[Foundation-l] *TELUS Detected Spam*Re: Has Wikipedia changed since 2005?

[Ray Saintonge]

  On 09/18/10 8:34 AM, Andreas Kolbe wrote:
> Bod Notbod, when you say, "I see a lot of green", it's also worth looking at what B actually means. The article on Doris Lessing for example, winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature, is B class.
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doris_lessing
>
> It is woefully inadequate. It says there are three phases to her writing, communist, psychological, and sufic. Only the latter has any coverage at all, and it is generally the least highly regarded part of her output. Everything there is on superficial "controversies" (why did she write science fiction, is she a feminist).
>
> Almost all the sources are newspaper articles; there is not a trace of the available peer-reviewed literature on her output.
>
> It is much the same in the article on Selma Lagerlöf, another Nobel Prize winner, which is Start class.
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Selma_Lagerlöf
>
> Again, no trace of the scholarly literature. The only biography listed in the bibliography is "Who’s Who in Gay and Lesbian History from Antiquity to World War II", which is sort of typical.
>
> I think there *is* a problem with the humanities, as well as with the gender imbalance in Wikipedia.
>
> It would be worthwhile to study the location of these deficiencies in more depth, and perhaps to establish links to universities, similar to the recently launched public policy initiative, to address the areas where Wikipedia's natural contributor base does most poorly.
>

You are comparing two women writers so I don't see gender imbalance as a 
factor here. I have also little to no interest in the game of 
determining whether any article is start, B, or feature class. If you 
recognize the stated deficiencies applying "sofixit" could be more 
constructive than an in-depth analysis of the problems.

Mention of the one work in the Bibliography only begs the question of 
why it has never been merged with the other 8 works in the "works about" 
section.  I agree that focusing on someone's sexual orientation is a 
matter of minor importance.  I can only respons with "So what?"  I also 
agree that there should be greater use of scholarly literature, 
especially for Lagerlöf because her prize was 90 years earlier; that 
simply gives that much more time for these works to have been written.  
Some may even be in the public domain.

Recentism may also be a factor in the analysis, as is the fact that only 
Lessing wrote in English.  A first step may be to list all the works 
that can be found about these writers (useful or not), and use that as a 
stepping stone to improvement. It does not take academic qualifications 
to do that. It does take work.

Ray