User:Nickywithdablicky/Evaluate an Article

Which article are you evaluating?
National African American Archives and Museum

Why you have chosen this article to evaluate?
I chose this article to evaluate because this museum is down the street from my home, I knew a little about it since I took a field trip there, and I feel it doesn't get as much attention as could receive.

Evaluate the article

 * I left some comments, indented. Dr Aaij (talk) 17:13, 29 January 2021 (UTC)

Lead Section


 * This article begins with a good introductory sentence. It is simple, clear, and gets straight to the point.
 * This article included brief information from the sections below. From the introduction, the writer mentioned the history in how the library came to be and the artifacts in the exhibit.
 * I do not see any information in the lead that's is not present in the article.
 * The lead is very concise. It involves all the information in each section without being overly wordy with unneeded details.

Content


 * The writer kept the article relevant to the topic. The writer did not stray off topic with details that were not needed. Every piece of information the writer provided was given a connection to the topic.
 * To my research findings, it showed that the content is up to date.
 * In the article, I did not see any content that did not belong. I do not see any content that is missing because all information was linked to the topic and the lead.
 * Well, you can't see missing content in the article... But I Googled real quick and didn't see anything obvious--there's not that much news coverage on the place. Nor did I see anything in Google Books.
 * Yes, this article does relate to a historically underrepresented topic. This museum is based on African- Americans throughout history.

Tone and Balance


 * This article is written from a neutral point of view. The writer did not have any wording to persuade me.
 * I do not see any references or wording of bias pointing towards a particular position.
 * In the article, I do not see any overrepresented or underrepresented viewpoints. The view remained solely on the museum and the history of it.
 * The writer wrote the minority viewpoints just as such and did not persuade to feel a certain way.
 * The writer does not attempt to persuade the reader to favor one position over another. The article adds information that supports the history, but stays on topic and does not wander off.

Sources and References


 * After clicking on each reference, I can say they are all secondary sources.
 * Most sources are thorough, however, the third source I could not find the book that was referenced.
 * You mean the fourth citation? the Thomason book?
 * The sources seemed to be quite dated since some of the dates are in 2007-2010. Upon researching, there appears to be no new information.
 * The author has chosen some sources with good coverage based on my research of no peer-review articles.
 * I'm not sure what "my research of no peer-review articles" means. The sources are mostly primary, except for the one book, which reflects my findings in Google News and Google Books, and it's sort of par for the course for this kind of topic: one often has to rely on databases and things about historical buildings. What this tells you is that the building itself was not all that important until it became a certified "historic" building--but then, if this were a library branch for a Black community in racist, segregated Alabama, it actually would have been HUGELY important to the people in that area: they had to collect the books for the library themselves! And they did! Unfortunately, and this goes right to the matter of "minorty viewpoint": few people in power, in those days and maybe still, thought it was important to record the lived experiences of, in this case, a Black community in Mobile. So the lack of coverage on the library period actually reflects the fact that Alabama history is, well, skewed from a racial perspective.
 * All links work and the author proceeded to attach a dead link to a source that is no longer there.
 * First things first: there is no "the author"--there are 28 editors who worked on it, some of them bots, but in this case there are actually two main authors: User:Altairisfar, who is a very experienced writer on Alabama topics, and, an editor with a ton of experience in US historical topics. What I note, though, is that the chunk of content starting "The building was modeled..." lacks a citation, and that's kind of important--it may be that along the way some edit was made that obscured which source verified the claims.

Organizing and Writing Quality


 * This article is very concise. The author stays on topic throughout the entire article. No information is left underrepresented or bias.
 * There are no grammatical errors.
 * Each section is broken down to the major points mentioned in the lead. All information is in its correct section.

Images and Media


 * Yes, the article included a picture of the museum.
 * Images are well captioned by name and date. Images include facts underneath the map.
 * All images are cited and adhere to copyright regulations.
 * The photo the author provided of the museum was clear and quite appealing.

Talk Page Discussions


 * The conversation mostly is about the archives and how to fix a dead bot URL.
 * According to the talk page, it is classified as a stub.

Overall Impressions


 * The article's overall status is okay. It is neat and organized. The lead is neutral and concise and includes the articles major sections. I think the article could use a little more research and sources/references.
 * The article's strength is its' lead, but could use a tad more support in the sections.
 * The article has secondary sources, but a few of them just come form random websites, instead of sources such as peer-reviewed articles. More articles of that nature should be added.
 * Hmm I wouldn't call those sources random.
 * This article is a little underdeveloped, but has lots of room for improvement.

Feedback


 * I would encourage to go digging for more reliable secondary sources to add to the article to build up the credibility.
 * OK, let's do that--but the thing is to look cleverly. What's missing? the history of the library, so let's look for "Davis Avenue Branch". BOOM there's this, which might be a goldmine, and it might not have shown up in other searches since it says "National African-American Archives", not "National African-American Archives and Museum". You want a goldmine? This is it. This also has stuff on what led to the opening of the library. And there's this. So, in all, "more sources should be found" is a much stronger statement if you can actually prove they exist, as I just did. And what you have here, now, is an opportunity to improve the article, which is one of your upcoming assignments., thank you so much for all your contributions in writing up Alabama history; you too, , for your work in covering that obvious content gap for African-American topics. Dr Aaij (talk) 17:13, 29 January 2021 (UTC)