Talk:Howard Dietz

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[edit] American or US-american?

I changed the header from "...was an American lyric writer..." to "...was an US-american...". This was changed back by User:Threeafterthree with the reason "(why US-American?? Just curious, per Wiki style on biographies, just list nationality in header, take to talk page if you feel different, thanks!!)". Not that I care about the change, I just wonder how it should be done correctly? I mean America is no country / nationality but the name of two contintents. It's like writing "Tony Blair, European prime minister" or "Pelé, American soccer player". Even if we in Europe and the USA mostly think of the USA if we talk about Amerika, should it be mentioned more clearly in Wikipedia. I made some Latin Americans upset when I talked about America, meaning the USA. I just wan't to know how it's done as I wrote US-american in several articles today. Cattleyard 15:55, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

Hey Cattleyard, thanks for taking this to the talk page, first off. Second, I would look at this Wikipedia:Manual of Style (biographies). Third, let me know which articles you change so I can change them back, JUST KIDDING...Serioulsy, take some time and look at a bunch of bios of famous "Americans". They are are all listed this way and should be. I got started on my recent tangent since some editors added "Jewish-American" to about a 1,000 bios recently. I am also working on Polish-Americans, Italian-Americans, you-name-it-Americans. My work shouldn't take more than 4-5 years at this rate. The problem is we end up having bios like "Joe Smoe was a Polish-Jewish-American of Russian decent born in present day Armenia painter specializing in landscapes"

The United States IS the country and IF you are BORN here you ARE an "American X(fill in occupation/specialization)". This seems to be the consensus, BUT as we know, this CAN change. Anyways, hope this helps and I am open to ANY other thougths on the matter. Cheers!--Tom 16:39, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

No worries, there's not much to change as all my "US-americans" are in the same article (it was a list of persons) ;o). I agree with you that we should avoid to name every origin from someones grand-grandfather unless it is of importance to the article. But the persons nationality should be given. In my eyes, Polish-American is no nationality but US-american is. The American continents have several countries and even North America has two, but there is only one USA. If you ask someone from Argentina or Cuba, they are American, but not US-American. I am European but with German passport. Even when I am living in Sweden, I will be a German user of Wikipedia and not an European user or an German-Swedish user, ... As I said earlier, I don't care that much, I just wanted to know how it should be according to the common rule, to avoid re-edits. So, if you are saying American will do, it's fine for me, as long as the other "Americans" don't complain ;o)). Cattleyard 10:53, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

......"If you ask someone from Argentina or Cuba, they are American"??.... I have to disagree with this point. The Cuban is probably going to say "I am a Cuban" and the Argentine is going to say "I am a Argentine" ect, ect on down the list. For better or worse, not to be to ethnocentric here, if you say "I am an American", people known that you are a US citizen and not a Peruvian :) Cheers! --Tom 12:17, 29 May 2006 (UTC)