Talk:Zelimkhan

POV

This article is pretty clearly written from a Chechen perspective, and makes a lot of claims about the relative military merits of Caucasian, Cossack and Russian forces and about the historiography of Chechnya. Not to mention, it's all apparently based on one paper that's not given much in the way of inline citations. It would be appropriate to add additional sources, and perspectives that are less romantic. Ibadibam (talk) 21:02, 11 February 2018 (UTC)

PROD

@Machinarium: I am very busy but the page can be improved using scholarship. Obviously the person who nominated it is not aware the topic is not unknown in scholarship:

• LR Gudaev "Abrek Zelimkhan: Fakty i dokumenty" [1]
• A Urushadze " The Caucasus in the Late 19th – Early 20th Centuries: Problems of Governance and Modernization on the Southern Outskirts of the Russian Empire " (using translated title for this work as maybe not everyone can tell what it would be unlike that above) [2] (English abstract : [3])

Of course there's tons more once you allow Google Scholar to grab Russian works and search his fullname, Зелимхан Гушмазукаев: [4].

• also, this, from the page itself... [[5]] -- Rebecca Gould, "Transgressive Sanctity: The Abrek in Chechen Culture "

No offense Onel, yes this page is badly written (I would know!), but this deletion on the basis of the topic being notable is Anglocentric at best. There is ample RS on the matter. --Calthinus (talk) 02:36, 11 September 2020 (UTC) ping also to proposer @Onel5969: --Calthinus (talk) 02:37, 11 September 2020 (UTC)

Indeed, I agree. Also Banditry and the Zelimkhan Phenomenon in Late Imperial Russia by Jeronim Perovic. Plus a huge amount of other Russian sources. I'm also very busy, but I'll improve the introduction and remove the essay. Machinarium (talk) 11:26, 11 September 2020 (UTC)

p.s. Zelimxan is not an alternative spelling, its a wrongful translation from the cyrillic version of his name Зелимхан. Machinarium (talk) 11:31, 11 September 2020 (UTC)

Machinarium you assumed using Zelimxan in English had anything at all to do with Russian. The trend among sources actually from the culture in question (Chechen, that is) at least was at one point to use Chechen Latin, which employs x.--Calthinus (talk) 14:34, 11 September 2020 (UTC)

In fact the usage of kh for x in Chechen in English is linguistically catastrophic as kh indicates a different and quite common sound (an emphatic variant of k) which would lead to some confused meanings... also, why do we have to put Chechen through the filter of Russian at the expense of English? For example, "Khasan". You will think this name is Xasan in Chechen based on that spelling. False. Chechen has x and it has h and it has kh and xh and even kx and all of these are different. In fact wherever you see this mangled "Khasan", you know what the poor dude's name actually is? Hassan! With an h, same as Turkish, Arabic and the unrelated Gaelic name in English too. Easy for Anglophones to pronounce. And all the Chechens named Hasan of the world have to watch Anglophones struggle over their incredibly English friendly name. -- Calthinus (talk) 14:37, 11 September 2020 (UTC) I didn't contest this page move tho because I checked and clearly Zelimkhan is in use in English rather than Zelimxan. It does look like Zelim-khant however, a patronym. --Calthinus (talk) 15:04, 11 September 2020 (UTC)

I've read quite a lot about this man but I certainly have never seen the name Zelimxan appear in English literature. I agree with you about the name "Khasan", but also note that his name does come from the historic title of Khan, which in English is never spelled "Xan". I'm not aware of how some Chechens spell it though, feel free to link any such material. Machinarium (talk) 15:28, 11 September 2020 (UTC)

Yes it is clearly Zelimkhan in English. Do beware that -khant means "son of" though. My search confirmed that Zelimkhan is used in English too. One day Chechen may be treated like Azeri and Somali are in English and the Xx used in Latin will be used, but that does not seem to be the case yet today. Its not consistent though. Sometimes for other names h is used for x in English. As for how Chechens feel that is never going to be an easy answer because you're talking about a worldwide diaspora. I just fell back on what Chechen websites (Waynakh etc -- oh the irony that it used Zelimxan but the site's name was Waynakh lol) were using. I was also in grade school, forgive me lol. All I ask is that if you ever write a page on Chechen humor (an interesting topic) do not transliterate the laughter as "khakhakha" -- that would, itself, be the joke ;). One thing I could point out is that English media did note Dzhokhar Tsarnaev resented the "kh" in his name tho representing diaspora Chechens with the terrorist is a no-no, obviously.--Calthinus (talk) 15:33, 11 September 2020 (UTC)