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GA Review

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Reviewer: Saskoiler (talk · contribs) 02:39, 31 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]


It's my pleasure to take on a GA review of this article. I will assess one criterion at a time, capturing the assessment in the table which follows. After the table, I'll list items which I believe need attention, if any. -- Saskoiler (talk) 02:39, 31 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Rate Attribute Review Comment
1. Well-written:
1a. the prose is clear, concise, and understandable to an appropriately broad audience; spelling and grammar are correct. Overall, the prose in this article is fantastic. It's articulate, clear, and easy to follow.

I have identified a few minor issues to look into. See below: Prose — Update: All of the prose suggestions have been addressed, along with other prose improvements to the article.

1b. it complies with the Manual of Style guidelines for lead sections, layout, words to watch, fiction, and list incorporation. Lead - The lead does a good job of concisely summarizing the article content. Interestingly, the first paragraph of the lead is a condensed summary of the second paragraph of the lead, which is itself a condensed summary of the article. It's good.

Layout - The article is intuitively organized, divided into appropriate sections and subsections. I have one minor question regarding categorization of the article. See below: Categories — Update: I made this minor change myself.

Words to Watch - No problems detected.

Fiction - n/a

List incorporation - n/a

2. Verifiable with no original research:
2a. it contains a list of all references (sources of information), presented in accordance with the layout style guideline. There is a "References" section with 16 references drawn from 5 works. The references are neatly layed out using a consistent style.
2b. reliable sources are cited inline. All content that could reasonably be challenged, except for plot summaries and that which summarizes cited content elsewhere in the article, must be cited no later than the end of the paragraph (or line if the content is not in prose). All citations are from reliable sources: mainstream newspaper articles, journal articles, etc.
2c. it contains no original research. I checked each of the citations (except one which requires a subscription), and the article reflects the source material, subject to some prose observations (discussed under "Prose"). There's no sign of original research.
2d. it contains no copyright violations or plagiarism. There is no evidence of copyright violations or plagiarism.
3. Broad in its coverage:
3a. it addresses the main aspects of the topic. Main aspects of the topic -- birth in Japan, emigration to Canada, World War I, interwar period, internment during World War II, and later years -- are all addressed.
3b. it stays focused on the topic without going into unnecessary detail (see summary style). The article is focused. Subtopics are presented in reasonable balance.
4. Neutral: it represents viewpoints fairly and without editorial bias, giving due weight to each. The article is presented with neutral language and prose. I do not sense any editorial bias.
5. Stable: it does not change significantly from day to day because of an ongoing edit war or content dispute. The article is stable. There is no edit war or content dispute. Indeed, nearly all edits for this article are from the GA nominator.
6. Illustrated, if possible, by media such as images, video, or audio:
6a. media are tagged with their copyright statuses, and valid non-free use rationales are provided for non-free content. There are two images provided with this article. Both have their copyright status clearly stated. One is in the public domain; the other is a Flickr CC image. Both okay.
6b. media are relevant to the topic, and have suitable captions. The first image (Mitsui himself) is integral to the article. The second is of secondary importance, but still relevant. Both have suitable captions.
7. Overall assessment. This is an excellent short article. I feel that I've been educated and enlightened. I am inspired to learn more; perhaps someday I'll create the article for the red-linked war memorial in Stanley Park. I'm certainly going to pay a visit the next time I'm there.

I've made a few very minor copyedits to the article and identified below a small number of issues to address for this article. Once that is done, I intend to pass this GA review. In the meantime, I'll set the review on hold to give time for the nominator (or someone else) to make updates.

Update: All of my concerns raised below have been promptly addressed, and confusion over the medals Mitsui was awarded has also been rectified. I believe that this article now satisfies the GA criteria. Thank you for your efforts to enrich Wikipedia with this article. Pass

Items to Address

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The following is a list of items which need attention. Please respond to each to let me know when it is resolved, or enter an explanation to justify why it should not be changed.

Categories

  • In addition to existing categories, should this article be added to Category:Japanese emigrants to Canada ? Seems like it should.

Prose

  • Biography
    • Re: "... to a samurai family ..." — What is a samurai family? To a novice on the topic (like me), this sounds like his ancestors were all samurais, or at the very least his father, grandfather, etc. I think this might overstate or mislead based on the fact in the source that he was the grandson of a samurai. How about this: "Masumi Mitsui, the grandson of a samurai, was born in 1887 in Kokura in Japan."
    • Re: "He developed a strong command of ability..." — I think this is intending to say "He developed a strong command of English...".
  • World War I
    • Re: "as British Columbia did not allow Japanese Canadians to sign up for the military" — I'm not sure that "allow" is consistent with the source. This suggests that the province itself didn't allow it, but the source states that 28 Japanese Canadians were enlisted in BC (compared to 169 from Alberta). Rather, they faced racial discrimination in seeking to enlist. The source talks about "a less racialized context in Alberta", so perhaps this sentence can be reworded to reflect that?
    • Re: "... but Mitsui stated that in battle "there was no time for such behaviour" " — The quotation is accurate from the source, but I'm struggling to understand the meaning of his words, and thus am unsure whether this is a valuable inclusion to the article. Does it mean that Mitsui didn't respond to the discrimination because he (Mitsui) was concentrating on the war? Does it mean that the discrimination stopped very soon because the perpetrators were concentrating on the war? Is it commentary from Mitsui that a battlefield is no place for racial discrimination, or that he wasn't concerned with such matters in that context?
    • I think a much more powerful quote (from the same source, p. 445) about why he enlisted could be added to that paragraph instead: "I went because I believed that it would be for the benefit of Canada and for the benefit of Japan."
    • Re: "He received the British Military Medal ... there; and for ... there ... Canadian Medal of Bravery" — I find that the 2 instances of "there" are unnecessary in this sentence and, more generally, the connection to the previous sentence could be stronger. There is a pre-existing "clarification needed" tag on this sentence as well. How about something like this:
He led 35 Japanese Canadians in the Battle of Hill 70, earning two military medals for his actions. He received the British Military Medal for leadership, bravery in battle, and assistance to the wounded;[1] and he received the Canadian Medal of Bravery for retrieving a Lewis machine gun there and bringing it back to use against the enemy.[2]
    • Re: "machinegun" versus "machine gun" — I'm no expert here, but the linked article uses two words "machine gun", and this seems to be used more commonly in other articles. e.g. machine gun
    • In the second paragraph of "World War I", I find the order of sentences to be confusing. In the 1st sentence, the war is ended. In the 2nd sentence, his command is suffering heavy deaths and casualties, and his friend dies. Although the source is ambiguous about when he wrote of his depressed feelings (during the war? after the war?), this sentence order originally confused me into thinking that the casualties referred to in the second sentence happened after the war ended while he was leading his platoon into Cologne. Recommend switching the order of sentences such that... "Mitsui's command suffered... After the war ended, Mitsui led his platoon... Mitsui refused to discuss ... He was honourably discharged..."
  • General
    • Prose in the body sections of the article give the full date on which he died (in "Later life"), but only the year of his birth (in "Biography"). Since I can't see any reason for this difference, I recommend making them consistent: either both full dates are given, or neither. (Both dates are given in the lead and the infobox.)

Saskoiler (talk) 18:36, 31 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Clarifying medals he received

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This is a very well crafted article, but can it please be clarified how Mitsui was a recipient of the Medal of Bravery (Canada)? That medal was instituted in 1972, over 50 years after World War I. There is either an inaccuracy in the source - I suspect the source is confusing the Military Medal for Bravery (which is just the Military Medal and which is already listed) with the Medal of Bravery (Canada)) - or there is something else to the story that isn't covered (i.e. a retrospective awarding). Thanks for your efforts. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 11:28, 1 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]
AustralianRupert: Hmm ... there's a photo of the medals here, and none of the appears to be Medal of Bravery (Canada). For now I've unlinked it. Curly Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 22:54, 1 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]
It lloks like it's a British War Medal, but I can't find a RS that says so—only a couple of blogs. I guess the TorStar got their facts wrong. Curly Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 23:03, 1 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]
G'day, yes definitely the British War Medal, IMO, (with the others being the Victory Medal and Military Medal). Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 23:09, 1 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Okay, I think I've got this worked out. Curly Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 23:37, 1 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Nice work. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 23:57, 1 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]
You both did a great job to rectify this. Bravo! Saskoiler (talk) 01:09, 3 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]
And thank you for the very thorough review—even digging deep into the sources! Curly Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 01:25, 3 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]
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