Talk:Elizabeth Boase

Latest comment: 3 years ago by PMCH2 in topic Christine's review of draft

Christine's review of draft edit

As per Kerrieburn's request, I'm reviewing this draft in the hopes that it will be accepted as an article. I hope that my suggestions and feedback will make a difference.

Others have made some changes, including how the article is structured. You should look at the resources listed under the "How to improve your article" section on the draft for descriptions for how WP articles are structured. I also recommend Help:Your first article and if you want to do a deep dive into learning how to write WP articles, Wikipedia:Manual of Style, especially MOS:LAYOUT. The best advice it gives is to look at a similar article and use it as a guide. I recommend looking at an article I created about an academic, Sydney Freeman Jr., even though he's not a woman religious, although he writes about religious topics and he's African American.

You needed a lead, which has been added, but I agree that it needs to be longer; see MOS:LEAD. Remember that the lead is a summary of the article; its length depends upon how the length of its body. Your sections will depend upon how many sources are out there about her. I like to write the article, and then go back and write the lead last. I also renamed the second section to "Career/Research concentrations" because it's a better description of the content.

The prose has been re-organized, but it still reads as a list. I suggest that you rewrite it into prose; you can do that by filling in some content and as the initial reviewer advised, increase the coverage. Another way to say that is making sure the article is comprehensive, and that you leave no important information about her out. Is there any information about where she grew up, or who her parents were? How did she decide to go into her field? Hopefully, you can find this information; if so, you need to use it so you can expand the article more. (I agree with the AfC reviewer that the current version doesn't have the right kind of references, that it doesn't demonstrate significant coverage, and that it lacks enough "published, reliable, secondary sources that are independent of the subject". Dr. Boase may not be notable enough, at least not at the current time, although I suspect that she is.

References: I think that reviewing your references is the next step.

Ref1: Not a secondary source; however, for this subject, I'd go ahead and use it so that you can be comprehensive. You could utilize (sorry, I really hate that word) the information better, as long as you paraphrase and cite it. It's called "mining your sources", a weakness of many new editors. You may have to support why you're using it; reviewers usually accept it if you state that it's needed in order to cover the subject.
Ref2: You shouldn't use it because it was written by the subject. I suspect that you'll be able find the information in other sources.
Ref3: Good source. This is an example of not mining your sources. For example, you could state that Boase pursued ordination on the advice of her minister.
Ref4: Again, written by the subject.
Refs5, 6: Like Ref1; contains good info about her work experience, degrees, and research.
Refs7: Not usable; like the initial reviewer stated, passing mentions aren't enough.
Refs 8, 9, 10, 12: No links, but I suspect they're okay because as has already been stated, book reviews are often good sources to use.
Ref11: Ah, there's a link of a book review. Good source, although the danger in using reviews is that you can include too much information. I think you can go into a bit more detail about the book, though. That's probably true about the the unlinked reviews, too.
Ref13: Since it contains a brief blurb about Boase's work and research concentrations, you can use it, although if you can find the same information elsewhere, I suggest it.
Ref14: Borderline acceptable, although if you can use a better source for the information, you should.
Ref15: Also acceptable.
Ref16: Link doesn't go to the correct article, just to the website's main page.

Kerrie, hope this help. Others have made some good suggestions in the email. Let me know how else I can assist. Christine (Figureskatingfan) (talk) 16:38, 15 September 2020 (UTC)Reply

  • This is really helpful Christine. I have seen a lot of articles that start out with one or two sentence as the lead. How long should it ideally be, for a stub or start?PMCH2 (talk) 16:06, 16 September 2020 (UTC)Reply