Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Animorphism

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was merge‎ to Therianthropy. Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 05:19, 17 August 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Animorphism[edit]

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Wikipedia already has a page for this at therianthropy. However, I am nominating this for AfD rather than simply redirecting it because I cannot find mention of this term in the slightest outside of a TVTropes page, meaning it violates WP:NOTNEO as likely just a neologism someone made up one day. It merits a discussion on whether the term is actually a relevant one, and if it is a separate topic rather than a complete overlap. ᴢxᴄᴠʙɴᴍ (ᴛ) 06:33, 9 August 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This discussion has been included in the deletion sorting lists for the following topics: Fictional elements, Science fiction and fantasy, Mythology, and Spirituality. ᴢxᴄᴠʙɴᴍ (ᴛ) 06:33, 9 August 2023 (UTC)[reply]
~~Speedy keep~~ Unless I am missing something completely, I can't see how I cannot find mention of this term in the slightest outside of a TVTropes page comes about. There are non-TVTropes sources which use the term already in the article. The usual Google Books and Google Scholar searches provide numerous hits, including the Lexical Semantics for Terminology and the The Routledge Companion to Literature and Disability. So no, this is not a neologism made up by users of TVTropes or Wikipedia editors. I did not check if this is notable in it's own right or a WP:CONTENTFORK of therianthropy, but as the nominator stated, that would not be a deletion discussion then. Daranios (talk) 07:15, 9 August 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Speedy keep Hey there, i saw that you left a message on my talk page, thank you for that! I wrote the article as it was listed on the wikipedia red link, upon reading up about it i found some academic articles mentioning it.

Based on my brief interpretation of the 2 items, I believe that Therianthropy and Animorphism differ in how Animorphism is only used as a literary device and trope in fiction. However Therianthropy also contains psychiatric and psychological aspects which extends beyond the realm of fiction and can be seen in modern day as forms of hallucination or psychiatric disorders.

I've added more academic articles if you still require evidence of it's mention. But as User:Daranios mentioned, there are multiple mentions outside TVTrope. Therefore I too will dispute that this article warrants deletion on the basis of "violates WP:NOTNEO" as WP:NOTNEO mentions "To support an article about a particular term or concept, we must cite what reliable secondary sources say about the term or concept, not just sources that use the term (see use–mention distinction)."

Source 4 in the article reference: "Animorphism in the anthropocene: nonhuman personhood in activist art practice" mentions the word "Animorphism" 41 times in the whole journal entry, thus it does not simply "use the term" but stretches the usage of "animorphism" to philosophy.

As of now there are currently 6 other academic sources in the Animorphism article which discusses animorphism and make mention of it as a medium for furthering the hypothesis of their academic article.Intuivo (talk) 07:16, 9 August 2023 (UTC)[reply]

I am rather unsure what "nonhuman personhood" as described in the cited thesis has to do with transforming into animals. Although it may be a moot point, since WP:SCHOLARSHIP states that "Masters dissertations and theses are considered reliable only if they can be shown to have had significant scholarly influence", and I am uncertain if that one does.

There may be uses of the term in various places but my point stands that it seems to be a neologism that is totally unlisted in dictionaries, or the article conflates different and unrelated uses of the term that mean different things. ᴢxᴄᴠʙɴᴍ (ᴛ) 08:55, 9 August 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Indeed. Nonhuman personhood is the point I make below: older sources often seem to understand the term as related to animism and personification. There is a danger that sources are added uncritically to this page that equivocate on what is meant. The page must not equivocate on terms or else other deletion reasons will be cited (TNT in particular). Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 09:04, 9 August 2023 (UTC)[reply]

~~Keep~~ or redirect to therianthropy - but any redirect would have to be a "redirect with possibilities". The article could do with some attention, particularly to establish how it differs from therianthropy, but it is clear that the term is widely covered in a large array of secondary sources. Per Daranios' searches, the term is used widely, understood and appears to have an overlapping defintion with therianthropy, whilst not being a subset of it - and this particularly around the TV tropes mentioned by the nom. It is interesting that the word does not appear in the OED, nor other dictionaries I have checked. But dictionaries are, like Wikipedia, lagging indicators of the notability of a word. The fact it is used in literature and in academic contexts does suggest there is a subject here. I caveat my own remarks, however, with a recognition that in the literature where this term is being used, it is frequently used within quotes ("animorphism") suggesting the author is intending a neologism (see nom's concerns regarding WP:NOTNEO), or, and this particularly the cases more than 10 years old, it may not be used as per the description on this page. for instance Hartman (1999) defines the term to mean something much closer to personification (page 49). (c.f. animism) Despite this, I don't think the subject fails GNG, so the only real question for editors is to what extent that this is different from therianthropy, and to what extent that merits its own page.

Hartman, C O. (1999) The Long View London : Wesleyan University Press

-- Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 07:59, 9 August 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Merge with therianthropy. Both articles seem to be about the same concept. "Animorphism is the ability of a character to transform into an animal" - "Therianthropy is the mythological ability or affliction of individuals to metamorphose into animals". Unless a source can be found that clarifies the distinction, I think this is a case of someone "reinventing" an obscure term, and coining a synonym. WP:CONTENTFORK applies. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 05:37, 11 August 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Redirect or merge to therianthropy, as WP:REDUNDANTFORK. I would be open to changing my !vote if there was significant coverage talking about how these are different. But it seems the evidence points towards these being the same, if not closely related. Shooterwalker (talk) 17:50, 13 August 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Redirect or merge to therianthropy, which is further developed and superior, but is currently missing a mention of "Animorphism". Being fictional, these two closely releated concepts have no inherent differences to justify two separate articles. – sgeureka ^t•c 11:57, 15 August 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Relisting comment: There won't be a Speedy Keep here but there are clearly those editors arguing that sources validate this article while others believe it should be Redirected or Merged. At least there is agreement on a Redirect/Merge target.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 06:45, 16 August 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Merge with therianthropy. I have struck my keep and moving to merge based on ensuing discussion and because of the relist. The topic is notable but no evidence has been presented to show it is significantly different from therianthropy to merit an article. The term can be mentioned in that article, and if any difference in focus of the terms can be shown, it could also be discussed there, without requiring its own article. Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 06:52, 16 August 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Merge any salvageable (reliably cited) materials with therianthropy, the term is probably just about worth keeping as a vaguely plausible search term (if anybody thinks like that), but the topic is identical. Chiswick Chap (talk) 08:37, 16 August 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Merge to therianthropy: In view of the later arguments beyond the nomination, it seems to me there is significant overlap, so a merge seems best. I did find one source relating both terms after all, though it is a bit off-handidly and in a pop-culture context, in this Wired article. Judging from a user comment at goodreads.com, the audio book Wolves and Werewolves in History and Popular Culture seems to have something to say on those terms. I guess there is noone around who can/would like to look into that one? Daranios (talk) 09:58, 16 August 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Marge to therianthropy as per nearly all of the above. The term "animorphism" could benefit from being mentioned in the article as a neologism or an alternate name, but other than that, as people have said above, it's a situation where you have two articles on more or less the same topic. Cheerio, ⛵ WaltClipper -(talk) 13:53, 16 August 2023 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.