User:Maloneel/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: Burke Museum of Natural History and Culture
 * As a Anthropology major and this being a History class, I thought this topic blended the two interests well.

Lead

 * Guiding questions
 * The introductory sentence is concise and clearly describes the topic of the article. The lead does mention some of the articles major sections like the naturalist club, the collections and turning into the state museum. However, it only vaguely mentions this and the sentences are out of order to the rest of the article. It also does not mention anything about the museum governance which is another section in the article. The lead has information that is present in the article, it even is a little short. Overall it is concise.


 * Does the Lead include an introductory sentence that concisely and clearly describes the article's topic?
 * Does the Lead include a brief description of the article's major sections?
 * Does the Lead include information that is not present in the article?
 * Is the Lead concise or is it overly detailed?

Content

 * Guiding questions
 * In the section called "Carousel of buildings" there is a part about the museums director that does not seem to belong. The sections on the collections and exhibits are somewhat lacking, they seem to short there needs to be more about what is actually in the museum. There is some of the physical structural content in the buildings section of history however, not a lot is mentioned about what is housed at the museum. The last edit was made in August of 2020 and their is information from the end of 2019, so it is pretty up-to-date. The article does mention the Native American artifacts that they have and the exhibit they have dedicated to that.


 * Is the article's content relevant to the topic?
 * Is the content up-to-date?
 * Is there content that is missing or content that does not belong?
 * Does the article deal with one of Wikipedia's equity gaps? Does it address topics related to historically underrepresented populations or topics?

Tone and Balance

 * Guiding questions
 * The tone is mostly neutral, some word choice could be less opinionated. The viewpoints that are overrepresented are those of the early naturalist group and those of the Burkes. As they contributed heavily to the museum this is understandable but the Native American view point of the museum is not represented at all. There does not seem to be any persuasion of a positoin, just that the viewpoint is very one sided and needs others to balance out.


 * Is the article neutral?
 * Are there any claims that appear heavily biased toward a particular position?
 * Are there viewpoints that are overrepresented, or underrepresented?
 * Does the article attempt to persuade the reader in favor of one position or away from another?

Sources and References

 * Guiding questions
 * The links of sources seem to work, and not all facts seem to be backed up with information. I thought there would be a lot more sources or places where the sources should have been. The sources are mostly news articles written about the museum or their/the Universities website. There does not seem to be a wide variety of authors of the articles and I would say that most of these sources are not neutral sources.


 * Are all facts in the article backed up by a reliable secondary source of information?
 * Are the sources thorough - i.e. Do they reflect the available literature on the topic?
 * Are the sources current?
 * Are the sources written by a diverse spectrum of authors? Do they include historically marginalized individuals where possible?
 * Check a few links. Do they work?

Organization

 * Guiding questions
 * It is concise, and somewhat easy to read. Some of the information could be organized a little better. For example the part on the director of the museum being in the buildings section. I did not notice any obvious spelling or grammatical errors. The overall sections are broken down well, I think the information that is in them is a little disorganized.


 * Is the article well-written - i.e. Is it concise, clear, and easy to read?
 * Does the article have any grammatical or spelling errors?
 * Is the article well-organized - i.e. broken down into sections that reflect the major points of the topic?

Images and Media

 * Guiding questions
 * The images are mostly about the outside of the buildings and they did enhance the understanding. Maybe take out one or two, there seems to be too many. I do not know if the inside of the museum or collection displays are copyrighted but those would have been helpful as well. I liked the map in the lead section, that was useful information. The images are kind of clumped together, they could be better aligned.


 * Does the article include images that enhance understanding of the topic?
 * Are images well-captioned?
 * Do all images adhere to Wikipedia's copyright regulations?
 * Are the images laid out in a visually appealing way?

Checking the talk page

 * Guiding questions
 * There is discussion on the organization of the information, of putting the information about the Naturalist Society within a new category of Burke Museum of Natural History and Culture. The information about how it became named would also be under this title. It is a C-class anthropology article.


 * What kinds of conversations, if any, are going on behind the scenes about how to represent this topic?
 * How is the article rated? Is it a part of any WikiProjects?
 * How does the way Wikipedia discusses this topic differ from the way we've talked about it in class?

Overall impressions

 * Guiding questions
 * Overall, the article is at a good starting point. The strengths are the lead section and having relatively neutral accurate content. The articles sources and organization could be improved. I think the article is underdeveloped.


 * What is the article's overall status?
 * What are the article's strengths?
 * How can the article be improved?
 * How would you assess the article's completeness - i.e. Is the article well-developed? Is it underdeveloped or poorly developed?

Optional activity

 * Choose at least 1 question relevant to the article you're evaluating and leave your evaluation on the article's Talk page. Be sure to sign your feedback

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