Talk:Laura Oldfield Ford

Citation revert

This revert needs explanation. It is citing a New Statesman blogged set of book reviews as if each of the reviewed book authors was a contributor to the review, which appears to be nonsensical. The revert edit comment says that is not what is being done, but does not explain what is. Please clarify in what fashion this makes sense. LeadSongDog come howl! 22:21, 4 February 2014 (UTC)

Sorry about the bluntness – I intended to elaborate on your talk page but real world things got in the way. The article isn't, as you say, a collection of book reviews; nor are the names in the headers the authors of the "books of the year". Rather, it's a collection of short pieces by commentators listing their picks for "books of the year": Tim Adams writes about Julian Barnes, Nicholson Baker and Mick Imlah; Fatema Ahmed names Pierre Bayard and Marcel Aymé, etc. The relevant part for this article is Owen Hatherley's contribution. The authors of the piece, then, are Adams, Ahmed, Alton, etc. While listing nine or more authors might seem excessive or confusing, I think it's a better choice than listing no author or saying "staff", which strikes me as being as good as useless. I hope that clears things up. – Arms & Hearts (talk) 01:33, 5 February 2014 (UTC)

No, the author of the blog post is the unnamed staffer. Adams through Wheen are contribution authors, but of them only Hatherley is relevant to the statement supported, unless you wish to say something like "of the 48 book reviewers listed only Hatherley chose it, as one of his three book of the year choices." If you wish to ignore what the other 47 didn't say, then don't cite them. I'd suggest something in the flavour of:

Ghosts (future): Savage Messiah 10: Abandoned London, the most recent issue of painter and psycho geographer Laura Oldfield Ford's urbanist zine, is an oneiric vision of a depopulated, post-catastrophe capital, pieced together from snatched conversations and reminiscences, set in a landscape of the labyrinthine ruins of 1960s architecture and today's negative-equity banlieue.

— "Owen Hatherley, in: Staff blogger. Books of the year 2008 New Statesman 13 November 2008"

LeadSongDog come howl! 15:48, 5 February 2014 (UTC)

No part of the text was written by an unnamed staffer. We don't cite parts of sources; we cite the whole thing, including all the relevant information, in order that it can be easily found by the reader. This is called verifiability. I don't understand what you're suggesting: a blockquote without an inline citation? Or just abandonment of the citation style used in the rest of the article? What this has to do with my initial revert of a bot which is altering references misleadingly is beyond me. – Arms & Hearts (talk) 01:02, 6 February 2014 (UTC)

"We don't cite parts of sources"? Nonsense. We cite small sections of compiled works all the time. We even have specific parameters chapter and contribution for it in cite encyclopedia, cite book, and others. In the work being discussed the unnamed staff blogger (per the byline) is effectively a compiler or editor of the 48. Only one of the 48 has any bearing on the assertion being made. On its face, the blog entry shows the 47 thought differently from the one, so why would we list them in implicit support of his thinking? LeadSongDog come howl! 14:11, 6 February 2014 (UTC)

We cite chapters, yes, but generally not paragraphs. That also applies to a much greater extent to print sources (e.g. encyclopedias and books) than online sources. I think we're coming at this from rather different conceptions of the purposes of references though (i.e., as indicators of "implicit support" vs. as means of verifying information). Perhaps we could proceed by requesting a third opinion? – Arms & Hearts (talk) 00:21, 7 February 2014 (UTC)

Additional editors are nearly always a good idea, but I suppose I have failled to convey my point. All but one of the writers listed in your version of the citation saw fit to omit commentary on Ford from their contributions. I contend that it is grossly wp:UNDUE to ignore the 47 and just use Hatherley as any sort of evidence without some explanation of why Hatherley's opinion is more important than the sum of all the others'. Why does he matter more? Listing them as if they were authors behind his opinion only aggravates the misrepresentation. LeadSongDog come howl! 22:10, 7 February 2014 (UTC)

I've come here in response to the request for a third opinion. After reading through this discussion and looking at the source, I have to agree that LeadSongDog's proposed citation makes the most sense to me. I do not share the concern that readers will not be able to find the source if the other contributing authors are not listed in the citation, but I do agree that only Hatherley's comment is relevant. Hopefully this is useful.

Also, I'm super impressed at how much thought you've both put into citation style! Keihatsu ^talk 02:17, 12 February 2014 (UTC)