Wikipedia:University of Edinburgh/Events and Workshops/Medieval Islamic Visual Culture

Consult the Manual of Style for style guidelines for articles on Wikipedia

 * Manual of Style for articles.

About the task
Have you ever wondered why the information in Wikipedia is extensive for some topics and scarce for others? On the 23rd of September 2020, the University's Information Services team will run a Wikipedia research session. Full Wikipedia editing training will be given. Thereafter the editathon will focus on creating & improving the quality of articles about Islamic art.

Working together with academic colleagues we will provide training on how to edit and participate in an open knowledge community. Participants will be supported to develop articles covering areas which could stand to be improved in the field of Medieval Islamic Visual Culture.

The formative assessment is a collaborative project and presentation due in week 5.

The task in detail
Imagine you’ve been hired as a consultant for a major museum to improve the public’s knowledge of Islamic art, science, and magic in advance of an exhibition. Your task is to write a new Wikipedia article, or to assess an existing Wikipedia article, chosen from the list below for the quality of its sources and content and then research, write, and improve it. You will work collaboratively in groups of 3-4 students. You will revise existing text and/or write new text (aiming for a group total of 500+ words), image(s), and scholarly references. In a 5-minute class presentation your group will explain how you improved the article, and what you learned from the process.

The overall goal is to contribute to knowledge about the connections between art and science as it developed in Islamic civilizations. By contributing to Wikipedia you will be using your skills as art historians to create, improve, and diversify this important source of free online knowledge. The assignment will feedforward to the essay and exam because it encourages you early in the semester to engage with the visual and material evidence available to art historians focused on Islamic art/science, craft/intellect, and religion/supernatural.

Join us to learn about how Wikipedia works and contribute a greater understanding of Islamic Art!



How do I prepare?

 * Create a Wikipedia account
 * Use a laptop or desktop computer.
 * Learn about editing if you like: Tutorial, or Getting started on Wikipedia for more information
 * Think about what you would like to edit.

Trainers
Ewan McAndrew, Wikimedian in Residence at the University of Edinburgh

Helpful links
Once you've learned the basics of editing using Wikipedia’s Visual Editor, I hope that you'll stay logged in and edit or create more articles. I've added some booklets and some links below that you may find useful. As a first step you may like to check out what What Wikipedia is not along with its 5 guiding principles: The 5 pillars.


 * The Wikipedia Adventure Start Page - a fun tutorial introducing new editors to Wikipedia
 * Visual Editor user guide
 * Questions – a guide on where to ask questions
 * The Teahouse new editor help space
 * Wikipedia Help pages
 * Article wizard – a Wizard to help you create articles
 * The simplified ruleset – a summary of Wikipedia's most important rules
 * Guide to Wikipedia – a thorough step-by-step guide to Wikipedia
 * Is your topic notable enough for an article?
 * Be Bold!
 * Don't let grumpy users scare you off.
 * Learn from others
 * How to write a great article
 * A simplified manual of style


 * Please sign your messages on talk pages with four tildes ( ~ ). This will automatically insert your "signature" (your username and a date stamp). The [[File:Button sig.png]] or [[File:Insert-signature.png]] button, on the tool bar above Wikipedia's text editing window, also does this.
 * If you would like to play around with your new Wiki skills without changing the mainspace, the Sandbox is for you.

Hit list of articles to be created or improved
Helpful updates could be as simple as: Making sure reference links are still appropriate and functional; Adding new inline citations/references; Adding a photo; Adding an infobox; Adding data to more fields in an existing infobox; Creating headings; Adding categories; etc.

The following is a small sample of topics to work on. Feel free to come up with your own ideas!

All are welcome to add names to the list which is intended to serve as a basis for creating new articles in this important but somewhat neglected sector on the English Wikipedia.

Articles to be created and improved
Choose your topics from the following:

Discussed in Wks 4-6

 * Astrolabe
 * Celestial Globe
 * Book of Fixed Stars
 * Zodiac

Discussed in Wks 8-9

 * Automaton
 * Book of Ingenious Devices
 * Ismail al-Jazari
 * Book of Knowledge of Ingenious Mechanical Devices
 * Water clock

Discussed in Wk. 10

 * Divination: Middle Ages and Early Modern Period
 * Talisman
 * Amulet
 * Geomancy

General

 * DiscoverEd to find books, ebooks, journals, ejournals and more.

News sources

 * Factiva
 * British Newspaper Archive
 * More at: Edinburgh University Library - Newspaper database

Theses databases

 * Edinburgh Research Archive. For theses produced at the University of Edinburgh Edinburgh Research Archive
 * Proquest Dissertations
 * More at: Edinburgh University Library - Theses database

Video guides to editing Wikipedia

 * Wikipedia - It's main policies & guidelines
 * Navigating Wikipedia's front page
 * How to structure an article on Wikipedia: the Featured Article
 * Wikipedia editing in under 25 mins
 * How to edit using with Visual Editor Part 1: Creating an Account
 * Editing Wikipedia using Visual Editor: Part 1.1 Adding Headings
 * Editing Wikipedia using Visual Editor: Part 1.2 Adding bold & italics
 * Editing Wikipedia using Visual Editor: Part 1.3 Adding bullet points
 * Editing Wikipedia using Visual Editor: Part 1.4 Adding links
 * Editing Wikipedia using Visual Editor: Part 2.1 Adding citations and references
 * Editing Wikipedia using Visual Editor: Part 2.2 Further practice with citations (DOI and Pubmed IDs)
 * Editing Wikipedia using Visual Editor:Part 2.3 Adding an image
 * Editing Wikipedia using Visual Editor: Part 2.4 Adding categories
 * Editing Wikipedia using Visual Editor: Part 3 Creating a new article in the Sandbox
 * Editing Wikipedia: Communicating with others using the Talk page and Help Desk

Tutorials on Wikipedia editing

 * Visual Editor User Guide
 * manual of style
 * Wikipedia cheat sheet (Bookshelf), another markup cheatsheet
 * Training for students, a tutorial for beginners
 * Beginners' guide to Wikipedia (account creation, article editing)
 * Five pillars of Wikipedia, philosophical guidelines and best practices for editing
 * Tutorial
 * How to edit a page
 * Wiki markup quick reference, PDF version of printed handout
 * Article development
 * Your first article (using the Article Wizard, if you wish)
 * Bookshelf, additional "getting started" resources
 * Biographies of Living Persons

Outcomes
To be determined.

What can I do after the event?
You may find these useful if you want to learn further about editing:
 * Video tutorials
 * Instructional videos on using Wikipedia

Participants - Sign Up Here!
Prior to the event: Don't worry! If you haven't edited Wikipedia before and don't have a Wikipedia User Name yet, we will help you on the day of the event! And remember to have fun!
 * 1) RSVP: [mailto:ewan.mcandrew@ed.ac.uk ewan.mcandrew@ed.ac.uk] 
 * 2) Do you have a Wikipedia User Name?
 * No? Create a Wikipedia account
 * Yes? Go to Step #2
 * 1) Sign up! Add your Wikipedia User Name to this section by clicking the blue button below (follow instructions). Your name will be added to the bottom of this page


 * LingshuF (talk) 14:19, 23 September 2020 (UTC)