Talk:Women in the Ottoman Empire/GA1

GA Review

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Reviewer: A. Parrot (talk · contribs) 00:34, 12 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

GA review – see WP:WIAGA for criteria

Is it well written?
A. The prose is clear and concise, and the spelling and grammar are correct:
The article's main fault seems to be problems of clarity. Several non-English terms, such as sharia and qanun, are not adequately defined; these terms are significant enough to the article that they should be defined in the text on their first appearance rather than requiring readers to link away from the article. In the case of hisse, there isn't even a link. There are also several unclear passages in the section on inheritance, including the numbered list at the start—it sounds like it's saying that the will of the deceased only governed up to a third of the estate and the rest was governed by debts, funeral expenses, and dispersals mandated by Islamic law, but I'm not entirely sure. The caption of the image for that section is similarly awkward. More trivially, there's quite a bit of excess capitalization, mostly involving the word "harem". The Imperial Harem might be a single formal institution requiring capitalization, but harems in general are not (for comparison, think of the capitalization of "the Supreme Court" versus "a court of law"). "Sharia" is also inconsistently capitalized; I don't know whether it should be uppercase or lowercase, but the article should use one or the other consistently, and the capitalization of qanun should probably match it. (I'd be inclined toward lowercase.)
First of all, thank you for the quick review, and I have started working on fixing the problems you have pointed out. I have a few things to explain concerning my changes however: For example, the word hisse has no direct translation. It certainly can just mean share, but it is, in this context, a 'right to produce' document. On the women and inheritance section, I have deleted the first two paragraphs, I believe you pointed out the tangential nature of a comparison between pre- and post-Islamic inheritance rules to the topic at hand. I also de-capitalized many instances of the word harem, although not the ones specifically referring to the Imperial one. Also de-capitalized both sharia and qanun. Uness232 (talk) 20:50, 12 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]
That's helpful, but I still think there are clarity problems. I don't understand how the qanun and sharia systems fit together, or which of them governed which aspects of women's roles. The passage about inheritance, and the discrepancy between what the records indicate and what women actually received, feels like it could be stated more simply and clearly. "This was largely because in the secular qanun law, there was 'direct succession', only from a deceased male land possessor to his male sons" similarly sounds strange, and it doesn't make clear whether qanun law limited women's ability to inherit in all cases, or simply in the case of agricultural land. A. Parrot (talk) 00:45, 19 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Alright, I'll be fixing those in the next 24 hours, I'll answer the questions here to aid your judgement on whether I'm able to communicate what the sources state.

"how the qanun and sharia systems fit together, or which of them governed which aspects of women's roles."

This is incredibly hard to explain unfortunately, as during the empire's history, the two systems had vastly different relationships with each other depending on the era, however I will try my best to explain it here. The qanun was the semi-secular law of the empire that applied to every citizen, regardless of millet. It was not directly based on a holy book, but was expected to be compatible to and support the Hanafi interpretation of Islam, and no such requirement was placed on its compatibility with other faiths. Therefore, it included an Islam-influenced penal and financial law that applied to all of its citizens, and could supplant sharia and other religious texts in these (and sometimes other) matters in some respects. The agricultural land inheritance issue was simply one of those instances.

The sharia system was/is built by Islamic scholars and enforced by Islamic jurists, and was the most dominant of the multiple religious laws that were enforced in the empire. It mainly applied, in its pure form (without the qanun interfering) to personal law, but as the qanun was already somewhat based on sharia, you could argue that the sharia had a very large impact on every part of Ottoman law. Important to note is the fact that sharia did not apply to people of other religions, their communities could form and enforce personal (and to some extent financial and penal) law, except in cross-faith personal law cases where a Muslim was also involved.

Again I'll try my absolute best to explain this in the article during the next 24 hours but it is difficult.

"The passage about inheritance, and the discrepancy between what the records indicate and what women actually received, feels like it could be stated more simply and clearly."

Might actually be better to quote the study on that one, I believe the explanation there was quite good.

"it doesn't make clear whether qanun law limited women's ability to inherit in all cases, or simply in the case of agricultural land."

This was a result of the systems (Timar, later on Chiftlik, etc.) in place specifically for agricultural land, which the qanun did have coverage over. However if a certain kind of inheritence was not mentioned in the qanun (i.e. almost all others) the appropriate religious law would be inforced.

I hope that helps, I'll try incorporating these into the article as quickly as I can. Uness232 (talk) 01:32, 19 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I've explained these to the best of my ability at this point. If there are further changes you would like to request, I'll be happy to listen. Uness232 (talk) 22:11, 19 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]
@Uness232: I think it mostly works now, but I think the passage about inheritance of agricultural land should clarify that farmers were (as tapu resmi puts it) "farmers were proprietors rather than outright owners", which is why when a farmer passed land down to his heirs there was still a landowner who needed to be paid. A. Parrot (talk) 17:00, 25 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Fixed this to the best of my ability. Uness232 (talk) 00:08, 29 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

B. It complies with the manual of style guidelines for lead sections, layout, words to watch, fiction, and list incorporation:
On a second look, I realize there are some problems. While the lead sentence doesn't have to mention the title verbatim (see Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Lead section#Opening paragraph), it should include something like the title. The current version doesn't mention women until halfway through the second sentence.
Alright, I've tried my best to change up the opening paragraph according to your request. Less of a fan of it now, but if it's required than I don't have much to say. Uness232 (talk) 01:42, 19 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Is it verifiable with no original research?
A. It contains a list of all references (sources of information), presented in accordance with the layout style guideline:
The sourcing generally looks good. The most serious hitch is the citation to "Winik, supra", when there isn't a Winik source listed anywhere else in the article.
Done by removing the source, as I believe the other source also corroborates the claim. Uness232 (talk) 01:27, 13 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

B. All in-line citations are from reliable sources, including those for direct quotations, statistics, published opinion, counter-intuitive or controversial statements that are challenged or likely to be challenged, and contentious material relating to living persons—science-based articles should follow the scientific citation guidelines:

C. It contains no original research:

D. It contains no copyright violations nor plagiarism:
Is it broad in its coverage?
A. It addresses the main aspects of the topic:
For the most part, coverage seems well rounded, but I think the varied meanings of "harem" also need to be clarified. Even if most of the information we have relates to the imperial harem, other varieties of harem need to at least be mentioned.
I have tried to clarify what a harem would be for an upper-class Muslim woman, but it is kind of impossible to cover every description of Harem as many of them are symbolic. Uness232 (talk) 01:27, 13 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

B. It stays focused on the topic without going into unnecessary detail (see summary style):
In a couple of places the article seems to go a little off topic. An example is the references to pre-Quranic inheritance customs—how are they relevant to an empire that was founded centuries after the Quran was written? Another is the bit about the physical appearances of Circassian and Syrian girls. I assume it's mentioned because they were prized for these features, but that needs to be stated explicitly so it's clear how their appearance is relevant. And while it makes sense to bring up eunuchs in the section on slavery because eunuchs guarded concubines, the details of eunuchs' enslavement are tangential because eunuchs are not women—unless Ottoman gender norms classified eunuchs as women (I didn't think this was the case, but I don't know).
I have removed both the descriptions of slave girls (I do not know of a source that explicitly claims what you have suggested, and I'm not a fan of the article that the information is taken from, so I'm reluctant to source it from there.) and the treatment of kizlar aghas and other eunuchs (Ottoman gender roles are complicated, and while it could be argued that as eunuchs are non-men according to Ottoman harem tradition, eunuchs do deserve coverage in this article, however, most scholars would not consider eunuchs women, even under the complicated and often fluid gender norms of the Ottomans.) Uness232 (talk) 01:27, 13 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Is it neutral?
It represents viewpoints fairly and without editorial bias, giving due weight to each:
Is it stable?
It does not change significantly from day to day because of an ongoing edit war or content dispute:
Is it illustrated, if possible, by images?
A. Images are tagged with their copyright status, and valid fair use rationales are provided for non-free content:

B. Images are relevant to the topic, and have suitable captions:
Overall:
Pass or Fail:
Pass. A. Parrot (talk) 04:52, 29 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]