User:Hannahcatesilver/Evaluate an Article

Which article are you evaluating?
Latah

Why you have chosen this article to evaluate?
I chose this article, because the idea of culture-specific disorders fascinates me. I am curious as to why some common mental disorders do not appear in other cultures and how they could be perceived differently. My initial reaction to the article was that it seemed to be missing citations in the more important aspects, such as the Malay Perspective, and Signs and Symptoms. but overall it seemed to give a decent rundown on what was an otherwise unknown disorder to me. I wish it went more in depth to the parallels of Latah in other culture-specific disorders.

Evaluate the article
Lead Section:


 * Defines what Latah is- very briefly states cause, and effect
 * mentions that it is a culture-specific disorder but does not go into depth on what that means.
 * does not discuss what the remaining article will present.
 * the lead section is by no means overly detailed

Content:


 * all of the content is relevant to furthering a reader's knowledge on Latah
 * The references are a bit outdated, most being from the 1990s- this may be a result of the disorder being altered in the DSM V which should be discussed in the article further. There is hardly any mention on why the diagnosis was changed, and especially with a different societal outlook on mental disorders Latah may not be the best way to describe a person undergoing these symptoms. The article should possibly include a criticism section.
 * All sections of the article needs to be expanded upon, it is difficult to say how much without further research.
 * There is no treatment section, nor mention of stigma surrounding a diagnoses.
 * I wish the article discussed other perspectives on this disorders and what it would mean to be diagnosed with Latah as a person in Malaysia
 * There needs to be a lot more said about Latah in Malay culture and the significance, prevalence, and connotations that are associated with it.
 * The article claims usually older woman experience Latah more than other groups, I would like for there to be more discussion on why this is the case as it could be evidence of sexism and misogyny and not so much a biological disorder.

Tone:


 * The author of this article does a good job on remaining neutral, especially when discussing why Malay believe women are more susceptible.
 * Latah was used as both a noun for a disorder and a verb describing unusual behaviors, I do not know if that would be accurate word usage.

Sources:


 * The sources listed all have commonly European sounding names, there should be more authors from different cultures, especially Malay
 * Some of the links do not work, some references do not have links

Organization:


 * I found the writing to be clear and easy to follow along- there were a few points where I was confused what the sentence was supposed to convey.
 * The article is broken up into clear sections, I think a few more may need to be added to further validate claims discussed.

Images:


 * There are no images nor media, which may be beneficial as depicting marginalized people can easily go wrong.
 * I personally do not think images are needed (except perhaps some to go along with the Malay section) as it could further stereotype the diagnoses as women belonging to this specific, lower-class group.

Talk page:


 * there are only two points made on the Talk page, both criticizing possible biases that I had overlooked
 * As I said, the Malay section is very small, someone pointed out that it should be moved to a different spot as it is most important- I agree.
 * Another person asked to correct a reference from a broad term to a more narrow, well-defined one.

Overall:


 * The article does a good job at very quickly getting the key points of Latah down, but fails to recognize the significance of it and it's presence in a more modern society.
 * All sections of the article need to be elaborated upon more.