Talk:The Thing Around Your Neck/GA1

GA review

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

---

Article (edit | visual edit | history) · Article talk (edit | history) · Watch

Nominator: SafariScribe (talk · contribs) 08:37, 6 October 2025 (UTC)

Reviewer: LEvalyn (talk · contribs) 04:32, 19 October 2025 (UTC)

I will take on this review! I typically prefer to make smallish prose edits myself and only place comments here when I have questions, though of course as always you should feel free to change or discuss any edits you happen to disagree with. Looking forward to it! ~ L 🌸 (talk) 04:32, 19 October 2025 (UTC)

Good Article review progress box

Criteria: 1a. prose () 1b. MoS () 2a. ref layout () 2b. cites WP:RS () 2c. no WP:OR () 2d. no WP:CV () 3a. broadness () 3b. focus () 4. neutral () 5. stable () 6a. free or tagged images () 6b. pics relevant () Note: this represents where the article stands relative to the Good Article criteria. Criteria marked are unassessed

Comments

Notes

• Appropriate NFUR for the cover, good license for the other image. It might be nice to add an image of the author (and move the book display image down to reception?) since I believe some exist. ~ L 🌸 (talk) 05:07, 19 October 2025 (UTC)

Suggestions / questions

• Can you add a clarifying wikilink for the "Hodder" part of her Hodder and MacArthur fellowships? I'm not sure what it refers to. ~ L 🌸 (talk) 05:07, 19 October 2025 (UTC)
• The "Background and publication history" is a bit confusing and disjointed -- could you make a pass through it to cluster all the background/composition together in one paragraph, and all the actual-publication in another? ~ L 🌸 (talk) 05:07, 19 October 2025 (UTC)
• It would also be good to name some of the magazines that the stories were originally published in, if possible. ~ L 🌸 (talk) 05:07, 19 October 2025 (UTC)
• I can't work out what this means: In "The Arrangers of Marriage", a newly married woman arrives in New York City with her husband but is unwilling to accept his husband rejecting being a Nigerian -- who is "his husband"? ~ L 🌸 (talk) 05:07, 19 October 2025 (UTC)
• Hm, I'm noticing several places where the article is much, much too close in wording to the source:
  • uses diverse narrative techniques to tell her stories which includes infusion of the first person and omniscient devices is much, much too close to the source's deploys diverse narrative techniques, including an infusion of the first person and omniscient devices
  • Ditto Jane Shilling wrote that family and exile are recurrent themes in the book since the characters are often far from home or alienated from the comforting familiarity of place and culture by either violence or fear or the hope of a better life. and Family and exile are recurrent themes in this collection: by compulsion or choice Adichie’s subjects are often far from home; alienated from the comforting familiarity of place and culture by violence, fear or the hope of a better life.
  • Chukwuma Ajakah of Vanguard wrote that the stories are thematically connected as most of them explore socio-cultural and economic issues relating to Africans living in either Nigeria or the United States. Although the stories differ, they are thematically connected as most of them explore socio-cultural and economic issues relating to Africans living in either Nigeria or the United States.
  • Earwig is picking up a lot of other similar bits of copying.

I also notice that there's a wonderful amount of research in this article but the "reception" section makes for challenging reading because it just goes from source to source rather than clustering together thematically similar sets of observation (e.g, putting all the comments on the characters in one paragraph, all the comments on presenting Nigeria to an American audience in another, etc). WP:Copyediting reception sections has some good advice on this topic.

I think a serious rewrite of the interpretive material (style/themes and reception) is necessary to address what appears to be persistent WP:CLOP-verging-on-copyvio, and to improve clarity. Is that something you'd want to tackle? If so, I can put the GA review on hold while you do. If not, I wouldn't mind failing the GA for now and rolling up my own sleeves for a rewrite, and we could co-nominate in future. Just let me know. ~ L 🌸 (talk) 05:07, 19 October 2025 (UTC)

On reflection, I guess a faster solution would be to just put all these borrowed words into quote marks so they're properly attributed. But I think that will leave us with an article that is much too quotation-heavy and it would be better served by focusing more on summarizing the sources. ~ L 🌸 (talk) 05:10, 19 October 2025 (UTC)

@LEvalyn, thank you for taking this up. I fully support your comments above and I look forward to co-nominating with you in the nearest future. It's part of learning and for me, there's always room for improvement. Cheers! Safari Scribe^{Edits! Talk!} 09:42, 21 October 2025 (UTC)

I'm glad you are open to an in-depth collaboration. I will fail this nomination now and start in on a rewriting pass for the interpretive sections. You've built a great foundation of research for it! ~ L 🌸 (talk) 00:27, 27 October 2025 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.