Wikipedia:WikiProject Magical Realism Reconsidered



The University of British Columbia's class SPAN365 ("Magical Realism Reconsidered: Survey of Spanish-American Literature since the 1820s") is contributing to Wikipedia during Spring 2010. Our aim is to bring a selection of articles on magic realism to featured article status (or as near as possible).

If you have any questions or comments, you can add them to the project's talk page or at my user talk page.

Goals

 * To improve Wikipedia's coverage of selected articles on Latin American literature and magical realism.
 * To submit these articles to Wikipedia review processes, such as peer review, good article nominations and featured article candidates.
 * To increase the number of featured articles in this area.

News

 * This project goes live the week of January 4, 2010. Please check back regularly for latest progress.

Featured articles

 * None yet.

Magic realism

 * --Ebenfc (talk) 18:15, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
 * --Kayohk (talk) 22:25, 7 January 2010 (UTC)
 * --Larodge (talk) 07:55, 8 January 2010 (UTC)
 * --Medge88 (talk) 23:47, 8 January 2010 (UTC)
 * --dolevsky (talk)

Wikipedia liaisons: Awadewit (talk), Scartol (talk)

Miguel Ángel Asturias

 * --Trowan (talk) 20:47, 7 January 2010 (UTC)
 * --Daquigg (talk)
 * --Phxalana (talk) 08:12, 8 January 2010 (UTC)
 * --Raluca Cretu (talk)

Wikipedia liaison: Scartol (talk)

Leyendas de Guatemala

 * --Kylabl (talk) 19:09, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
 * --Liloljeffy (talk)
 * --Sezekiel (talk)
 * --Rekarrr (talk) 05:05, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

Wikipedia liaisons: Ceranthor (talk), Mike Christie (talk)

Alejo Carpentier

 * --Katie322 (talk) 04:59, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
 * --Josiemitchell (talk) 06:33, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
 * --Hannefj (talk)
 * --JordiHUBC (talk) 18:24, 11 January 2010 (UTC)
 * --Tniamath (talk) 13:55, 16 January 2010 (UTC)

Wikipedia liaisons: NuclearWarfare (talk), Moni3 (talk)

The Kingdom of this World

 * --Patrussell (talk)
 * --Avneet86 (talk) 16:00, 5 January 2010 (UTC)
 * --Chris Weber (talk) 23:37, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
 * --Svetlana 365 (talk) 16:50, 13 January 2010 (UTC)

Wikipedia liaison: EyeSerene (talk)

One Hundred Years of Solitude

 * --Laurarosenielsen (talk) 05:56, 7 January 2010 (UTC)
 * --Aellingboe (talk) 01:59, 8 January 2010 (UTC)
 * --Brhoads2 (talk) 20:02, 17 January 2010 (UTC)
 * --Patricklivemon (talk) 09:31, 8 January 2010 (UTC)

Wikipedia liaison: Awadewit (talk)

McOndo

 * --TonyBill (talk) 17:48, 7 January 2010 (UTC)
 * --Thussen (talk)
 * --jeremyblaugrana (talk)
 * --robertsk88 (talk)
 * --Lionthanatos (talk) 19:11, 11 January 2010 (UTC)

Wikipedia liaison: Ruhrfisch (talk)

Stages
These are the stages we need to pass through:


 * Start. Get familiar with Wikipedia. Make some trial edits, however minor.  Demystify the process.  Leave behind any sense of intimidation.  As Wikipedia puts it, learn to be bold.  Learn basic editing skills.  By January 8, everyone should have sent me their username, added themselves to a group (above) and the membership list (below), plus made at least one edit anywhere on Wikipedia.

There's no precise order for everything. Small, incremental change is always important. But over the course of the project we're looking for radical change, in some cases seeking to create a featured article from scratch. So we need also to be methodical.

NB see also what Wikipedia has to say about article development.

Style guides
To be awarded "good" or "featured" status, articles have to conform to the Wikipedia style guides. The three most important aspects of style are:


 * Layout – this guide describes heading and sub-headings.
 * Lead section – the all important abstract at the head of an article.
 * Manual of Style – the collection of rules.

Secondary style guide are specific to different projects. Articles must conform to these also. Conflict between any of these is inevitable and troublesome; editors simply have to work out conflicts through consensus.


 * Manual of Style (writing about fiction) - collection of rules for fiction.
 * WikiProject Novels/Style guidelines – mostly lay out issues for articles on novels.

The simplest way to understand the various style guides is to examine articles that have passed GA or FA. Here is a recently-promoted featured article of a novelist: Mario Vargas Llosa. Here are a couple of featured articles of a novel: El Señor Presidente and The General in His Labyrinth. What's more, these three articles were all written by UBC students like you.

Resources

 * Getting started
 * The perfect article
 * Assessment
 * Article development


 * Good article criteria
 * Guide for nominating good articles
 * Good article review cheatsheet
 * Good article nominations


 * Feature article criteria
 * The differences between good and featured articles
 * How to satisfy Criterion 1a

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November 11, 2008
This is our progress since the last update:


 * Carmen Rodriguez: 86 edits, is now at B class. Two active editors (from a group of two).
 * Chicano literature: One completely useless editor.
 * How the García Girls Lost Their Accents: 153 edits, is now at B class. Three active editors (from a group of three).
 * José Martí: 180 edits. Three active editors (from a group of three).
 * Julia Alvarez: 279 edits, is now at B class. Three active editors (from a group of three).
 * María Ruiz de Burton: 100 edits, is now at C class. Three active editors (from a group of three).
 * Sandra Cisneros: 211 edits, is now B class. Three active editors (from a group of three).
 * Tomás Rivera: 64 edits. Two active editors (from a group of two).
 * Who Would Have Thought It?: 177 edits, is now at C class. Two active editors (from a group of three).
 * Woman Hollering Creek and Other Stories: 192 edits. Three active editors (from a group of three).

The improvement is ongoing and indeed accelerating. Special props perhaps to Team Julia Alvarez and Team Sandra Cisneros, but there's definite progress all around. Still some ways to go, but let's hope that we can continue at this rate and have a few Good Articles by the time of the next update. Well done!

Article traffic
Article traffic statistics indicate the size of the public for our work. Below are the figures for June, 2008. Numbers are likely to go up significantly as the articles improve.


 * José Martí: 13,060 views. Or c. 155,000 views per year.
 * Sandra Cisneros: 4,895 views. Or c. 58,000 views per year.
 * Julia Alvarez: 2,354 views. Or c. 28,000 views per year.
 * How the García Girls Lost their Accents: 1,309 views. Or c. 15,000 views per year.
 * Tomás Rivera: 809 views. Or c. 9,500 views per year.
 * Chicano literature: 282 views. Or c. 3,300 views per year.
 * Maria Ruiz de Burton: 171 views. Or c. 2,000 views per year.

By comparison...


 * José Martí (Spanish Wikipedia): 30,393 views.  Or c. 365,000 views per year.

Google page rank
More information to track the significance of this assignment. Below are each article's Google page ranks, using the most likely search parameters.

-->
 * Jose Marti: google rank #1 on first page of results
 * Tomas Rivera: google rank #1 on first page of results
 * How the Garcia Girls Lost their Accents: google rank #1 on first page of results
 * Sandra Cisneros: google rank #2 on first page of results
 * Julia Alvarez: google rank #2 on first page of results
 * Maria Ruiz de Burton: google rank #2 on first page of results
 * Who Would Have Thought It? google rank #6 on first page of results
 * Chicano literature: google rank #6 on first page of results
 * Woman Hollering Creek: google rank #9 on first page of results
 * Carmen Rodriguez: google rank #14 on second page of results

Non-students
We welcome participation and help from other Wikipedia editors. You may wish to add your username below.
 * – Magic realism, One Hundred Years of Solitude
 * – Leyendas de Guatemala or One Hundred Years of Solitude
 * – The Kingdom of this World
 * – Leyendas de Guatemala
 * – Alejo Carpentier
 * – McOndo
 * – Miguel Ángel Asturias and/or Magic realism
 * – McOndo
 * – Miguel Ángel Asturias and/or Magic realism