Wikipedia:Peer review/Gamal Abdel Nasser/archive1

This peer review discussion has been closed.
I've listed this article for peer review because Al Ameer Son and I have been working on it for months now and wish to bring it to FA status. We wanted a peer review from an uninvolved user to give us some comments on how to further improve the article and spot any issues in there.

Thanks, Diaa abdelmoneim (talk) 08:30, 25 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Finetooth comments: This is a fascinating article, packed with information about an important historical figure. The prose is generally flowing and clear. I wonder about the heavy reliance on Aburish (100 or so citations), and I have several other comments or suggestions for further improvement.

These look generally good on a quick read-through. However, instead of saying "Nasser" or "Palestinian flag", it would be better to stick to what can be said about the image itself rather than adding information from elsewhere; i.e., "a man" and "a flag", with brief descriptions of their appearance. Finetooth (talk) 19:02, 5 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]
done all alt texts conform with the criterias now...--Diaa abdelmoneim (talk) 16:29, 7 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • The link checker shows that at least one of the citation urls is dead.
done removed the link, it's his book so no need for a weblink really...
  • The dabfinder tool in the box at the top of this review page shows that Unef is linked to a disambiguation page instead of the intended target.
doneAll disambiguated....

Lead

  • "This period of glory for Nasser had eroded roughly as soon it came about and three years after the founding of the union... " - Tighten to "This period of glory for Nasser quickly dissipated, and three years after the founding of the union... "?
done
  • "TIME magazine wrote that... " - Generally Time is lowercase except for the first letter even though the trademark name is all caps. Ditto for other places TIME occurs in the subsequent sections.
done
  • "may have been enough to balance his flaws and failures." - Since this is a direct quote, it needs a source. Generally, direct quotations need a reference placed immediately after the end punctuation of the quotation rather than somewhere later in the article. Ditto for similar situations in the main text sections.
done

Ancestry

  • "Hussein Sultan's in-laws emigrated to Alexandria... "- Wikilink Alexandria here rather than in the next section?
done
  • "With his elementary diploma he entered the postal service in 1908 or 1910." - In North America, elementary school usually refers to a school for children up to about the age of 12. That would be too young to enter the postal service, so I'm wondering what "elementary school" and "elementary diploma" mean in this context. It might be good to include a brief explanation in the text.

Influences

done

Family

  • "His entry into the officer corps secured him relatively well-paid employment in a society where most people lived in poverty." - Would it help to say, "His entry in 1937 into the officer corps had secured him relatively well-paid employment in a society where most people lived in poverty"? This would make it clear that his military career began before he married. It isn't until the next section that we learn any details about that career.
done

Free Officers

  • ""nobody knew all of them and where they belonged in the hierarchy except Nasser." - Every direct quote needs a citation to a source.
done
  • "After the Wafd government abrogated the 1936 Anglo-Egyptian Treaty, on October 11, 1951... ". The triple date should be flipped to d-m-y format; i.e, 11 October 1951. Ditto for any other full dates in the main text.
done

Disputes with Naguib

  • "and in a visit with the US Secretary of State, John Foster Dulles, he promoted an image of him being Egypt's head of state" - For clarity, would it be better to say, "and during a visit with the US Secretary of State, John Foster Dulles, Naguib promoted himself as Egypt's head of state"?
done

Collapse of the UAR and aftermath

  • "On September 28, 1961, Syrian army units in Damascus... " - The date formatting in the main text must be consistent to pass FAC. I changed quite a few dates, including this one, to d-m-y format to match what you used in the lede and infobox. You should check all of the remaining dates in the main text to make sure they are all d-m-y.
done

Revival on Arab stage

  • "After Nasser allowed them to operate from Cairo, it gained a considerable following among minor Saudi princes and the co-founder of OPEC, Abdullah al-Tariki." - For clarity, perhaps change "them" to "the Free Princes movement"?
done

Internal dissent and shifts in policy

  • "Amer's increasing autonomy led Nasser, who had diabetes" - Wikilink diabetes?
done
  • "Nasser aligned himself with the ANM of George Habash" - Should Arab Nationalist Movement be spelled out here as well as abbreviated? I think it's the first use of the term.
it's mentioned before in Pan-Arabism section

Writings

  • "Nasser authored a number books during in his lifetime including the following" - To be comprehensive, the article should probably include the complete list with all the usual bibliographical details.
  • The link to Egypt's Liberation is dead. Also, it would be good to include the publisher and place of publication for this book.
  • Towards freedom needs the bibliographical details.

References

  • Page ranges take en dashes rather than hyphens. I fixed a lot of these as I went, but a lot more need to be changed.
  • Aburish is cited about 100 times. This heavy reliance on one source is sure to raise eyebrows at FAC. I don't know enough about the field to say whether or not it's possible to find other sources (possibly disagreeing with Aburish on various points) or not, but you'll want to be sure before going to FAC that you've thought about this question. Are the views of Aburish over-represented? Have the views of other important scholars in the field been left out?

I hope these suggestions prove helpful. If so, please consider reviewing another article, especially one in the PR backlog. That is where I found this one. Finetooth (talk) 19:30, 4 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Comments from Ealdgyth (talk · contribs)

  • You said you wanted to know what to work on before taking to FAC, so I looked at the sourcing and referencing with that in mind. I reviewed the article's sources as I would at FAC.
Hope this helps. Please note that I don't watchlist Peer Reviews I've done. If you have a question about something, you'll have to drop a note on my talk page to get my attention. (My watchlist is already WAY too long, adding peer reviews would make things much worse.) 13:45, 7 January 2010 (UTC)