User talk:Michael.c.gallego

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Hello, Michael.c.gallego, and welcome to Wikipedia! My name is Ian and I work with Wiki Education; I help support students who are editing as part of a class assignment.

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If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to contact me on my talk page. Ian (Wiki Ed) (talk) 16:05, 24 January 2022 (UTC)

Sierra Leone Constitution

I'd just like to follow up some more on the response I left you on Pppery's talk page.

The first issue is that you aren't summarising the constitution of Sierra Leone - you're engaging in close paraphrasing. Based on my reading of Section 7 of the Copyright Act of 2011, the official text of the constitution isn't subject to copyright, but it's still plagiarism to present close paraphrasing as a summary. Beyond that, you're only citing "https://www.constituteproject.org/?lang=en", so an entire domain, rather than the specific copy of the constitution of Sierra Leone hosted by that website, which is "https://www.constituteproject.org/constitution/Sierra_Leone_2013?lang=en".

The second consideration is that a summary based on a primary source can't provide interpretation or meaning. You can't go beyond the actual wording of the text to add an explanation of what some phrasing or terminology means without engaging in "original research". The real value to readers comes from reporting what scholarly sources say about the meaning of these sections of the constitution. Every constitution, and almost every section of a constitution, draws substantial coverage from legal scholars. Judges interpret constitutional provisions. Scholars comment on these interpretations. Neither the plain text of a constitution, nor a paraphrase thereof, is all that important to most people. But translating those scholarly interpretations into plain English, and providing access to work that's hidden behind paywalls, is a major help to readers.

Whatever you do, please start by undoing your revert. When you did that, you engaged in edit-warring, which is a bad thing. Please try to work with other editors like Pppery - we're all here with the same goal, and their wealth of experience is something you should try to tap into, not fight with. Ian (Wiki Ed) (talk) 16:25, 9 May 2022 (UTC)

Hi Ian,

I just deleted my comment on Pppery's page. I realized it was a little passive aggressive and I'm probably in the wrong. I'm going to try and fix my page, but I'm unsure how. There is a dearth of contemporary legal scholarship on the Sierra Leone Constitution that I am able to access through the databases and sources that I have as a Vanderbilt student. I'm remiss to delete something that I worked hard on and I believe has intrinsic value, but I understand that it most likely counts as original research which goes against Wikipedia's policies. Perhaps there is a way to keep up my work but have it flagged as original research or improperly cited... let me know what you think.

I tried to use the United States Constitution Wiki article as a model to base my article off of—if you look the original frame section you will notice that summarizations are not always cited because the text can sometimes be understood plainly (e.g., the requirements to serve as a member of Congress). Indeed, in Constitution of Sierra Leone I attempted to do the same. There is intrinsic value in having an article that helps people in Sierra Leone understand what their rights and liberties are, the limits of governmental power, and how their government functions per the text of their constitution. This is especially true given the violent and occasionally repressive history of Sierra Leone's government in the last 50 years. While people in Sierra Leone can (if they have internet access) wade through the 80+ pages of jargon-laden text to discover their rights, liberties, and structure of their government, this Wikipedia article attempts to offer a more condensed version of it and a background of the constitutional evolution of that country.

The decision to use a primary source in this case is self-evident. A Wikipedia article about the Sierra Leone Constitution mostly concerns that document (i.e., that primary source). I did not offer any interpretation in the article, but rather a recital of the facts it offers: "A primary source may be used on Wikipedia only to make straightforward, descriptive statements of facts that can be verified by any educated person with access to the primary source but without further, specialized knowledge." Most of the time there was no other way to engage with the text of that document without trying to stay as true as possible to the plain text: "Close paraphrasing is also permitted when there are only a limited number of ways to say the same thing. This may be the case when there is no reasonable way to avoid using technical terms, and may also be the case with simple statements of fact."

In the late 1930s H.G. Wells offered the idea of a world encyclopedia. He said "Its uses will be multiple and many of them will be fairly obvious. Special sections of it, historical, technical, scientific, artistic, e.g. will easily be reproduced for specific professional use. Based upon it, a series of summaries of greater or less fullness and simplicity, for the homes and studies of ordinary people, for the college and the school, can be continually issued and revised. In the hands of competent editors, educational directors and teachers, these condensations and abstracts incorporated in the world educational system, will supply the humanity of the days before us, with a common understanding and the conception of a common purpose and of a commonweal such as now we hardly dare dream of" [emphasis added]. I believe Wikipedia is the descendent of that noble idea.

Moreover, I would like to keep my article up there until my instructors have had a chance to grade it. I do not doubt Pppery's or your expertise on the rules of Wikipedia, but I do question whether no contribution at all on Sierra Leone's Constitution is a better thing than the one I have proffered. I love Wikipedia, use it on a daily basis, and because of that want to contribute to it. These are my thoughts on the topic. Michael.c.gallego (talk) 19:06, 9 May 2022 (UTC)

We're not here to right great wrongs, so the fact that there is a dearth of contemporary legal scholarship on the Sierra Leone Constitution is irrelevant. This is not an appropriate time to use a "other stuff exists" argument (for example, there are over a hundred thousand articles with no sources at all, that doesn't make adding new unsourced content appropriate). And I disagree that it is at all self-evident to use a primary source to add tens of thousands of bytes of primary-sourced content given the requirement to be cautious about basing large passages on [primary sources]. And there are surely not a limited number of ways of explaning the structure of the Sierra Leone ‎constitution to the degree that close paraphrasing is necessary.

Finally, Moreover, I would like to keep my article up there until my instructors have had a chance to grade it is nonsense; the content you added will still be available in your sandbox where you originally added it as well as in the page history even if I were to re-revert you and I believe Wiki Ed instructors are supposed to grade based on that not what happens after the content is moved to mainspace (although Ian can correct me if I'm wrong). * Pppery * _{it has begun...} 18:06, 10 May 2022 (UTC)

@Pppery Yes, that's right - they're supposed to grade based on what's in the sandbox. Ian (Wiki Ed) (talk) 20:01, 10 May 2022 (UTC)

@Michael.c.gallego I understand your desire to improve the information that's available. But to be honest, the difference between wading through the entire constitution and wading through your summary is small. One of the important things you need to keep in mind is that in order to reach people, you need to make your work accessible. Most people in the developing world rely on mobile devices - so picture someone scrolling through the text on a phone screen. As far as close paraphrasing goes, what they're talking about is something like "she ate eggs, bread, and cheese for lunch" can be reproduced as is, or nearly as is, without having to resort to something convoluted construct to avoid the problem. This is not what you're doing here - it's extremely easy to cover this without engaging in close paraphrasing.

If you want people to read, you need to front-load what you're writing. People read the first few sentences, then maybe the first few sentences of a section of interest further down the page. You need to make your writing much more accessible (and that will also bring into more into line with Wikipedia's style). What's more, long sections like what you've added are likely to get deleted over time, because someone finds it too long and too difficult to parse.

For example, Chapter 1:

Proclaims Sierra Leone as a sovereign republic with discrete boundaries (see First Schedule), creates a national flag, and vests Parliament to prescribe the creation of a public seal and national anthem.

None of the terms here are explained. You also don't link to other Wikipedia articles that could help readers understand unfamiliar terms. You say "(see First Schedule)" but you don't provide a link to that section of the page (and scrolling on a mobile device to find that is going to be very difficult). What's worse is if they do scroll all the way down, they'll simply see Delineates the borders of Sierra Leone. I don't know about you, but if someone sends me scrolling down a page like that and gives me no new information, I'm likely to get annoyed and quit reading.

Chapter 2 has even more problems

The Constitution sets out these not justiciable principles of state policy, meaning that these principles do not confer legal rights and are not enforceable in a court of law, but nonetheless guide how laws are made.

Using phrasing like justiciable principles of state policy does far more to obscure meaning than it helps with understanding. If you do use them (which I would advise against) they should come after an explanation in clear English. Krio is the de facto national language, and many people who speak English do so as a second or third language. Straightforward language might help accessibility - language that's barely accessible to someone who isn't familiar with legal jargon is less than ideal.

That HG Wells quote is a great example of how not to write for Wikipedia.

• Its uses will be multiple and many of them will be fairly obvious. Pure filler. There's almost no information in there.
• Special sections of it, historical, technical, scientific, artistic, e.g. will easily be reproduced for specific professional use.
• Based upon it, a series of summaries of greater or less fullness and simplicity, for the homes and studies of ordinary people, for the college and the school, can be continually issued and revised.
• In the hands of competent editors, educational directors and teachers, these condensations and abstracts incorporated in the world educational system, will supply the humanity of the days before us, with a common understanding and the conception of a common purpose and of a commonweal such as now we hardly dare dream of (The ideas here could be expressed more clearly, and in fewer words.)

As far as the US constitution goes - that doesn't seem like a very good document to go on. For starters, large swaths of the article are unsourced, and while it's possible that the linked daughter articles have the required sources, it's also possible that it's just a bad article.

Finally: There is a dearth of contemporary legal scholarship on the Sierra Leone Constitution that I am able to access through the databases and sources that I have as a Vanderbilt student. I don't believe this is true. Vanderbilt has an excellent library, and this page shows links to HeinOnline, LexisNexis and Westlaw. Ian (Wiki Ed) (talk) 21:46, 10 May 2022 (UTC)