Talk:Choctaw Civil War/GA1

GA Review
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Reviewer: Shearonink (talk · contribs) 18:34, 30 May 2020 (UTC)

GA review – see WP:WIAGA for criteria


 * 1) Is it well written?
 * A. The prose is clear and concise, and the spelling and grammar are correct:
 * See Prose issues section below. Shearonink (talk) 05:08, 1 June 2020 (UTC)
 * B. It complies with the manual of style guidelines for lead sections, layout, words to watch, fiction, and list incorporation:
 * See Lead Section below. Passes all other MOS aspects. Shearonink (talk)
 * 1) Is it verifiable with no original research?
 * A. It contains a list of all references (sources of information), presented in accordance with the layout style guideline:
 * Have not checked the verifiability/reliability of the references yet but the citation forms/formatting themselves are in line with the layout style. Shearonink (talk) 19:01, 30 May 2020 (UTC)
 * B. All in-line citations are from reliable sources, including those for direct quotations, statistics, published opinion, counter-intuitive or controversial statements that are challenged or likely to be challenged, and contentious material relating to living persons&mdash;science-based articles should follow the scientific citation guidelines:
 * See Reference issues section. Shearonink (talk) 05:08, 1 June 2020 (UTC)
 * C. It contains no original research:
 * Main points backed up from reliable sources. Shearonink (talk) 00:03, 1 June 2020 (UTC)
 * D. It contains no copyright violations nor plagiarism:
 * Ran copyvio detector, also put random phrases through Google - no hits. Shearonink (talk) 19:01, 30 May 2020 (UTC)
 * 1) Is it broad in its coverage?
 * A. It addresses the main aspects of the topic:
 * Yes. Gives a general overview of the topic. Shearonink (talk) 00:03, 1 June 2020 (UTC)
 * B. It stays focused on the topic without going into unnecessary detail (see summary style):
 * Agreed. Shearonink (talk) 05:08, 1 June 2020 (UTC)
 * 1) Is it neutral?
 * It represents viewpoints fairly and without editorial bias, giving due weight to each:
 * Yes. Seem fairly dispassionate and reasoned. Shearonink (talk) 00:03, 1 June 2020 (UTC)
 * 1) Is it stable?
 * It does not change significantly from day to day because of an ongoing edit war or content dispute:
 * Obvious from editing history. Shearonink (talk) 19:02, 30 May 2020 (UTC)
 * 1) Is it illustrated, if possible, by images?
 * A. Images are tagged with their copyright status, and valid fair use rationales are provided for non-free content:
 * The single image is relevant & captioned appropriately but the source material/source website has gone dark. Are there any other sources for this image? Shearonink (talk) 18:42, 30 May 2020 (UTC)
 * B. Images are relevant to the topic, and have suitable captions:
 * See note above. Shearonink (talk) 18:42, 30 May 2020 (UTC)
 * 1) Overall:
 * Pass or Fail:
 * Status on hold pending various issues below. Shearonink (talk) 05:08, 1 June 2020 (UTC)

General notes

 * No obvious quick-fail issues. Shearonink (talk) 18:42, 30 May 2020 (UTC)

Prose issues

 * The Choctaw warred intermittently the - should be something like warred with... A groups doesn't war another group.
 * fixed. SamHolt6 (talk) 13:45, 1 June 2020 (UTC)


 * A third, smaller division (known as the Okla Hannali, the People of Sixtowns)[6] known as the Southern Division... repetitive phrasing, too many known as
 * fixed. SamHolt6 (talk) 13:45, 1 June 2020 (UTC)


 * Redlinked Couechitto? Is this linking necessary?...
 * redlink removed. SamHolt6 (talk) 13:45, 1 June 2020 (UTC)


 * His trading with was uncovered and the chief was widely chastised by other Choctaw leaders, but Red Shoes continued to trade with the British, even going so far as to lead a delegation to Charleston.... The present word-choice/phrasing seems somewhat opaque "His trading with was uncovered"...
 * sentence has been reworded. SamHolt6 (talk) 13:45, 1 June 2020 (UTC)


 * Further exasperating these issues, ... "exasperating"? I think the word meant was exacerbating.
 * fixed. SamHolt6 (talk) 13:45, 1 June 2020 (UTC)


 * Struggle and Survival in Colonial America By David G. Sweet, Gary B. Nash is cited 8 times. Are all these cites from the same page? Seems that the cites could be more exact and refer to a specific page.
 * citation now included attribution to pages 49–67, as all of these pages detail the life of Red Shoes and the Choctaw nation. SamHolt6 (talk) 13:45, 1 June 2020 (UTC)

I'll do a few more close-read/deep-dives - see if anything else comes to mind. Shearonink (talk) 19:50, 30 May 2020 (UTC)


 * Lead section...
 * The war resulted in the deaths of hundreds of Choctaw and the pro-French leaders of the Choctaw retaining their influence within the nation.
 * So. The war resulted in the deaths of hundreds of Choctaw & [the war resulted in] the pro-French leaders retaining influence....plus it repeats the previous sentence of "The war...". I think the sentence should be re-written somewhat along the lines of (this is just a suggestion):
 * Hundreds of Choctaw peoples died in the war and the pro-French faction retained their influence within the Choctaw nation.
 * Shearonink (talk) 23:58, 31 May 2020 (UTC)
 * changed. SamHolt6 (talk) 13:45, 1 June 2020 (UTC)

Reference issues

 * Ref #5 - "Early political structure - School of Choctaw Language". choctawschool.com. Retrieved 2018-09-03. - fails verification. Shearonink (talk) 02:52, 31 May 2020 (UTC)
 * reference removed (I was unable to find an archived version of the webpage) along with the sentence that was purely sourced to the removed reference. SamHolt6 (talk) 13:49, 1 June 2020 (UTC)


 * All references from JSTOR (Refs #2, #4, #10, #11, #15) should be marked as "subscription required" etc. Shearonink (talk) 00:01, 1 June 2020 (UTC)
 * done. SamHolt6 (talk) 13:49, 1 June 2020 (UTC)


 * Ref #14 (O'Brien, Greg (February 2001). "The Conqueror Meets the Unconquered: Negotiating Cultural Boundaries on the Post-Revolutionary Southern Frontier") is a direct pdf - no subscription is required so that phrase should be removed from that ref. Shearonink (talk) 15:18, 1 June 2020 (UTC)
 * Ref #11 (O'Brien, Greg (2008). Pre-removal Choctaw History: Exploring New Paths. University of Oklahoma Press) is referenced 9 times for different statements, but the book itself is 265 pages long. The individual statements will have to be referenced from specific page numbers. Shearonink (talk) 15:18, 1 June 2020 (UTC)
 * Thank you for adding those page numbers to Ref #11. However, that is still too broad to fulfill verifiability. Please see the next section. Shearonink (talk) 17:50, 1 June 2020 (UTC)

Multiple cites to too broad of a page range, to too much content

 *  'Ref #11 (O'Brien, Greg (2008). Pre-removal Choctaw History: Exploring New Paths. University of Oklahoma Press) &  Ref #6 (Galloway, Patricia (2008) "Choctaw Factionalism and Civil War, 1746-1750") co-mingle references from one volume, edited by O'Brien but the text itself was written by Galloway so these two seemingly separate references are actually to the same content. Ref #6's page range of 70-102 is too broad - one or two pages is within the realm to check but 32 is just too much. Same with Ref #11.
 * The way Ref #11 is constructed the article is basically telling the reader to search through 19 different pages to look-up/verify separate claimed facts -
 * "smallpox outbreak in the summer of that year killed many Choctaw children and elders"
 * "The first major action of the war came in July of 1748"
 * "Many hundreds of Choctaws were killed, and hundreds more were captured and enslaved", and so on.
 * Keeping verifiability in mind the individual statements of fact will need to be referenced from individual pages or from short page-ranges referring to Galloway as the main contributor. I am sorry I didn't realize this earlier in my review. Shearonink (talk) 17:50, 1 June 2020 (UTC)
 * ok. I will merge the Galloway refs and refine exact page numbers over the next few days. Thanks. SamHolt6 (talk) 21:03, 2 June 2020 (UTC)
 * I have replaced all of the Galloway 2008 citations with the 2008 O'Brien source, and broken the range of page numbers into individual page numbers. Is this adequate? SamHolt6 (talk) 15:42, 5 June 2020 (UTC)
 * I'll take a look at all that as soon as I can. Might be a few days, will try to be done before Tuesday. Shearonink (talk) 19:11, 5 June 2020 (UTC)

Submitter Comment
thank you for taking the time to review this article. I implemented the changes you requested above - please let me know if you have any additional feedback. SamHolt6 (talk) 13:50, 1 June 2020 (UTC)
 * - Thank you for your responses. Additional feedback above re: references. Shearonink (talk) 15:19, 1 June 2020 (UTC)
 * done. SamHolt6 (talk) 15:36, 1 June 2020 (UTC)

Status query
Shearonink, SamHolt6, where does this review stand? It's been nearly a month since anything was posted to this page, and almost as long since the article was edited. Thanks. BlueMoonset (talk) 00:21, 5 July 2020 (UTC)
 * Thank you for the reminder. There's been this pandemic, see, and my mind & life have been full of so many things... Apologies for not finishing up &  - am getting to that right now. Shearonink (talk) 02:11, 5 July 2020 (UTC)