User:Binoshita/sandbox

Week 1: Practicing the Basics (Notes on Community Development Article)

• • Is each fact referenced with an appropriate, reliable reference   
    • Yes, facts are references with appropriate, reliable references.
  • Is everything in the article relevant to the article topic? Is there anything that distracted you?
    • No, I did find anything distracting and the information was relevant. However, the "See also" section was a little random and not cohesive with the rest of the article. Also, it is interesting how the article breaks down the global north and south. I am curious why this divide and why these particular terms?
  • Is the article neutral? Are there any claims, or frames, that appear heavily biased toward a particular position?
    • Yes, is neutral.
  • Where does the information come from? Are these neutral sources? If biased, is that bias noted?  
    • The information comes from scholarly journals and united nations sources. They appear neutral.
  • Are there viewpoints that are overrepresented, or underrepresented? 
    • Community development in the global south is a bit misrepresented/underrepresented. It is interesting that the global south is combined while the global north is broken down.
  • Check a few citations. Do the links work? Is there any close paraphrasing or plagiarism in the article?
    • The links do seem to work.
  • Is any information out of date? Is anything missing that could be added?
    • Not that I am aware of.
  • Check the "talk" page of the article - what is the Wikipedia community saying about how to present this topic? How is the article rated in terms of Wikipedia's quality scale? 
    • In the talk page there is a discussion of removing "faith-based organizing"

Binoshita (talk) 05:37, 13 April 2017 (UTC)

Week 2: Critique an Article

• New Article: Capacity Building
• Capacity Building Vs. Community Development
  • Is each fact referenced with an appropriate, reliable reference?
    • No, the lede does not contain any citations. Citations are used for almost exclusively definitions.
  • Is everything in the article relevant to the article topic? Is there anything that distracted you?
    • Yes, everything is relevant.
  • Is the article neutral? Are there any claims, or frames, that appear heavily biased toward a particular position?
    • The article is neutral.
  • Where does the information come from? Are these neutral sources? If biased, is that bias noted?
    • The information comes from World organizations like the United Nations and scholarly articles. Sources of scholarly articles include, Stanford University Press and The Centre for Community Empowerment.
  • Are there viewpoints that are overrepresented, or underrepresented?
    • No, viewpoints are equally represented.
  • Check a few citations. Do the links work? Is there any close paraphrasing or plagiarism in the article?
    • The links work. There is some close paraphrasing/copy and pasting of definitions.
  • Is any information out of date? Is anything missing that could be added?
    • Does not seem out of date.
  • Check the "talk" page of the article - what is the Wikipedia community saying about how to present this topic? How is the article rated in terms of Wikipedia's quality scale? 
    • Some people are saying that the article deals with a narrow definition of capacity building.
  • What sections in this article are different than in the Community Development article? What new information or different information is presented in the two? 
    • The article is completely different although community development is referenced as an aspect of capacity building.

Binoshita (talk) 07:01, 19 April 2017 (UTC)

Week 3: Choose Your Topic/ Find Your Sources

Article: The Center for Third World Organizing

The article have chosen does not have a page yet, so I hope to create one. It is a racial justice organization, so I will draw on their official website, their publications, their facebook page, and perhaps some scholarly articles that cite their work. In the article I will cover their mission, history, work they have done/continuously do, and how to contact or get involved. I will try and model the structure of the article after other wikipedia articles that are written about community organizations.

Potential List of Sources

• http://ctwo.org/
• https://www.facebook.com/centerforthirdworldorganizing/
• http://caseygrants.org/grantees/center-for-third-world-organizing/
• Salomon, Larry Raphael. Leading with Race: The Center for Third World Organizing and the Politics of Race in Community Organizing. N.p.: n.p., 2005. Print.
• Prashad, Vijay. Everybody Was Kung Fu Fighting: Afro-Asian Connections and the Myth of Cultural Purity. Boston: Beacon, 2007. Print.
• Sen, Rinku. Stir It up Lessons in Community Organizing and Advocacy. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass, 2003. Print.

Binoshita (talk) 22:32, 23 April 2017 (UTC) ~~~~

Week 4: Draft Your Article

"lead section"

The Center for Third World Organizing

The Center for Third World Organizing (CTWO, pronounced C-2) was initially a training and resource center for community organizers of color engaging in direct action that was founded in 1980 by Gary Delgado and Hulbert James, but has since expanded their programming. Delgado and James were welfare rights community organizers who realized a lack of racial analysis in community organizing networks emerging in the 1970s and sought to address the social, political, and economic conditions faced by people of color. CTWO decisively used the term "third world" to express the belief that all Third World people are connected in the fight for liberation; the term "third world" was popularized by the Third World Liberation Front during the 1960s. Since its founding, CTWO has evolved into a racial justice organization that works with a vast and diverse network of organizations and activists of color. Today, CTWO has three pillars of their organization: the Movement Activist Apprenticeship Program (MAAP), Community Action Trainings, (CAT), and movement building. The Center for Third World Organizing's main office is located in Oakland, CA and they have a secondary office in Brooklyn, NY.

Movement Activist Apprenticeship Program (MAAP)

The Movement Activist Apprenticeship Program (MAAP) was established in 1985 and is CTWO's flagship program. The program is an eight week training course for people of color who are 18 years or older who seek to learn the practices of grassroots organizing. MAAP attracts young activists from across the country and has trained over 450 organizers. Graduates of the program often move on to hold positions of responsibility in community organizations. A list of MAAP alumni is available on the CTWO website.

Community Action Trainings (CAT)

CTWO began offering Community Action Trainings (CAT) in 1995 to train staff of community and nonprofit organizations. It is a vigorous three day program where participants have the opportunity to learn from seasoned organizers and activists. CAT has trained over 4,000 organizers and offer training sessions four times a year at different locations across the United States.

Reflection

While critiquing the articles, I learned about the writing style, form, and structure of a typical wikipedia article.  I decided to critique to critique an article on capacity building because I wanted to learn more about the topic personally and because it’s a relatively obscure topic.  I was surprised by how comprehensive the article was.  When critiquing the article I evaluated how well it compared to a well-developed wikipedia article, Abraham Lincoln.  During the critiquing process, I realized that the quality of writing in Wikipedia is measured by how well you conform to the usual, rather than how unique your writing is.  People expect a certain style, form, and structure when they pull up wikipedia page.  For example, when I am quickly searching for information on Wikipedia, I only read the lede.  If the information I am looking for is not in the lede, I usually move on to a different source of information.  Critiquing articles helped me recognize the usual structure of Wikipedia articles that I had to adopt in my article.

I decided to contribute to the article for the Center for Third World Organizing (CTWO) because it was a community organization that I had never heard of before.  I was surprised that they used the term “third world” because I believed that the conception of third world people that they adopted was no longer employed.  Also, based on a quick Google search, I learned that the organization was very active during the 1980s and 1990s, yet no Wikipedia page existed on the organization.  Hence, I started the Wikipedia from nothing.  I wrote about the founding, the goals, and the current programs.  I decided to concentrate most of writing in the lede section, recognizing that other people may be like me and only read the lede section.  I decided to write about the programs of CTWO because they have been operating since the 1980s and continue today, which I found really impressive.

The peer review process, like the critique process, helped me further recognize the typical wikipedia writing style.  The article that I critiqued was on place identity.  I made recommendations on the Talk page about structural aspects of the article, adding headings and subheadings because I noted that most Wikipedia articles have such structures.  I also made recommendations on tone.  My article was not peer reviewed.

This process has lead to me to believe that Wikipedia holds a lot of power.  When I was writing my article, I felt like I was contributing to a significant body of knowledge.  I felt like it was really important that the legacy of the Center for Third World Organizing be preserved.  I was thinking, maybe when I am really old, this article will still be on Wikipedia (unless someone deletes it or wikipedia becomes irrelevant).  For fun I decided to look at the wikipedia pages of some community organizations or communities that I am involved in and I noticed that they lack information.  When I am done with this course, I am going to sit down and edit the articles of communities that I am a part of or host an edit-a-thon.  I feel like the communities I am involved in are misrepresented on Wikipedia, which is concerning because many people get their information from Wikipedia.  This leads me to believe that in some cases, Wikipedia can cause misunderstanding of communities.  However, after this process I also recognize that it might be difficult to write an article about a community or community organization that conforms to the wikipedia style of writing.