Nationality lead-in

A nationality lead-in is a lead-in that gives the nationality, occupation, time period, or other attributes of the answer. These clues serve either to narrow the answer space to one answer before any clues are given (resulting in a buzzer race between good teams) or to two or three answers (in which case a team that knows more people of that nationality is penalized since they know to wait, while a team that only knows one possible answer can guess that answer without penalty). Nationality lead-ins are form of bad quizbowl.

Note that nationalities, time periods, etc. are perfectly fine at the start of the giveaway.

Examples

Here are examples of nationality lead-ins. Note that the rest of the question is irrelevant, as every good team will buzz before the rest of the question:

• "Which 19th-century Norwegian playwright..." (Ans: Henrik Ibsen)
• "Which Polish composer..." (Ans: Ignace Jan Paderewski)
  • Here, if good teams buzz here, they are taking a guess as to what composer the question writer is thinking of. Instead of rewarding knowledge, the question writer rewards ESPN.
• "What Chinese-born American architect..." (Ans: I. M. Pei)
• "What blind English poet..." (Ans: John Milton)

Wheaton North has a list of two- and three-word clues dating back to the 1990s, when such clues were popular. Today, studying those lists is of dubious value, unless a local tournament (possibly televised) is using bad questions that actually make studying those lists a good idea.