User:Tlmarks/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: Legal History (link)
 * Briefly describe why you have chosen this article to evaluate: appeared interesting.

Lead

 * Guiding questions


 * Does the Lead include an introductory sentence that concisely and clearly describes the article's topic? Yes.
 * Does the Lead include a brief description of the article's major sections? Not really.
 * Does the Lead include information that is not present in the article? Yes.
 * Is the Lead concise or is it overly detailed? Detailed in ways not entirely relevant to what's in the actual article.

Content

 * Guiding questions


 * Is the article's content relevant to the topic? Not really.
 * Is the content up-to-date? Yes.
 * Is there content that is missing or content that does not belong? Yes. The lead is misleading -- it implies that the article will be a discussion of legal history and what it is, but then the article is actually just a list of the history of the laws of various countries. So either the lead needs to be rewritten or the text does.

Tone and Balance

 * Guiding questions


 * Is the article neutral? Yes.
 * Are there any claims that appear heavily biased toward a particular position? No.
 * Are there viewpoints that are overrepresented, or underrepresented? I'm not sure -- if it is representative of all of the types of legal systems, then yes.
 * Does the article attempt to persuade the reader in favor of one position or away from another? No.

Sources and References

 * Guiding questions


 * Are all facts in the article backed up by a reliable secondary source of information? Most of them.
 * Are the sources thorough - i.e. Do they reflect the available literature on the topic? Most appear to be from books, from reputable publishers (Oxford, Cambridge, Lexis).
 * Are the sources current? Not really, but they wouldn't necessarily need to be for this topic.
 * Check a few links. Do they work? Yes.

Organization

 * Guiding questions


 * Is the article well-written - i.e. Is it concise, clear, and easy to read? The first paragraph is somewhat confusing and doesn't provide an overview of the actual article. In many ways, the short overview of each legal system is too concise.
 * Does the article have any grammatical or spelling errors? No.
 * Is the article well-organized - i.e. broken down into sections that reflect the major points of the topic? Yes, if the topic were not legal history but rather an introduction to the legal histories of the different legal traditions.

Images and Media

 * Guiding questions


 * Does the article include images that enhance understanding of the topic? No.
 * Are images well-captioned? Yes.
 * Do all images adhere to Wikipedia's copyright regulations? Unclear; they are not sourced.
 * Are the images laid out in a visually appealing way? No.

Checking the talk page

 * Guiding questions


 * What kinds of conversations, if any, are going on behind the scenes about how to represent this topic? None -- just changes to external links.
 * How is the article rated? Is it a part of any WikiProjects? Rated as level 4, vital, start-class article. Yes, both history and law.
 * How does the way Wikipedia discusses this topic differ from the way we've talked about it in class? N/A

Overall impressions

 * Guiding questions


 * What is the article's overall status? Start article.
 * What are the article's strengths? Good list of different legal systems and brief introduction to their histories.
 * How can the article be improved? It could talk about what the title says it will talk about.
 * How would you assess the article's completeness - i.e. Is the article well-developed? Is it underdeveloped or poorly developed? Severely underdeveloped.

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

with four tildes — ~


 * Link to feedback: