Vanderwaalforces

Should interviews be discounted as primary sources...

In your nomination, en:Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Ogaga Sakpaide, you wrote the article relied on "...obviously PRs, advertorials, interviews, piecs that closely relates to the subject..."

I agree with you, that wikipedia articles should not rely on sources that are PR, advertorials, or are written by the BLP themselves, or their friends and associates.

But, when I was an active wikipedia contributor, I spent a couple of hours trying to get to the bottom of why wikidocuments seem to classify interviews as primary sources.

Short version? If you take a deep dive into the wikidocuments, they do not actually classify interviews, what everyone interprets as interviews, as primary sources.

One of the most famous interviews of the 20th Century was when British journalist en:David Frost got disgraced former President en:Richard Nixon to sit down to several hours of interviews. These interviews were so important they became the subject of a feature film. Frost, and a team of researchers, spent months preparing for the interview.

So, should these interviews be considered a primary source? Should any interview, where a professional journalist does a bunch of research be considered a primary source? What about interviews where the reporter or journalist has not specifically done any research, but is basing their probing questions on their years of experience in the field.

When I looked at the relevant wikidocuments, for the passages that asserted that interviews are primary sources, I found the key passage referenced three dry academic papers. Those three old academic papers did make comments about interviews.

Here is the very disturbing thing.

The three old, dry academic papers, cited by the very important wikidocument, really only mention one kind of interview, in passing. And, the kind of interview they mention was not a news interview! The interviewers it talked about were not reporters or journalists!

Certain kinds of academics, like historians and sociologists, also rely on interviews. When there was a key historical event historians will seek out eye witnesses, and interview them.

When an academic, like a historian, interviews an eye witness about a historical event, they want the interviewer, and the interviewer's opinions, to fade into the background, as much as possible. If the academic interviewer is successful in not letting their opinions and prejudices influence what they recorded the eye witness saying, then a transcription of that interview is definitely a primary document. Similarly, when a sociologist interviews subjects, to guage their opinions, transcriptions of those interviews are primary documents.

But, in my opinion, every AFD where someone has argued real interviews from reporters or journalists should be discounted because they thought a wikidocument said those interviews were primary documents has been based on a big mistake.

I am leaving this message here, rather than on en.wiki, because I am indefinitely blocked there. Please don't ignore my comments due to that block. For the record, that block was totally without merit. Geo Swan (talk) 01:11, 1 August 2024 (UTC)