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Wiki Article Evaluation: Valerie Solanas

Evaluating content


 * Most of the article is relevant to the topic, however, there is a significant amount of the article dedicated to the shooting of Andy Warhol which was done by Solanas, but it somewhat distracts from other aspects of her as a person and writer.
 * Solanas was a writer and wrote many works including the most popular SCUM Manifesto, however there is little mention of her other works and her feminist views and beliefs. Also there is very little about her early life and what she did with her degree in Psychology.
 * Another improvement could be including more on how her views aligned with radical feminism. There is a brief mention of it in the article but very little reference to how she influenced radical feminist movements. Another commentary could be included to include how mental illness was treated at the time and including research on how women were diagnosed in the 50s and 60s and if Solanas really was mentally ill or not.

Evaluating tone


 * The tone of the article does feel somewhat biased because there is a heavy focus on the shooting of Warhol and not much on Solanas as a person. The article makes her seem like this insane radical feminist woman, but she has a degree in psychology and attended Berkeley.
 * The focus on Warhol, though important to the story of Solanas is a huge focus of the article and kind of takes over and overshadows the other things she did in her lifetime. Her education and writing is not focused on as much and is given only a few sentences of mention in the whole article.

Evaluating sources


 * Most of the sources are valid sources from peer reviewed journals and the links provided work. For those sources without links if you search the name and author of the publication it comes up.
 * The majority of facts are cited with appropriate and reliable references. Most sources do not seem to be neutral and are either all in favor of Solanas and her radical feminism or think she was a paranoid schizophrenic and did not agree with her views at all.

Checking the talk page

Now take a look at how others are talking about this article on the talk page.


 * People have discussed sources and contradictions in articles about Solanas's views and if SCUM is an acronym or not. There is also critique of how the opening of the wiki page has characterized Solanas as a writer, feminist and schizophrenic claiming that mixing her views with her mental illness is problematic and doesn't go together. "That's like describing somebody as a liberal, a poet, and a diabetic. The first two are political and career choices, the last is a condition that requires treatment. It's mixing apples and oranges." They suggest instead to say she was a feminist and writer who suffered from schizophrenia instead.
 * Yes. This article is part of WikiProjects such as Women History's articles, Women writers, Sexology and sexuality, Feminism articles, LGBT studies articles, etc. This article is considered a Good article and has been reviewed by others that have not edited the article as being a good article.
 * A question was posed in the Talk page where it was brought up that Solanas refused to identify as a feminist but she is called on anyway and her article is categorized with radical feminist articles. The person asked if there were policies in place to prevent this since Solanas did not herself identify as a feminist but other people called her that. On wikipedia it doesn't seem to matter what you choose to call yourself, it is what other people see you as and how they interpret your work that makes you something. In class we would probably say that this isn't right and that we cannot assign labels to people if they do not identify that way.