American Revolution subcategory for Louisiana

Question

Under the 'United States of America, American Revolution' category, there is a sub-category named 'Louisiana, American Revolution.' It contains profiles for seven individuals who lived under Spanish rule and aided the American cause.

This sub-category should not be listed under the 'United States of America' and appears to be an error.

It would be more appropriate to place it under the 'American Revolution' category or another relevant sub-category, similar to 'France, American Revolution.' Alternatively, a new 'Spanish-American Revolution' category could be created.

Could we please have this sub-category moved?

Category: Louisiana, American Revolution (wikitree.com)

Comments

See my comment to Ginny Fields' answer.

Answer 1

Jimmy, 

I agree that this should be changed, but it should reflect the way things were at "at the time". During the American Revolution, Spain did own the area under the name "Province of Louisiana" (Provincia de La Luisiana). Louisiana did not officially become a US territory until 1803. So I believe all this needs to be taken under consideration before we initiate any changes.

Hope this helps....

Comments

You should remember to coordinate any changes with the 1776 leader.

Answer 2

This category is under review by the 1776 Project. Thank you for your input.

Betty Norman - 1776 Project Leader

Answer 3

Category: Louisiana, American Revolution has been removed and is scheduled for deletion as soon as one remaining link has been removed. Louisiana Militia has been connected to Category: Contributions From Areas Other than Original 13 States and also still rolls up into Category: Militia, American Revolution.

Thanks again for suggesting this change. It needed to be done.

Betty

Answer 4

By any chance was the Louisiana Project consulted? I am one of the Leaders and have not been notified of a pending change until I saw this post.

Comments

I agree that this category was misnamed, if that is what caused it to be nested with locations that were revolting from England, and I do appreciate the correction.

But I also agree with other project leaders who have wondered in this forum why we are often the last to know about name changes to relevant location-related categories. Shouldn't the location-specific project be brought into the conversation? At the very least, a location tag should be added to these location category name change requests.

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I struggle to understand the hierarchy for changes/questions. The category in question was managed by the 1776 project. Apart from its name 'Louisiana,' it had no connection with the 'Louisiana Project.'

Out of an abundance of caution, I included tags for '1776,' 'Military and War,' 'American Revolutionary War,' and 'Categorization.'

How is a person supposed to navigate these unwritten rules? Ultimately, it seems there needs to be one project owner, and others with an interest in that area should monitor the G2G forum and speak up if they have a stake or suggestion on the matter.

In this particular incident, it appears to have been handled perfectly. The question included a tag to the project owner asking for a change. The project owner posted a response stating it was under review, giving other interested parties the chance to respond. The project team with ownership initiated the change.

I wish all project owners used this approach.

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I'm not trying to be critical of anything you've done, Jimmy. Just hoping to bring some awareness to a common oversight in communication. You got the right result, so I don't mean to quibble. But the Louisiana Project did have a connection with the category, in that all of the profiles categorized in it are or rather should be managed by the Louisiana Project. There are geographic projects for all of the states and many countries, so it seems only logical to me to add one more tag to a question -- please tag the location project if a location is part of the name of the category.

 "In this particular incident, it appears to have been handled perfectly. The question included a tag to the project owner asking for a change. The project owner posted a response stating it was under review, giving other interested parties the chance to respond. The project team with ownership initiated the change. I wish all project owners used this approach."  Aside from not understanding what you mean by "project owner," (maybe you meant "project leader?") How can we use any approach if we aren't included in the conversation? Our newest leader happened to spot the question and didn't know if a category that seemed to be very much in our interest should be changed without our input. She did speak up, but got no answer. 

Again, in this case, it worked out, and we appreciate your having gotten that particular change made. But it hasn't always been the case that a lack of communication works out. And, TBH, categories are probably an unmanageable beast for a wiki with 20,000 active members (https://www.google.com/search?q=how+many+active+members+on+wikitree&rlz=1CATTSD_enUS727US732&oq=how+many+active+members+on+wikitree&aqs=chrome..69i57j33i160l5.14239j0j7&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8). Anyone can create them and name them anything without talking to anyone else. Projects are here to try to help, but we can't help what we don't know. So I'm just taking this opportunity to ask folks to please add any logical location tags to category questions on G2G.

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I appreciate your thoughtful response. However, from an outsider's perspective, the categorization seems confusing. In this case the category is managed by the 1776 Project in association with the Categorization Project. If other projects have an interest in the category, additional tags should be added to clarify their involvement. Otherwise, how is anyone to know who has an interest in that page? For assistance with this or related categories, please ask in G2G, making sure to tag your question with both CATEGORIZATION and 1776.

Some categories have no project management, but in this case it gave the guidance that it was managed by one project 1776, and to include tags for 1776 and categorization.  Maybe instead of tags, we should use links that send to all project leaders interested in the page. Again, they would need to add their tags or something to the page.

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My apologies, Virginia! I did not realize there WAS a Louisiana Project. My oversight. You should have been contacted.

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Thank you, Betty! Like Stephanie said, the correct decision was made, but Leaders of a project should be consulted before major changes. Thank you for your comment and, hopefully, this instance will give pause for thought on future changes.