User talk:Emiliepichot/sandbox/WikiEd

Hi Emilie! I think you've done a fantastic job cleaning up the wording and organizing Frances Harper's page. I've organized my feedback by section, I hope it's helpful.

Lead

-"the mother of African-American journalism": Does this need a citation?

- Out of curiosity, why did you remove the info on "Sketches on Southern Life" from the lead? Just too much info?

- I think a lot of the info you removed was a good decision, especially the last line about her burial, etc.

Early Life and Education

-In terms of content, you've made a huge improvement here. I'd change the 3rd sentence to "...Henriette and Rev. William Watkins, from whom she received her last name." Then launch into how her uncle was a civil rights activist, abolitionist, a minister, etc. and therefore a major influence on her life and work, especially since she was educated at his own school where he taught. Just a suggestion for organization.

Writing Career

-Again, great organization. It's clear and understandable. My biggest observation for this section (and this likely applies to your other sections as well) is that there's a real mixing of present and past tense, which you may want to overhaul. For example "Her story "The Two Offers" was published in Anglo-African Magazine, making her...". This could be 'which made her'. Likewise, the next sentence contrast 'published' with 'she links'. Next sentence, 'were both periodical' and 'serves as'.

-Minor note: there is an additional space inserted before the last paragraph in this section.

Teaching and Public Activism

-I see that most of this is the original page content, so my only suggestion here is to remove the parentheses around the freestanding sentence or incorporate this parenthetical thought into the previous sentence.

Progressive Causes/Personal Life

-I'm really happy you added the personal life section because that last line about her death in the original version seems to come out of nowhere and is a little jarring!

-perhaps include names of children?

Legacy and Honours

-Any chance there is a photo of the wall of the Contemplative Court at the Smithsonian with her quote on it? That might be a nice photo to include.

Misc.

-There's a lot going on with Citations, References, Further Reading, and External Links. If all of the listed References are within the Citations section, do you need both sections? I'm also struggling with this issue on my page and I don't actually understand the policy on this, but I'm in favour of minimalism. Again, just a suggestion :)

-Overall, really nice work improving the flow of this page. The reorganization you did was really smart and the article is much more intuitive. The only thing I can think of that would be a quick & easy addition is to include maybe a block quote or two from Harper's own works that provide the reader with examples of her voice and the words she wrote about slavery/abolition. Other than that, this was a really fascinating article to read - Thank you!

(Gardneca (talk) 02:38, 23 November 2018 (UTC))

Review of Edit draft
You have done a lot of work on this article, Emilie; it looks great. There are a few items I noticed that you might want to go back and take a look at. The first is in the lead section, and has been mentioned by Chelsea already -- In the first paragraph, the mention that Frances Harper is considered the "mother of African American journalism" has no citation. It was in the original article and had no citation there, either. Perhaps it is one of those facts that is understood in literary circles, but for anyone who is not familiar with African American literature, it needs some kind of documentation, I think.

I found the section on her Writing Career a little confusing when the name kept changing. You refer to her sometimes as "Watkins" and later as "Harper." I did go back and check the dates and realize that many works were written prior to her marriage. When I have checked other sources, I find that they use her married name consistently, even when discussing her earlier works. If you want to reinforce the fact that she began her writing career long before her marriage, you could mention here that her career started twenty years prior to her marriage. I would suggest that you stick with "Harper" throughout the article, so there is no confusion.

The section "Progressive causes" -- About halfway through the 4th paragraph..."Activists like Harper and Willard..." You should put the full name here; in the next paragraph, it is okay to just use the last name, but the first time a person is mentioned, the full name needs to be stated.

Overall, the work you have done on this article is wonderful. It is obvious that a lot of research has been done. I enjoyed reviewing it and seeing the before and after improvements. Capejoani (talk) 20:50, 24 November 2018 (UTC)