Talk:Michael Marks

Was Marks a refugee?

The article doesn't say that he fled persecution. Was he an economic migrant? Obviously, all M&S customers will be grateful that he came, whatever the reason! But Wikipedia needs to be accurate. 81.148.12.80 12:00, 4 August 2005 (UTC)

This may help you understand what was going on in eastern Europe at about the time many Jews started moving westward in the mid and late 19th century. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pogrom

When was he born?

Alot of people need to know but the article doesnt say —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.9.142.90 (talk) 20:03, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

Nobody knows. As the article says. Mr Stephen (talk) 20:19, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

According to the following Censuses, the year of his birth was -

5th April 1891 - 1861 Poland, Russian Empire 31st March 1901 - 1863 Poland, Russian Empire

I got these from Ancestry. I would take an educated guess and say that he was born possibly in 1862, but again I don't think we'll ever know for sure unless there are birth records still around in contemporary Belarus. 194.221.74.7 (talk) 13:06, 12 February 2013 (UTC)

Nationality

Regarding his nationality, there is unclarity across different sources. The sources currently used in the article suggest that Marks was either Russian or Belarusian Jew. However, considering he came from a part of today's Belarus, then being part of the partitioned Poland and also refferred to as Belaya Rus (White Rus), where historically Belarusian and Polish Jews had lived (see Schagal and others for an example of reference ), the article uses dual nationality to address both of the unproved, but most possible options. As such, either 'Russian' must be used to refer to the independent state of birth, or 'Belarusian' and 'Polish' to refer to the dependencies of that time, unless a reliable source with more details on Mark's biography is provided. Please provide further evidence, if found (please note that even though the sources from published books are preferred, alternative resources from established and historical organisations are accepted if they add to a point). — Preceding unsigned comment added by Katlianik (talk • contribs) 07:21, 25 January 2021 (UTC)

Firstly, before publishing content please reach a Wikipedia:Consensus on here; it needs to be discussed. The sources you have added are either broken or have no page numbers so I can't check and verify the content. If it really is difficult to determine I'd just leave the Polish and British part out and purely say that he was a businessman with no nationality in the lead. Chagal was born in eastern Belarus, Słonim is in the west; that complicates the dispute. Nationality is not citizenship, hence his nationality was not Russian. Jewish identity under Wikipedia rules is not classified as a nationality either, unless it was important to the man's work eg. religious leaders. Certain sources claim "Belarusian-Jewish" looking solely at the geographical placement of Slonim at present, which is in Belarus. It's like saying that Germans born in Breslau (since 1945 Wrocław) are not Germans only Poles. The source which states "Russian-Jewish" is based on the register from the country he came from at the time, the Russian Empire. These sources for example claim he was a Polish Jew: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 Oliszydlowski (talk) 08:25, 25 January 2021 (UTC)

1. Please see through all the references provided carefully. They all state a variety of possible national origins, namely Belarusian Jew, Polish Jew, Russian Jew. Hence there is no sole citation nor approach that could be solely used as a valid. You point on the approaches taken by different sources to determining nationality is invalid as there is no sole scientific way of doing so (unless a person explicitly uses or used one specific nationality in their life or official documents), hence all logical approaches and reliable sources must be taken into account. Here is some of the sources you removed that support the duality of Marks' nationality (they exclude the ones that you mention above. Please also note, that you refer to a Russian source as biased, however yourself provide a source by Polish authors which can be regarded biased on the same grounds; regardless, I do not referr to it here.): [1] [2]

2. The region of Slonim of the 19th century cannot be solely addressed to as Polish. There is lots of historical evidence that is was then referred to both as Poland and Belaya Rus (Belarus) within Russia [3][4]. Besides, should a historical approach being taken, it was a Slavic Ruthenian region within the Polish-Lithuanian commonwealth, so we cannot know for sure self-identification of the locals unless proven vividly. Reasonably, in similar cases, it is customary to mention all possible nationalities in Wiki articles (see Schagal, Kalinowski, etc), in cases when there is no clear evidence of how a person referred to themselves in any of the sources (same evidence is found in other nationalities).

3. Other arguments can only be treated as personal opinions as they are based only on assumptions.

4. Therefore: - all reliable sources must be taken into account - existing Wiki practices should be looked at - personal opinions outside of existing sources must be views only as opinions to exclude bias - any resources cannot be weighted against each other based on personal opinions - quantity of resources is not a valid reason of choosing a dominant (e.g. Marks is mentioned more often as Russian Jew in the internet, however it may well be due to the number of Russian publications, not their importance) - hence all reliable sources must be equally taken into account and not selectively excluded

5. In light of this, to avoid bias and provide full information on the issue, dual Belarusian-Polish nationality must be used in the article, unless new sources which disapprove existing opinions are found in future.

6. There is no clear view across various sources on whether Jews is a nationality or not. So I leave out this point for future discussions. My suggestion would be simply avoid using 'Jews' and nationality in one sentence where possible.

7. Russian citizenship is most likely to be correct. However, there is no evidence Marks actually had one. Hence, I would suggest using Russian as the most probable one, as there is no other options, and leave it for future discussions.

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