Talk:Anastasia/GA1

GA Review

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Reviewer: Squeamish Ossifrage (talk · contribs) 22:14, 6 January 2015 (UTC)

Although there are quite a lot of anthroponymy articles, there are very few that have made their way to the higher quality levels. Unfortunately, I don't think this article is ready to join them. I'll try to step through some specific problems regarding the criteria below, but the fundamental issue is that there's just not enough article here to begin with. At 1517 characters of readable prose size (per the DYK check tool), this is just barely long enough to meet the DYK length requirements. While short articles can be GA-quality, it's a tough road to demonstrate breadth of coverage.

1. A Good Article is well-written.

• "The name originates with Greek etymology and carries the meaning "resurrection"." -This feels awkward. It has an etymology, rather than originating with one. It means something, rather than carrying a meaning.
• "Anastasia was created during the early days of Christianity and was abundantly given to Greek children born in December and around Easter." -More specificity as to the time period would be idea. "Abundantly" feels off-tone here. The Easter thing is self-evident (but could probably be made more so), but do sources discuss the resurrection / December pairing?
• "There are a number of short forms; Russian: Nastya, as well as various hypocoristics: Nastenka, Nastyusha, Nastyona; Serbian, Slovenian: Nastja." -Too much in too small a space, especially with the way languages are presented in combination with the hypocoristics. This really almost isn't prose.

2. A Good Article is verifiable with no original research.

• I'm dubious of the reliability of a couple of the sources. Essential Baby, in particular. And possibly the two foreign-language sources, which I haven't examined in much detail.
• The source you cited at newadvent.com is actually (as it says itself) a reprint from the public-domain 1907 Catholic Encyclopedia, and your referencing should probably reflect that (and/or cite the original PD source directly).

3. A Good Article is broad in its coverage.

• This is the big problem here. This article just isn't broad in its coverage. Now, it's not directly comparable, because surnames and given names are different creatures, but consider Spencer (surname), a current GA. There's much more thorough coverage of etymology (we don't even see the original Greek form for Anastasia here, at least in the text), and at least some effort to give broader information about popularity and prevalence. Prevalence information here seems very light, and rather Russo-centric. Anything about its use in Greece? In the Anglophone world? Are there any sources that discuss how its prevalence may have been influenced by the periodic media/entertainment interest in Grand Duchess Anastasia Nikolaevna of Russia?
• I can't see any immediate connection to the names linked as See also topics.

I really think that this article needs more (and better) sourcing, and simply a more thorough treatment of the topic, in order to satisfy the expectations of GAC. This is outside the topics I typically work with, but the scholarly journal Names might be a place to start looking for more material. Good luck with the article's continued development. Squeamish Ossifrage (talk) 22:14, 6 January 2015 (UTC)

Squeamish Ossifrage, thanks a lot for taking on this review even though you failed it. I'm a bit busy at this very moment, but will take some time off to reply later. Peace. Jonas Vinther (speak to me!) 22:25, 6 January 2015 (UTC)

No worries! I'm quite familiar with both the difficulties of writing comprehensive articles on small-ish topics and the difficulties of being very busy. Take care. Squeamish Ossifrage (talk) 22:28, 6 January 2015 (UTC)

Once again thank you for your review, Squeamish Ossifrage. I'll take note of the points you made and improve the article, but not in January I'm afraid as I'm very busy with real life stuff. I'm also super glad you pointed out Spencer (surname) - when I expanded and improved this article I didn't know about any other name articles of GA-class, so didn't know about the standards of such an article and so forth. I'll be sure to ping you whenever I begin the GA-improvement and hope you will edit your input and do some copy editing in you see the need for it. Thanks again and a delayed Happy New Year. :) Jonas Vinther (speak to me!) 15:19, 10 January 2015 (UTC)