at a glance, but yet you continue. I've had enough.--Cúchullain ^t/c 17:49, 4 June 2012 (UTC)

I have removed contentious passages from the article as per your remarks. Please do give more feedback thanks Robin klein (talk) 03:15, 5 June 2012 (UTC)

Salvaging what we can

Now that Robin klein's topic ban has been settled, I'm going to set about gutting this article to remove as much of the POV-pushing, original research, and myriad style errors as I can. First I've moved it away from its awful title, and I'll get to the rest shortly.--Cúchullain ^t/c 13:48, 6 June 2012 (UTC)

Ah, sorry. I've only just seen your note. I've done some of the style stuff but will back off until you have trawled through it. Feel free to restore to the version prior to my recent edits if that makes the task easier. - Sitush (talk) 15:15, 6 June 2012 (UTC)

No worries. I've given it a start, and will be back later on. What a mess this was. I frankly can't believe this was written by someone who has been editing Wikipedia for eight years.--Cúchullain ^t/c 16:35, 6 June 2012 (UTC)

Such things are common in the India-related sphere, as are the behavioural traits such as tendentiousness. I usually delink [[India[[, btw, per WP:OVERLINK. I also don't see how we can use Cantillation as a reference, although there is hopefully a decent source in that article that can be imported (after checking it!). Quibbles such as these are, of course, inevitable when a big rewrite is underway. Would it be worthwhile adding {{in use}} or {{under construction}} for the time being? - Sitush (talk) 16:41, 6 June 2012 (UTC)

Considering how outrageously the Ross work was misinterpreted, it's very likely the same has been done with the other sources. I've already done that in a couple of places (chiefly where the source was clearly inappropriate), and I'm going to remove everything I can't verify myself (including the bit sourced, evidently to the Wikipedia article on Cantillation!). Anyone who can make any further use out of the rest of it is of course encouraged to do so.--Cúchullain ^t/c 19:34, 6 June 2012 (UTC)

General impression coming in cold to this article

I notice a lot of "may" and "might" mixed in with "is" and "was", but no discussion of the debatable points implied by "may" and "might". ISTM that when a Wikipedia article is about a topic on which there is legitimate debate, it's important that the article summarize the various sides of the debate in an even handed way. Alas, such is not the case here, buttressing earlier comments about distorted references, biased POV, etc.

PS: If anyone reading lives in a community of St. Thomas Christians, record a few samples of their music for inclusion in this article. Any Wikipedia article about music or speech should include an audible example. Or so it seems to me.

Floozybackloves (talk) 23:36, 24 June 2012 (UTC)

Categorisation

I have had a discussion with User:Alan Liefting on their talk page. They had removed Category:Saint Thomas Christians and Category:Christian communities of India. I reinstated them because I couldn't understand the rationale, which was lost behind the HotCat automatic edit summary. I was then reverted and the rationale is basically that the article concerns music, not communities.

I can see that there may be some overcategorisation going on here: Category:Saint Thomas Christians is a subcat of Category:Christian communities of India, and therefore the latter is not required. I am struggling to see why the former is somehow in contravention of WP:CAT, and why the logic employed has left Category:Kerala society in there. Yes, AL has tried to explain it but I must be thick or summat - can anyone do a better job? - Sitush (talk) 07:36, 25 June 2012 (UTC)

NB: while writing the above, Alan Liefting has explained that they wavered re: whether or not to retain the Kerala category - a sort of edit conflict, across two talk pages. Sorry. - Sitush (talk) 07:40, 25 June 2012 (UTC)

Just a wee note. "They" should read "him". -- Alan Liefting (talk - contribs) 07:49, 25 June 2012 (UTC)

Indeed, and the same with me. But when I say that I sometimes find the gender neutral people go a bit doo-lally. Can't win! - Sitush (talk) 07:54, 25 June 2012 (UTC)

I reinstated Category:Saint Thomas Christians. The article is clearly related.--Cúchullain ^t/c 16:56, 25 June 2012 (UTC)

{{One source}}

I tagged this with {{one source}} because, of its eight references, seven are to the same source. As the tag says, it'd be good if citations to additional sources could be added. I don't really know what else to say. Thanks. – Arms & Hearts (talk) 20:59, 25 June 2012 (UTC)

Drive-by tagging without discussion is usually pretty useless (especially considering that more than one source was used). Do you believe the main source was being misused or was otherwise problematic? Do you know of other reliably-sourced points of view that are not being represented? To quote the template page, "Please consider improving the article or making a good faith attempt to find additional citations before adding this template", "It is considered good form to provide a rationale in your edit summary or on the talk page of the article. The more specifically you describe your concerns, the less likely other editors are to misunderstand", etc.Cúchullain ^t/c 23:01, 25 June 2012 (UTC)

And generalised negative reactions to good-faith editing is worse than useless; it's actively harmful. Especially so when you don't seem to have even read the text of the template in question, which doesn't require that only one source be used (rather, that the article "relies largely or entirely upon a single source.") If I believed the source was being misused or that points of view were not being represented, I would have raised those concerns here or edited the article to rectify them; in the absence of specific concerns but in the knowledge that reliance on a single source is likely to indicate weight, neutrality and/or notability concerns, I added the tag. I find your refusal to assume good faith problematic, and your insistence that you were unable to discern the meaning of the template disingenuous. – Arms & Hearts (talk) 23:32, 25 June 2012 (UTC)

I'm sure we've just gotten off on the wrong foot. However, I'm not going to spend any more time going back and forth over some silly tag. If you have anything to add to the article or the subject in general, please do so.Cúchullain ^t/c 12:38, 26 June 2012 (UTC)