Rio Grande Glaze Ware edit
- A script has been used to generate a semi-automated review of the article for issues relating to grammar and house style; it can be found on the automated peer review page for June 2008.
This peer review discussion has been closed.
I've listed this article for peer review because after I first posted it, a couple of my fellow archaeologists thought it might be too technical for Wikipedia and therefore might be marked for deletion. My questions are: (1) is an article of this general type "too technical" for Wikipedia; and (2) if it's generally acceptable but too technical in places, where and how does it go over the line? Other comments welcomed, of course.
Thanks, Dogofthedesert (talk) 14:57, 24 June 2008 (UTC)
Ruhrfisch comments: Interesting article and I do not think it is too technical. This is a really good initial effort, but it does have to follow Wikipedia's Manual of Style - see WP:MOS. While it is clear that a lot of work has been put into it, some more is needed to improve it further to meet MOS standards. Here are some suggestions for improvement:
- Get rid of this note at the top: Note: this article includes in-text references, as is common in U.S. archaeology journals. Most archaeological dates are approximate. Would you include such a note at the top of a manuscript submitted to an archeology journal? I would include the "dates are approximate" info in the body of the article.
- The article is missing a lead, which should be an accessible and inviting overview of the whole article. Please see WP:LEAD
- Nothing important should be in the lead only - since it is a summary, it should all be repeated in the body of the article itself
- My rule of thumb is to include every header in the lead in some way. The current Introduction section could be the basis of a decent lead, but it makes no mention of the two keys for classification (rims and paint style)
- The article should have an image in the upper right corner as part of the lead. I would use one of the images of a bowl, probably the red slip complete bowl.
- Biggest problem the article currently has is with references. The MOS allows several styles of refs, but it has to use one and only style consistently throughout. This seems to use two different styles of refs.
- Article needs many more references. My rule of thumb is that every quote, every statistic, every extraordinary claim and every paragraph needs a ref. See WP:CITE and WP:V
- Per WP:CITE references come AFTER punctuation, and are usually at the end of a sentence or phrase.
- Article has many very short (one or two sentence) paragraphs which interrupt flow. These should be combined with other paragraphs or possibly expanded.
- A few sections - Rim C and Rim D for example - are also very short and should be combined or expanded
- Images are supposed to be set at thumb width to allow reader preferences to take over - see WP:MOS#IMages
- Provide context for the reader - make captions clearer. I thought at first that the rim images were of patterns on the pottery, not cross sections.
- The article uses bold and italics way too much per WP:MOS#Italics
- Parts of the article read like a how to manual (on classifying pottery), which is not what Wikipedia is for or about. See WP:NOT
- The headers for sections do not follow WP:HEAD
- Please use my examples as just that - these are not an exhaustive list and if one example is given, please check to make sure there are not other occurrences of the same problem.
Hope this helps. If my comments are useful, please consider peer reviewing an article, especially one at Wikipedia:Peer review/backlog (which is how I found this article). Yours, Ruhrfisch ><>°° 04:35, 26 June 2008 (UTC)
Second look by Ruhrfisch As requested here is a second look at the article. It is improved - there is a lead, the references are consistent, the image captions are clearer and the images are licensed properly. Some more work is still needed, here are my suggestions.
- The lead should probably three paragraphs per WP:LEAD and the length of the article. Much of the "Overview and cautions" section could be adapted for an expanded lead.
- Biggest problem is still a lack of references. The lead does not need any (as it is a summary and the refs are in the article) but the rest of the article needs many more. For example, the last three paragraphs of "Overview and cautions" have no refs, neither do the whole sections on Glaze B Rims, C, D, and F. If this were up for Good Article, that would be enough to "quick fail" it. I assume the main author is an expert in the field, but the idea is to provide references to reliable sources so that anyone could check the facts or read further if they wanted to.
- Please read WP:HEAD - the current headers do not follow this. For example, typically only the first word is capitalized and articles are not included, so "A Key Based on Paint Styles" might be "Key based on paint styles"
- Headers are also not supposed to repeat the title of the article or other higher headers, so "A Key Based on Rims: The Mera System" might be better as something like "Mera key system: rim based" and the subheaders might then be "Glaze A", "Glaze B", etc.
- As noted before, try and avoid very short paragraphs (one or two sentences) or sections (same), so could it be "Glazes C and D", for example?
- A model article is useful for ideas and examples to follow - I am not sure what might be a good model, but Borobudur is a FA. Others may be listed at Wikipedia:Featured_articles#Art.2C_architecture_and_archaeology