Wikipedia:Peer review/Maya Angelou/archive1

Maya Angelou

This peer review discussion has been closed.
I've listed this article for peer review because I'd like to have more eyes look at it before submitting it FAC. I've worked on this and most other Maya Angelou articles on my own, so input from disinterested parties is much needed and would be much appreciated.

Thanks, Christine (Figureskatingfan) (talk) 05:28, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

I'll do this. --Noleander (talk) 02:44, 13 April 2012 (UTC)

Oh goody! Thanks, I'll wait until you've given me a bit more before I start addressing your comments. Christine (Figureskatingfan) (talk) 05:09, 13 April 2012 (UTC)

Comments from Noleander

• Wording: " author and member of the Harlem Writers Guild, ..." - Probably should be separated by comma, since they are in a long list of comma-separated jobs: " "author, member of the ...". Although, is member of a Guild an "occupation"?

  I just removed the phrase, since it's not notable enough to mention in the lead, I think, or at least not notable in comparison to all her other jobs.

• Sidebar Navbox is a bit skimpy. Not to suggest you should go overboard with trivia, but are there some fields you could add to the sidebar that are informative? See, e.g. Ayn Rand for a fuller box. See {{Infobox writer}} for all possible fields.

  That's because, to be honest, I hate infoboxes. But done nonetheless. Christine (Figureskatingfan) (talk) 16:39, 14 April 2012 (UTC)

• Name pronunciation: In 1st sentence: consider also showing the simpler pronunciation key Wikipedia:Pronunciation respelling key - (see W. E. B. Du Bois for an example)

  I believe that was the key that was used. If anyone can help improve it, please do.

• Repetitive: "Angelou is one of the most honored writers of her generation. She has been honored by ..." - Can one "honor" be replaced with a different word?

  "Decorated" is there now. Christine (Figureskatingfan) (talk) 19:12, 14 April 2012 (UTC)

• "Works" section - Should be reformatted to be consistent with other poet/author articles. As it stands, it is a bit incomplete, and doesnt really sync up with the rest of the article. I recommend the following: eliminate the section; move any important facts into other, more specific sections (Legacy, era of her life, etc); and a new section be created at the bottom of the article named "Selected Works" or "Works" (the latter, if the number of her works is less than, say, 40). In that new section, just bullet list all the works; so it is a reference section, not a prose/text section. For examples, see Langston Hughes or e. e. cummings, etc.

  Angelou's template at the bottom of this page (and all her articles) list her works, and there's the list that's linked in this section. Her works are definitely longer than forty. I looked at FAs about authors. Ann Bannon doesn't have a "Works" section, but it discusses each of her books. Anton Chekhov has a dedicated section with a link to a separate list. Noel Coward lists his bibliography. My point is that there seems to a wide variety of how to handle an author's works. It's set up in this article because MA's "works" include much more than books and poetry, and I thought a more general discussion with a link to the list better suited this article.

• Something unsaid? - The first paragr of "Style and genre" section discusses fiction vs autobiography; there are many examples where authors pretended there autobio work was 100% true, and it turned out there was some fiction, which resulted in a scandal. Did that happen with Angelou? (BTW: I have no idea if it did or did not) The section seems to hint there was some controversy, but doesnt come out and give details. If there was no controversy, that is fine, just curious.

  Believe me, I looked for controversy and scandal, but I found none. Personally, I think that it was implied because when autobiography is discussed, the fictionalized part of it is discussed, at least cursory, partly because of these famous scandals and partly because it's part of the genre. That issue has been brought up before [1], in the many improvements of the Caged Bird article (a FA). The issue is addressed here in the same way it's addressed there, and reviewers have seemed to be okay with it. Christine (Figureskatingfan) (talk) 20:04, 14 April 2012 (UTC)

• Hyphen: "African American oral tradition .." - AA used as adjective needs hyphen.

  He he, I laugh because those two words (and "Black") are the two most discussed words in all of MA's articles. First time anyone's brought it up, but you're right of course. Changed.

• " used similes and metaphors (i.e., the caged bird) " - should be e.g. not i.e., correct?

  Ah, hard English stuff! ;) Obviously, I wasn't sure, so I looked it up, and sure enough, you're right again. Changed. I love how much stuff you get to learn here in WP. ;)

• Section mismatch: One section is "Poetry" and another is "Style and genre" ... they seem to not be consistent. Is the S&G section intended to be about her autobiographies? If so, it should be retitled to "Autobiographies" to parallel the Poetry section. Or, if S&G is about the S&G of both poems and autobiographies, that is okay, but then what is the intention of the Poetry section?

  Wondered if anyone was going to catch that after I expanded the S&G section and created the forked article. It's exclusively talking about her autobiographies. the "Poetry" section is exclusively about her poetry, both its style and the content of her poems. Easily handled: I changed the title to "Style and genre of Angelou's autobiographies. Christine (Figureskatingfan) (talk) 20:45, 14 April 2012 (UTC)

• Reception/criticism material seems to be spread out in 3 sections: (1) Critical Reception; (2) Poetry; and (3) S&G. Recommend that you clean up the article organization as follows: eliminate those into three sections and move the material into three new sections which replace them: (a) Style & Genre; (b) Reception (includes all criticism and analysis); and (c) Legacy/Honors. Hence, eliminate format-based sections "Poetry" or "Autobiography". Merge Legacy with Honors into 1 top level section (with 2 or 3 subsections). I'm not talking about writing new material for the article: just moving the existing paragraphs around into more logical sections.

  Um, I think that your way make them more confusing. There is a huge difference between the style and themes in MA's autobiographies and in her poetry, and there has been much more written about her autobiographies. If there were more information out there, I'd even create the forked article Poetry of Maya Angelou, but I don't personally feel that it's warranted and that the content belongs better in her bio article. I've seen a lot of author articles formatted this way, with a separate list (or in this case, section linked to a list) of his/her honors and awards. I did some experimenting to see what your suggestions would look like, and decided that I like it. I put the "Honors" section as a subsection in the "Reception and legacy" section. Does that work? Christine (Figureskatingfan) (talk) 21:05, 14 April 2012 (UTC)

• Personal life section: - I see there is no "Personal Life" section; that is optional, and not a bar to FA status; but many readers may find it informative. In this case, it may be especially useful to avoid confusion; for example in the section "Adulthood and early career: 1951—1961" you write: "Angelou has been married three times or more ... After Angelou's marriage ended...". Which marriage? When were the marriages? Any children? Readers may benefit from "one stop shopping" in a "Personal life" section. That section could also include details about her daily writing habits, idiosyncrasies, and any other personal information that secondary sources comment upon.

  When I first read the above, I went, "Ugh," but after thinking about it, I think it's not a bad idea at all. It would solve some of the issues others have brought up, about if some content fits where they're currently in, like her Mende background and writing habits. I'll get to work on that in the coming days, I promise.

* Hyphen again: " African American culture ..." - check all uses of AA for hyphens if adjectival.

• "There have been many negative reviews of Angelou's poetry, ..." - The quantity "many" needs a specific source to justify it; Is that really what the Burr p 181 source says? I trust you, just making sure.

  I can get overzealous at avoiding close paraphrasing at times, so that statement needed clarification. Changed to: Scholar Zofia Burr has connected Angelou's "failure to impress professional poetry critics"... Better?

• Cite year: Lupton (1998) .... dont need (1998) in the footnote since there is only one Lupton

  Grr, thought that I had dealt with that when all instances of the 2nd Lupton book moved with the Themes forked article. Thanks for the catch.

  More later. I need a nap now. Christine (Figureskatingfan) (talk) 21:32, 14 April 2012 (UTC)

• Cite formatting: You have period ending the non-book footnotes; and no period on the book footnotes. I recommend making them all use period ... it looks inconsistent to have half end one way, and half the other. I see the logic, but it still looks odd.

  Wow, that pick--er, thorough! ;) You're the very first person who's ever noticed it; it's because the templates used for the "non-book" sources put a period in automatically. I suppose it's accurate, so I went ahead and added the missing periods.

• Web site in Sidebar Navbox: It looks like an orphan at the bottom: most web sites in SideBars have a bold face "Web Site" on the left side, so it is aligned with the other info above it. Never mind ... it looks like the sidebar template imposes that format for the web site; can't say that I like it.

  No argument from me. It gives evidence to my dislike of infoboxes. They make articles ugly, and I'm not ashamed to say how important that is! ;)

• Photo rights: the FA reviewers are pretty strict about photo rights. For photo File:Angeloupoem.jpg: can you provide any more detail on its provenance? The NPR site says "courtesy of white house" ... but that doesnt mean the author of the pic gave away their copyright; it may just mean the White house gave permission for NPR to use the photo one time in the NPR site.

  This could be an issue. That image is used to tie together all of the MA articles on WP; it's used in all of them and in the template. It's used in the two MA FAs, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings and Singin' and Swingin' and Gettin' Merry Like Christmas, and it was never an issue for their FACs. I've actually looked for the image on the White House webpage, but had no luck finding it. Images used for government purposes or published by the White House and federal sites tend to be free as a rule, so I suspect that it's all right. At least that's my hope. We're wait and see what happens. Christine (Figureskatingfan) (talk) 17:07, 16 April 2012 (UTC)

• "Writing habits" section? - you have a nice quote box in the "Style and genre" section with 3 quotes. It looks like they are intended to illustrate her writing habits ... why not create a subsection devoted to "Writing habits", so readers grasp the purpose of the quotes & accompanying material?

  Actually, this article at one point had that section, but other reviewers suggested that it be cut and put elsewhere. I think it better belongs in a "Personal life" section as per your suggestion above.

• Parallel section titles: Two of the chrono sections have years in their names: 1951-1961; 1961-1969; but the third one "Later years" does not. Seems a bit asymmetrical. Consider adding "1969 - present" or similar.

  Well, asymmetry is a valid artistic style. ;) Seriously, part of the reason it's done this way is "artistic" reasons, and I think that readers are smart enough to know that the section is about the last portion of MA's life. "Early years" doesn't have a year span, either, so there can be an argument made that it is symmetrical. How 'bout I leave it as is and see what others say about it?

• Clarify & reword: " Some of her more controversial works have been challenged or banned in U.S. schools and libraries, but have been used in schools and universities internationally." - Needs to be rewritten. The way it is written now implies that her works are not widely used in the US. Also, the "challenge or banned" is misleading: just because some crackpots challenged her book in a library, does not mean the challenge succeeded. Consider: "Although attempts have been made to ban her books from some US libraries, her works are widely used in schools and universities worldwide".

  I'm good with that; changed.

• Final note: it is a great article on an important figure. I think it is very close to FA status. The key improvement, in my opinion, is the section re-organization mentioned above. I'd recommend doing as much of the above recommendations that you concur with, then consider doing one more Peer Review before going to FAC.

End Noleander comments. --Noleander (talk) 02:51, 13 April 2012 (UTC)

Noleander, thanks so much for the PR! I'll take care of the re-organization and re-submit it to PR. I think we're very close too, so I appreciate the input and valuable feedback. Christine (Figureskatingfan) (talk) 17:33, 16 April 2012 (UTC)