Talk:Albania–Turkey relations/GA2

GA Review

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Reviewer: Mike Christie (talk · contribs) 17:42, 25 February 2018 (UTC)

I'll review this. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 17:42, 25 February 2018 (UTC)

I'll copyedit as I go; please revert if I make any mistakes.

• Why have the Albanian and Turkish translation of the title in the first sentence? This isn't something we'd do for most articles.
• What's the reason for the italics in the first paragraph of the lead? I see some italics in the body, too, e.g. for Young Turk and Black Sea Economic Cooperation; why?
• A couple of points that are not an issue for GA, but you may want to fix:
  • These are dead links: [1], [2], [3], [4].
  • Some of your harvard references are broken; Gingeras2009, KutSirin, AgirArman, Doja2006, Young 1999, BlumiKrasniqi, EspositoYavuz, and Boskovic2016 in the footnotes don't link to their source.
    • I've taken the liberty to fix the obvious ones. Gingeras 2009, Doja 2006, and Young 1999 still missing. – Finnusertop (talk ⋅ contribs) 20:30, 25 February 2018 (UTC)

@Finnusertop:, i fixed Gingeras, Doja, Young with footnotes now linked to source. I checked the others one by one and the others cited: Kut & Sirin, Agir & Arman, Blumi & Krasniqi, Esposito & Yavuz, Boskovic & Reljic & Vracic, with their footnotes linking to their source. Most of these are chapters in edited books. Weblinks for website sources, i'll need a day or two to find those. With Turk and Albanian names, they can go from the paragraph. Italics were used for names of organisations/institutions, as some Wikipedia articles do this and so does some academic literature -can remove it though. Best.Resnjari (talk) 14:10, 26 February 2018 (UTC)

• The coat of arms and flag seem unnecessary in the table; the flags are already in the infobox, and the coat of arms doesn't tell the reader anything about the topic of the article.
• What makes todayszaman.com a reliable source?
• and later sociopolitical circumstances of discrimination and violence experienced by Albanians in Balkan countries: I can't tell how this relates to the first half of the sentence. Does it refer to a later phase of the diaspora?
• During the 1920s Albania adopted an approach to strengthen relations with neighboring states and other international powers to conserve Albanian independence and territorial integrity: vague, which means in turn that the first half of the next sentence, The pursuit of developing and furthering interstate relations with the Turkish state was within that context, doesn't really mean anything.
• Tirana was also concerned about the forced removal of Muslim Albanians during the population exchange with Greece who had arrived to Turkey and were living in difficult economic circumstances to be permitted migration to Albania if they so wished: Too compressed;' I can't tell what's going on from this.
• Granted that right for Albanians from Chameria, the arrangement also covered Albanians arriving in Turkey from Yugoslavia to migrate to Albania: suggest "The right to migrate to Albania was granted for Albanians from Chameria, and for Albanians arriving in Turkey from Yugoslavia", assuming that's the intended meaning.
• You refer to Albanian nationals in Turkey, but Turkey doesn't appear to have regarded them as Albanian nationals.
• I see almost nothing in this section about Turkey's interests and diplomatic goals; everything is phrased from the Albanian point of view.

I'm going to stop here; these two paragraphs are too compressed, and don't give enough background to make the information comprehensible to a reader who's not already familiar with the topic. Rather than quick fail, though, I will place the nomination on hold and wait to see if the problems here can be addressed in a reasonable time. The article could use a copyedit by someone who knows the correct use of commas, but a copyedit isn't going to solve the main problem, which is that the information is not well presented, and appears to be one-sided. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 19:58, 25 February 2018 (UTC)

@Mike Christie: with coat of arms, flag etc that table format was taken from the United Kingdom–United States relations prior to some changes having been made there. Over there they made the table collapse [5] maybe something for here. The flag and coat of arms were made smaller as well. I'm ok with deletion of them and even a collapse of the table. On information presentation, its very hard to find sources about Albanian-Turkish relations that delve into the topic just from that angle. In Albanian and Turkish language scholarly sources that have been written on the topic, they focus on the early interwar period. I searched and searched and this is what came up, and sentences are based on what the content contained. This relationship for the most part has been pursued by Albania and only in the 1990s and more so in the 2000s onward has Turkey given it that kind of attention. If the article comes of one sided, its just how the sources themselves have presented it, even the Turkish (whether written by Turkish scholars in English or Turkish). I have academic journal articles and can send them to editors for further consultation if they so wish. The article used from Today's Zaman was from a time when it was independent and prior to Erdogan's takeover of the news organisation in 2016 which also resulted in the deletion of their past hardrive. I am going to have to find a copy of the article via other sources on the web, may take a day or two. I'll go through each sentence highlighted so far and do fixes as recommendations come through here. I appreciate the advice and many thanks for taking the time to do this. Best.Resnjari (talk) 14:10, 26 February 2018 (UTC)

Let me know when you're ready for me to take another look. Note that the Today's Zaman article doesn't have to be replaced; dead links are not required to be fixed for GA, though of course you may wish to do so. With regard to sources, if you can't find anything about the Turkish half of the relations, I am not sure the article can make GA -- "broad coverage" is required. I believe you when you say that you have searched diligently, but it's quite hard to believe that nothing reliable has ever been written on the topic. Somewhere in Turkish or Albanian print sources there is certain to be something, wouldn't you think? Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 11:10, 27 February 2018 (UTC)

@Mike Christie:, from the aspect of newspapers or digital news sources, i only used what is available now. I don't have access to that content pre 2000s though i wish i did have that. Most that has been printed is about so and so minister visiting each country etc or Turkey and its private enterprises investing in a project in Albania, enhancing cultural ties via a cultural or religious organisation etc. Its mostly one way of Turkey's involvement in Albania and not of Albania in Turkey. The relations are lopsided as Turkey is bigger. In academia, Albanian and Turk academics have mainly focused on the interwar period and the post communist 1992 era. I stand to be corrected by any editor out there on this. I used both Albanian and Turkish search terms (|Marrëdhëniet mes Shqipërisë dhe Turqisë, Marrëdhëniet shqiptaro-turke, Türkiye ilişkileri) as well to find those scholarly works and went through their bibliographies that was a secondary source to find other scholarly sources on this topic. The fruits of that labour are in the article, as best as was possible. Most, separate to those works only deal with bits and pieces on this relationship in larger studies of Turkey's modern era role in the Balkans. That is reflected heavily in the article bibliography. With daily Zaman (BBC etc articles [6], [7] on pre and post 2016 state of news organisation). I found one of the Zaman articles, where the author has published elsewhere but noted it was on Zaman first [8], and a copy of the other article has been uploaded here [9] - to see its contents and check the sentences based on those. I don't know if this article might pass a GA, but i think its well worth a shot to fix it up and to know what is left to be done. I will diligently apply all recommendations with the hope to bring this article to a standard that could be a GA, fingers crossed. Best.Resnjari (talk) 14:36, 1 March 2018 (UTC)

I have some time now in the next few hours to finish off the first batch of recommendations. Best.Resnjari (talk) 14:36, 1 March 2018 (UTC)

@Mike Christie:, i tweaked and fixed other sentences clarifying them, as per contents of acedmic sources. Have a look, hope its in line with what you had in mind. Ready for the next lot of fixups. Best.Resnjari (talk) 19:28, 1 March 2018 (UTC)

• Comment It is hard to find sources for that issue because the political, ideological and social factors have only lately allowed scholarship to start to reflect and produce good works on it, however I gave Resnjari a very good and detailed source on the Albania-Turkey relations (mostly 1912-1939) [10] and they can use it to make the requested improvements to the article. Ktrimi991 (talk) 18:35, 1 March 2018 (UTC)

I want to knock out content based issues before i add more with the sources you cited. Best.Resnjari (talk) 19:28, 1 March 2018 (UTC)

@Ktrimi:, its a PHD thesis, i'll read it tomorrow as its long. Looks promising for addressing issues pointed out about having more of the Turkish diplomatic viewpoint during the interwar period. Thank you. Best.Resnjari (talk) 19:33, 1 March 2018 (UTC)

Resnjari, Ktrimi, I'm delighted to see that another signficant source has been found. I think that's going to be a big benefit to the article, but I don't think it's the sort of thing that should be done during a GA review. I know the delay is long at the moment, but I think the best thing to do would be to fail the article, improve it (and I'll be happy to continue giving feedback on the talk page) and then renominate it. If I'm available when it's renominated I will try to pick it up early, so you don't have to wait another nine months. What do you think? Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 19:55, 1 March 2018 (UTC)

Per the above, I am failing this GA nomination on criterion 3a: it does not fully address the main aspects of its topic. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 03:52, 5 March 2018 (UTC)