User:Sheppyshepp111/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: (Betty Birner)
 * Briefly describe why you have chosen this article to evaluate: I have chosen to evaluate this article because it seemed to be lacking essential qualities of a Wikipedia article, so I wanted to take a look at which qualities it was lacking.

Lead

 * Guiding questions

The introductory sentence is very short and isn't further described until the next sentence. The lead doesn't describe any of the article's major sections. The lead includes the idea of marked word order, but the rest of the article never mentions marked word order.The lead doesn't have enough detail and the concepts in the lead aren't described very well in the major sections of the articles.


 * 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

The content of the article is relevant because it is talking about Betty Birner's area of discipline. The content was last updated in March of 2019, so the article could definitely use some updating. There is missing information in the Research section regarding the technical terms in the text. Wikipedia should be able to give information about a topic to even people who don't know much about linguistics, yet I barely understand what the research portion is trying to say. If they are going to talk about technical linguistic terms, they need to include links to the Wikipedia page about that argument, or just go more into detail in the article itself.


 * 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?

Tone and Balance

 * Guiding questions

The article doesn't seem to have any sort of bias. Though there is no obvious bias, the article doesn't give a good amount of information about Betty Birner or her studies. Since there isn't much information on her studies, there isn't any information given about any opposing viewpoints or viewpoints that are similar to hers.


 * 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 sources given are not reliable sources. Most of the sources are blogs or works written by Betty Birner herself. The sources reflect the lack of material in the article, because the sources only give very vague information about Betty Birner and her field. The sources are from 2015, so the article could definitely use some more current 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?
 * Check a few links. Do they work?

Organization

 * Guiding questions
 * The article includes many technical terms which the lay person could definitely not understand, such as "marked word order."The article doesn't have any grammar or spelling errors, but the order of the sections is odd. Instead of putting her biography first, the article put her research first. I think that it would be more appropriate to introduce her first, and then talk about her accomplishments and studies.


 * 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 article doesn't include images, but it does include one example of her study of sentence inversion. I couldn't find any sources from where they got these examples, so they should definitely include a source along with it.


 * 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
 * The last comments were made in 2018. The users commented that there should be more information about Betty Birner and her early life. The users also suggested that there should be citations with information about Birner's research. The article has a Start-Class rating and is a part of WikiProject Chicago and WikiProject Women scientists.


 * 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

I would say the article is definitely in its beginning stages and underdeveloped, but the information so far is good. The information mainly needs more detail and an improvement in the ordering of subjects.


 * 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?