User:Anawinner/Evaluate an Article

Which article are you evaluating?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abortion_in_the_United_States

Why you have chosen this article to evaluate?
When considering which topic to evaluate my first article on, I immediately thought of abortion. Following Dobbs v. Jackson last summer and the divided nature of the U.S. right now, this has been at the front of my mind when considering political science. Also, knowing a good amount about abortion in the United States, I feel fairly qualified to evaluate this article.

Evaluate the article
Lead Section

This article starts out strong with a well-worded, concise lead section. The introductory sentence emphasizes the divisiveness nature of abortion, specifically regarding political affiliation and abortion legislation. This introduction touches on the majority of the further sections, including information that is later expanded on. My only critique is that I think this section goes a little too in-depth on the history of legislation. I understand abortion is a nuanced topic that is heavily intertwined with the law, but some of the information on cases could have been put in their corresponding sections below.

Content

Having a fairly well-educated perspective on abortion in the United States, I believe this article did a great job of including all the information one would expect to find on this page. Some of the concepts discussed (such as “sanctuary cities for the unborn”) were completely new to me, showing that the authors took time to include everything. And, to my knowledge, all relevant content that should be included is included as well as up-to-date (e.g. Dobbs v. Jackson). While this article is very detailed, none of the sections or content felt out of place. As for the diversity of perspective in this article, I think there is a gap in information and attention toward women of color. This article does address the disproportionality of abortion for women of color however the sections are fairly short and, in comparison to the rest of the article, could do with a little more detail.

Tone and Balance

When it comes to the morality of and role of the government in abortion, everyone is going to have an opinion. I would say the strongest thing about this article is its ability to remain neutral in tone when discussing such a polarizing topic. I didn’t identify any unsupported claims about a political group or identity that may misrepresent them. It did seem like there was more discussed about the pro-choice movement than the pro-life, but it is difficult to discern whether that is due to bias or that the pro-choice movement simply has more relevant information about the topics of abortion discussed in this article. As best as I can tell from a biased standpoint, this article did not attempt to suede readers to one side of the debate. However, when assessing balance, I again feel the need to bring up the lack of representation of women of color beyond being a statistic.

Sources and References

From skimming through a few of the hundreds of sources cited in this article, it looks as though all the major facts presented are based on and cited to a reliable source. These sources are very thorough, spanning from larger concepts (feminism) to those more specific to abortion (the Mexico City policy). These sources all seem to be up-to-date, especially those regarding the current political state of the U.S. on abortion and its corresponding legislation. There seems to be a fair bit of diversity amongst the source authors, with a lot of female writers in the citations. Looking through about a dozen sources, all of the links worked and I found the various source material to be well-researched, academic, and relevant.

Organization and Writing Quality

The writing quality of this article is good, with no noticeable grammatical or spelling errors. Authors discuss the topic of abortion in a concise, clear, and professional way using scholarly language without losing readability. The sections of the article are well-organized and consolidate relevant aspects of abortion. However, I do not think the ordering of the sections was very meticulous and, while it doesn’t undermine comprehension, it could be reworked in a more effective way.

Images and Media

This article includes various images that help visualize the concepts being discussed, the most prevalent being demographic maps of the United States. Every image in the article is properly captioned and abides by Wikipedia’s copyright regulations. The images are laid out in an appealing way that makes it easy to tell what they show. However, as warned at the top of the page, the intense colors in these images make them difficult to discern for color-blind individuals, harming the article’s accessibility.

Talk Page Discussion

The Talk page includes a few conversations, mostly suggestions to reword and clarify vague language or half-right statements. This article is rated B-class, mid-importance, and is a part of nine WikiProjects. This rating feels accurate, as while not exceptional, this article serves its basic purpose of properly educating readers in an unbiased way about abortion in the United States. In class, we attempt to discuss controversial topics through the lens of the law and even sociology, but bias is impossible to avoid at a strongly left-leaning college. This article succeeds in educating people on abortion in a neutral way that cannot be replicated in the classroom.

Overall Impressions

After reading and evaluating this article, I have a positive impression of its writing, structure, and merit. I think this article provides a well-researched, thorough look at abortion in the United States. The biggest strengths of this article are its neutral tone, the extensiveness of research, and its up-to-date information. The main way to continually improve this article is to listen to the Talk page. Before viewing it, I hadn’t picked up on some of the factual discrepancies or vague language in the article, but others did. This article will never be complete, as the legislation and thinking surrounding abortion in the U.S. will continue to evolve over time. Listening to the Talk page and continuing to update new developments and research will ensure this remains a useful text.