User:Vansam823/Evaluate an Article

Which article are you evaluating?
1974 Elliot Lake miners strike

Why you have chosen this article to evaluate?
I chose this article to evaluate because its close to my home town Sudbury, is somewhat related to the course, and I have some knowledge in the mining department. It matters in general because it is a important moment in Ontario history as it may have lead to bill changes in worker safety. My impression so far, is that it is covering an important topic; however, there is some lack of information as some areas are not very long compared to the whole article (background) and some comments may not be true. The strike being the first in industrial action for safety seems far fetched as I thought there was one in Sudbury prior to 1967. This will require some research on my end.

Evaluate the article
I kept the sections from the guide as a way to separate the evaluation of the article. I will probably follow this format for other articles to help me properly evaluate them and keep my ideas organized.

Lead Section:

The lead section does have a descriptive first sentence; however, the sentence structure could use some work. It does not include a description of the sections of the article. The lead has information in it that does not appear elsewhere in the article. It mentions the Ontario premier Bill Davis which is then excluded elsewhere in the article. It also mentions the number of miners which is not seen anywhere else. The lead is somewhat concise, as it is short and to the point; however it mentions details that are not further elaborated on elsewhere, it is short/lacks important details and has no description of the sections in the articles.

Content:

The content in the article does appear to be relevant and up to date, a lot of the journal articles I found were from 2012 and below as some of the references and changes made were from 2021. There is, however, some background information missing, it just seems to state the facts with no explanations or further context. It also does not cover any underrepresented populations and may be a part of the equity gaps; however, I believe workers' rights to be a part of a repressed population especially since the strike happened in 1974. There are still issues with workers' rights today. It also covers a northerner population, they tend to have less representation. In terms of racial groups, it does not cover any underrepresented groups and appears to be mostly about the male working class.

Tone and Balance:

Overall the article covers the events of the strike and the aftermath with a neutral tone, without any biased claims. It does not seem to persuade the readers in any direction, it just covers the good that came out from the strike, which may seem to be pushing that bias; however, I am not sure if there were any negative outcomes from the strike. The only comment I have is the quote placed in the strike sentence as it doesn't really need to be there and shows to favor the side of the workers. The quote also holds no factual value and is just a random opinion placed with little context. The article covers the viewpoints from the government, the union and the mine owners; however, it does not cover a lot on the miners itself other then the oddly placed quote. I would say the viewpoint of the miners themselves is underrepresented, but that may be some hard information to find.

Sources and References

All the reference links work; however, there is not one for the book as it needs to be purchased. The author did add the correct ISBN. Not all of the facts are backed up by a second source. There are some journal articles that could be used as a backup for some of the newspaper articles. The sources used do not need to be replaced, but more references are needed to prove the facts. The event itself is old and small in scale requiring some local newspaper articles as sources. The sources appear to have the most up-to-date and current information; however, as stated some journal articles could be used as stronger sources. The sources do individually cover a diversity of authors from newspaper reporters/journalists, to journal articles, a book, and a commission report.

Organization and writing quality

The article is well written, there are just some uses of the word "the" that should not be there and somewhere they should be. For example, where it says prevalence it should be the prevalence; where it says the political it should just say political. There are also a couple of areas that need commas and some that do not. It is also organized overall, as the section are broken into major parts but it is missing there mentions at the top of the article. It is also just missing some information as some of the major sections are shorter then they should be, such as the background section.

Images and Media

There is one image in the article in the effects section which helps demonstrate the amount of death caused by uranium and shows one of the reasoning behind more health and safety regulations. The image is well captioned and appealing; however, it does not state the owner of the image and the user that is linked does not exist. The latter shows it does not follow copyright regulations.

Talk page discussion

The article has a C rating, but the talk page states that one of the facts was used in the did you know column on the main Wikipedia page. There is a short conversation on the talk page about some errors made by the author, the author thanked the individual and did make the correct changes. The one stating the errors also had the same issue with the book as it is not openly accessible thus requiring us to just trust the author using it as a source. It does not seem to differ from what was discussed in class, the conversation is quite civil, but there is not much back and forth (it was resolved quickly).

Overall impressions

The article's overall status could use some work in terms of content and the length of the sections. It is, however, straight to the point and easy to read. I would say it is underdeveloped as a whole as it requires more information and sources.