Talk:George Gurdjieff

Proposal to delete the fiction section

I am intending to delete the fiction section because it is not relevant at all to the subject but serves only to promote some novels which have nothing to do with Gurdjieff. Londonlinks (talk) 16:51, 14 November 2024 (UTC)

Personally, I am indifferent as to its inclusion or removal. Demetrios1993 (talk) 15:48, 24 November 2024 (UTC)

Nationality

WP:NATIONALITY clearly defines nationality on Wikipedia as the country of which the subject was a citizen. Gurdjieff was born in the Russian Empire and was a Russian citizen. Armenia did not exist as a separate county at the time, and neither of his parents were even first generation immigrants. We don't categorize people by their ethnic descent in the lead paragraph on Wikipedia, we discuss it in the early life section. Skyerise (talk) 16:04, 14 March 2025 (UTC)

I have provided a link to an image of Gurdjieff's passport which was issued in the 1920's by the Republic of Armenia:

http://www.gurdjieff.am/library/passport/

This shows that he was a citizen of Armenia at least in the 1920's and not of any other country. He later obtained a Nansen passport and was able to travel to the USA .

If Wikipedia defines nationality on the basis of citizenship as you state, then why have you deleted the reference to G being a "Greek-Armenian" philospher and instead have replaced it with a reference to G being a "Russian" philosopher? His parents were not Russian, but Greek and Armenian.

I have explained in a discusson on my talk page how other biographies on Wikipedia - such as for example Pythagoras and Beethoven - and there are some 2 million biographies on Wikipedia - refer to their ethnicity (Greek and German) in the opening sentence, which for the general public is of more significance than the place of birth of the subject, which could be referred to in the second sentence of an opening. The fact that a person may have been born in Nigeria doesn't make that person a "Nigerian" if in fact the person's parents are French.

Beethoven for example was born in Austria, but nobody would consider him to be "Austrian" as both his parents were German.

As a further example, the Dalai Lama as you know was Tibetan by race. It would be wrong to defined him as "Chinese" simply because he was born in China.

Likewise the biography of Gurdjieff's pupil Thomas de Hartmann begins by referring to him as "Ukrainian" and not "Russian" even though he was born in Russia. There is a great distinction between the different races who have occupied Russia over the centuries and it would be quite wrong and not to say misleading to refer to all these people as "Russian."

The opening which referred to G as a Greek-Armenian philosopher born in Russia should be reverted to. Londonlinks (talk) 19:50, 14 March 2025 (UTC)

Please also note what Wikipedia states about Nationality, since you have quoted the policy:

"The lead sentence should describe the person as they are commonly described by reliable sources."

Gurdjieff has never been described as "Russian" by any source, but always as a Greek-Armenian philospher.

Your edit is therefore contrary to this policy.

Where there could be ambiguity involving two possible nationalities, then the word "and" could be used - but in this case it is you who is introducing the ambiguity as for about 100 years Gurdjieff has aways been referred to as Greek-Armenian.

Please read the article and particularly take note of the various references to the reliable sources used to compile the page. Londonlinks (talk) 20:04, 14 March 2025 (UTC)

There is no picture of a passport at that link. It says "The page cannot be displayed because an internal server error has occurred." Skyerise (talk) 00:34, 15 March 2025 (UTC)

I found the picture of the passport which appears to have been issued in February 1920. Problem is, the First Republic of Armenia lasted only 2.5 years, from late May 1918 to 2 December 1920, when it was officially Sovietized. Since Gurdjieff was in Georgia in 1919, he must have gone back to Armenia to get that passport issued in February, it looks like, in order to travel to Constantinople in May. So he was a Russian citizen for 50 years and held a valid Armenian passport for less than a year. Per WP:CONTEXTBIO, he should still be described as Russian. Skyerise (talk) 00:51, 15 March 2025 (UTC)

Also, we don't follow sources that use a different definition of nationality than Wikipedia does (i.e. interpreting it as meaning ethnicity). Skyerise (talk) 01:04, 15 March 2025 (UTC)

I also don't know what you're on about re Beethoven. He was born in Bonn, which became a city in the German Empire the year after he was born, so all his adult life, he was a citizen of the German Empire. He is described as German not because it was his ethnicity but because it was the country of which he was a citizen. That really doesn't seem too difficult to understand. Skyerise (talk) 01:21, 15 March 2025 (UTC)

Finally, the sentence you quote: "The lead sentence should describe the person as they are commonly described by reliable sources.", isn't in the nationality section. It is in the section about "Positions and roles". Nationality is based on citizenship; positions and roles are based on sources. There is nothing in the nationality section about overriding our nationality is citizenship policy based on sources. In fact, it specifically says, "Ethnicity, religion, or sexuality should generally not be in the lead unless relevant to the subject's notability." If he were an Armenian revolutionary who stayed in order to resist Soviet takeover, then the fact that he was supposedly ethnically Armenian might be relevant. But that's not even certain, as the article says, "The long-held view is that Gurdjieff's mother was Armenian, although some scholars have recently speculated that she too was Greek" - so he may not have even had Armenian ethnicity at all and the sources you quote may be erroneous. In any case, instead he fled the country only two years after it was founded, and after having been a citizen of the Russian Empire for 50 years. As for "Greek", that may have been a family narrative, but it was his father's claim that this emigration happened in 1453, over 4 centuries before George's birth, so his father was not from Greece and he didn't inherit Greek citizenship from his father. He was born in Russia, was a Russian citizen for 50 years, then was a Russian expatriate in Europe: which is exactly how he is categorized as well. Skyerise (talk) 01:35, 15 March 2025 (UTC)

You opined that nationality on Wikipedia is defined by citizenship and so I provided a link to Gurdjieff's Armenian passport which defined his citizenship as Armenian, but you have rejected this on the basis that prior to the formation of the Republic of Armenia he was a citizen of Imperial Russia and therefore should be categorised as "Russian."

Even if you were right (which you are not) that it is the citizenship at birth that matters, the word "nationality" conveys both citizenship and ethnicity to the general public. A person can change their citizenship (as they can their domicile) during the course of their life, but ethnicity cannot be changed. You wish to ignore the ethnicity of Gurdjieff and also his Armenian citizenship to only focus on his citizenship at birth, which was as a citizen of Imperial Russia. This however is a distortion of the Wikipedia policy on Nationality and particularly as there is no longer a country called Imperial Russia. Gurdjieff moreover was never a citizen of the USSR and certainly could not be a citizen of present day Russia, as he died in 1949.

But even this is not the point, as your argument for calling Gurdjieff "Russian" is based on Gurdjieff's citizenship at birth.

There are many people who were recently born in the fomer USSR (which was formerly known as the Russian Empire up to 1917) but would find it inapproprate and misleading (not to say offensive) if you were to say that they were "Russian." To make the point clear, without having to refer to thousands of biographies on Wikipedia, consider the famous Ukrainian boxer Wladimir Klitschko and read his Wikipedia page. It starts by stating that he is Ukrainian even though at birth he was a citizen of the USSR .

Based upon your rationale, should you now amend the opening sentence on his page to say that he is Russian because he was born in the former Soviet Union?

This is the correct place to respond but it would have been helpful if you had posted your intention on this talk page for discussion before jumping in to amend the opening sentence.

As you can see, there has already been much discussion about whether Gurdjieff could be either Greek alone or Greek-Armenian which has been resolved by concessions made by the editors - but there has never been a discussion about wherher Gurdjieff could be described as Russian, for the reasons stated above. He was never ethnically Russian and neither was he a citizen of Russia. In that case, how can the Wikpedia policy on Nationality be applied?

Please note that present day Russia consists of 190 ethnic groups and the Russkie group is only one of them: List_of_ethnic_groups_in_Russia but most people from these groups - such as Armenian, Georgian, Tibetan, Mongolian etc would never describe themselves as "Russian" even if they were a citizen of Russia or had been born there.

Please also note the criticism which is contained on your talk page: "Please learn some self-control and let editors edit after they tell you they are going to edit instead of having to deal with edit conflicts and absurd reverts. This seems to be your MO. "

Londonlinks (talk) 10:35, 15 March 2025 (UTC)

Please note that we are not calling him an ethnic Russian: we are calling him a Russian citizen, which there is no doubt whatsoever that he was from his birth until at least 1918, over 40 years. Skyerise (talk) 11:56, 15 March 2025 (UTC)

You have not attempted to answer the points I have made. In saying that Gurdjieff was a Russian philosopher you are deliberately creating the false impression that Gurdjieff was of Russian ethnicity whereas neither of his parents were Russian. His native language was Greek and his mother tongue was Armenian.

The opening sentence is quite in order to express his ethnicity. Even if one accepts that both his parents were Greek, it would be wholly misleading to say that he was a Russian philosopher rather than say that he was a Greek philosopher born in Russia in 1867.

If you wish to stress the importance that when he was born he was a citizen of Imperial Russia then that can be shown elsewhere.

I agree that Nationality should be construed narrowly to exclude reference to ethnicity, which is the basis of Wikipedia's policy, but in this case the opening sentence is not directed to his nationality as you are trying to do, but to his ethnic background.

Even on the point that you are trying you are being misleading because the subject was not a citizen of Russia as that country is currently understood to be, but he was a citizen of Imperial Russia in the late 19th century and thereafter for a short while a citizen of the Republic of Armenia. He was never even a citizen of the USSR.

It is misleading to state that Gurdjieff was a "Russian" philosopher in the way that Tolstoy was a Russian author.

If we cannot agree then please request a Third Opinion but I should say that this discussion should have taken place before you jumped in with both feet and I would ask you therefore out of respect for the many editors who have worked on this page over the years to revert your edit pending the outcome of a Third Opinion. Londonlinks (talk) 13:30, 15 March 2025 (UTC)

If you want a third opinion, then request one. But those opinions are not binding. Our guideline is very clear. Tolstoy and Gurdjieff were Russian in exactly the same way, they were both citizens of the Russian Empire. Tolstoy's article does not use the word "Russian" to refer to his ethnicity, which is strongly discouraged by WP:CONTEXTBIO, it uses it to describe the nation of which he was a subject, and the same is being done here. Ethnic arguments are irrelevant due to policy, so please stop with the interminable and WP:DISRUPTIVE arguments about ethnicity. Continuing to disrupt talk pages with walls of text about ethnicity could be considered a blocking offense, proving that you are not here to bulid an encyclopedia but to instead promote ethnic views. Skyerise (talk) 13:38, 15 March 2025 (UTC)

I can understand that you are reluctant to subject your views to a Third Opinion because if it tells against you then you would not be willing to change your stance.

The opening sentence is not directed to Gurdjieff's nationality as you interpret it to be but to his ethnic background. I will amend the edit to retain your edit but make his ethnic background clear that his father was Greek etc. Is that acceptable to you?

There is no point in requesting a Third Opinion if you do not intend to abide by it. I will give you a chance to eat your lunch and wait for your acceptance before editing, as Wikipedia is based on editors being cooperative.

Kindly remove the templates you have posted to my talk page regarding vandalism etc because that criticism is uncalled for. Londonlinks (talk) 14:12, 15 March 2025 (UTC)

No, because introducing erroneous information is vandalism, regardless of your motivations. Additionally, editors are not allowed to remove material from another editor's talk page, but you are allowed to remove it yourself. Skyerise (talk) 14:59, 15 March 2025 (UTC)

Please see WP:Manual_of_Style which states that if nationality is in dispute then it can be omitted.

That is what I propose to do. Londonlinks (talk) 15:19, 15 March 2025 (UTC)

I've already done that. Skyerise (talk) 15:26, 15 March 2025 (UTC)

Thank you. Londonlinks (talk) 16:09, 15 March 2025 (UTC)