Wikipedia:Featured article review/Turkish language/archive1


 * The following is an archived discussion of a featured article review. Please do not modify it. Further comments should be made on the article's talk page or at Wikipedia talk:Featured article review. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was not promoted by User:Dana boomer 16:06, 1 March 2013.

Review commentary

 * Notified: WikiProject Turkey, WikiProject Languages

I am nominating this featured article for review because...


 * ... it hasn't had one in the more than five and a half years since it was promoted,
 * the three editors responsible for getting it to FA have all left Wikipedia in that time, leaving it vulnerable to vandalism and general neglect,
 * it already shows some signs of slipping, such as the poor layout in the first section and some uncited bits at the end of paragraphs. Compared to Swedish language, the other language FA, there has been some definite decline.
 * In a week since I posted about this on the talk page there has been neither a response there nor any non-bot edits to the article.
 * It may be salvageable, but I'm not the one to do it. Daniel Case (talk) 21:02, 7 January 2013 (UTC)


 * The rationale seems a little vague to me. I don't know how one would practically address what seems to be a fairly general concern that the article may have deteriorated because of lack of attention.·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 21:14, 7 January 2013 (UTC)
 * Well, isn't this about looking for ideas? It's a politically sensitive enough article that it's semi-protected; without addressing this now there will be less room for debate on a future review. Daniel Case (talk) 23:32, 7 January 2013 (UTC)
 * One user has begun adding unsourced and poorly sourced material to the article so maybe it is justified after all. Unfortunately I have neither the expertise or interest to save this article from being demoted.·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 15:55, 15 January 2013 (UTC)

FARC commentary

 * Featured article criteria brought up in the review section include referencing and structure. Dana boomer (talk) 23:51, 26 January 2013 (UTC)


 * Delist per my original post, and failure to address issues in the meantime. Daniel Case (talk) 05:43, 3 February 2013 (UTC)
 * The only concrete concern you had was poor layout in the first section which I fixed weeks ago, and uncited material which you didn't specify well enough to be actionable. If you had given concrete concerns it might have been possible for someone to address them.·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 13:03, 3 February 2013 (UTC)
 * I'm sorry I hadn't noticed the photo issue had been resolved, Good work. However, there is now so much uncited in the article (particularly the later sections) that I have given up adding fact tags to it, and I think it needs a refimprove banner. My opinion is even firmer than it was that this no longer meets the criteria. I also don't see the need for that long poetry sample at the end. Daniel Case (talk) 05:26, 4 February 2013 (UTC)
 * I think the poetry sample is good and important. So is your point with the references that the referencing standard for FAs has risen since the article promoted or that the article has deteriorated? The refimprove banner doesn't help anyone unless they can also see where you believe references may be needed.·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 09:19, 4 February 2013 (UTC)
 * I put a batch of tags in the article last night; perhaps I should put a section banner in. My point was that it seems that there seems to me to be even more unreferenced material now than when I first brought this article here. As for the poetry sample, it would certainly be relevant to an article about Turkish poerry; I fail to see what point it makes about the language as a whole that it requires including the entire poem. Daniel Case (talk) 15:24, 4 February 2013 (UTC)
 * Addendum: OK, I see that the article on Swedish has a sample too. However, I a) note that it's much shorter, and doesn't include IPA and b) I question the need for a sample at all given that any decent article on a language would have more than enough samples included in its examples demonstrating grammar, syntax etc. that have the additional benefit of directly demonstrating what is described in the text. Just because our only two FAs on languages have sample sections does not mean that all our articles on languages should have one. Daniel Case (talk) 15:34, 4 February 2013 (UTC)
 * The article is about a language, being able to read a coherent text in the language is an illustration equivalent to having a picture of a the empire state in an article about that building or a map in an article about a geographic location. ·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 15:31, 4 February 2013 (UTC)

See my response above, which actually seemed to have anticipated your response before the edit conflict. Daniel Case (talk) 15:34, 4 February 2013 (UTC)
 * The addition of IPA in this article is an improvement relative to the Swedish article because it includes pronunciation help. Swedish and Turkish are not the only two featured articles on languages - Nahuatl also includes a text sample. Mayan languages doesn't because it is abotu an entire language family. And no that doesn't mean that all article on languages have to - but it means that your point that is it superfluous is unjustified. It is just an "I dont like it" argument. ·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 15:38, 4 February 2013 (UTC)

I'm sorry; when I had originally searched for other language FAs while I was doing peer review on American Sign Language, I only found two in the index that seemed from their names to be about specific languages. I missed Nahuatl because it doesn't end in "language". My bad. Still, though, I believe I gave a lot more reasons for not having one than your characterization of my response would allow. I do not see what encyclopedic purpose a long text sample by itself serves, particularly when it is presented entirely without context (granted, this is not the case with the Nahuatl article). Now, granted, especially with the IPA included, it might make more sense if it was also accompanied by an audio file of a native speaker reading that text (There is no audio in that article, but then there's not in a lot of our language articles). Daniel Case (talk) 15:59, 4 February 2013 (UTC)
 * I disagree, as do apparently most of the authors and reviewers of FA language articles.·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 16:08, 4 February 2013 (UTC)
 * Disagree with which of my assertions above? That without context it's pointless? Or that it would be better with a sound file? Daniel Case (talk) 17:43, 4 February 2013 (UTC)
 * With this: "I do not see what encyclopedic purpose a long text sample by itself serves". Of course it would be better with a recording but that is not the standard in language articles. To my knowledge no language articles have actual sound samples. Yes it would be good if they did, but it is not currently feasible.·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 18:46, 4 February 2013 (UTC)
 * Actually, it's quite feasible to record something, convert to .ogg, upload to Commons, and put it in the article. I've done this with videos ... audio shouldn't be a problem. However, we're sort of losing the point here because the lack of an audio file really wasn't the issue. Daniel Case (talk) 22:55, 4 February 2013 (UTC)
 * What I meant is that it's not feasible to make it the standard for language articles, because it is not very easy to find speakers of most of the world's languages.·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 00:21, 5 February 2013 (UTC)
 * True, but there's a difference between a language spoken by a few hundred on some remote island and a language with over 60 million native speakers spread over a large area. Daniel Case (talk) 21:35, 5 February 2013 (UTC)

I agree that the underreferencing (even if present when the article was promoted) is a serious threat to retaining this article as FA. I have asked two people from my university that work with Turkish, and while one refused, the other agreed to provide references at least for the stress part. Maybe even more, we shall see. I just want to suggest not to close FARC to quickly. Time goes WAY too fast on Wikipedia. G Purevdorj (talk) 15:22, 12 February 2013 (UTC)

A short FAR of my own
Comparing the versions of 2007 and today:


 * (improvement) Speaker number is addressed much more carefully in the disinformation box.
 * (detoriation) Use of honorifics plays a too prominent role in the lead.
 * (detoriation) Sentence about Tonyukuk is clumsily worded.
 * (equal) The paragraph starting with “The past few decades ...” is unsourced. This was already the case when the article was promoted. The same holds for the next paragraph.
 * (equal) Content and quality of the article up to but not including “Dialects” are roughly equivalent.
 * (arguably improved) The dialect part was somewhat improved, even if the list style information in the latter part of the chapter is a bit overburdening. (One might consider getting it into another article and summarizing it on the basic of linguistic features. But in any case, even the preceding text has been slightly improved, so there is no decrease in quality.)
 * (arguably equal) The phoneme status of soft g was discussed in a problematic manner in the first article, but the revision has yielded in inconsistent wording. The source is accessible, though, so this can probably be amended.
 * (deotiation) The wording in the last paragraph of the consonant section (“When a vowel ...”) is a bit redundant; it could be shortened to two sentences.
 * (arguably detoriated) “Consonant voicing and devoicing” is a useful short new section, but it fails to be integrated with what is mentioned in the preceding paragraph. It also confusingly talks about “letters” where one might expect a discussion of phonemes/allophones.
 * (detoriated in one respect, improved in one respect) The unsourced addition (“However, ...”) in the “Vowels” section should be sourced or deleted. (The same section has gained a source, though, rendering it approximately equivalent with the previous version.)
 * (improved) A useful comment on the accusative has been added to the nouns section, and new examples have been added to the ev table (still unsourced and as a paradigm of a major language probably even not requiring a source)
 * (improved notably) The grammar section has overall been expanded, and the expansions are sourced and concern issues that merit to be mentioned.
 * (equal) Vocabulary section basically unchanged.
 * (improved) The writing system section has been somewhat expanded. One may argue that this can be put shorter or that the new length is better. In any case, adding a picture here (as language articles tend to have comparatively little of such supporting materials) seems a very good idea. The new examples are also helpful.

Summarizing, while a few minor edits are in place, the article has slightly improved compared to May 2007. The article should clearly be kept. I also want to express my concern here that a FARC such as by Daniel Case who relegates the actual reviewing work to others or (even worse) delists an article without recourse to article-internal facts unfairly shifts the burden of proof against good articles. The burden should be with the reviewer. And unless he can provide any real evidence (that would have to argue that even the 2007 article did not meet current Wikipedia standards for FAs), he has both failed to demonstrate that the article detoriated or that it didn't meet FA criteria in the first place.


 * Keep.

G Purevdorj (talk) 18:20, 3 February 2013 (UTC)
 * My decision to vote delist does not by any means mean that the article will be delisted. Please try harder to understand this process before you comment. Other editors would have to agree with me that it had declined sufficiently for that to happen. We do have to have consensus.
 * I assume you meant that I was relegating the actual work of restoring the article to others. As I freely admitted, I don't have the expertise. But I did have some concerns that this had to be at least reviewed because it seemed to have declined, not least because the three editors who developed it to FA and looked after it have all left Wikipedia. I provided some evidence that it might have indeed suffered, especially compared to Swedish language, currently our only other language FA. The burden of proof always rests with those who would have an article kept.
 * The article could indeed be found to up to 2007 standards but not today's, and thus delisted. Consensus can change. Daniel Case (talk) 05:14, 4 February 2013 (UTC)
 * See above, as well. The article has a great deal of unreferenced material. Daniel Case (talk) 05:26, 4 February 2013 (UTC)
 * I think that Purevdorj makes good points. And think he also meant reviewing since your initial comments didn't constitute an actual review, but just a very general statement of opinion about the state of the article. I also think he makes a good point that overall the article has in fact improved since its initial promotion.·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 09:24, 4 February 2013 (UTC)
 * As I said above, I disagree. No article with as much uncited material as I found last night would make it through FAC today. Or even in 2007. Daniel Case (talk) 15:24, 4 February 2013 (UTC)

Delist. Purevdorj, it really doesn't matter when the article was promoted, or what the standards were at the time, or whether the article has deteriorated or improved since its promotion. There are only two questions whose answers are relevant here: Does the article meet today's standards? Is this article an example of Wikipedia's best work? I am inclined to say "No" to both for all of the following reasons: --Cryptic C62 · Talk 02:35, 20 February 2013 (UTC)
 * There is a ton of unsourced material throughout the article. In some cases, entire subsections are devoid of citations.
 * Many of the book sources provided do not give page numbers, which makes it difficult for the reader to verify the material.
 * Why is there a Notes section with only one footnote when the Citations section also has several non-citation footnotes? This is bad organization.
 * What is the distinction between sources which are fully cited in Citations versus those which are fully cited in References and then referred back to in Citations? Again, bad organization.
 * "Work is currently in progress" See WP:ASOF
 * "This example is of course contrived" See MOS:OPED


 * Agree with citation style and referencing problems. tons of is exaggerated, but still. (Note that is is not me but the original reviewer who ought to have come up with this criticism.) Two hours by a specialist editor could do the trick. As I am not an expert on this and it seems that I cannot find suitable editors either. Trying to fix everything myself would take more time than I want to use. So procede as you like. G Purevdorj (talk) 09:14, 24 February 2013 (UTC)

Dana boomer (talk) 21:07, 1 March 2013 (UTC)
 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.