Wikipedia Project Support

Good afternoon!

I’m writing a quick post in response to your requests from this morning’s Wikipedia Workshop.  We’ll talk more after break, but I wanted to make sure you had my feedback in case you’re already working on finding sources and coming up with a strategy to improve your articles.

Questions you raised:

  • Finding sources: this was by far the most common question.  You should take advantage of the rich library resources available to you at the College of Wooster.   The Latin American Studies LibGuide organizes many of these tools.  You can start with online encyclopedia databases like Credo for a broad overview.  For biographies, check out the Biography Reference Bank.  For more detailed research on Latin American topics, Historical Abstracts is my next stop.  Depending on your topic, resources like LGBT life or Chicano Database will be helpful.  Come see me or a librarian for help.  IF YOU USE THESE OFF CAMPUS, you need to connect with the VPN.
  • Writing: We’ll have peer review in class, and you can always get helpful feedback from the Writing Center.  And remember to refer to Wikipedia’s guidelines on tone.
  • Shaping a “Stub” Article: I find it very helpful to look at models from similar articles for ideas about what works and what doesn’t.  For example, when I created the article for Kerolin Nicoli Israel Ferraz, I looked at how other soccer players’ pages were structured, and what kinds of information they included.
  • KH seeing my work: Don’t worry, as long as your are logged in, Wikipedia lets me track all of your contributions to class articles.  I can also see the History pages for each article.
  • Translation: there is a helpful tutorial on translation if this is part of your project.

The next steps in this project:

Before class on Friday, October 18th you will:

  • Complete Wikipedia Peer Review Training.
  • On your article’s talk page, create a new heading to introduce your proposed edits.
  • On the talk page, write a few sentences about what you plan to contribute to the selected article, and why these additions are important. Think back to our discussions of content gaps, Wikipedia’s 5 Pillars, and the American Historical Association article.
  • Compile a list of at least 6-8 relevant, reliable books, journal articles, or other sources. Post that bibliography to the talk page of the article you’ll be working on.

We’ll work on peer review of your improvement plans, as well as any technical or technological questions that may arise in class that Friday.

Celia Sanchez-LA

This topic is closely represented by the Cuban Revolution and Cuba’s government post-revolution. When looking at websites that talk about Celia Sanchez, it seemed to be biased and opinionated since there were many speculations about Celia and Castro being lovers since they were really close friends. But scholarly articles seemed to have a more in-depth explanation of her life before, during and after the revolution, which is helpful in making the article be unbiased. Some of the sources some from one book and a couple of websites but checking out the websites they seemed biased and less factual about her. I might improve the article by using more scholarly articles and emphasizing her contributions to the revolution.

Alpha 66 Blog Post

Alpha 66 is poorly represented. It is sloppy and severely lacking in terms of relevant sources. Even the information presented is more speculation than fact.

Alpha 66 is overwhelmingly seen through the lens of a conspiracy theorist. Recent news articles and outdated documents create the main support for this page’s flawed ideas.

It is not unreasonable to state that any change will improve this page, but I will focus on removing baseless claims whilst simultaneously adding sources and factual details about the group and its history.

Corrido

This article on Corridos does a good job at explaining the history and the role they play in Mexico today. The article begins by defining corrido and explaining where and when they originated. This entire article seems to come from a neutral perspective. Before my entry, the article only had three sources and they all seem to be credible sources. The only downside of them is that they are all in english and are most likely  for a United States audience. I can improve the article by adding a section that explains what narco-corridos are and their significance today. I can also add sources that are written by a Mexican author for a Mexican audience.

Ruth Buendía

This article does a fairly god job of summarizing the most important aspects of Buendía’s work as an indigenous activist and environmentalist. Although it doesn’t seem slanted, the English version stops at 2014 regarding her activity and lacks detail on her childhood (the Spanish version does a much better job of both of these matters, with a whole subheading regarding current problems she is tackling). To improve this, I would definitely rely on sources in Spanish to cite for the English article, because there should be much more information on what Buendía is doing in the current day – maybe even in relation to the recent press on Brazil’s fires.

LGBT history in Honduras

I’m not really sure what to right for this response, mostly because the Wikipedia article is only 3 sentences long.  Basically if I even add one source to the article it would already be a big improvement.  I’m honestly surprised that the article isn’t considered a stub.  But I already have found some articles to use.

Túpac Amaru Revolutionary Movement

The Túpac Amaru Revolutionary Movement (MRTA) page is informed largely by sources critical of the movement, and consequently they are cast in an overtly negative light. The article is largely accounts of their criminal and terrorist activity, with very little from the perspective of members and collaborators. The MRTA was of course unambiguously violent and guilty of violating international humanitarian law. To improve the article, I would likely look at sources that discussed the trials related to MRTA members, as well as any manifestos or statements issues by the group on their stated goals. The talk page also has multiple instances of editors drawing doubt on the accuracy of information released by the Peruvian government.

The Cuban Literacy Campaign

In the article, The Cuban Literacy Campaign, the program is represented in a very one dimensional way, it speaks mainly of the successes without contextualization and fails to give enough weight to parts that may have been less than savory, i.e. the fact that all the reading material was revolutionary propaganda. This leads into the biases that are seen throughout the article, as it is written from a largely socialist perspective. The sources used are all quite old, having no citations from documents written past the year 2011, and the article lacks a fresh perspective having been left untouched and labeled as low priority on Wikipedia for a while. Editing the language of the article to be more neutral as well as offering context and discussing certain points further in order to offer more well rounded information would be an excellent start to bringing the article up to Wikipedia’s standards.

LA in the news: State of Emergency Declared in Ecuador in Response to Strikes

Ecuador Declares State of Emergency as Protesters Decry End to Fuel Subsidies

Photo Credit: Dolores Ochoa/AP

Demonstrators clash with the police in Quito, Ecuador, on Thursday.

On October 3 the Guardian reported that the President of Ecuador, Lenin Moreno, had just declared a State of Emergency in response to widespread strikes over the end of Ecuador’s 40-year fuel subsidy. The main supporters of the strikes are taxi, bus, and truck drivers who are severely impacted by the loss of the subsidy, as well as students, unions, and indigenous groups. The article makes no claim about general support for the strikes outside of these groups.

The strikers have so far blocked roads in Ecuador’s two largest cities, Quito (the capital) and Guayaquil (a port city), using the vehicles of taxi, bus, and truck drivers (the largest supporters of the strike). Strikers have also had several clashes with police, including one instance where masked strikers threw rocks at riot police, who responded with tear gas and armored vehicles. So far there have been 19 arrests for strike-related activities.

A demonstrator is detained by the police in Quito.

Moreno, the President of Ecuador since 2017, justified the State of emergency as necessary to “ensure citizen’s security and avoid chaos”. A State of Emergency allows the government to suspend certain freedoms and to use the armed forces to reestablish order. During a press conference, President Moreno condemned the fuel subsidy as “perverse” and argued that in it’s forty years of existence it had severely harmed Ecuador’s development. Ending the fuel subsidy would alleviate $2.27 billion out of a target $3.6 billion deficit reduction goal of Moreno’s government. President Moreno went on to say that protesters would not “paralyze” Ecuador. The Article also noted that three presidents between 1997 and 2007 had been removed though similar street protests.

I selected this article because it was the most detailed report on the story unfolding in Ecuador. An overview of other major news outlets yielded some conspicuously weak coverage. The BBC’s report had minimal detain but kept a relatively neutral tone. The New York Times coverage had more detail and contextual information and touched more on the disruption of business in Ecuador (including international travel). The Washington Post’s coverage was noticeably more critical of strikers and protesters, at least relative to the other outlets I looked at. Ecuador is portrayed as suffering from systemic economic issues as well as a tendency towards violence in protests.

Considering the statements by President Moreno and various protesters, unrest in Ecuador appears to be explained by political differences. The President is interested in ending subsidies, cutting corporate taxes, and working with international institutions to improve the economy. In February, he negotiated a $4.2 billion deal with the IMF, which is distrusted by many Ecuadorians who blame international forces with austerity policies. A sentiment apparent in many statements form protester is that the government has failed to keep promises and that they have not benefited citizens. This seemed to align well with what John Chasteen described and the right-left political spectrum in Latin America. Moreno’s policies cast him as a neoliberal, while the protesters support for subsidies and rejection of external influence is in line with Nationalism.

Some of James DeFronzo’s characteristics of successful revolutions are present here as well, notably mass frustration and political crisis. Support for strikes seems weaker among middle-class business owners (based on limited information) however, and it is unclear if elites are divided or if there are major external pressures on Ecuador.

The Guardian (main source): https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/oct/03/ecuador-state-of-emergency-fuel-subsidies-protest

The BBC (video): https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-49929272

The New York Times: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/03/world/americas/ecuador-transit-strike-fuel-subsidy.html

The Washington Post: https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/ecuador-president-declares-state-of-emergency-over-strike/2019/10/03/2f0871a4-e613-11e9-b0a6-3d03721b85ef_story.html

Granma (newspaper)

The wikipedia article on the Granma newspaper starts by explaining the historical context of the newspaper, but does not elaborate on its role in the history of Cuba or Latin America as a whole. The article seems fairly unbiased, but this may be because the ideological basis of the newspaper is not discussed in detail. The biggest weakness in the article is probably the sources. The article only cites two, and there are many “citation needed” footnotes in the editions section of the article. The two sources are both academic works, one being a book, and the other being an article. To improve this article, I could research information about the importance of the Granma newspaper to the history of both Cuba and Latin America. I could also research where the newspaper is published, it’s relationship to the Cuban government, and its reception both in Cuba and abroad. My most important change to the article, though, will likely be the addition of sources to support the existing article, as well as my additions to it.