Talk:Arabs

really an ethnic group?

i've heard a lot of Arabs say they regard Arab chiefly as a linguistic group identity; ethnically they are Moroccan or Palestinian, Jordanian or Druze, Iraqi or Algerian. I know this is just hearsay, but maybe the contested nature of the label should be elaborated? 128.114.255.141 (talk) 05:46, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

here's at least one .edu source which agrees https://www.africa.upenn.edu/K-12/Who_16629.html it's pretty clearly a rudimentary kids' intro to the topic, but seemingly one made by qualified experts 128.114.255.141 (talk) 05:48, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

Suggestions on cutting length

In follow-up to this, I'd suggest trimming the "History" section in particular, transferring any well-sourced content to History of the Arabs or elsewhere. Not only is it the largest section by far, but most of this history is covered directly by other relevant articles, so an overview article about one ethno-linguistic group doesn't really need to go into all this detail. The sections on "Antiquity" and the paragraphs preceding it are especially in need of WP:SUMMARYSTYLE.

The "Renaissance" subsection is also inserted awkwardly out of chronological order and has a bit of a POV slant: emphasizing an "Arab" character on the history of the whole Muslim world, even for something like the "Timurid Renaissance", which is hardly of central relevance here. We could probably move the most relevant points to other subsections and trim some of the more puffery-ish material. The Nahda, which is only mentioned in passing, might deserve more attention as part of the "Modern period". R Prazeres (talk) 20:30, 15 February 2024 (UTC)

I support trimming the "History" section. Aintabli (talk) 03:07, 16 February 2024 (UTC)

Missing region with significant population

There is significant amount of the arab diaspora in the Dominican Republic which is not mentioned here. There is an estimate of 1 million descendants of arabs in the Dominican Population, specially coming from Palestine, Lebanon and Syria. This must be added as in the map is not even marked. The influence is so high that the current president is arab, the vice president as well as his wife. 2A02:AA10:227E:5380:89F6:AA8:6F1C:158F (talk) 06:29, 14 April 2024 (UTC)

You need to provide a reliable source. Zero^talk 15:01, 14 April 2024 (UTC)

I'm not finding any estimates remotely approaching 1 million. The World Atlas puts the number at 1% of the population, which, in turn, is about 11 million. The background of the president is irrelevant. Peru has had a Japanese-Peruvian president though only 0.2% of its population is of Japanese ethnicity. Largoplazo (talk) 18:41, 14 April 2024 (UTC)

Amorites

It is stated that the Amorites "likely originated from Arabia, but as even mentioned on the Amorites Wiki page, the prevailing academic consensus is that the Amorites (actually) most likely originate from central Syria in the mountainous region of Jebel Bishri. This should be mentioned to avoid creating a false impression of the dominant global academic consensus. 2601:587:4302:1620:1A6:8CEB:D70A:D0CC (talk) 14:59, 18 April 2024 (UTC)

Whichever is the case, the language that they spoke doesn't seem to have been close to Arabic... AnonMoos (talk) 15:43, 18 April 2024 (UTC)

Why Peter Webb's work isn't mentioned ? .

It should be specified in the Pre-Islamic period that the concept of "Arab" as an ethnic identity did not yet exist among the Arabic-speaking populations in the world . Arab shouldn't be confused with "Arabian" . TheCuratingEditor (talk) 17:45, 18 April 2024 (UTC)

Era

This article used the BC/AD convention until 17 September 2008 when an IP user unilaterally changed parts of the article to the BCE/CE convention without discussion. The Manual of Style states the following: "An article's established era style should not be changed without reasons specific to its content; seek consensus on the talk page first (applying Wikipedia:Manual of Style § Retaining existing styles) by opening a discussion under a heading using the word era, or another similarly expressive heading, and briefly stating why the style should be changed." The unilateral change by the IP user in 2008 was clearly in violation of this rule.

In 2018, a user brought the issue up on this Talk page, arguing that "a general unwritten rule on Wikipedia that when an article is closely related to a non-Christian people, we use BCE/CE". Another user indifferently agreed and the issue has not been brought up again. This issue should be revisited now for discussion of the merits under the MoS.

The correct era convention for this article under the MoS is BC/AD. This was the original convention and per the MoS should not have been changed without reasons specific to the content.

The 2018 Talk entry suggestion for changing the convention is there is an unwritten rule. Wikipedia is built on written rules and citations, neither of which apply to the argument here. It could be just as easily said that the majority of the world uses the BC/AD convention, the majority of the world is not Christian, and thus there is an international rule to use the BC/AD convention at all times. The implied suggestion that non-Christians find the acknowledgement of the current calendar being based of the believed year of Christ's birth offensive and that those people would rather believe in a recently conceived imaginary common era that coincidentally aligns with the year of Christ's birth makes a lot of unsupported assumptions about those people. The MoS could easily state that if a user finds BC/AD offensive or believes a group that may read the article would find the convention offensive, a user may change it. Instead, the MoS looks only towards if there are reasons specific to the content of the article. Reasons specific to the article should be limited to technical limitations of the subject that would require the use of one or another. An article that draws heavily from quotes that use one convention should likely stay with that convention outside of the quotes. To allow a change in era for every article not dealing directly with Christianity is anathema to the dictates of the MoS.

The implied suggestion that the subject of the article would somehow be offended by a portion of the article that is factual and follows the MoS is not a reason to go beyond the rules of the MoS. If there is a genuine concern that BC/AD shocks the conscious of potential Arab readers then why use CE when the Islamic calendar tells us that it is the year 1445 AH? The answer should be because Wikipedia uses a set of neutral rules to write about facts. The 2018 Talk writer even acknowledged that there are Arab Christians. Per the current Wikipedia article, there are 10-15 million. Following the logic of the 2018 Talk post, those millions of Arabs love Christ, but more Arabs are not Christians, so we should change the established style to placate the majority. This is a dangerous othering of a religious minority.

It should be clear now that the imagined, uncited offense a user claims may be felt by one group should not be the standard by which an article deviates from the MoS. I do not suggest this last point I will make should be part of the discussion, however, I mention it for those that believe the MoS can be changed based on implied allegations of offense to be taken. Following the 2018 Talk page's own logic, that BC/AD should be limited only to pages discussing those people who love Jesus, it should be noted that Muslims love Jesus.

If, after considering the rule in the MoS, there is a consensus that there are not reasons consistent with the MoS to have changed the Era style in the article, I would respectfully request someone with editing privileges to revert the Era style to BC/AD as it was before the unilateral decision to change it in 2008. Shaggydan (talk) 06:22, 2 May 2024 (UTC)

I've never been able to understand the passion that some people bring to the AD/CE issue, but if you're very worried about offending people, then it might be better to avoid a simplistic "Muslims love Jesus" slogan, since Christians who are knowledgeable about their religion are aware that Muslims love a Docetic 100% human Jesus. AnonMoos (talk) 11:46, 2 May 2024 (UTC)

Since the edit was made 16 years ago, the article's established era style is the current one. M.Bitton (talk) 13:44, 2 May 2024 (UTC)