User:MLoson20/sandbox

UPDATED Transition to Independence
Following World War II, rapid decolonization swept across African territories as many gained their independence from European colonization.

In August 1941, United States President Franklin D. Roosevelt and British Prime Minister Winston Churchill met to discuss their post-war goals. In that meeting, they agreed to the Atlantic Charter, which in part stipulated that they would, "respect the right of all peoples to choose the form of government under which they will live; and they wish to see sovereign rights and self government restored to those who have been forcibly deprived of them." This agreement became the post-WWII stepping stone toward independence as nationalism grew throughout Africa.

Consumed with post-war debt, European powers were no longer able to afford the resources needed to maintain control of their African colonies. This allowed for African nationalist to negotiate decolonization very quickly and with minimal casualties. While there's plenty of examples where independence was gained smoothly. There's also some territories, which saw great death tolls as a result of their fight for independence.

Ghana Independence (formerly Gold Coast)
On May 6, 1957, Ghana (formerly Gold Coast) became the first sub-Saharan African country to gain its independence from European colonization in the twentieth century.

Starting as early as the 1945 Pan-African Congress, Gold Coast’s American-educated, independence leader Kwame Nkrumah made his focus clear. In the conference’s declaration, he wrote, “we believe in the rights of all peoples to govern themselves. We affirm the right of all colonial peoples to control their own destiny. All colonies must be free from foreign imperialist control, whether political or economic.”

Four years later in 1949, the conflict would ramp up when British troops opened fire on African protesters. Riots broke out across the territory and while Nkrumah and other leaders ended up in prison, the event became a catalyst for the independence movement. After being released from prison, Nkrumah founded the, Convention People’s Party (CPP), which launched a mass-based campaign for independence with the slogan ‘Self Government Now!’” Heightened nationalism within the country grew their power and the political party widely expanded. In February of 1951, the Convention People's Party gained political power by winning 34 of 38 elected seats, including one for Nkrumah who was imprisoned at the time. While the movement started with violence, it would end with political cooperation.

Gold Coast finally gained its independence in 1957, which would become a symbol of the possibilities for colonized Africa.

Algerian Independence War
In Algeria, anti-colonialism sentiment grew following World War II until it reached a boiling point. Unlike many African territories that gained their independence through a smooth transition, France believed the African colony was an important portion of its countries livelihood. Starting in 1954,

Started in 1954

300,000 deaths

Eight-Year War

90% of non-Africans gone by 1962

ORIGINAL Difficulties in transition [copied from 'Decolonisation of Africa]
''The transition to independence in many postcolonial countries is often fraught with political and ethnic tensions. In Rwanda and neighbouring Burundi, the move from colonial to independent rule led to violence. Racialised policies under colonial rule led to rivalries between ethnic groups and was a major contributor to the 1994 Rwandan Genocide. The first Presidential election in Rwanda, 1962 was won by Grégoire Kayibanda, leader of the Parti du Mouvement de l'Emancipation du Peuple Hutu (Party for Hutu Emancipation) which sustained the backbone of his government policy. Following this, many Tutsis left the country as they became increasingly ostracised in Rwandan society. There had always been tensions between the Hutus and Tutsis, but the animosity between them grew substantially under Rwanda’s transition to independence and many serious Hutu-Tutsi conflicts ensued.''

''On May 6, 1957, Ghana became the first black African country to gain independence in the twentieth century. It's president, Kwame Nkrumah, was an American- educated reformer who brought many western ideas for modernization of his country. Although the Ghanian people united to throw off British rule, they did not share a common language or history, so they began to return to ethnic and regional divisions following independence. For that reason, unification was a priority for Nkrumah's administration. Within the first two years following independence, Ghana saw measurable improvements in agricultural yields, literacy, healthcare, transportation and communication. However, many of Nkrumah's initiatives were met with resistance when they disrupted traditional agricultural and social practices and were often the source of class and ethnic competition and resentment. The Volta Dam Project was planned to supply power for a smelting plant needed to create aluminum from Ghanian bauxite and to much of the country. This project was ultimately financed with the aid of the Soviet Union. In 1958, Ghana hosted the All- African People's Conference, with the goal of increasing cooperation among the newly- formed African states born of decolonization.''

Potential Article Notes:
I picked this article, because I figure right away I knew I'd be able to correct the spelling in the title! (just kidding)

The "Decolonization of Africa" article is graded as starter-class and at first glance, you can tell there's plenty of room for additions. It appears that each of the sections is laid out in an easy to understand way, but there's not a whole lot of details. The talk page is also bare, so it doesn't appear there has been many people working on the articles, so I think the article would benefit greatly from adding and diversifying sources.

After doing some research on the decolonization of Gold Coast for the blog, I know there's additional information that can be added to describe the influences of decolonization in Africa. I know I already have some pretty good sources and information that can benefit the article.

---> Use three library books as notes: Decolonization of Africa, The Transfer of Power in Africa, Africa Since 1935

Web Resources:

---> Nkrumah, Kwame, Fifth Pan-African Congress, Declaration to Colonial People of the World (Manchester, England, 1945).

---> Larmer, Miles, “Was the Gold Coast ‘decolonised’ or did Ghana win its independence?”, University of Oxford, accessed 4/2/2018, https://www.history.ox.ac.uk/sites/default/files/history/documents/media/teaching_resource_ghanas_independence.pdf

Additional Helpful Web-Journals:

---> http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/106591297102400110?journalCode=prqa

---> https://history.state.gov/milestones/1945-1952/asia-and-africa

Also, while there's not a huge amount on-line, there's some book that I can check out at local library.

---> Basil Davidson, “The Second World War, 1939-1945,” Modern Africa: A Social and Political History

---> http://www.cambridge.org/us/academic/subjects/history/african-history/africa-and-world-war-ii?format=PB&isbn=9781107630222#7OgySOAuC3Y8TAsK.97

---> Gifford, Prosser, and Roger Louis, eds. Decolonization and African Independence: The Transfers of Power, 1960-1980.

Course Work: Article Evaluation
"Fourteen Points."

It appears like the article is part of four different projects like, "WikiProject United States Public Policy" and "National Archives Project." For each of the four projects, it's graded as a "start-class" or "C-Level" article, which means there's certainly room for improvement.

My initial reaction to the introduction paragraph is that it seems long and like it's including too much information. It's hard to follow, because each sentence seems to pull readers in a different direction. However, after the introduction, I think the article breaks down in an easy to understand and straight-forward format. I like that it gives Background, Context, the Actual Points and then Reaction, the article doesn't waste a readers time.

In terms of citations, each sources seems to be high-quality and all the links point readers to the actual online source or relevant book. The only places I thought could use a citation was the last paragraph of the introduction and the Reaction by the Allies section. When I read this line, "As a major public statement of war aims, it became the basis for the terms of the German surrender at the end of the First World War" it screamed for a citation. It reads very much as a biased point of view. At the end of that paragraph, there's actually a [citation needed], so someone felt the same way as I did.

Overall, I felt like the article was fact/information based, but on the Talk page, one user mentioned that the article appears to be written with an American bias. I imagine that's a common occurrence. Similar to how most old history books are written to be western culture centered. As I mentioned above, I can certainly see where a reader would get the "American biased" point of view.

Our textbook didn't give a lot of information about the Fourteen Points, so I felt it was a good Wiki article to review. It laid the Fourteen Points is a simple way and I think I came away with a better idea of the role that Woodrow Wilson and his ideology played in peace efforts following the Great War.

Course Work: Content Gaps
For me, a good Wikipedia article will have clear, concise and too the point information and facts about a particular subject. Because it's important to have a laser-like focus on the individual topic, it's possible that very important information on a slightly different topic will be omitted. This is a content gap: the space between topics where important information that might just not fit a particular article falls off & isn't covered. In order to remedy, it's important for a writer to clearly identify the information necessary for a particular article, but to also double-check that the information that they belief is a slightly different topic doesn't fall through the cracks. This might mean that you'll need to put together a second article or at least another section with that information.

With very strict rules regarding how to write a Wikipedia article, a reader shouldn't be able to identify a bias from the writer. It's important that throughout the entire web-site that when a person is reading any article, they're getting clear, unbiased facts about the topic (with plenty of good sourcing). I know that when I log onto a sight like Wikipedia, I just want the facts and therefore I'm glad they set up clear expectations for the writers.

Great Depression and Farming Notes
http://drought.unl.edu/DroughtBasics/DustBowl/TheGreatDepression.aspx

When drought began in the early 1930s, it worsened these poor economic conditions. The depression and drought hit farmers on the Great Plains the hardest. Many of these farmers were forced to seek government assistance. A 1937 bulletin by the Works Progress Administration reported that 21% of all rural families in the Great Plains were receiving federal emergency relief (Link et al., 1937). However, even with government help, many farmers could not maintain their operations and were forced to leave their land. Some voluntarily deeded their farms to creditors, others faced foreclosure by banks, and still others had to leave temporarily to search for work to provide for their families. In fact, at the peak of farm transfers in 1933–34, nearly 1 in 10 farms changed possession, with half of those being involuntary (from a combination of the depression and drought).