User:Natwill78/Choose an Article

Article Selection
Please list articles that you're considering for your Wikipedia assignment below. Begin to critique these articles and find relevant sources.

Option 1: ASL Interpreting

 * ASL interpreting
 * Article Evaluation:
 * As I stated before, this article is lacking in the balance that it needs. While the content included in the article is undoubtedly relevant to the topic, it fails to provide readers with a global view of ASL interpreting. Despite ASL interpreting presenting positives, this article largely focuses on the negatives, such as burnout. In order for a Wikipedia article to be successful in the eyes of Wikipedia itself, it must present neutrality. That is not to say that "negatives" and "positives" cannot be discussed, but that they should be equally weighted. Moreover, I believe that some more general facts surrounding ASL interpreting should be included on this page rather than briefly referenced and linked to. Not everyone is going to want to hop from link to link, despite this being a common feature of Wikipedia articles. I just think that the fact that the article only has 4 sections (one of which being references) highlights that more could be expanded upon. I also believe it could use some fine-tuning, such as in the lead section. While all the information included within it is interesting and worthy of the reader's attention, I just think it could be streamlined a bit. As Wikipedia indicates, there are citation issues within the article, therefore, if I tackle this article, this is something that I would look into. The feedback on the talk page is good, however, there is only one contribution. More discourse about this article, the writing style, content, etc. would be beneficial. Lastly, the article contains no images. This would be helpful to people who learn best when presented with imagery as well as breaking up chunks of text.
 * As I stated before, this article is lacking in the balance that it needs. While the content included in the article is undoubtedly relevant to the topic, it fails to provide readers with a global view of ASL interpreting. Despite ASL interpreting presenting positives, this article largely focuses on the negatives, such as burnout. In order for a Wikipedia article to be successful in the eyes of Wikipedia itself, it must present neutrality. That is not to say that "negatives" and "positives" cannot be discussed, but that they should be equally weighted. Moreover, I believe that some more general facts surrounding ASL interpreting should be included on this page rather than briefly referenced and linked to. Not everyone is going to want to hop from link to link, despite this being a common feature of Wikipedia articles. I just think that the fact that the article only has 4 sections (one of which being references) highlights that more could be expanded upon. I also believe it could use some fine-tuning, such as in the lead section. While all the information included within it is interesting and worthy of the reader's attention, I just think it could be streamlined a bit. As Wikipedia indicates, there are citation issues within the article, therefore, if I tackle this article, this is something that I would look into. The feedback on the talk page is good, however, there is only one contribution. More discourse about this article, the writing style, content, etc. would be beneficial. Lastly, the article contains no images. This would be helpful to people who learn best when presented with imagery as well as breaking up chunks of text.

Option 2: American Sign Language Phonology

 * American Sign Language phonology
 * Article Evaluation:
 * While interesting and a decent start, this article is lacking. Although it seems to be quite neutral with relevant content, I believe that it does not reference enough sources. Only 8 sources are consulted, 6 of which from 1960-1998. Although these sources may be illuminating, they are growing outdated and much progress has been made in the understanding and exploration of ASL. Furthermore, Wikipedia is again highlighting that the article "has an unclear citation style" and not all of the facts included in the article are cited. These kinds of oversights make people less likely to trust Wikipedia as a source of quality information. If I were to edit this page, I would include references to the readings that we have done for this class thus far which have been interesting and informative and were published in the textbook in 2018. I would also look for newer facts and figures published in journals and studies. This would result in more sections and expanding upon those that already exist. Moreover, ASL is a visual language. The fact that this article is dissecting ASL and includes no pictures is counterintuitive. In order to help people understand, showing what is being written about seems logical. As it stands, there is no discussion on the Talk page. I believe this is why the article has been able to remain like this. It is a good base to work off of, but is, right now, just reading like a base to me.
 * While interesting and a decent start, this article is lacking. Although it seems to be quite neutral with relevant content, I believe that it does not reference enough sources. Only 8 sources are consulted, 6 of which from 1960-1998. Although these sources may be illuminating, they are growing outdated and much progress has been made in the understanding and exploration of ASL. Furthermore, Wikipedia is again highlighting that the article "has an unclear citation style" and not all of the facts included in the article are cited. These kinds of oversights make people less likely to trust Wikipedia as a source of quality information. If I were to edit this page, I would include references to the readings that we have done for this class thus far which have been interesting and informative and were published in the textbook in 2018. I would also look for newer facts and figures published in journals and studies. This would result in more sections and expanding upon those that already exist. Moreover, ASL is a visual language. The fact that this article is dissecting ASL and includes no pictures is counterintuitive. In order to help people understand, showing what is being written about seems logical. As it stands, there is no discussion on the Talk page. I believe this is why the article has been able to remain like this. It is a good base to work off of, but is, right now, just reading like a base to me.

Option 3: Language Deprivation

 * Language deprivation
 * Article Evaluation:
 * Overall, this article is not very well written. It presents some features that are commonly looked down upon, such as using contractions, "weasel words", brief sectioning, and not being the consistently substantiated or consistently neutral. Some of the cases of language deprivation that they include before the section on Deafness are "alleged" and quite outdated. This made me uncomfortable reading the remaining sections of the article. This is damaging, the entire article should be clear, academic, and updated in order to ensure that people feel confident to read on to the section on Sign Language deprivation. From the looks of it, one person wrote the sections that brought me discomfort, and another (who has done a better job in researching, writing, composing and substantiating claims) wrote the section on Deaf children. Quite honestly, I would prefer to make Sign Language Deprivation its own article. Although the deprivation of language from deaf individuals may present overlap with hearing individuals, I think it still merits an article of its own and does not need to be attached to anything else. This would make it so that what has been written about deafness and language deprivation already would not have its contents detracted from because of weak content presented before it.
 * Overall, this article is not very well written. It presents some features that are commonly looked down upon, such as using contractions, "weasel words", brief sectioning, and not being the consistently substantiated or consistently neutral. Some of the cases of language deprivation that they include before the section on Deafness are "alleged" and quite outdated. This made me uncomfortable reading the remaining sections of the article. This is damaging, the entire article should be clear, academic, and updated in order to ensure that people feel confident to read on to the section on Sign Language deprivation. From the looks of it, one person wrote the sections that brought me discomfort, and another (who has done a better job in researching, writing, composing and substantiating claims) wrote the section on Deaf children. Quite honestly, I would prefer to make Sign Language Deprivation its own article. Although the deprivation of language from deaf individuals may present overlap with hearing individuals, I think it still merits an article of its own and does not need to be attached to anything else. This would make it so that what has been written about deafness and language deprivation already would not have its contents detracted from because of weak content presented before it.

Option 4: United States at the Deaflympics

 * United States at the Deaflympics
 * Article Evaluation:
 * This article is very short. It only seems to focus upon quantitative information. While this is interesting and relevant, more sections on the event, organisers, participants, importance, and culture could most definitely be added to further bolster the article. Moreover, a table has been started but not finished so even with the concentration on numbers, a sizeable amount are missing (seen with the "Winter Deaflympics" table). Because it is so short, only 4 references have been included. Overall, this article could use much expansion in order to provide the Deaf Community with more representation on Wikipedia.
 * This article is very short. It only seems to focus upon quantitative information. While this is interesting and relevant, more sections on the event, organisers, participants, importance, and culture could most definitely be added to further bolster the article. Moreover, a table has been started but not finished so even with the concentration on numbers, a sizeable amount are missing (seen with the "Winter Deaflympics" table). Because it is so short, only 4 references have been included. Overall, this article could use much expansion in order to provide the Deaf Community with more representation on Wikipedia.

Option 5: See What I'm Saying: The Deaf Entertainers Documentary

 * See What I'm Saying: The Deaf Entertainers Documentary
 * Article Evaluation:
 * I personally have watched this documentary and, therefore, know that much much more expansion could be done with this article. The documentary is engaging and telling, allowing people a glimpse into the lives of Deaf entertainers. By writing about the contents of the documentary, which would be reporting on the facts of the film, I would be able to highlight Deaf experiences on Wikipedia. This is not the most common of possibilities because Wikipedia does not like for articles to sound too subjective. The only section in this article besides the two lead sentences is entitled "reception", which is relevant but not the most important aspect to be reported on in this article. I would add sections on each of the subjects of the documentary, elaborate on the intentions behind the film, and talk about its impacts, to name a few changes that I would make.
 * I personally have watched this documentary and, therefore, know that much much more expansion could be done with this article. The documentary is engaging and telling, allowing people a glimpse into the lives of Deaf entertainers. By writing about the contents of the documentary, which would be reporting on the facts of the film, I would be able to highlight Deaf experiences on Wikipedia. This is not the most common of possibilities because Wikipedia does not like for articles to sound too subjective. The only section in this article besides the two lead sentences is entitled "reception", which is relevant but not the most important aspect to be reported on in this article. I would add sections on each of the subjects of the documentary, elaborate on the intentions behind the film, and talk about its impacts, to name a few changes that I would make.