Talk:Bessie (South African queen)

Bessie

This article does not cite any high quality scholarly sources, "Sunburnt Queen" is written by an artist and I can't find any reliable reviews of the book. Can't find any mentions of Bessie in other historical sources. – Thjarkur (talk) 22:48, 23 September 2020 (UTC)

Moved from User talk:Þjarkur

 – – Thjarkur (talk) 08:32, 26 September 2020 (UTC)

Hello, Thjarkur...

I wrote the Wikipedia article on Bessie of the Tshomane. I thought that I'd get in touch and clarify some of my choices pertaining to it.

Firstly, I was unaware that only literature written by scholars was admissible. That seems like an unnecessarily stringent application of the rules pertaining to verifiability. I can try to find a scholarly thesis for you about the AbeLungu, but in the meantime what about the book by Taylor? Does it meet with your approval?

Secondly, the cited article mentions that one of the Grosvenor survivors joins a clan whose matriarch is coincidentally herself a white castaway. That is a reference to Bessie, and it's also supported by Crampton.

Third, the bit on some of her descendants being Coloured people is supported by the Hayward Kalis citation. It says that a minority of them identify as Coloured more than Xhosa, and so their descent from her isn't as important to them as it is to the Xhosa descendants.

Lastly, the article by Hayward Kalis is scholarly. At the time that it was written, she was a researcher with the University of Cape Town. It was posted on the UCT website, as the link shows.

Please let me know of any other concerns that you have concerning the page. Warm regards,

O.ominirabluejack (talk) 07:19, 26 September 2020 (UTC)

P.S: Here is that link to a thesis in which Bessie is mentioned extensively.

[[1]]

O.ominirabluejack (talk) 07:31, 26 September 2020 (UTC)

Hello O.ominirabluejack, I had only had a quick look last week but I had problems with verifying the article since I wasn't able to find mentions of the subject in sources accessible online. Using print sources is fine, it's just that it makes verifiability a little bit harder.

I had been trying to see if Crampton's work was considered respected or not, but a search didn't turn up any reviews or mentions, which can sometimes be indicative of a source not being ideal.

I see Google has made Caliban's Shore available online (was not accessible last week), and that source does include coverage of Bessie, which is good.

I had overlooked that the Guardian source was using her other name.

It doesn't appear that the Hayward Kalis source discusses Bessie. Would probably be a bit of a synthesis to cite it here.

I've moved the page to article-space. Just so you know, submitting an article for review is not required at all, you are free to move your creations to mainspace as you see fit (that templated text you probably received is directed towards new editors).

– Thjarkur (talk) 08:32, 26 September 2020 (UTC)

Thanks for the head's up, Thjarkur...

O.ominirabluejack (talk) 16:56, 26 September 2020 (UTC)