User talk:Astraflame

Home birth references
Hi Astraflame, I am also trying to review the available literature for home birth. I think we can find some valid (if not perfect) data that discusses the safety of home birth without resorting to drawing conclusions from non-home birth studies. So far I've been able to gain access to the much maligned BMJ study, the Cochrane study (home-like, not homebirth), and an article in CMAJ about British Columbia. Would you be willing to work together on this and share references? This article is regularly under attack, and I'd like to have a good grasp of the available studies to be sure we have adequate data, regardless of whether it says homebirth is safe or not. Thank you. Lcwilsie (talk) 12:21, 22 August 2008 (UTC)


 * I think that's a great idea. Unfortunately, as the focus of my current research project is c-sections and birth centers rather than home birth, I don't have anything readily on hand. I made a suggestion on the article's talk page to go ahead and take a peek at the NICE guidelines' references, but I'm sure that the article list there hardly constitutes an exhaustive search of the literature. I'll get back to you when I have any more information. --Astraflame (talk) 17:45, 22 August 2008 (UTC)


 * Much appreciated. Lcwilsie (talk) 00:23, 23 August 2008 (UTC)

Thank you
Just a quick note to thank you for your rational, measured and helpful comments on the home birth article. Gillyweed (talk) 23:06, 24 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Hey, thanks. I'm still trying to find my way here, so I really appreciate your comment! --Astraflame (talk) 23:35, 24 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Ditto what Gillyweed said. I did some reorganizing of your new content - tried to pull the most important statment/conclusion to the top of each section to speed reading. Nice work. Lcwilsie (talk) 14:39, 25 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Sweet! That also gives me the opportunity to add information about the transfer rates. And I hope you don't mind me messing around with the sub-headings on the section on safety (good call btw!). Thanks for your help, Astraflame (talk) 15:11, 25 August 2008 (UTC)

Late reply
Late reply is here. The Signpost interview I was talking about is here. Carcharoth (talk) 19:58, 1 September 2008 (UTC)

Tolkien stuff
See what I've put at User talk:Astraflame/Tolkien Bibliography. Discussion should probably take place over there. Carcharoth (talk) 08:39, 6 September 2008 (UTC)
 * Some long replies here. As I said there, please don't get discouraged by the AfD nomination of the "themes" article. That is happening mainly because I (and others who could have worked on that article) have been lazy. If the work gets done, with proper sources, there will be no problems.Even if the article is deleted, once the work is done, or a reasonable start has been made "from scratch", then there should be no problems recreating or moving a new article out from a userspace draft. Carcharoth (talk) 09:37, 7 September 2008 (UTC)
 * Aww, thanks. I appreciate the encouragement. I've secretly, perhaps cynically, been hoping that the Themes article be deleted so that it can be rewritten from scratch. Not really a good reason to actually put up the nomination myself, so I'm not including myself in the discussion over at the AfD page, but that is my opinion. However, I do think that rewriting it would take a while, especially since I'm more intending this to be a long-term hobby rather than a full-time job. Thanks for your synopsis of Tolkien studies as you see it. I'm thinking that we definitely should add a section on major Tolkien scholars in the key studies section, or at least make a list of them on the talk page. The collections list, by the way, feels very incomplete. There were a huge number of collections published within the past five years that I have actually just forgotten to post since my notes on them needs a bit of clean-up. I'll get that up soon, but until then, updating that part of the Key Studies article would be great. Also, the only reason I didn't add biographical studies is that for whatever reason Drout did not include those in the article and I didn't have them organized / handy because I haven't read any of them besides Carpenter's Biography. But I'll put that comment in the talk page where it belongs. Astraflame (talk) 14:49, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

Library access and old stuff
Would you be able to order or chase down the old pre-1984 books or books that include pre-1984 stuff? In particular "Richard C. West's Tolkien Criticism: An Annotated Checklist and Judith Johnson's J. R. R. Tolkien: Six Decades of Criticism."? Carcharoth (talk) 07:46, 10 September 2008 (UTC)
 * I can try. However, my schedule is super tight right now as I'm going abroad in two weeks and still have a job to wrap up among other things. I'll let you know if I get a chance to do anything about the West and Johnson bibliographies. West also has a (more recent) bibliography posted through MFS, which I should be able to get through proxy server.


 * However, until I get a chance to do that, why don't we start reading some of this stuff and taking notes? Awadewit posted a page that she and Simmaren used to take notes on Jane Austen. Perhaps we should start something similar? If possible, it'd be great if you could start on the works that I don't actually have a copy of (i.e. not Shippey and not Flieger). I'm planning on starting with Flieger, actually, working from Splintered Light up, but I may start reading The Road to Middle-earth as well. I have a feeling that you may have read all of Flieger and Shippey already, so I hope you aren't too miffed by me offering to read those. I also have Isaac and Zimbardo's collection, but I'm not sure how much we'll actually need from that. Astraflame (talk) 01:40, 11 September 2008 (UTC)


 * I'm still reading the delightful (and short) 1968 book by William Ready. :-) I have read some of Shippey and Flieger, but by no means all (and it is time to read them again anyway). I found Splintered Light heavy going, though. To be honest, I will have to pick what takes my fancy, as otherwise I may lose interest (terrible though that may sound). I still think that a piecemeal approach of having a reference template reading for the book one is currently reading, and then picking out the main points and adding them to various articles as one goes along, might work quite well. Though I would also update the workpages as well. What sort of schedule do you want to work to? Start now or wait until you have more time? The other point is that it is important to keep things open for others to join is as well, but equally not to have people treading on each other's toes. Maybe co-ordinate things at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Middle-earth? There are some other members of WP:ME who I know would be interested in this. Carcharoth (talk) 21:55, 11 September 2008 (UTC)


 * Oh, I was definitely going for starting with what strikes one's fancy and then going from there. I actually enjoy reading Flieger and Shippey, so I would be happy to work through their work, but would leave some open if someone else wants to jump in as well. Please, again, recruit whoever else you can on this project. It will probably take me a couple months to just get through just Flieger and Shippey, and there's still a lot of literature besides. I'm not sure where we should coordinate this. Certainly taking notes on Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Middle-earth would be wildly inappropriate, but putting up sign-ups there is probably a fantastic idea! Astraflame (talk) 22:19, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

Collaboration work page
Wow. User:Simmaren/Sandbox/Jane Austen/Collaboration Work Page is a bit of an eye-opener and no mistake! (Said Sam!) The points at User talk:Simmaren/Sandbox/Jane Austen/Collaboration Work Page might also be worth taking on board. I think one decision that should be taken now is whether to do this in user space or at a subpage of the WikiProject. Carcharoth (talk) 22:14, 11 September 2008 (UTC)


 * Yeah, it's pretty exciting :) Well, we would have to set up a sandbox either way. Can we set up sandboxes as subpages of WikiProjects? or are those a feature exclusively for userspaces? Astraflame (talk) 22:19, 11 September 2008 (UTC)


 * Article sandboxes are usually in a user subpage, but you can have collaborative ones as subpages of a WikiProject as well. No actual difference. At the end of the process, the article is moved into the mainspace (along with the edit history) and the redirect either disconnected or deleted. Workpages, to plan things, are obviously not moved. But really, there are no restrictions on how you we or others organise user space and wikipedia space subpages. Though one thing to avoid would be edit warring over a draft article - never seen that happen yet! :-) I think make a start in your userspace, and then move later if it takes off. Carcharoth (talk) 01:34, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

Homebirth "satisfaction" statement
Hi there, in your reading for the safety section, did you come across any articles about satisfaction surveys? I recall seeing these when I was reading about safety, but haven't been able to find them again. I think the lede of this article would benefit from some documentation on the statement that women who have more control over their birth report greater overall satisfaction. Thanks!Lcwilsie (talk) 21:07, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

Hi again - it's been awhile, but if you're still around and interested, the homebirth article needs some reasonable people. I greatly appreciated your work on the safety section - much of it still stands despite continuous attacks. Lcwilsie (talk) 19:48, 6 May 2009 (UTC)