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This study analyzes the portrayal of 158 wars across 20 different Wikipedia language editions, focusing on how connotation frames鈥攕pecifically power, agency, and sentiment鈥攁ffect the narratives presented. The researchers found that language editions exhibit systematic biases when describing conflicts involving their own communities, with these biases varying significantly across different languages. Conversely, for wars not involving their linguistic communities, the narratives displayed a high degree of cross-linguistic similarity, highlighting the influence of cultural context on historical representation.
Language communities shape war narratives on Wikipedia, revealing that even supposedly neutral accounts are influenced by cultural perspectives.
While Wikipedia promotes a neutral point of view on historical conflicts, its language editions are written by editors from distinct linguistic and cultural communities. In this study, we analyze 158 wars since 1900 to examine how the descriptions of combatants vary across 20 Wikipedia language editions. Using connotation frames---which assess power, agency, and sentiment toward an entity---we examine how each language portrays the parties involved in the conflict. We find systematic differences when language editions describe wars involving their own communities, although the direction of these asymmetries varies across languages. However, when language editions describe conflicts that do not involve their own linguistic communities, their narrative structures exhibit high cross-linguistic similarity. These findings show how linguistic communities influence war narratives on Wikipedia, revealing that shared historical accounts remain shaped by the perspectives of the language communities that produce them.
