Talk:John Henry Thomas

Contested deletion

This article should not be speedy deleted as lacking sufficient context to identify its subject, because... (your reason here) --Sandra paech (talk) 08:19, 15 February 2016 (UTC)

I have only started it and intend to do a lot more with the entry over time because I am an older person who requires time.

He was the composer of cornish christmas carols in Australia after his arrival in 1885 and is remembered as a gifted composer and conductor in the so called Little Cornwall of Australia, i.e. The Cornish triangle of Moonta, Kadina and Wallaroo. His carols are sung every year at or near Christmas time chiefly in Carols by Candlelight in South Australian towns. I have reliable sources as references.

Thankyou for your consideration.

Sandra Paech

Sounds good. Why not write that in the article then? NeemNarduni2 (talk) 08:58, 15 February 2016 (UTC)

Suggestions

Hi! I've made some of the citations in-line cites. When citing material on Wikipedia, you need to have the citation on the end of the sentence (ideally) or the claim. The site doesn't do cites like you would see in written, print papers like "(8)" - it has to be akin to what I've done in the article.

The article also needs editing for tone and grammar, as there are a few dropped commas and periods in the article. I also note that at one point you mention someone by their last name only. When mentioning someone in an article, you need to give the person's full name and if they have an article, link to that. However you should only really name someone if you're going to be quoting them, as otherwise you only have to write out the claim and put their citation at the sentence's end. Now if this is a claim or opinion held only by one or two people, then mentioning a name would be good. However if it's a known publication then you only have to write out the sentence thusly:

"In 1897 Thomas edited and published The Christmas Welcome, a collection of Cornish carols, in Germany through c.G. Roder, Leipzig. The collection contained a selection of Cornish carols for which he was the major composer, several of which were also his own compositions."

This gets the same point across, but in fewer words. Brevity is something to keep in mind when editing. While of course you don't want to make it 10 sentences long, if you can write the same information in fewer words, the better. Also, make sure that you're careful about tone. I get the impression that you're likely a student (if so, we do have a program set up for students and their teachers) and something to keep in mind is that encyclopedia articles is a bit different than a student or academic paper. Tokyogirl79 (｡◕‿◕｡) 04:04, 16 February 2016 (UTC)

• Another note - if he's mentioned in publications after the fact you don't entirely need to list each and every name drop unless they're making a very particular statement and even then it's more dependent upon who is saying it. For example, if Neale stated something like "Thomas is the greatest composer of Cornish Christmas carols in Australia", then that may merit a mention - however since she's a PhD candidate and not someone with a PhD at this point in time, she may not have enough standing to where her opinion would hold a huge enough amount of weight to warrant a sentence that lists her by name - although we could likely have the opinion in the article somewhere. Now if he was just listed as an example of someone from a geographic area, then there's really no reason for a sentence that just says that he was listed in a newspaper article. That's considered to fall under the concept of WP:UNDUE weight, since getting an offhand mention in a news article is considered to be relatively WP:TRIVIAL on Wikipedia and in an encyclopedia article. That's another way that an encyclopedia article differs from an academic paper, as you can work something like that into a paper without it seeming out of place or giving it undue weight. However brief mentions in publications is considered to be routine as far as encyclopedias go and aren't really worth mentioning here, unless the mention is an opinion by an authoritative source or is part of a notable accolade (ie, like Time Magazine's "Best of 2016" lists). I'll do some editing for tone and flow. Tokyogirl79 (｡◕‿◕｡) 05:49, 16 February 2016 (UTC)
• Oh! One last thing - when making claims, the claim needs to be explicitly stated in the source material. For example, the claim that Thomas's songs are sung every year isn't really backed up by this source. What's also problematic is that the source isn't considered to be reliable per Wikipedia's guidelines, since it's a forum post. Forum postings are considered to be self-published sources and undergo little to no editorial oversight. Sometimes, rarely, self-published sources can be considered reliable, but this would require that the source be routinely seen and cited as a reliable source in other reliable sources. Also, be careful of WP:PRIMARY sources, which would be anything written by Thomas, his family/descendants, or anyone affiliated with him. For example, his obituary would be seen as a primary source since those are almost always written by a friend or family member. It doesn't appear to have been written as a newspaper article since it's in the obituary section and listed along with other deaths, so it cannot show notability. It can back up basic, primary details, but none of the assertions or claims in the obit will be able to establish notability - although if it does assert notability then we can do a search to find out if the claims were legit. I'll do a little cleaning for flow.

Now something else I noticed - one of the posters had a similar last name as yours and said that Thomas was their ancestor. If you're a descendant of his, then you will need to read over the conflict of interest guidelines. The main takeaway from all of that is that you will just need to be very careful about sourcing and tone, which is something you'd need to be careful about anyway. Tokyogirl79 (｡◕‿◕｡) 05:59, 16 February 2016 (UTC)

• I'm going to remove some things, such as the name dropping of his picture appearing on one publication or another. As said above, this can be seen as undue weight in the article (as it's considered to be unimportant in the grand scheme of things in encyclopedia articles) and it's not always guaranteed to be something that would establish notability. For example, the book Coronets on the Copper Field looks to have been written by someone affiliated with the Kadina Wallaroo Moonta Band. This means that it would be either primary (meaning that he was a member of the band at some point in the past) or it'd be a local source, which is greatly depreciated on Wikipedia when it comes to notability. Sorry if this is a lot of information all at once. I just wanted to explain why I was removing things. Tokyogirl79 (｡◕‿◕｡) 06:27, 16 February 2016 (UTC)
• I'm also removing the mention of this news story. The book is only in the picture, so it would be a trivial source at best. To show notability the book would have to be mentioned in quite some length. Tokyogirl79 (｡◕‿◕｡) 06:35, 16 February 2016 (UTC)