Talk:Baidouska

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Encyclopedic definition, almost certainly not attestable in its excruciating detail. DCDuring TALK 19:40, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

As usual, I object to the notion that the facts in a definition must be "attestable". No such requirement is described in WT:CFI, and I don't think such a requirement is tenable. Our definitions shouldn't be encyclopedic, but "attestability" is not the reason. (I should create a template for this comment.) —Ruakh_TALK 02:23, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

What is the reason definitions shouldn't be encyclopedic? How can a contributor tell whether a contribution is encyclopedic? What fact-based standard is there about definitions? There seems to be no internal compass that enables most contributors to distinguish encyclopedic from non-encyclopedic content.

If we wish to create a class of entries that are permitted to be encyclopedic or simply not bother with the distinction, we may of course do so. We will need to have some additional standards for enforcing a level of quality control on our entries. Are we just to accept references from "authorities"? Will there be any limit on the types of entries for which references will be accepted? Would references have more or less force than attestation? DCDuring TALK 04:29, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

I am echoing Ruakh: 'I object to the notion that the facts in a definition must be "attestable". No such requirement is described in WT:CFI, and I don't think such a requirement is tenable.' --Dan Polansky 08:12, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

I think that the idea of attesting senses is well established. We regularly amend senses to fit the citations provided. What seems new is applying attestation to proper nouns. That in turn follows from the breaching of barriers against inclusion of entries that have little prospect for anything but encyclopedic content and contributors who seem to lack the cultural knowledge to produce usage-based definitions intuitively. I don't really trust anyone's intuitive definitions of any term, but some contributors seem to have no ability to produce a definition without copying. If no dictionary has the term, they seem to have recourse to encyclopedias for the definitions. But an encyclopedia is not a long-form dictionary. It is its own thing with its own standards, in which considerations of ordinary usage do not loom large.

I never understood why there was not a practice of trying to infer from usage what people actually meant by proper nouns. The effort to find what "Lassie" actually means when used shows that there is a set of attributes which seem to be invoked by the use of "Lassie", but that many characteristics need to be explicitly repeated. Relying on external sources for definitions has not proven a major problem for most older true dictionary entries, as Webster 1913 and Century provide copyright-free sources and other online lemming-sources provide a way of pointing out missing senses. Newer words usually require attestation to allow inference of meaning. DCDuring TALK 12:35, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

It's not just proper nouns; as I mentioned before, the same thing applies to, say, goose. More generally, there are many words where usage seems to be guided by something like ostensive understanding (it's a duck because it looks and walks and quacks like a duck, and I know what a duck looks and walks and quacks like because I've seen other ducks, and I know that those were ducks because . . . ; she's Ibo because she speaks Ibo and belongs to the Ibo ethnic group, and the Ibo ethnic group consists of people who are Ibo, and Ibo is the language they speak, and I know that the language is Ibo because . . .), and I simply don't think it's possible to capture that sort of understanding in a dictionary definition without resorting to factual information.

By the way, relatedly, I think we should always keep reality in mind when writing definitions, even if reality has no bearing on usage. Many English speakers have believed that dragons were real, and that belief affected their usage of the term; but we would do our readers a disservice if we included a definition of dragon written from that perspective.

—Ruakh_TALK 17:03, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

As you know I am an advocate and practitioner of ostensive definitions: pictures, drawings, examples (rhetorical figures), and even sound files. Are they encyclopedic? Even if they are, they seem to correspond closely to the idea that a word often has a central concrete representative.

But verbal definitions necessarily place a great reliance on the selection by the definition writer of salient features to include in the definition. I cannot think of a better way to find out what features of the referent of a word are most saliently evoked by its use than by an attestation process. We routinely do this for words other than proper nouns, unless we are just lazily copying other dictionaries' definitions.

For many words we have only technical definitions of terms that clearly are normally used without knowledge of the elements of the definitions we provide. The average golfer using a golf club with a "titanium shaft" is completely unaware of virtually all of the components of the definition we provide: "a chemical element, atomic number 22; it is a strong, corrosion-resistant transition metal, used to make light alloys for aircraft etc." It is not merely a problem of length. The problem begins with the choice of the word "element" rather than, say, "material" or "metal". I have no objection to having a definition such as ours in the context {{chemistry}}. But the folks who name products are far ahead of us in understanding what such words actually mean to normal people ("hi-tech", high-performance, high-status). We could do worse than pay attention to such usage in preparing definitions. ::::I would suggest that "titanium" needs a first definition something like "A strong metal used in demanding aerospace, marine, medical, and sports applications." The second definition can be something more like what we have.

Almost all definitions of basic technical terms should have a general non-technical definition reflecting actual usage. Something similar would apply to a term like "goose", whose first sense should not include its taxon. DCDuring TALK 18:44, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

Re: "The average golfer using a golf club with a 'titanium shaft' is completely unaware of virtually all of the components of the definition we provide": Well, so what? If I say "titanium" and you say "titanium" we're still talking about the same thing, and using the same word in the same sense, even if one of us knows more about titanium than the other. A golfer who speaks of his golf club's "titanium shaft" doesn't just mean that the shaft is made of a strong metal with certain other users, he means that it's made of the strong metal that chemists and materials scientists refer to as "titanium". If you give him a club with a titanium shaft and one with an adamantium shaft and he finds no golfing-relevant difference between the two, his reaction will be, "wow, adamantium is just as good as titanium!", not "O.K., so 'adamantium' means 'titanium'". (That's a cool thing about words: we can use them to store information that we don't even have. I can use "titanium" coherently and meaningfully to mean "whatever it is that 'titanium' means". But it'd be a crappy dictionary that tried to define it that way!)
Overall, I think you're making a great point, but I think you're taking it too far, and — if I may speak relevantly for a moment — our current CFI still don't demand three cites for each aspect of a definition, even if you convinced me that they should.
—Ruakh_TALK 18:58, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

I have nothing against there being a "technical" definition. I object to its having no usage context. I believe that your position requires a great deal more acceptance of authority than one that is based more on attestation.

In the case of Baidouska, I have added an external video link so as to provide another ostensive definition, in addition to the WP article linke. Combined these links make something far better IMHO than a definition based on what one person thinks salient that is short enough for a dictionary.

I have brought this item here for attestation for a few reasons:

1. just in case someone could actually show that there is attestation in some context.
2. to illustrate what is meant by encyclopedic in a definition.
3. to discourage contributors from abdicating the task of making usage-based English definitions.
4. to defend the proper role of a dictionary relative to an encyclopedia.
5. to justify in advance the editing of encyclopedic entries into dictionary entries.

I am greatly relieved that I do not need to bring each encyclopedic definition to RfV.

Citations:Lassie is a complement to this discussion, illustrating IMO problems with many of the citations that might be used to justify encyclopedic content. DCDuring TALK 19:40, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

We don't need multiple definitions that mean the same thing. If the set of creatures signified as "goose" in common usage is equivalent to the set of creatures signified by the taxon, then we should use the taxon. Moreover, define goose without including its taxon. Give me a definition of goose that completely specifies the creature in such a way that it's clear that swans and ducks aren't geese, and isn't encyclopedic.--Prosfilaes 19:45, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

Collins Pocket provides: "a fairly large web-footed long-necked migratory bird." Encarta provides: "long-necked water bird: a large waterfowl with a long neck and webbed feet, noted for its seasonal migrations and distinctive honking sound. Geese resemble swans but have shorter necks. Subfamily Anserinae. I admire the three-level Encarta approach: 1., the bold terse lead, 2., the longer, ordinary-English definition, and 3., the link to the world of taxons. DCDuring TALK 23:30, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

I would echo Ruakh again. What I would add is perhaps this: A quotation serving as an attestation of a use of a term is typically silent on the details of what the term means precisely because it already presupposes that the reader knows the term. A sentence that does not presuppose the previous knowledge of the term typically explains the term, and is thereby qualified as a mention of the term, and thus a poor quotation for attestation purposes. Quotations attesting details of the meanings of terms can probably be found for many terms, but these would be mention quotations, a set disjuct with the set that we normally accept. --Dan Polansky 17:18, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

• Deleted the last two sentences and, voila, it's no longer an encyclopedic definition. ---> Tooironic 05:07, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

  Definitely an improvement, but the existence of more than one sentence or more than 40 words in a definition is not necessary for a definition to be encyclopedic. DCDuring TALK 12:35, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

No real opinion, but the Wikipedia article is Paidushko_horo, and w:Special:WhatLinksHere/Paidushko_horo doesn't even list this in the redirects, suggesting our title is either wrong, or a less common form. The translations seem to "support" this too. Mglovesfun (talk) 12:41, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

Striking as cleaned up. Or was it actually verification that is needed? DAVilla 16:56, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

Unstriking, yes, three citations please. Mglovesfun (talk) 17:05, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

Yes, like Mglovesfun I would like to see citations. I see only two in Usenet and only one in Google Books that could be acceptable. - -sche 18:42, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

• Unstriking. I don't think that the English terms attestably bears the meaning relating to the beat. What the dance is and what the word means are the essence of the distinction between encyclopedic and lexicographic, especially at a truly descriptive dictionary as we claim to be. If we want to claim that, because some people (trained musicians ?) attestably use the translations of the word as having the meaning of having a certain beat, the English word has that meaning to general users of a dictionary, we can do so. But I believe that we are eliminating distinctions among languages and among usage contexts within languages. DCDuring TALK 17:12, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

  The specific portion of the definition that needs attestation (or simple deletion) is: "done to a 5-beat meter, divided into "quick-slow" units of two and three beats." If English attestation is found, the attestation source may provide a clue about usage context of a definition with such a component. DCDuring TALK 17:58, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

  • No, what the dance is is part of the definition. Our definitions should make it clear how something differs from similar somethings--"A folk dance of Bulgaria and Macedonia" is a lousy definition because it doesn't give you any way to distinguish between this folk dance and others. It's like defining communism as "an economic theory".--Prosfilaes 19:45, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

    But the words that create the discrimination should be intelligible to a general reader and not require a paragraph. In the case of Wiktionary, we have multiple means of providing a user with a means of gaining a more direct experience of the definiendum: a photo or drawing, a sound file, a link to WP (and/or other sister projects), references, and links to external sites. In this case, I believe that the YouTube video I added is vastly superior in breadth of reach and specificity to the wordy definition and even the WP article. I don't think a still picture is much help and couldn't find a sound or image file at Commons.

    As for communism, I don't think our definition at sense 1 is especially good at distinguishing communism from the ideology of the British Labor Party in the '50s, a distinction that seemed very important to users of the word at the time. It might be an adequate definition for a dictionary, but it does not succeed in making the distinctions that would ideally be made. I think this is a problem of any usefully short definition that reflects actual usage. DCDuring TALK 20:09, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

    The problem with a photograph or video is that it doesn't express the range of the subject. We can illustrate Chihuahua with the same picture as dog definition 1 and dog definition 2. The same creature might fit all three definitions, but the meaning of those definitions is quite different. Moreover, words are the only medium that can reach the blind and deaf and even deaf-blind.

    communism is its own bear, like any other word that has been used and abused as a political football over the years. But we still need definitions that separate it from capitalism and feudalism, as users are generally agreed it's separate from those things, and definitions that briefly explain its relation to socalism.--Prosfilaes 20:32, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

    The problem of diverse natural kinds can be addressed by galleries and by single photos suggesting the range of possibilities. The latter is quite easily found for dogs. In any event users don't expect perfect knowledge from a dictionary or even an encyclopedia. I always expect users to select the appropriate medium for their capabilities. I have nothing against providing technical definitions and links to WP. If such definitions would provide a means for the differently abled to get a deeper understanding of "titanium" or "dog" or "Baidouska", then so much the better. But it should not be necessary for standard-configuration humans to have had a Physics or Chemistry class to get some basic idea of what titanium is, as "element" presupposes IMO.

    In my discussion of communism, I was just trying to work with the example you provided. Why don't you take a run at improving our definition of communism so it exemplifies the kind of differentiation that verbal dictionary definitions can achieve. At least we would then have one better definition.

    Do we have that many users that don't know what an element is? Provide a link to element, then; it's certainly a simpler word and easier to explain then metal.--Prosfilaes 18:07, 25 February 2011 (UTC)

    Very few people have any direct experience of titanium in the real world except as the metal. They experience titanium dioxide as a pigment. To insist on the superior reality of the technical view seems to be a new technocratic form of prescriptivism. "Metal" may hard to explain because it is not a new-fangled artificial concept, but one that has existed for a long time and has intuitive meaning relating to the tactile and other qualities that people experience. That some materials that chemists call metals don't have some these qualities and that metals don't have those qualities in all environments does not diminish the linguistic reality that metal has a principally non-technical meaning in the language. DCDuring TALK 18:32, 25 February 2011 (UTC)

I strike this as RFV-failed, because there are no citations at all in the entry. For the record (the archive), the current definition is "A folk dance of Bulgaria and Macedonia done to a 5-beat meter, divided into "quick-slow" units of two and three beats." The following translations are in the entry: Bulgarian: Пайдушко хоро n (Pajduško horo), Macedonian: Пајдушко оро n (Pajduško oro), Turkish: Payduşka Dansı, (deprecated template usage) Greek: Μπαϊντούσκα f (Baïntoúska). The entry points to Paidushko horo on Wikipedia.Wikipedia and at YouTube.com. The original definition was "Baidouska, Paidushko horo (Template:lang-bg; Template:lang-mk, Template:lang-tr) is a folk dance of Bulgaria and Macedonia done to a 5 beat meter divided into "quick" (2 beat) and "slow" (3 beat) units, abbreviated quick-slow or 2-3. Like many other Balkan folk dances, each region or village has its own version of the dance. It is traditionally a men's dance, but in modern times it is often performed in lines of both men and women." - -sche (discuss) 04:14, 19 August 2011 (UTC)

Variant of paidushko and friends

If anyone's still interested, baidouska might be considered a variant of pajduska/paidushka/pajduško/pajdusko/paidushko, which appears to be verifiable in English without too much trouble. —Michael Z. 2012-01-30 22:56 z

RFC discussion: May 2009

The following discussion has been moved from Wiktionary:Requests for cleanup (permalink).

This discussion is no longer live and is left here as an archive. Please do not modify this conversation, but feel free to discuss its conclusions.

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Baidouska

This needs some sort of cleanup, and may need to be moved to a Cyrillic spelling. --EncycloPetey 17:16, 24 May 2009 (UTC)

That’s Greek, but I don’t know whether it’s also used in English. The dance is named for the Bulgarian village of Пайдушко, so I would think the capitalization is okay in any case. —Stephen 21:57, 24 May 2009 (UTC)