User:143737k/Evaluate an Article

Evaluate an article
This is where you will complete your article evaluation. Please use the template below to evaluate your selected article.


 * Name of article: Adoption in ancient Rome
 * Briefly describe why you have chosen this article to evaluate. I am planning on updating and improving this article and wanted to figure out how to best improve the article.

Lead

 * Guiding questions


 * Does the Lead include an introductory sentence that concisely and clearly describes the article's topic? The introductory sentence does include a clear review of the article however it only focuses on the male aspect of adoption.
 * Does the Lead include a brief description of the article's major sections? It touches on 1 but It should have a clearer description of the major sections throughout the article.
 * Does the Lead include information that is not present in the article? Yes they talk about the Roman inheritance rules which aren't covered later in the article.
 * Is the Lead concise or is it overly detailed? It is rather broad touching on multiple aspects of adoption in ancient Rome, could definitely be refined to be less redundant.

Content

 * Guiding questions


 * Is the article's content relevant to the topic? The content it has is all very relevant the largest issue is the lack of content and the focus is mostly on the elite with almost no info on the lower class.
 * Is the content up-to-date? The most recent deference was from 2004 so that provides some rather up to date info, however the only other reference is a 1890 article. most of the article seems pretty up to date but could definitely use some fresh info.
 * Is there content that is missing or content that does not belong? There is lots of content missing there should be at least 1 or 2 more sections additionally more info for Imperial succession is needed.

Tone and Balance

 * Guiding questions


 * Is the article neutral? The article has a neutral feel but if you look objectively its clear that there is a clear bias towards males and the importance of male adoption.
 * Are there any claims that appear heavily biased toward a particular position? The lead sentence starts with "In ancient Rome, adoption of boys was a fairly common procedure" This entirely ignores female adoption leaving only 1 comment near the end of the intro to say adoption of girls was much less common.
 * Are there viewpoints that are overrepresented, or underrepresented? The viewpoint of male adoption is clearly over represented with almost no info on females.
 * Does the article attempt to persuade the reader in favor of one position or away from another? It seems rather neutral in providing info about adoption but it does seem like it wants the reader to think female adoption didn't matter at all.

Sources and References

 * Guiding questions


 * Are all facts in the article backed up by a reliable secondary source of information? No there is almost no reliable sources supporting this article the entire thing has only 2 references. A large part of the updates will be adding more data to the existing infos.
 * Are the sources thorough - i.e. Do they reflect the available literature on the topic? One is from the Britannica Encyclopedia which is rather good but the second is a rather odd website which doesn't appear to be a very reliable source.
 * Are the sources current? No 1890 and 2005 it would be nice to get a more recent source to really help validate this article.
 * Check a few links. Do they work? Yep tried a few links they all functioned properly no complaints there.

Organization

 * Guiding questions


 * Is the article well-written - i.e. Is it concise, clear, and easy to read? Its easy to read but the information in some sections is not very concise seeming to be stretched out for no apparent reason.
 * Does the article have any grammatical or spelling errors? I couldnt find any, I will run it through Grammerly before my final publishing.
 * Is the article well-organized - i.e. broken down into sections that reflect the major points of the topic? The sections are clear and well layed out. I will probably add in a few sections that tie them all together in a more uniform way.

Images and Media

 * Guiding questions


 * Does the article include images that enhance understanding of the topic? There is one image of Augustus a famous Roman emperor who was adopted. Another image that shows more of a household view would be great to add to the article.
 * Are images well-captioned? The image has a nice caption that clearly provides info on the image and the relevance.
 * Do all images adhere to Wikipedia's copyright regulations? Yes the image is in the Public domain registered before January 1925.
 * Are the images laid out in a visually appealing way? The Image is in the introduction helping to get the readers attention early. I think this is visually appealing and a nice touch to the article.

Checking the talk page

 * Guiding questions


 * What kinds of conversations, if any, are going on behind the scenes about how to represent this topic? In the talk section there is talk about different opinions and sources on information. An interesting take is the representation in pop culture that adoption takes when viewing Rome which I found interesting.
 * How is the article rated? Is it a part of any WikiProjects? The rating is a start class needing lots of work. This is part of Wiki projects Rome, Classical Greece and Rome and Adoption.
 * How does the way Wikipedia discusses this topic differ from the way we've talked about it in class? This goes a lot deeper in depth we only really discussed the importance of adoption in a few key moments of Rome history mainly the famous adopted people.

Overall impressions

 * Guiding questions


 * What is the article's overall status? The info they have is very interesting but definitely needs more content.Additionally the info has almost no references so it is hard to trust any of the info on the article.
 * What are the article's strengths? The writing style and flow of the article makes it easy to read and follow along with.
 * How can the article be improved? Lots of references and research needs to be added, additionally expanding the last section and adding in more sections. Cleaning up the intro to be more relevant and focused on the article will also help.
 * How would you assess the article's completeness - i.e. Is the article well-developed? Is it underdeveloped or poorly developed? Very under developed, the content is good but needs lots of research verification. Once verified and with a few additions shouldn't be that hard to improve this articles rating.

Optional activity

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